ASAP Automated System for the Assessment of Programming
Project Motivation address the issues of teaching a technically demanding subject with discipline-specific requirements including –Increasing class sizes –Widening participation –Evolving content
ASAP objectives Publish appropriate standards for unit tests in educational sector Publish tools for authoring and using unit tests Looking at working closely with JPlag (Plagiarism Detection) and RoboProf (Question Generation) from project partners
Design Service based architecture – the JISC e- learning framework Standards – XML, WSDL, XML, SOAP Technologies and Tools – J2EE, Apache Axis, CVS User Agents – Blackboard, WebCT
Automated Assessment Service Instructor creates (or edits) test documents in the unit test repository (1,2) Student accesses document and attempts assignment (formative or summative) Solution is submitted (4) and evaluated using the assessment service [private unit tests] (5) The result communicated to the student (6) and the database of student marks (7) Instructors view details of assessments (8)
Use Case
Associated Services Partners providing complimentary services JPlag –Provides Plagiarism testing on submitted code Roboprof (Dublin) –Provides Objective Assessment
User Agents Generic Web Portal –Initial interface to ASAP –Evolving from a test environment Blackboard v6 (Kingston / de Montfort) Web-CT v2 (City University)
TAPAS First stage of project Prototype system Currently being tested for Java Programming Assessment at Kingston University 1st Gen. Self-serve 2nd Gen. Asses. Server 3rd Gen - WSDL 4th Gen - eLF?
TAPAS Precursor to ASAP Internally funded Assessment Server –Provides unit testing to assess Java program code Blackboard Building Block –VLE ‘User Agent’ –Communicates with assessment server –Instructor: uploads testing code and assignment –Learner: Downloads assignment –Uploads source code –Assessment server compiles and tests –Gives feedback and uploads results to Blackboard gradebook
Blackboard Interface
Automated Java Marker Server
Feedback from service