Grtex

A system for making up computer-graded exams in multiple versions

Grtex is a system for writing computer-graded exams, both multiple-choice and numerical answer questions, in latex. It consists of latex macros and a program for extracting questions from a set of possible ones and producing multiple versions. This document outlines the writing of the source file using the macros --- for running the grtex program on that file to produce the multiple versions, see Running Grtex. The details explaining how to put together the source file for a grtex exam is the examexample file, available both as LaTeX source and as a PDF file.

That file explains the numerous formats for the questions. It also gives some recommendations about how one can use a single database file for all your questions, serving for many years and sharable with colleagues. But the file explains only the LaTeX part of grtex, that is, a set of latex macros which make it easy to formulate exam questions in a form that the other part of grtex can use to make exams in multiple versions.

A grtex input file consists of several required parts in order:

The source for an exam source.tex in grtex format can (and should) be run through latex for debugging before running it through the grtex program. It should also be checked for being free of non-ascii characters and too-long lines with /physics/local/bin/longestline source.tex and /physics/local/bin/nonascii source.tex. The longest line should be no more than 99 characters, and there should be no non-ascii characters reported. Then you are ready to run grtex, which will select the problems and make the multiple versions. This is described in Running Grtex.

The best way to get started is to copy the file examex.template and add what you want. But if you are using one of the databases already in existance for your course, you should follow the instructions in Using a Database.

Here are some other documents which describe grtex. They are somewhat older.


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Joel Shapiro
(shapirophysics) Last modified: Tue Jul 24 14:17:38 2018