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Current Implementation Status
=============================
The question support API is still in the early stages of implementation.
With some additional work it can be used by dedicated developers in their
own activities.
The fully working and implemented components are few. Only the multiple
choice (and true/false) question objects are fully implemented, and the only
input format that is parsed (GIFT, from the Moodle project) is incompletely
parsed. The current code also requires a refactoring to change the question
object hierarchy to better represent the nature of missing-word style
questions.
Action Items
------------
- Change all question types to support a ``tail_text`` attribute that
represents text to be presented *after* the answers, or answer space.
- Extend the GIFT parser used to include support for parsing the partial
credit notation for answers as well as the "answer comment" feature of
GIFT, allowing immediate feedback for answers to questions. (This
support needs to be added to the question objects as well.)
- Complete the implementation of the additional question objects for
Numerical, Matching, and Short Answer questions.
- A lot more work needs to be put into the ``markup_type`` coercion and
formatting code, only an outline currently exists and the design is
probably not scalable.
- The reporting code is, right now, extremely simple, and implements a
bare-minimum format. Additional collaboration with the Moodle
application would be beneficial.
Future Work
===========
- Implement additional input formats. The initial targets should
include:
- MoodleXML, the XML format underlying Moodle, probably a richer
format than GIFT in terms of metadata, but GIFT is easier for
humans, particularly unskilled humans to write, so it was
implemented first.
- Direct Moodle access. This would require support from Moodle, in
some fashion, using a simple API or talking directly to the Moodle
database, but would allow the API to read question data directly
from the application, without an import/export step.
- sqlite database format. Mostly useful for independent Activity
authors to bundle a database of questions with an Activity, but
perhaps useful as a 'file format' for distributing questions to
activities with full support for whatever metadata and rich querying
the API (eventually) supports.
- Implement / Design a method for embedding non-text or rich-text in
question objects. This has been minimally started, but the
implementation has not been tested and is mostly a sketch of the idea.
Supporting at least an HTML subset along with simple markup formats
like markdown and reST would be appropriate to give instructors control
over formatting the text. Additionally, the ability to embed images or
interactive content, like flash or javascript in the case of HTML, would
allow great flexibility. Embedding MathML or TeX-like markup for
mathematical notation would also be a goal.
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