The Custom seriation technique can be set in the Seriations table. Custom seriation is an option to mix and match various settings used in determining seriation techniques. For example, you may want to treat one feature as an Occurrence seriation and another as Shortest Path seriation. Occurrence seriation uses Hamming distance and Ranked data while optimal path uses Euclidean distance and Measured data. Using Custom seriation you have a choice in setting other seriation parameters as well - see Setting the Earlier, Later, Blanks and Zeroes Parameters.
If it is all a bit overwhelming, choose one of the standard techniques: Shortest Path (recommended), Occurrence, Frequency, Nominal and Discrete. Parameter settings are automatically set to default values for each of the standard techniques. To change parameter settings, you must first select the Custom Technique in the Seriations table. All techniques are special cases of the optimal path model and all use the same algorithms to create a seriation. However, setting the parameters differently (or choosing a different technique) can greatly change the final seriation.
In Custom seriation, careful thought should be put into setting the feature parameters appropriately - see Setting the Earlier, Later, Blanks, Zeroes and Transition Parameters.