Pattern match
Maintained by
Tim Hunt, Chris Nelson, Hieu Vu Van, Mahmoud Kassaei
Allows a short response of one or a few sentences that is graded by comparing against various model answers, which are described using the OU's pattern match syntax.
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I tried to upgrade Pmatch qtype in my current installation (Moodle 3.5) and I got this error:
Excepción - syntax error, unexpected 'const' (T_CONST), expecting variable (T_VARIABLE)
Más información sobre este error <-- Notice that my defaul language is Spanish
×Debug info:
Error code: generalexceptionmessage
×Stack trace:
line 48 of /question/type/pmatch/classes/local/spell/qtype_pmatch_spell_checker.php: ParseError thrown
line ? of unknownfile: call to core_component::classloader()
line 129 of /question/type/pmatch/db/upgrade.php: call to spl_autoload_call()
line 632 of /lib/upgradelib.php: call to xmldb_qtype_pmatch_upgrade()
line 1857 of /lib/upgradelib.php: call to upgrade_plugins()
line 694 of /admin/index.php: call to upgrade_noncore()
Fortunately I could cancel the upgrade and restore my old version.
Before sending this message I tried it one more time after changing my default languague to English and I got the same error but with much less additional information:
Exception - syntax error, unexpected 'const' (T_CONST), expecting variable (T_VARIABLE) <-- Just this!
I hope that will be easy to fix. Either way, it is not urgent for me as I can go on using the current version.
Thank you in advance Tim!
The solution was to add a 'No languages found' option to the setting if the list would otherwise be empty. That seems to be enough to stop Moodle getting confused. There is not need to select the otion that now appears. Just click continue.
For some bugs, you look at the reported symptoms, and it is just obvious how you screwed up. In other cases, and sadly this is one, the symptoms make no sense until you have time to dig into it deeply, then hpefully, you can work it out and fix the problem.
Pattern match is a very powerful resource, saving time and also allowing for some introspective journey into the structure of language, something that being busy all the time (with grading open questions for example...) is becoming increasingly rare. So thanks for giving us this possibility at the same time!
However there is a potential risk in case the question is of the type "give a definition of.....[anything]" as it is possible, and very quick too, to open a wikipedia page, look for the wanted definition and paste it into the answer field. Many wikipedia pages start with short definitions, very often within the limit of 20 words suggested by the PM syntax help and inevitably matching the pattern set in the question rules. This can be worked around with formative quizzes (e.g interactive with multiple tries) where the feedback could state the wikipedia origin and the quiz ask for editing the answer, but in case of summative quizzes with deferred feedback I couldn't find a way to obtain the same (state the wikipedia origin + ask and allow for an editing), and in principle anyone with appropriate knowledge could generate the same sentence. Anyone experiencing the same problem or having already solved this issue?
Many thanks
Adriano
we're planning to update from 3.1 to 3.4 and I pre-checked the compatibility-statements of our plugins. Glad to hear that it works, there was no specific problem. Thanks and best regards.
Sebastian
Best regards and thanks
Sebastian
Any hope to have it running in the Moodle mob app?
Thanks!
Giovanni
I encountered a little problem (and did not find any mention of it in forums) :
The environment :
Moodle 3.3.3+ (Build 20171201) (on Ubuntu 16.04.3 with MySQL 14.14 dist 5.7.21, php 5.6.33-3)
Plugin qtype_combined 1.6 (2017061400)
Plugin qtype_pmatch 2.0 (201608400)
The problem :
Make a first question Q1 of type combined with at least 2 entries PM1 & PM2 (PM1 and PM2 could be numeric or pmatch)
Duplicate the question Q1 and obtain a new question Q2.
Change question Q2 directly (without saving and editing) : delete in HTML the link to PM1 and change weighting to match 100%
DO NOT "Verify the question text and update the form" and just "Save changes"
You obtain a warning text "One or more embedded questions have been removed ..."
Clic "Save changes" again
Edit the question Q1 : the Answer for PM1 has been deleted (both answers for PM2 in Q1 and Q2 are OK).
This leads (if you don't edit the Q1 and reencode the answer for PM1 again) to an error message when trying to pass a test that includes Q1 : "Coding error detected, it must be fixed by a programmer: This question is of a type that is not installed on your system. No processing is possible." and the test is not usable.
Note:solution is to click "Verify the question..." and then answer for PM1 is not lost in Q1 but this is a bit annoying. You can also save the question Q2 without changing it directly and edit it and then all is OK too.
I confirm that this great plugin is working well (except this issue) on Moodle 3.3.3+.
Thanks.