Forum archive 2000-2006

Bill Ziemer - Gateway Test ghost

Bill Ziemer - Gateway Test ghost

by Arnold Pizer -
Number of replies: 0
inactiveTopicGateway Test ghost topic started 11/16/2006; 1:04:14 AM
last post 11/17/2006; 8:33:29 AM
userBill Ziemer - Gateway Test ghost  blueArrow
11/16/2006; 1:04:14 AM (reads: 140, responses: 3)
There is a course that I am hosting where the instructor made a gateway test, decided it should be a homework and changed it. So far so good. The problem is that the "Homework Sets" page still shows the gateway test, with no status entry. It throws an error when clicked (not a gateway test), and I can't find where to remove it. It doesn't appear anywhere I can see except for the "Homework Sets" page. Any ideas?

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userGavin LaRose - Re: Gateway Test ghost  blueArrow
11/16/2006; 8:25:49 AM (reads: 170, responses: 1)
Hi Bill,

Let me make sure I understand what happened: the instructor created an assignment, then decided to make it into a gateway test, and saved the assignment that way. This was assigned to one or more students in the course (presumably including the instructor). After that, the instructor changed the assignment back to a homework assignment. Now when someone who is assigned the set clicks on the link an error is returned.

And a couple of additional questions to try and get a better picture of it all:

  1. What's the error message?
  2. Is the link for the set on the homework page "the set name", or "Take new set name test"?
  3. Did the student/person getting the error take the test when it was a gateway test?
  4. Is this error seen when a professor is acting as a student, or when someone is clicking on the link on the homework list page themself?

The motivation for asking these questions is as follows. If the assignment type in the database is still "gateway", the system should display the "Take new stet name test" link. If the student/person took the test when it was a gateway, then there's a version of the test for that person running around in the database---I'm not sure off the top of my head what would happen if after creating the version the master set was changed back to a regular assignment, but I think it will cause problems. And if a professor acts as a student, s/he can't create a new set version, which throws a different error.

Thanks,
Gavin

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userBill Ziemer - Re: Gateway Test ghost  blueArrow
11/16/2006; 10:58:26 AM (reads: 199, responses: 0)
What you describe is what happened; assigned as a gateway act as a a couple students and take some questions, change to homework.

Weirdly, the stubs have disappeared overnight.

Last night, this was the situation:

# What's the error message?

CH5tkhome (test 1) is not a gateway...I don't remember the rest, and since they have disappeared, can't recreate.

# Is the link for the set on the homework page "the set name", or "Take new set name test"?

The "Homework Sets" page looked like:
Sel. Name Status
<check box> CH5tkhome now open, due ...
<check box> CH5tkhome (test 1)

# Did the student/person getting the error take the test when it was a gateway test?

Both those that did and those that did not take the test get the error

# Is this error seen when a professor is acting as a student, or when someone is clicking on the link on the homework list page themself?

Both signing in as a student and acting as a student receive the same error, and sees the same "Homework Sets" page.

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userGavin LaRose - Re: Gateway Test ghost  blueArrow
11/17/2006; 8:33:29 AM (reads: 155, responses: 0)
Hi Bill,

Ok, I think I have an idea of what happened. I think this is a product of the way we generate gateway set versions.

When the student took the gateway test in your course, it created a version of the test which exists as a separate entry in the user_set table of the database. This entry is a clone of the test that's assigned to the user, but has the due dates, etc., set to reflect the correct values for this set version. In particular, the version knows that it's a gateway test, which means that it knows that it's supposed to be obtained by calling the GatewayQuiz content generator, not the Problem content generator.

So, if the instructor changes the global set definition so that instead of being a gateway/quiz it's now a regular assignment, we have conflicting definitions: the global set is defined to be a homework assignment, but the version the student has already taken knows that it's a gateway/quiz.

I think this means that when the system lists (on the homework set list) the version of the test that the student has taken, it notes that it's a gateway test and sets the link to point to the GatewayQuiz content generator. However, when it gets to the content generator after clicking the link, the system notes that the global set is not a gateway, and therefore throws the error.

This is probably something that Sam and I have to think about and decide how it wants to be addressed. I think in most production cases it shouldn't be an issue.

I'm not sure why the version would have vanished from the set list later, unless you deleted the assignment (which should delete all versions) and then recreated it.

Does that make sense?
Gavin

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