Long duration experiment and timing question

[rafaelc...@gmail.com]

Hello everyone,

I plan to run an experiment that should keep going for around 3 months. The idea is that people can click on their link at different points in time to make a decision. There will be different periods in which the decision parameters change. Each period should last about 24 hours on the server side, so that if people forget to log in for a day, they should see new information when they log in, i.e., the time should keep running even if people close the page.

I have three questions:

1. Do you know if it is possible to run an experiment for that long time. I fear that the app may crash during the three months.
 

2. Related to the previous question, I mat have to take care of the database so the app does not crash. Can otree handle database migrations so that I don't have to reset the database if I have to fix a bug or add a new field? I know that Django has tools to do this, although I have never used them myself. Are these tools applicable to otree?

3. It is possible to handle time on the server-side and not on the client-side, right? If I understand correctly, otree's starts counting only when participants arrive on the page. It does not run simultaneously for all the participants whether they are or not on the page, or does it?


Sorry for how the questions are so vague, but I need to know if otree is the right tool for this task or if I should move on to a different one.


I appreciate any help you can provide.