Vimarsh ======== [![Build Status](https://travis-ci.org/FOSSEE/online_test.svg?branch=master)](https://travis-ci.org/FOSSEE/online_test) #### Introduction This project provides an "exam" app that lets users take an online programming quiz. #### Features * Define fairly complicated programming problems and have users solve the problem. * Immediate verification of code solution. * Supports pretty much arbitrary coding questions in Python, C, C++ and simple Bash and uses "test cases" to test the implementations of the students. * Supports simple multiple choice questions and File uploads. * Since it runs on your Python, you could technically test any Python based library. * Scales to over 500+ simultaneous users. * Distributed under the BSD license. Quick Start =========== #### Pre-Requisite 1. Ensure [pip](https://pip.pypa.io/en/latest/installing.html) is installed #### Installation 1. Install the vimarsh app pip install vimarsh 1. In the terminal run vimarsh create_demo [-p PATH] project_name - ```project_name``` is the desired name of the django project - PATH is an optional argument to specify where the django project will be installed - If PATH is not provided, the project is created in the current directory 1. The script does the following; 1. Creates a new django project called `projectname` 1. Creates a new demo database 1. Creates two users, test moderator and test examinee 1. Loads demo questions 1. Loads demo quiz 1. Run: vimarsh run_demo 1. In a new terminal run: sudo vimarsh run_code_server 1. Open your browser and open the URL ```http://localhost:8000/exam``` 1. Login as a teacher to edit the quiz or as a student to take the quiz Credentials: - Student - Username: student | Password: student - Teacher - Username: teacher | Password: teacher Production Deployment ====================== #### Pre-Requisite 1. Install dependencies using pip install -r requirements.txt 1. Install MySql Server 1. Install Python MySql support 1. Install Apache Server for deployment #### Configure MySql server 1. Create a database named ``online_test`` by following the steps below $> mysql -u root -p mysql> create database online_test 1. Add a user named ```online_test_user``` and give access to it on the database ```online_test``` by following the steps below 1. mysql> grant usage on online_test.* to online_test_user@localhost identified by 'mysecretpassword'; 1. mysql> grant all privileges on online_test.* to online_test_user@localhost; 1. Create a file named `local.py` in folder `testapp` and insert `DATABASE_PASSWORD = 'mysecretpassword'` and `DATABASE_USER = 'online_test_user'` To deploy this app follow the steps below: 1. Clone this repository and cd to the cloned repo. git clone https://github.com/FOSSEE/online_test.git 1. Run: python manage.py syncdb 1. Add questions by editing the "docs/sample_questions.py" or any other file in the same format and then run the following: python manage.py load_exam docs/sample_questions.py Note that you can supply multiple Python files as arguments and all of those will be added to the database. 1. First run the python server provided. This ensures that the code is executed in a safe environment. Do this like so: $ sudo python testapp/exam/code_server.py Put this in the background once it has started since this will not return back the prompt. It is important that the server be running *before* students start attempting the exam. Using sudo is necessary since the server is run as the user "nobody". This runs on the ports configured in the settings.py file in the variable "SERVER_PORTS". The "SERVER_TIMEOUT" also can be changed there. This is the maximum time allowed to execute the submitted code. Note that this will likely spawn multiple processes as "nobody" depending on the number of server ports specified. 1. The ```wsgi.py``` script should make it easy to deploy this using mod_wsgi. You will need to add a line of the form: WSGIScriptAlias / "/online_test/wsgi.py" to your apache.conf. For more details see the Django docs here: https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/1.6/howto/deployment/wsgi/ 1. Go to http://desired_host_or_ip:desired_port/admin 1. Login with your credentials and look at the questions and modify if needed. Create a new Quiz, set the date and duration or activate/deactivate the quiz. 1. Now ask users to login at: http://host:port/exam And you should be all set. 1. Note that the directory "output" will contain directories, one for each user. Users can potentially write output into these that can be used for checking later. 1. As Moderator user you can visit http://host/exam/monitor to view results and user data interactively. You could also "grade" the papers manually if needed. 1. You may dump the results and user data using the results2csv and dump_user_data commands. 1. The file docs/sample_questions.py is a template that you can use for your own questions. 1. Sometimes you might be in the situation where you are not hosted as "host.org/exam/" but as "host.org/foo/exam/" for whatever reason. In this case edit "settings.py" and set the "URL_ROOT" to the root you have to serve at. In the above example for "host.org/foo/exam" set URL_ROOT='/foo'. Development Settings ==================== To install this app follow the steps below: 1. Clone this repository and cd to the cloned repo. ```git clone https://github.com/FOSSEE/online_test.git``` 1. Run: python manage.py syncdb 1. Add questions by editing the "docs/sample_questions.py" or any other file in the same format and then run the following: python manage.py load_exam docs/sample_questions.py Note that you can supply multiple Python files as arguments and all of those will be added to the database. 1. First run the python server provided. This ensures that the code is executed in a safe environment. Do this like so: $ sudo python testapp/code_server.py Put this in the background once it has started since this will not return back the prompt. It is important that the server be running *before* students start attempting the exam. Using sudo is necessary since the server is run as the user "nobody". This runs on the ports configured in the settings.py file in the variable "SERVER_PORTS". The "SERVER_TIMEOUT" also can be changed there. This is the maximum time allowed to execute the submitted code. Note that this will likely spawn multiple processes as "nobody" depending on the number of server ports specified. 1. Now, Run: python manage.py runserver : 1. Go to http://desired_host_or_ip:desired_port/admin 1. Login with your credentials and look at the questions and modify if needed. Create a new Quiz, set the date and duration or activate/deactivate the quiz. 1. Now ask users to login at: http://host:port/exam And you should be all set. 1. Note that the directory "output" will contain directories, one for each user. Users can potentially write output into these that can be used for checking later. 1. As admin user you can visit http://host/exam/monitor to view results and user data interactively. You could also "grade" the papers manually if needed. 1. You may dump the results and user data using the results2csv and dump_user_data commands. 1. The file docs/sample_questions.py is a template that you can use for your own questions. 1. Sometimes you might be in the situation where you are not hosted as "host.org/exam/" but as "host.org/foo/exam/" for whatever reason. In this case edit "settings.py" and set the "URL_ROOT" to the root you have to serve at. In the above example for "host.org/foo/exam" set URL_ROOT='/foo'. Additional commands available ============================== We provide several convenient commands for you to use: - load_exam : load questions and a quiz from a python file. See docs/sample_questions.py - load_questions_xml : load questions from XML file, see docs/sample_questions.xml use of this is deprecated in favor of load_exam. - results2csv : Dump the quiz results into a CSV file for further processing. - dump_user_data : Dump out relevalt user data for either all users or specified users. For more information on these do this: $ python manage.py help [command] where [command] is one of the above. Inspiration =========== At FOSSEE, Nishanth had implemented a nice django based app to test for multiple-choice questions. I was inspired by a programming contest that I saw at PyCon APAC 2011. Chris Boesch, who administered the contest, used a nice web application [Singpath](http://singpath.com) that he had built on top of GAE that basically checked your Python code, live. This made it fun and interesting. I wanted an implementation that was not tied to GAE and decided to write one myself and the result is the "exam" app. The idea being that I can use this to test students programming skills and not have to worry about grading their answers myself and I can do so on my machines. Contact ======= For further information and support you can contact * Forum Link * Email Address License ======= This is distributed under the terms of the BSD license. Copyright information is at the bottom of this file. Authors ======= Main author: Prabhu Ramachandran I gratefully acknowledge help from the following: - Nishanth Amuluru originally from FOSSEE who wrote bulk of the login/registration code. He wrote an initial first cut of a quiz app which supported only simple questions which provided motivation for this app. The current codebase does not share too much from his implementation although there are plenty of similarities. - Harish Badrinath (FOSSEE) -- who provided a first cut of the bash related scripts. - Srikant Patnaik and Thomas Stephen Lee, who helped deploy and test the code. Copyright (c) 2011 Prabhu Ramachandran and FOSSEE (fossee.in)