[pmwiki-users] ZAP forms for multiple assignments-- each a group?

[The Editor]

Sorry Chris...

I'm only occasionally monitoring the PmWiki list, but took an interest
in this post, and would like to work with you on it if you like. To at
least think it through together...

On 9/2/07, Chris Lott <chris.lott at gmail.com> wrote:
> I was thinking about using ZAP forms in my class wiki for homework
> submission. But it seems very cumbersome. Each of the homework
> assignments shares three pieces of information: date, student name,
> assignment name
>
> And then varying fields depending on the assignment.

Question--Are you using the quiz module to automatically grade them or
just using ZAP for student input?

> If I am understanding ZAP correctly, then for each assignment I create
> the form which has to save the data to a group for that particular
> assignment, whose group page creates a list of assignment submissons
> and whose group header is used to format the display of the actual
> assignment. So I end up with, for 14 assignments, 14 groups each with
> their own pagelist and group header?

Well, there are several ways to do it. You could put them in folders
by student and name the pages after the quiz. Or, you could put them
all in on folder like this:

homework.2007-class1-assign14-student

This makes your quiz output as simple as

(:pagelist name=2007-class1-assign14 fmt=grades:)

Are all the assignments the same? ie... 10 questions each? If so you
could use one template for all. Even if they weren't, you could have a
template with several conditionals something like:

(:if ! equal "{$:q18}" "":)18: {$:q18}(:if:)

Pardon my PmWiki syntax--I'm out of practice...  But this could be
made to show only the questions that have been answered.

I'm also thinking (if your class is small and your answers short) you
could set up the pagelist as columns--with each column a different
student. This would make grading a snap...

Another option is to skip the templates completely, and just have the
assignments mailed to you, using the emailto command.

> Is there any way to combine these? It would seem logical to have one
> group for all submissions so they could all be seen on one list, but
> then I don't know how to have a different format for each individual
> assignment type.

Using creative pagenaming and a creative template you should be able
to get it all done in one folder, one template.

BTW, if you use the quiz module, did you know you can get it to
automatically not only grade assignments, but automatically calculate
an entire class grade... It's a bit complicated to get it set up, but
not too bad, and once it's done, everything is automatic. Just to
entice you into looking deeper.

Cheers,
Dan