Overview

1. Software that resides on a standard web server
2. Works in conjunction with ReadyGo Web Course Builder
3. Supports student registration
4. Grades student tests
5. Saves student test scores
6. Saves student survey results
7. Includes online reporting capabilities that make it easy for trainers to track test scores and to view test progress by question, test, course, or student.
   View sample reports

What is Server-Side Testing?

1. CGI script that resides on a web server and stores student names and results on that server in a comma-separated file.
2. Course authors set up student registration and test grading options in ReadyGo Web Course Builder.
3. Supports registration and result submitted by multiple students at once.
4. To support easy integration, we provide source code for the Server-Side Testing module.
5. Server-Side Testing is written in C.

Features of Server-Side grading and storage

1. Storage of just test scores or of scores plus all student answers.
2. Option to pre-register students or allow students to self-register.
3. Supports an unlimited number of students.
4. Unlimited number of self-registered students.
5. Course authors can define up to 20 registration fields such as last name, first name, department, and location.
6. Course authors can choose to require a password for student registration.
7. Option to have test questions and answers randomly ordered each time a student takes the test.
8. Tests can be generated and stored by server or just stored by server.
9. Option to include or exclude individual questions in the student's total score. (This might be used for a survey question.)
10. Advanced feature - Ability for the course author to create hidden parameters that are stored with the test results. You can use hidden parameters for customization or storage of test results with existing systems.
11. Creation of student certificates after completing a test or course
12. Track amount of time student is on a test page
13. Course author can select a central student dataset to be shared between courses
14. Test question pooling
15. Ability to launch SST and register students from a URL
16. Utility to make it easier to download student files from the server
17. Central storage of each event: SST can be configured so that every time someone takes a test (in any course), their score, name, date, testname, coursename, etc. is stored in a single file that can summarize everything that has happened. It can also be configured that information is stored when someone registers, is denied access, is denied access to a test, or requests a certificate

Registration capabilities

1. Students may self-register - No password is required. This option allows for storage of results from any one taking a course.
2. Students with a password may self-register - This option allows all students who have been given a password to register and take the course.
3. Students must be pre-registered - Course author identifies students who may take the course and uses ReadyGo Web Course Builder to create a student list.
4. Scores are only saved if a student is registered.
5. Automatic re-registration - repeat students are automatically registered
6. The student identifier and password are stored as cookies on the student's browser.
7. The course administrator can change the password at any time. All students need to re-enter the password if it has been changed.

Student and tracking reports

1. ReadyGo automatically generates the following reports:
1. Student List - list of registered students, date they took the course
2. Individual test report - answer for each test question by student
3. Certificate report - report on students that receive a course certificate
4. Course Grade Book - list of registered students with scores for each tests and a total/aggregate score
5. Cross- Course Grade Book - lists student's scores for each test and overall course score for all courses that share the same student list
2. Information tracked:
1. Course creator can customize up to 20 fields such as first name, last name, department, and employee ID.
2. Answer for each test question
3. Answer for every test, each time a student takes a test
4. Date and time the student takes a test
5. Elapsed time on test
6. Student IP
3. Raw Results File - report information is saved in a CSV file. Easy download of raw data to Excel, a report generator, or a database.
4. Course authors can customize the reports using style sheets (CSS)
5. Admin groups - You can set up groups of students within a course or between courses. Managers can then be given access to specific admin groups. This way large groups of students can take a course and managers can be given access to the grades of only a select group of students.
6. An e-mail can be automatically sent to an administrator when an event occurs.
7. Test result can be easily removed from reports for any individual. When we added a limit on the number of times someone could take a test, it raised the problem of how to give people another chance to take that test again. We now have a simple HTML page that can be used as an interface. The author provides the user name, course name, test name, number of test instances to "remove", and a password. This will change the userID on specific results so that when SST counts up the number of times someone has taken the test, it skips over them.

Server-Side Testing requirements

1. Standard web server that support CGI such as IIS, Apache; or ISP account
2. NT, Unix, Linux, Solaris
3. Pentium 200 or faster
   1. Memory as recommended for the operating system
   2. SST application is approximately 300KB

Student requirements

1. The student must accept two cookies set by Server-Side Testing. Normally this is invisible to the student.
2. The student must enable JavaScript in their browser.

Test questions supported

1. Multiple choice (one correct answer)
2. Select from Pull-down question (one correct answer)
3. True/False (one correct answer)
4. Text fill-in-the-blank (text string answer must match expected results. Case insensitive.)
5. Numeric fill-in-the-blank (answer must match expected results exactly or be within a specified range)
6. Multiple Selection (Pull-down) question (one or more correct answers)
7. Ranking/Sequence question (requires students to put the answers provided in the correct or preferred order)
8. Picture Click Multiple Choice question (one correct answer)
9. Picture Click Single Region question (one correct answer)
10. Matching Column question
11. Drag-drop Matching Column question
12. Drag-drop Matching to Image question
13. Custom question (incorporate any type of question in JavaScript or any web-readable code)
14. Per answer feedback

Survey questions supported

1. Multiple choice (one answer)
2. Select from Pull-down question (one correct answer)
3. True/False (One answer)
4. Text fill-in-the-blank
5. Numeric fill-in-the-blank
6. Multiple Selection (Pull-down) question (one or more correct answers)
7. Ranking/Sequence question (requires students to put the answers provided in the correct or preferred order)
8. Multiple selection (student may select multiple answers - "Which of the following apply…")
9. Preference/Likert (student selects from a scale. For example, strongly disagree to strongly agree with five possible levels, plus a "not applicable" choice)
10. Picture Click Multiple Choice question (one correct answer)
11. Picture Click Single Region question (one correct answer)
12. Matching Column question
13. Drag-drop Matching Column question
14. Drag-drop Matching to Image question
15. Custom question (incorporate any type of question in JavaScript or any web-readable code)

Server-Side Testing storage architecture

1. Server-Side Testing is a C program that resides on a web server. It works in conjunction with a course created using ReadyGo Web Course Builder.
2. The course author creates the tests and sets up student registration in ReadyGo Web Course Builder.
3. The course author transfers each course's test files to the Server-Side Testing subdirectory.
4. Student information is stored in a group of flat ASCII files on the server. A course author needs to have access to the server to view student information.
5. Programs like Microsoft Excel or any database can read the flat ASCII file.
6. ReadyGo provides source code for Server-Side Testing. A C programmer can modify the code. Most often this would be done to create an automatic routine to save student information into a database.