Hi Tim,
I've been digging through moodle looking at the past work gone into integration with STACK and I am trying to get a picture of where things stand today. From what I can make out, the RQP support has now been superseded by opaque, which currently interfaces with the OU's OpenMark system. I've seen STACK and opaque mentioned in the same sentence, but haven't been able to work out whether or not the opaque question type is interoperable with a STACK server.
Does anyone have a working STACK-Moodle integration working for moodle 1.8/9? Or can any one advise on what work would be involved to make the two interoperable? I'm just in the early stages of looking at this, so please excuse me if I'm asking silly questions.
Many thanks,
Stuart Anderson.
What a timely question.
I have been in contact with the Stack people over the last couple of months. Well, that is, I sent Chris Sangwin and Jonathan Hart the Opaque stuff about two months ago, and they worked away at it quietly, and just last week Jonathan got back to me to say that it was basically working.
I have not yet had time to install Stack myself and try it, partly becuase Stack install instructions are only available in draft form, but mostly becuase I have been up to my neck in bugs.
When I say basically working, I mean that it is in the same state that OpenMark is. You can do Stack and OM questions inside a Moodle quiz, but it is not totally sooth because of slight differences in the way these systems work. I am going to be doing more work on Opaque to make the whole thing work more slickly in the next week or two.
So if you want to try things out and report back on your experiences, this would be a good time. You will need Moodle 1.9 dev with the opaque plugin, and the latest development version of stack.
I have been in contact with the Stack people over the last couple of months. Well, that is, I sent Chris Sangwin and Jonathan Hart the Opaque stuff about two months ago, and they worked away at it quietly, and just last week Jonathan got back to me to say that it was basically working.
I have not yet had time to install Stack myself and try it, partly becuase Stack install instructions are only available in draft form, but mostly becuase I have been up to my neck in bugs.
When I say basically working, I mean that it is in the same state that OpenMark is. You can do Stack and OM questions inside a Moodle quiz, but it is not totally sooth because of slight differences in the way these systems work. I am going to be doing more work on Opaque to make the whole thing work more slickly in the next week or two.
So if you want to try things out and report back on your experiences, this would be a good time. You will need Moodle 1.9 dev with the opaque plugin, and the latest development version of stack.
That's great news, thanks! We're installing STACK right now. I'll let you know how things go.
--Stuart.
--Stuart.
I am very interested in this - having symbolic algebra quizzes available through Moodle. Is there any documentation which explains what software I need, and how to get it all going?
I could always get hold of STACK and run that separately, and just provide a link from my Moodle site, but it seems better to use Moodle's own quiz module.
Thanks very much,
Alasdair
I could always get hold of STACK and run that separately, and just provide a link from my Moodle site, but it seems better to use Moodle's own quiz module.
Thanks very much,
Alasdair
Hi, I'm Jonathan Hart one of the developers of STACK.
The original STACK is standalone only, I don't believe it's possible anymore to link it in with Moodle.
STACK2 is currently heavily in development, it's pretty much a ground up rewrite and allows much more complex questions to be wrote including multipart questions. STACK2 is designed to only provide questions and depend on a VLE such as Moodle to handle users, quizzes and so forth.
While the core question authoring and answering is pretty much finished, including STACK2 questions in Moodle still needs a fair amount of work done.
For testing purposes it's possible to author and test questions without moodle for now.
STACK can be downloaded from http://sourceforge.net/projects/stack
A example server running the original STACK can be found at http://stack.bham.ac.uk
Once our STACK server has been rebuilt, (hopefully with in a week), I'll start to put some documentation online. As a quick guide Stack requires PHP5, MySQL 4.1 or above, Maxima 5.10+ and the Latex converters TtH and TtM.
Hope that helps,
Jonathan
The original STACK is standalone only, I don't believe it's possible anymore to link it in with Moodle.
STACK2 is currently heavily in development, it's pretty much a ground up rewrite and allows much more complex questions to be wrote including multipart questions. STACK2 is designed to only provide questions and depend on a VLE such as Moodle to handle users, quizzes and so forth.
While the core question authoring and answering is pretty much finished, including STACK2 questions in Moodle still needs a fair amount of work done.
For testing purposes it's possible to author and test questions without moodle for now.
STACK can be downloaded from http://sourceforge.net/projects/stack
A example server running the original STACK can be found at http://stack.bham.ac.uk
Once our STACK server has been rebuilt, (hopefully with in a week), I'll start to put some documentation online. As a quick guide Stack requires PHP5, MySQL 4.1 or above, Maxima 5.10+ and the Latex converters TtH and TtM.
Hope that helps,
Jonathan
Jonathan, I couldn't to download the stack software from Sourgeforge.net
Download section has the following message (I attached snapshot image).
Cheers
Mónico
Download section has the following message (I attached snapshot image).
Cheers
Mónico
STACK is not quite ready for release yet, we've asked a few people such as John to try STACK out & see if they find any problems we may have missed.
Our intention is to release STACK for the MoodleMoot in two weeks time.
You can download STACK from CVS if you want an early look.
Thanks for the interest!
Our intention is to release STACK for the MoodleMoot in two weeks time.
You can download STACK from CVS if you want an early look.
Thanks for the interest!
Hi Tim,
I'm going to be testing STACK integration. I attempted to install the Opaque question type in the latest trunk version of Moodle (1.9 Beta+, upgraded today), but got database errors. The information is posted in another discussion in this forum. Any suggestions?
I'm going to be testing STACK integration. I attempted to install the Opaque question type in the latest trunk version of Moodle (1.9 Beta+, upgraded today), but got database errors. The information is posted in another discussion in this forum. Any suggestions?
John,
Please use the version of opaque bundled with STACK. This includes additions to Opaque which allow STACK questions to be authored from within Moodle & a few other STACK specific features. Opaque on its own just allows you to embed STACK questions in Moodle.
Jonathan
Hi Jonathan,
No problem. The instructions Installing Stack 2.0 should be changed to make this clear. The instructions currently point to the moodle documentation wiki, which points to the modules and plugins database entry for the Opaque question type.
No problem. The instructions Installing Stack 2.0 should be changed to make this clear. The instructions currently point to the moodle documentation wiki, which points to the modules and plugins database entry for the Opaque question type.
Thanks, I've made some modifications, hopefully that's more clear.
I wanted to give credit where credit is due, but can understand the confusion caused.
Jonathan
I wanted to give credit where credit is due, but can understand the confusion caused.
Jonathan
Hi, Jonathan.
I have readied a server for STACK without realizing that there still isn't a release candidate. How close are you to completion?
I have readied a server for STACK without realizing that there still isn't a release candidate. How close are you to completion?
Stack 2 was released before Christmas!
Hi, Tim.
Well, I still don't see any packages defined on their sourceforge download section, and in cvs the STACK 2 folder still has nothing in it except for a small place holder file. I checked out the current dev version and attempted to install it. All went smoothly until the health check when I got the following error:
XML Parsing Error: not well-formed
Location: http://moodle.spcpa.org/stack-dev/install/healthcheck.php?
Line Number 74, Column 59:
The derivative of <html><span class="errorMsg"CAS Error: No output for x^4/(1+x^4)</span></html> is <div class="displayedEq"> <html><span class="errorMsg"CAS Error: No output for diff(x^4/(1+x^4),x)</span></html> </div><p><span class="valid">Success</span> <img src="/stack-dev/pix/correct.png" width="16" height="16" alt="Success" />
----------------------------------------------------------^
Can anyone help me out? I know it isn't officially released yet, so I feel like a bit of a bastard checking out the dev version then asking for assistance, but it would be fantastic if I could get it working.
I'm running Ubuntu Server Edition, if that helps.
Well, I still don't see any packages defined on their sourceforge download section, and in cvs the STACK 2 folder still has nothing in it except for a small place holder file. I checked out the current dev version and attempted to install it. All went smoothly until the health check when I got the following error:
XML Parsing Error: not well-formed
Location: http://moodle.spcpa.org/stack-dev/install/healthcheck.php?
Line Number 74, Column 59:
The derivative of <html><span class="errorMsg"CAS Error: No output for x^4/(1+x^4)</span></html> is <div class="displayedEq"> <html><span class="errorMsg"CAS Error: No output for diff(x^4/(1+x^4),x)</span></html> </div><p><span class="valid">Success</span> <img src="/stack-dev/pix/correct.png" width="16" height="16" alt="Success" />
----------------------------------------------------------^
Can anyone help me out? I know it isn't officially released yet, so I feel like a bit of a bastard checking out the dev version then asking for assistance, but it would be fantastic if I could get it working.
I'm running Ubuntu Server Edition, if that helps.
There may not be a package at sourcegforge, but here is the announcement: http://stack.bham.ac.uk/mod/forum/view.php?id=1. I don't think any active development is going on at them moment, so the latest version in CVS http://stack.cvs.sourceforge.net/stack/stack-dev/ is the 2.0 release.
I suggest you email Chris Sangwin clarify the situation. He is the lead developer and a very nice guy. He will be interested to know you are planning to use stack anyway.
I suggest you email Chris Sangwin clarify the situation. He is the lead developer and a very nice guy. He will be interested to know you are planning to use stack anyway.
I sent him an email. Hopefully he'll respond soon.
It's a strange problem. I get an xml error if my paths for TtH and TtM are correct, but if they are incorrect, I get fail on the TtH and TtM tests, but also on the Maxima connection. Any idea why my connection to Maxima wouldn't be working?
It's a strange problem. I get an xml error if my paths for TtH and TtM are correct, but if they are incorrect, I get fail on the TtH and TtM tests, but also on the Maxima connection. Any idea why my connection to Maxima wouldn't be working?
Here's some more info if there's anyone out there who can help me out. I'm pretty sure that my problem is the connection to Maxima. I went into the test suite and ran all tests. Here are the results. If there's anyone who can give me a hand, I'd very much appreciate it.
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML1 -> @a:1@ produced no output. at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 65]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML1 -> Should have produced 1, instead: at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 66]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML2 -> Should have produced 1, instead: <html><span class="errorMsg"CAS Error: No output for a:1</span></html> at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 75]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML3 -> @a: (1+2)@ produced no output. at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 85]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML3 -> Should have produced 3, instead: Problem with maxima? at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 86]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleValidates3 -> at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 64]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleCasProcess -> [NULL] should not be null at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 84]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleCasProcess -> Multicastext processing failed at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 85]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleUsage -> at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 132]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleUsage -> Not equal expectation fails [NULL] matches at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 134]
Fail: QTList validation test -> testCasProcess -> at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestList.php line 97]
All tests
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testDisplayCastextNotEmpty -> @diff(x^5,x)@ produced no output. at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 57]Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML1 -> @a:1@ produced no output. at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 65]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML1 -> Should have produced 1, instead: at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 66]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML2 -> Should have produced 1, instead: <html><span class="errorMsg"CAS Error: No output for a:1</span></html> at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 75]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML3 -> @a: (1+2)@ produced no output. at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 85]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML3 -> Should have produced 3, instead: Problem with maxima? at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 86]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleValidates3 -> at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 64]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleCasProcess -> [NULL] should not be null at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 84]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleCasProcess -> Multicastext processing failed at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 85]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleUsage -> at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 132]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleUsage -> Not equal expectation fails [NULL] matches at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 134]
Fail: QTList validation test -> testCasProcess -> at [/var/www/stack-dev/other/testing/tests/TestList.php line 97]
6/6 test cases complete: 151 passes, 12 fails and 0 exceptions.
Here are some more specifics. I entered the correct paths for tth and ttm, and as I said above, the whole page seems stuck at an xml error. But when I view source, I can see more from the checkhealth page. It seems that every test is passed (in the technical sense) except maxima, which fails to connect. The CAS test, however, although it indicates that it was passed, throws a CAS Error. Here's the code:
div class="box"> <h3>Testing CAS</h3> The derivative of <html><span class="errorMsg"CAS Error: No output for x^4/(1+x^4)</span></html> is <div class="displayedEq"> <html><span class="errorMsg"CAS Error: No output for diff(x^4/(1+x^4),x)</span></html> </div><p><span class="valid">Success</span> <img src="/stack-dev/pix/correct.png" width="16" height="16" alt="Success" /> </p> </div>
<div class="box"> <h3>Testing Plots</h3> <html><span class="errorMsg"CAS Error: No output for plot([x^4/(1+x^4),diff(x^4/(1+x^4),x)],[x,-3,3])</span></html><p><span class="valid">Success</span> <img src="/stack-dev/pix/correct.png" width="16" height="16" alt="Success" />
Hi again, Tim.
I tried installing under openSUSE 10.3, and everything went fine, except for the soapServer. For some reason, I can't get it to pass the connection check. Any ideas?
I tried installing under openSUSE 10.3, and everything went fine, except for the soapServer. For some reason, I can't get it to pass the connection check. Any ideas?
Sorry, no. I am still waiting for someone else to give me access to a server to install Stack on, so I am really not an expert. Sadly, the Stack developer forums (link here http://stack.bham.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=2) seem to be offline at the moment.
Is it possible to install STACK to Debian Etch?
I installed Maxima 5.13.0 and it is starting and working ok command line:
kone:~# maxima
Maxima 5.13.0 http://maxima.sourceforge.net
Using Lisp GNU Common Lisp (GCL) GCL 2.6.8 (aka GCL)
Distributed under the GNU Public License. See the file COPYING.
Dedicated to the memory of William Schelter.
This is a development version of Maxima. The function bug_report()
provides bug reporting information.
(%i1)
I installed stack-dev with command
cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@stack.cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/stack co -P stack-dev
and all other things gone well but STACK Health Check says:
Testing Maxima Connection
Failed Could not start an instantance of Maxima.
What things I shall check out?
I am having exactly the same problem on Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron)
I have Working Installations of
but STACK Health Check says:
This is what I get when try to run the UNIT Test
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML2 -> Should have produced 1, instead: <html><span class="errorMsg">CAS Error: No output for a:1</span></html> at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 75]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML3 -> Should have produced $ 3 $, instead: <span class="errorMsg">CAS Error: No output for a: (1+2)</span> Problem with maxima? at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 86]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML9 -> Comments not removed d, instead: d at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 145]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleValidates3 -> at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 64]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleCasProcess -> [NULL] should not be null at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 84]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleCasProcess -> Multicastext processing failed at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 85]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleUsage -> at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 132]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleUsage -> Not equal expectation fails [NULL] matches at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 134]
Fail: QTList validation test -> testCasProcess -> at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/TestList.php line 97]
I have Working Installations of
- Maxima 5.13.0
- Stack-dev
- Moodle 1.9.4+ (Build: 20090211)
but STACK Health Check says:
Testing Maxima Connection
Failed Could not start an instantance of Maxima.
This is what I get when try to run the UNIT Test
All tests
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML1 -> Should have produced $ 1 $, instead: <span class="errorMsg">CAS Error: No output for a:1</span> at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 66]Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML2 -> Should have produced 1, instead: <html><span class="errorMsg">CAS Error: No output for a:1</span></html> at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 75]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML3 -> Should have produced $ 3 $, instead: <span class="errorMsg">CAS Error: No output for a: (1+2)</span> Problem with maxima? at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 86]
Fail: Castext display validation test -> testCorrectHTML9 -> Comments not removed d, instead: d at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/TestOfCastextDisplay.php line 145]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleValidates3 -> at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 64]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleCasProcess -> [NULL] should not be null at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 84]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleCasProcess -> Multicastext processing failed at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 85]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleUsage -> at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 132]
Fail: QTTuple validation test -> testTupleUsage -> Not equal expectation fails [NULL] matches at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/Test_qttuple.php line 134]
Fail: QTList validation test -> testCasProcess -> at [/usr/share/moodle/stack/other/testing/tests/TestList.php line 97]
6/6 test cases complete: 150 passes, 10 fails and 0 exceptions.
You might do better to post in the Stack forums: http://stack.bham.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=9
Thanks Tim,
I indeed followed the instructions posted in Stack forum that can found here
http://maths.york.ac.uk/serving_maths///mod/forum/discuss.php?d=960
There appears to be some problem with Debian-Ubuntu package of Maxima (version 5.13).
I had to built Maxima from source using CMU Common Lisp. Could not make it work with Debian-Ubuntu GCL, though (hence, it's not worth downloading GCL with Aptittude. I will have to built it, too for I need a Server version of Stack).
Linux version of stack is up and running normally.
Cheers, LK
I indeed followed the instructions posted in Stack forum that can found here
http://maths.york.ac.uk/serving_maths///mod/forum/discuss.php?d=960
There appears to be some problem with Debian-Ubuntu package of Maxima (version 5.13).
I had to built Maxima from source using CMU Common Lisp. Could not make it work with Debian-Ubuntu GCL, though (hence, it's not worth downloading GCL with Aptittude. I will have to built it, too for I need a Server version of Stack).
Linux version of stack is up and running normally.
Cheers, LK
I'd be very interested to hear what the future of STACK is or if anyone gets it up and running successfully. I played around with it a bit a year or so ago but I got the impression that it was still developmental.
Hi there,
Simon and I are currently working on STACK. I'm basically happy with the design of the core, although there are probably bugs to fix. We are currently working on the interactions between STACK and the Moodle Quiz via Opaque.
Currently there are some unsatisfactory interactions to do with the quiz. E.g. we'd like the work solution to be available automatically when a student "submits all and finishes", or after the due date. Simon and I are finding these are quite difficult to do, without changing anything in Moodle. They may be impossible! This links in with Tim's discussions on http://docs.moodle.org/en/Development:Changing_the_Moodle_Question_Engine#Detailed_design
Chris
Simon and I are currently working on STACK. I'm basically happy with the design of the core, although there are probably bugs to fix. We are currently working on the interactions between STACK and the Moodle Quiz via Opaque.
Currently there are some unsatisfactory interactions to do with the quiz. E.g. we'd like the work solution to be available automatically when a student "submits all and finishes", or after the due date. Simon and I are finding these are quite difficult to do, without changing anything in Moodle. They may be impossible! This links in with Tim's discussions on http://docs.moodle.org/en/Development:Changing_the_Moodle_Question_Engine#Detailed_design
Chris