Migration from WebCT 4.1: Calculated Questions (fwd)

[Robin Hill-3]

Sakai Migration Experts:

I've been following the WG: Migration list conversation for a while, and
investigating the various tools documented on its Confluence page.  A solution
to our particular problem seems imminent, but not quite there yet.  Coaching
would be appreciated.

We just started a Sakai pilot (hosted by rSmart).  On our WebCT 4.1 platform,
we a have Physics course with hundreds of calculated questions.

1.  First, the problem with the bulk of the questions in the WebCT Question
Database:

Respondus produces the QTI format that Sakai imports, but, as the collab
documents attest, a direct import of the resulting file fails to express the
questions correctly because Respondus tags the XML questions with
"ident=QUE_nnn" rather than the type that the Sakai "Import" function expects,
resulting in unknown type defaulting to short-answer.

The solution might be to categorize (by type) in the WebCT Question
Database, run Respondus on a single category of questions, generate the QTI
version, and then apply a universal edit to change the relevant field in the
XML, to "ident=MCSC," for instance.

Right?  Make sense?  Will that then upload correctly into Sakai?  We'll try it
and find out.

2.  Now, the problem with calculated questions:

Respondus produces Flash files with Javascript calls for calculated questions
(like it does for question pools when Respondus is given a WebCT Quiz as
input).  But there must be a simpler way to address this:  A little
investigation into the WebCT tagged text download file shows that a WebCT
calculated question is really like a short-answer question pool-- all the value
variants are predetermined and hard-coded.

Can't that tagged text file be processed by some script to output an XML file
containing the equivalent question pool in nice QTI form (as an exam, if there
is no QTI pool format)??  Then the QTI file could be imported into Sakai as a
question pool, with its behavior-- random presentation of a variant-- identical
to the behavior of the WebCT calculated question. (Note:  There is no download
of question pools from WebCT, since a question pool is a property of an
individual Quiz, not a property of the Question Database; so there's no WebCT
tagged text format for question pools.)

Right so far?  Has this been done, or attempted?  If not, and it seems
plausible, we might try writing it ourselves...  but we have lots to do.
Can anyone help with a short-cut-- a link to a concise version of the QTI
short-answer/fill-in-the-blank format, for guidance?


We will also have to face the image import problem, which I have not researched
yet.  And we are about to try the UNE facility mentioned by Stephen Swinsburg
(thank you, Rutgers and UNE!) on whole courses, in conjunction with the
delivered WebCT Content Migration Utility, and we will then be able to see how
it handles the quiz questions.


--
Robin Hill          hill@...       307-766-5499
University of Wyoming
Instructional Computing Services     Ellbogen Center
http://www.uwyo.edu/ctl/Inst_Computing/

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[jayshao]

On Dec 26, 2007, at 3:10 PM, Robin Hill wrote:

> 1.  First, the problem with the bulk of the questions in the WebCT  
> Question Database:
>
> Respondus produces the QTI format that Sakai imports, but, as the  
> collab documents attest, a direct import of the resulting file fails  
> to express the questions correctly because Respondus tags the XML  
> questions with "ident=QUE_nnn" rather than the type that the Sakai  
> "Import" function expects, resulting in unknown type defaulting to  
> short-answer.

Robin,

At Rutgers, I know Chuck did some work to build a custom JSP (well,  
it's implemented as a JSP, but it's really ~ 1500 lines of Java code)  
specifically to handle import of Respondus-flavored QTI.

If you're interested, I can probably post the code into contrib -- I  
don't think there are any RU dependencies (though it may require  
Samigo 2.4.x/2.5)

> 2.  Now, the problem with calculated questions:
>
> Respondus produces Flash files with Javascript calls for calculated  
> questions (like it does for question pools when Respondus is given a  
> WebCT Quiz as input).  But there must be a simpler way to address  
> this:  A little investigation into the WebCT tagged text download  
> file shows that a WebCT calculated question is really like a short-
> answer question pool-- all the value variants are predetermined and  
> hard-coded.

I *believe* the flash-generated questions for generated types come  
through correctly through some ContentHosting and Samigo manipulation  
(which I believe might satisfy your goals) though I'll admit to not  
being familiar with more than the high-level details -- this was a  
quick-n-dirty we're having IT staff use to transfer publisher content  
by importing through Respondus.

I apologize for the vague-ness -- I'm pretty heads down until 1/10  
(and probably a week or 2 past then).

Jason

--

Jason Shao
Application Developer
Rutgers University, Office of Instructional & Research Technology
v. 732-445-8726 | f. 732-445-5539 | jayshao@... | http://jay.shao.org


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