{"id":705,"date":"2015-02-05T15:14:53","date_gmt":"2015-02-05T15:14:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.numbas.org.uk\/numbas\/?p=655"},"modified":"2015-02-05T15:14:53","modified_gmt":"2015-02-05T15:14:53","slug":"a-new-part-type-matrix-entry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.numbas.org.uk\/theme-testing\/blog\/2015\/02\/a-new-part-type-matrix-entry\/","title":{"rendered":"A new part type: matrix entry"},"content":{"rendered":"

We’ve got a pretty big new feature for Numbas this week – a whole new part type! The\u00a0matrix entry<\/em> part asks the student to enter a matrix.<\/p>\n

In the past, we’ve hacked together questions where we ask the student to enter a matrix by putting a load of gapfills in a table. That was very laborious to set up, and the user experience for the student wasn’t particularly great.<\/p>\n

The matrix entry part is meant to make all this a lot smoother – you give a JME matrix variable as the correct answer, and the student is shown a (optionally resizable) grid of cells to enter their answer.<\/p>\n

It works like this:<\/p>\n

\"numbas<\/p>\n

The student\u00a0picks the size of their answer, then enters numbers in each of the cells. It’s marked as correct if\u00a0the matrix they give exactly matches the one you give.<\/p>\n

If you want, you can lock the size of the answer matrix, so\u00a0the student doesn’t have to be shown the size picker interface. That looks like this:\"numbas<\/p>\n

There are a few other options:<\/p>\n