Essential Applications

The want file (for example 123s03h2.w) specifies which questions are to be used on an exam, how these questions should be scrambled, how many points they are worth, as well as some text that goes into the output of grad, and specifications of other options which are not usually used, but are described later.

For a very simplified want file, useful for getting started, see "The Want File (Simple Version)".

Here are the beginnings of two want files, not including the last lines which specify the questions to be used. Note that most want files have wrong=0, and will be simpler, including only the first three lines of these examples.

An example for exams with numerical questions:

Exam II -- Physics 123 -- April 8, 2003
NumKor  Date   # Ques Ver  Sort   Max   Credit Wrong  Mult Extra M32
  194, 040115,   3,4,  4,   5,9, 30,20,   0,    2,1,   0,    0,   0,
   17    5  132
  432  221   52   05

The want file for MC only exams has the format:

Exam II -- Physics 194 -- April 8, 2002
Kourse  Date   # Ques Ver  MULT  Max  Wrong  Credit Msort  Extra M32
  194, 040116,    15,  4,   0,   100,   1,     0,     9,     0,   0
    54  3456 4592346  998     1   213  3345     8 56899    22
    11 12345  4466    14   325

The first line is arbitrary and can be used to identify the exam. It will appear in the listing output from grad, which may be presented to the students. The second line is used to identify whether this as a numerical exam (NumKor) or a purely multiple-choice exam (Kourse). The rest of the line just helps identify the numbers on the third line. Where there are two numbers for one quantity, the first applies to the numerical questions and the second to the MC questions. Note that these numbers and the wanted question numbers are read in free format. Just separate the numbers by one or more spaces and commas. All numbers except Mult, Max, Wrong, Credit, and Extra should be changed only in the want file. These five parameters are sometimes changed after the exam is given, in the key file, to rectify mistakes.

• NumKor: The course number. Note that NumKor must appear at the beginning of the second line for a numerical exam. Change NumKor to Kourse for a multiple choice only exam. The entry under this (first entry on the third line) must be a pure number, and is generally the course number.
• Date: YYMMDD is recommended, but the number is arbitrary.
• # Ques specifies the number of numerical questions (3) and MC questions (4), or MC only. For numerical exams, the limits are 15 and 30 respectively. For pure multiple-choice, the limit is 100 (maybe 200?).
• Ver is the number of versions (normally 4). Ver=1 is useful for debugging without waste of paper. The limit on Ver is 5 for numerical exams and 10 for purely multiple-choice exams, though I am not sure if anyone has tried more than 4.
• Sort: The first digit, 5, applies to the numerical questions and the second digit, 9, specifies the scrambling for the multiple choice questions (see below for possibilities).
• Max shows the maximum total credit for all the numerical questions and all the multiple choice questions. In this example, numerical question credits add up to 30 points and each of the four MC questions is worth 5 points.
• Credit: If non-zero, each multiple choice question can be assigned a different credit. One or two lines (possibly more for MC exams) are added in free format at the bottom.
• Wrong specifies the score to be subtracted for an incorrect answer; here 2 for a numerical question and 1 for a multiple choice question (normally zero).
• Mult can be used to give credit for more than one Multiple Choice answer. This is useful when a question is found after the exam is printed to have more than one reasonable answer. This is usually changed in the key file.
• Extra is reserved to allow special coding to be accessed to resolve special problems with an exam.
  Does anyone understand this?
• M32, if non-zero, indicates that all possible combinations for filling the five multiple choice dots are legal. This permits up to 32 different answers for each multiple choice question.

Meaning of Sort

Value of Sort:

For numerical questions, randomizing the answer order means that which variable definition bracket is used is randomized. Otherwise the first bracket is used for the first version, etc. A bracket is used only once unless there are more versions then variations.

Specifying the questions to be used

The next lines are used to identify numerical questions and then multiple choice questions in the Question file. You may place as many question numbers per line as you wish, but the multiple choice questions must start on a new line. Do not use a blank line for a purely multiple-choice exam.

The question numbers are those used to identify the questions in the question file. Note that the questions are placed in the exam in the order they are called for in the want file if they are not scrambled. All numbers are read in free format; they may be separated by one or more spaces and commas.

???This next confuses me
The meaning of the symbols is very similar to that in numerical exams. The last line(s) specify the questions wanted and their order in the exam. As with numerical questions, you may put an arbitrary number of question numbers on each line.

This page needs to be pieced together from existing documentation, including
/physics/doc/physics/grading/grek DONE

Criticisms or additions to this page should be sent to

(shapirophysics)