STACK icon

STACK

Maintained by Chris Sangwin, Tim Hunt
The STACK question type adds a sophisticated assessment in mathematics and related disciplines, with emphasis on formative assessment underpinned by computer algebra.
Price option: Free

Supports Moodle 3.5-5.2 See all versions
Latest release: 1 day ago
Installations: 2365
Downloads (last 90 days): 926

Frankenstyle name: qtype_stack
Question types
STACK

Comments

Product ratings and reviews are coming to Moodle Marketplace. Until then, existing comments remain available to read, but new posts have been disabled.

Hi Cristopher!
As it wasn't tagged for Moodle 3.0, I assumed that there was some incompatibility with it. But after reading your comment, I've dared to install it again anyway, and as you say, all seems to be going well so far.
Thanks!
Kevin,
I've been testing this myself and I can't find any serious problems yet. Is this a blocker for you, i.e. do you need us to officially tag support for Moodle 3.0? We are going to support this for Moodle 3.0!
Any chance of having support for Moodle 3.0?
It almost certiainly runs fine. However, I have not found time to formally test it and update the compatibility information here.
Hi all, thanks for a great plugin. Do you know if STACK is compatible with moodle 3.0?
Thanks. Andrew
Thanks for that response, Chris - it will be really useful. Our Moodle is hosted so we will have to wait for the official release, but it's good to know they're coming.
Stuart
Stuart,
There is no good reason for us not to support these options. By default, we switch things off and only allow them once they have been checked. These are new options, which I've added in this commit: https://github.com/maths/moodle-qtype_stack/commit/02b11c198a987a9fcda7968327b17938e7daca51
If you'd like this code you can pull this from master. Otherwise we will tag a new release in due course.
Chris
I'm trying to build some Stack quizzes for A level students. Is it possible to style a plot with 'traditional' axes? I've tried [box,false] - this gives the two axes, but drawn with dotted lines and no numbers labelled. I tried xtics option but that's not supported. Any advice welcome, thanks.
Stuart
Ok. Thanks Tim!
Getting maxima.bat working from the command-line first is certainly the right way to start.
Since it is a .bat file, you should be able to open it in a text editor, and see what it is trying to do, find the failing bit, and work backwards from there.
Hello Chris and Time!
I just can't wait to get Stack working on my local Moodle install. It looks great!
However, I too am getting a "CAS failed to return any evaluated expressions. Please check your connection with the CAS" error.
Here's the debug information I'm getting...
---------------------------------
Platform: win
Maxima shell command: C:\moodle\server\moodledata/stack/maxima.bat
Maxima initial command: load("C:/moodle/server/moodledata/stack/maximalocal.mac");
Maxima timeout: 15
Maxima command
cab:block([],print("[TimeStamp= [ 0 ], Locals= [ 0=[ error= ["), cte("CASresult",errcatch(diff(x^n,x))), print("1=[ error= ["), cte("CASversion",errcatch(stackmaximaversion)), print("2=[ error= ["), cte("CAStime",errcatch(CAStime:"2015-04-29 03:44:06")), print("] ]"), return(true));
Command line
"C:\moodle\server\moodledata/stack/maxima.bat"
------------------------------
I found the mix of forward and backslashes somewhat odd but maybe your code deals with that later in the process???
I tried to execute C:\moodle\server\moodledata\stack\maxima.bat directly at the command line and I got a popup window saying sbcl.exe had stopped working.
Any advice?
Hi, i'm getting an error "CAS failed to return any evaluated expressions. Please check your connection with the CAS". Anyone can help with this?
It seems that, if you edit the requirements in the version.php files for all the required plugins, specifically
* $plugin->requires change that value to 2013051400
* (qbehaviours only) $plugin->dependencies change all the version numbers there to 2013050100.
then STACK v3.3.3 will work with Moodle 2.5. However, we don't recomment that you use an un-supported version of Moodle. There are security risks. You should upgrade your version of Moodle instead. But, if you can't you may still be able to run the latest STACK.
HI Chris, sorry to keep bothering you. Getting ready for the new quarter by writing new STACK questions! I have a question about plotting:
I'm using STACK 2014032800 (installed via git). None of my plots are showing grid lines; they do show zero lines. ("The grid has been changed by adding the gnuplot commands set zeroaxis, set grid. This adds more grid lines than Maxima's default...") I am using Gnuplot 4.2.6 and Maxima 5.32.1 (I compiled Maxima on my OSX Lion machine, but not gnuplot):
STACK_SETUP(ex):=block(
MAXIMA_VERSION_NUM:31.3,
TMP_IMAGE_DIR:"/Library/WebServer/moodledata/stack/tmp/",
IMAGE_DIR:"/Library/WebServer/moodledata/stack/plots/",
PLOT_TERMINAL:"png",
PLOT_TERM_OPT:"large transparent size 450,300",
DEL_CMD:"rm",
GNUPLOT_CMD:"/Applications/Gnuplot.app/Contents/Resources/bin/gnuplot",
MAXIMA_VERSION:"5.31.3",
URL_BASE:"!ploturl!",
true)$
/* We are using an optimised lisp image with maxima and the stack libraries
pre-loaded. That is why you don't see the familiar load("stackmaxima.mac")$ here. */
Any insight as to why grid lines are not showing up? In case it's relevant, changing [nticks] has no effect, either.
Thanks again,
Kevin.
Is it possible to have a subscript in a student answer? For example, I'd like to have as an answer ta: 1/(4*pi*epsilon[0])*q/r^2 (Coulomb's law for a point charge). When I preview the question, the epsilon[0] renders correctly as the Greek letter epsilon with a subscript zero, but STACK rejects this when entered as the answer with the message "map: improper argument: epsilon[0]". Is there any way to allow a student to enter a subscript?
Thanks in advance!
Kevin