Exam View Presentation: JISC Sharing Stories September 2012
1. Exam View
Alex Walker
Web Developer (Learning Technologies)
City of Glasgow College
2. About the College
Glasgow Metropolitan Central College Glasgow College of
College of Commerce Nautical Studies
• Formed in 2011 when three colleges
merged.
• One of Scotland’s biggest colleges.
3. About the College
Bb
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1.9.8
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1.9.8
469 Courses 672 Courses 609 Courses
628 Sta! Accounts 363 Sta! Accounts 157 Sta! Accounts
4. Aims of the Project
• Extending the functionality and
"exibility of the VLE by letting
students see their own results.
• Creating a ‘single point of access’ for
students to access their information.
5. Bene#ts of the Project
• Extending the functionality and
"exibility of the VLE.
• Creating a ‘single point of access’ for
students to access their information.
• Having live access to data lets
students take quick, remedial action.
6. Bene#ts of the Project
• Encourages sta! to input results
into Student Records system
promptly.
• Adds value to the VLE, keeps users
coming back.
7. What We Had Before
• Students could contact their lecturer
to #nd out their results - lots of
admin time for lecturers.
• Printed copies posted to students.
Uses lots of paper, takes time to
arrive.
8. The Challenges
• As a funded project, other
institutions must be able to use it.
• Di!erent institutions use di!erent
student record systems and VLEs.
9. The Solution
• Build Exam View in a layers.
• Front-ends for various VLEs.
• Back-ends for various student record
systems.
• Common ‘language’ so di!erent
layers can communicate.
10. The Solution
Moodle Plain HTML Blackboard
Block Page Front-End
UNITe MySQL Web
(Oracle) Database Service
13. ‘Front End’ Responsibilities
• Integrating into a main system
(Moodle, Blackboard etc)
• Knowing which user to request exam
results for.
• Displaying exam results to the user.
14. ‘Back End’ Responsibilities
• ‘Speaking to’ the student
record system.
• Requesting exam results for a
given user.
• Translating exam results into a
format the front-end can
understand.
15. The Solution
Presentation
Student Model Layer Data Layer
Layer
Request for Exam View page
get_student_id
get_student_results(student_id)
Call to database or data API
Unformatted data layer return
process_records
results (resultRecord[ ])
Page displayed to user
16. Challenges
• Exam View does require technical
skills and liaising with sta! in your
institution.
• Many institutions guard their
student record system, and
rightly so.
17. Challenges
• Jumping through hoops was
required to get access to our
student record system.
• An independent UNITe consultant
gave us the (big) query to pull data
from our UNITe installation.
18. Challenges
• How powerful is your Student
Record system?
• What happens when 5,000 students
try to get their exam results at once?
19. Challenges
• Sta! and students log in to MyCity
using their Novell accounts (LDAP).
• User accounts were set to expire the
day after a student’s course #nished.
• Students couldn’t log in to get
results after their course #nished.
• Communication is key.
20. Challenges
• Initial plan was to show results in a
block in Moodle’s sidebar.
• This space was far too small.
• Created a block that links to a
separate results page.
21. Launching Exam View
• Initially piloted at Glasgow
Metropolitan College.
• College used Blackboard as a VLE,
but was piloting Moodle with #ve
second-year HND courses.
• Installed on the pilot Moodle.
27. Launching College-Wide
• In 2011, we launched a new VLE
built on Moodle 2, called MyCity.
• Migrated existing materials across
and switched o! old VLEs.
• Exam View launched college-wide in
early 2012.
28. How Exam View Evolved
• Our college developed a front-end
for UNITe, called Enquirer.
• After the merger, we decided to go
through Enquirer rather than
through UNITe’s Oracle database.
• We just wrote a new back-end to
look at Enquirer. Nothing else
changed.
33. Publicising Exam View
• There’s nothing magical about the
link in ExamView’s block.
• The results page looks at the logged
in user, then displays the results.
• You can create a link to /blocks/
examview/index.php from anywhere.
36. Publicising Exam View
• No sta! development required.
• Sta! workfold hadn’t changed: still
entering results into the student
record system in the same way.
• Sta! aware of Exam View feature
through MyCity news posts and
all-sta! emails.
38. Analytics
Month Uses
April 2012 1,157
May 2012 4,137
June 2012 13,699
July 2012 1,612
August 2012 802
39. Use of ExamView
• A few institutions have launched, or
are launching ExamView.
• We’ve been contacted by people in
Scotland, England and Algeria.
40. What’s in the Box?
• A ‘moodle block’ folder, ready to add
your chosen back-end to.
• Several sample back-ends that read
UNITe’s database, a MySQL
database, or a simple PHP array.
• Loads of documentation.
41. Before Using ExamView
• This isn’t a simple “drag and drop to
install” block.
• It requires technical knowledge to
connect ExamView to your exam
results database.
• Lots of documentation, but
moderate development skills
are assumed.
42. Before Using ExamView
• You’ll need to explain the situation
to your MIS people. Get them on
board early.
• Make sure your student accounts
don’t expire the day their course
#nishes.
43. Installing Exam View
• Exam View is available from our
development blog.
newsletters.cityofglasgowcollege.ac.uk/examview
• Version 0.91 for Moodle 1.9
• Version 1.01 for Moodle 2.0 - 2.2
44. Documentation
! Exam View System Architecture! Page 1
Using Exam View with Moodle and UNITe
In addition to the Getting Started guide, this is a fast-track guide for getting
Exam View working with UNITe and Moodle.
Exam View
Install the Moodle Block
Rename the ‘moodle_block’ folder to ‘examview’ and copy it to the Block folder
of your Moodle installation. To install it, log in to Moodle and go to
Administration Notifications. This will get Moodle to recognise the Exam
Architecture
View block.
Creating a Database User for Oracle
UNITe uses an Oracle database, so we’ll be using that to get our data. First, you
Diagrams
need to set up a user account that Exam View will use to connect to the
database. You should do this using SQL Plus. Documentation is available here.
You may need to consult your college’s UNITe administrator to get this done.
You should give your new user account read-only access to the database.
Making Exam View Read from Oracle
In Exam View’s block folder, open frontend-moodle.php. At the top there are
Alex Walker
two include() lines. Make sure the back-end one reads backend-oracle.php.
Version 1.1.0
Now, open backend-oracle.php. Near the top of the file, you’ll find three
24th November 2010
variables.
• $oracle_server should contain the address and instance of Oracle you 1.0 Initial Version
1.0.1
Added optional ‘feedback’ element to Exam Results array in network communication diagram.
want to connect to you. For example, 10.0.0.7/ULIVE. 1.1.0 Updates to Exam View data structure. Applies to software version 0.9.1 and later.
• $oracle_username is the username you set up in Oracle for Exam View.
• $oracle_password is the password you set up in Oracle for Exam View.
There is another variable called $oracle_query. The supplied query should
work with any UNITe installation, provided you have set up the username,
password and permissions correctly. You can, of course, change the SQL as
necessary.
45. What’s Next for Exam View
• Refactor code to make it properly
object oriented, using an Interface
for front-end and back-end.
• Rewrite Moodle block to better use
Moodle 2’s theme framework.
• Use a view for UNITe’s Oracle
database, rather than the big query.
