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List:       php-general
Subject:    Re: [PHP] php quiz script/tutorial
From:       Adam Richardson <simpleshot () gmail ! com>
Date:       2010-04-27 18:32:53
Message-ID: m2me4d8ea9d1004271132ja334f56fhf591b4d5ef3e0c1e () mail ! gmail ! com
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On Tue, Apr 27, 2010 at 12:55 PM, tedd <tedd.sperling@gmail.com> wrote:

> At 4:12 PM +0100 4/26/10, Paul Jinks wrote:
>
>> I'm considering my options for making quizzes mostly multiple choice
>> type of thing, but also 'filling in the gaps'. This is in support of
>> educational materials I'm working on. So far I've looked at Flash and
>> javascript but have concerns about accessibility for both of these.
>>
>> Does anyone have any experience of writing quizzes with php and if so,
>> can you recommend any resources to get me started?
>>
>> TIA
>>
>> Paul
>>
>
> Paul:
>
> I have written surveys/quizzes, but have not found a lot of resources for
> it.
>
> I use javascript usually to handle minor user things, such as "Please
> answer the question before moving on" or "Rank these items in order of
> importance", or other such immediate demands of the user, but still the user
> input not to be trusted. IOW, you still have to scrub everything.
>
> While I could use Flash, I choose not for it would simply make my work-load
> harder.
>
> Quizzes and such are just a long cascade of forms.
>
> I usually use one form and populate it with questions (content and type)
> from a database. Then when the user submits their data, I then save the
> answer as a independent record with ties to the "test", "question" and
> responder. The database design takes some thought to set up correctly.
>
> In the end, there is not really anything that hard about this, it's just
> collecting information from the user via a form and storing that information
> in a database.
>
> Cheers,
>
> tedd
>
>
>
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>
If you were going to use Flash, I'd go the Flex route as it makes short work
of this kind of view.

Ted already mentioned the DB route using PHP, but you could also use PHP to
set up an XML schema that represents quizes (e.g., <quiz><question
id="1"><text>Will this work?</text><options><option>Yes this
will.</option><option>No it won't.</option></options></question><email>
responses@msu.edu</email></quiz>)  With this type of scheme (one in which
the html form is automatically built up from an XML document), you could
just have the results emailed to an account as individual TSV file
attachments (that's why I included the email tag in the example above),
making it easy for anyone to tally the results after dragging the documents
into Excel.

Last, you can also leverage existing technologies.  In addition to quiz
generators available online, Google Docs allows you to create forms that
store responses in spreadsheets (Create New -> Form).  You can choose from a
variety of response types (text, multiple choice, etc.), and it works quite
well.

Just tossing out ideas ;)

Adam

-- 
Nephtali:  PHP web framework that functions beautifully
http://nephtaliproject.com


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