UsingWW: login/authentication errors in new webwork 2.5 installation

Sunday Aug 12 2012
I installed webwork on a new Ubuntu 12.04 server following the instructions on

http://webwork.maa.org/wiki/Installation_Manual_for_2.5_on_Ubuntu_12.04

I obtained the files from git
$ git clone git://github.com/openwebwork/webwork2.git
$ git clone git://github.com/openwebwork/pg.git
$ git clone git://github.com/openwebwork/webwork-open-problem-library.git

Webwork runs but its home page displays an authentication warning before I even try to log in:

"Your authentication failed. Please try again. Please speak with your instructor if you need help ...

Warning messages

* Use of uninitialized value in string ne at /opt/webwork/webwork2/lib/WeBWorK/ContentGenerator/Login.pm line 180.
* Use of uninitialized value in string ne at /opt/webwork/webwork2/lib/WeBWorK/ContentGenerator/Login.pm line 230. "

Nevertheless I can still log in, but every subsequent page displays similar warnings e.g.

" * Use of uninitialized value in string eq at /opt/webwork/webwork2/lib/WeBWorK/Authen.pm line 733.
* Use of uninitialized value in string eq at /opt/webwork/webwork2/lib/WeBWorK/Authen.pm line 568."

If anybody has a suggestion please let me know.

Also on the Main Menu, under Instructor Tools, the classlist editor, homework sets editor and library browser are all missing. There is just a blank space. I did not change the settings of these things in the configuration files, they are all set to display version 1. Perhaps the authentication problem prevents them from displaying.

There are some small problems with the instructions for installing the webwork-open-problem-library. In the library there is an INSTALL file with instructions for using OPL-update to update the library database, but I could not find OPL-update in the library or in webwork2/bin
NPL-update works, but not if you follow the instructions on the README in webwork2/conf because the README says one should avoid editing global.conf and just edit prelocal.conf and postlocal.conf But NPL-update seems get the path to the library from global.conf so it can't find the library unless you enter its path in global.conf

Also perhaps the instructions should suggest that if one is going to use the webwork-open-problem-library then one should create an alias

$ cd /opt/webwork/libraries
$ ln -s webwork-open-problem-library/OpenProblemLibrary \ NationalProblemLibrary

to avoid breaking old courses.

Regards,
George Jennings

Re: login/authentication errors in new webwork 2.5 installation

by Arnold Pizer - Monday, 13 August 2012, 8:23 AM

Hi George,

Thanks. These are known bugs and there are a few others that we know of that you haven't discovered yet. I have added a warning to the installation instructions not to use the git version until the warning is removed. At this point if you are installing on a production server that you will be using with students, I would recommend using the svn version.

The git version is actually very close to WeBWorK 2.5.1 and our hope was to have a stable 2.5.1 on git before the end of the WeBWorK coding camp in Winona that just ended. However, we missed that deadline and our new deadline is about two weeks from today.

Here are a few comments about the bugs you report.

The login warning you see causes no harm at all (it is just an erroneous error message when using password authentication). There are now new versions of the the classlist editor, homework sets editor and library browser. Not all are totally developed so you have a choice of which to use and display. The current (buggy) default configuration files display none but is very easy to change. Unless you made some changes (e.g. moved the textbooks file or edited NPL-update), when you installed the library, it didn't get any textbook information to be used in advanced search. Your suggestion of using a link so that old courses don't break is exactly what I did on the new MAA server and I'll put that in the instructions. A bug you haven't discovered yet prevents solutions being displayed for problems that do have solutions.

Arnie