[LON-CAPA-users] Unreduced answers in Numerical Response

[Guy Albertelli II]

Hi Lars,

> > > Thanks! Are there any other differences between between
> > > formularesponse and numericalresponse if the former is used for
> > > a numerical answer?
> > 
> > Well it allows a large pile of possibilities in the answer.
> > 
> This is as it should be for any class at college level or above - One
> has to hope that these folks can do basic algebra. For this reason the
> default for a numerical response should be "expressions allowed" (and
> here I mean including perl functions, like sqrt, pi, sin, fraction,
> etc.).

formularesponse supports all of these, and if you want pi or some
other constant you can use the smaples field to do this

<forumalresponse answer="pi*sqrt(2)" samples="pi@$pi">

> > Meaning if you ask the question:
> > 
> > What is 3/5+3/10?
> > 
> > The student can just enter 3/5+4/9 and get it right.

Sorry meant 3/5+3/10

> > 
> > Or enter 45/50
> 
> Great.

I think most instructors would disagree. Most of them like the
students to have to do the computations.

> > Seems like there is enough reasons that one could do a fraction
> > control option in numericalresponse
> > 
> 
> Yes! But "all" expressions should be allowed (see above).

I think fractions might be a useful subset I could see an instructor
wanting to accept fractional answers but not allow the student to be
doing all kinds of other things.


> I'm not sure what you mean here, but there probably should be a switch
> to turn the "expressions allowed" off

Correct, and should this switching occur in a place only the author
can change (i.e. when editing the problem)
Or should it be something a course coordinator chooses (and thus a
parameter to show on the parm screen)

-- 
guy@albertelli.com          BM: n^20 t20 z20 qS 
Guy Albertelli -7-7-9-  O-
    Today I will treat myself as I would my best friend--with sarcasm
    and neglect.