EDU Bugs, Puzzles and Complaints

We're keeping track of bugs, puzzles and complaints about the EDU testing system. You can look at this list if you like, to see if a problem you've encountered has already been seen, or can be fixed, or isn't a bug but a "feature".

If you have a bug, puzzle, or complaint to report, you can send mail to the lab manager, John Burkardt.

Bugs

A bug is when the program doesn't do what it says it's going to do.

The secant function won't preview properly.
This problem was reported by a Math 166 student on 22 January 2002.
The problem is very simple. If your answer is a formula, such as sec(2x), when you try to preview the formula, the previewer box only displays an error message, saying Broken ML Link.
Choosing the "Move Down" command once too often crashes the program and loses the currently edited assignment
This problem occurred to John Burkardt on 23 January 2002.
This problem is only of interest for instructors. When they set up a new test, it gets listed first in the list of assignments. To move it down the list, you click on "Move Down". If you click once too often, the program crashes. We have reported this problem.
The [PRINT] item doesn't print my results.
This problem was reported in early January 2002,
If you use the "View Previous Results" option to see past results, and then "View Details" to see one whole test, then the words "[PRINT]" appear on the test, suggesting that if you click there, your test will print. At least on Macintoshes, nothing happens. Brownstone Software reports "there is no quick fix for this".
The graphs in my test don't print out.
This problem was reported in early January 2002.
This problem only occurs for Math 150 right now, and only for tests in which a special command is used to draw graphs. Oddly enough, the graphs will print correctly from a PC, but not from a Macintosh.
The grading authorization message is confusing.
This problem noted by John Burkardt, 24 January 2002.
When the student clicks on GRADE, the authorization page comes up. But it's the authorization page for starting the test, not grading it! In particular, part of it reads: "Method 2: ...Once you have been authorized, you can proceed to the test by pressing the button: START" which should read "Method 2: ...Once you have been authorized, you can proceed to have the test graded by pressing the button: GRADE".

Puzzles

A puzzle is when you're not quite sure how to ask the program to do something, or you can't figure out what it's trying to tell you:

Is the square root the same as the 1/2 power?
Yes. You should be able to write either
```
        sqrt(x)
```
or
```
        x^(1/2)
```
. However, you would not get the square root if you typed
```
        x^1/2
```

Complaints

Complaints aren't quite bugs. They refer to issues where we wish the program could do something, or do it in a different or better way.

I can't enter the square of a trig function like sin²(x).
If you want to type a formula involving the square of the sine function, you do not enter it the way it is normally printed, where the power of 2 comes right after the name of the function and before the argument. Instead, it must be entered after the argument;
```
        sin(x)^2
```
to be safe, you should put an extra pair of parentheses around the function and its argument:
```
        ( sin(x) )^2
```
The program times me out after 20 minutes, and my work is lost.
This problem occurred to an entire Math 150 class on 23 January 2002,
This seems to be true. If you spend more than 20 minutes on one question, or, if your test is all one page and you spend more than 20 minutes on the test, the program...times you out and discards your work. We have talked to the EDU developers, who tell us this is a security feature. They have temporarily agreed to change the time to 60 minutes. We will try to figure out a better solution.
The same question showed up twice on one exam.
This happened to user MURPHYJ on 23 January 2002, taking Math 142 Unit Exam 1.
We believe that EDU will never pick the same question twice. Our best guess right now is that the particular question was accidentally put into the system twice, so EDU sees two copies and doesn't know they're the same. We're checking on this one.
I clicked on PRINT but nothing came out.
When trying to print out a sample test or a graded proctored exam, you have to be careful. What looks to you like a test is actually two frames. One frame is the EDU control bar; the other frame is your test. If you try to print by clicking on the Netscape or Explorer printer icon, you'll very likely just get a printout of the EDU control bar. To get what you want, make sure you click somewhere in the area of your test, and then go to the FILE menu item and select PRINT or PRINT FRAME. This should do a better job.
Polynomials are printed funny in questions.
This problem was reported by Fritz Keinert on 28 January 2002.
For developers, this problem is of concern when setting up problems with randomly generated polynomials. The program has a crude way of presenting the results, without properly omitting terms with zero coefficients, suppressing unit coefficients. In particular, a randomly generated polynomial like
```
        x^2 - x
```
will be displayed as
```
        1 x² + -1 x + 0
```
I don't know yet if this problem has been reported.