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Monster Media 1996 #15
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Monster Media Number 15 (Monster Media)(July 1996).ISO
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QUIZ.PAR
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1996-04-26
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Command line options:
The "command line" refers to what was typed at the DOS
prompt to start the Create A Quiz program. For example, if
your Create A Quiz disk is located in drive A:, your screen
should display an "A>" prompt. When you type the letters
"QUIZ" before you press the [ENTER] key, you are at the
"command line".
Additional text can be appended to the command line
after the key word "QUIZ" that will instruct Create A Quiz
to perform certain functions not available through the menu
selections.
Please note that the following options are NOT
available in the "Lite" version of Create A Quiz. Command
line options are only available in the full-featured
Teacher's and Student's versions.
QUIZ filename.QZ
If a name of an existing .QZ file is added on the
command line after the key word "QUIZ", then that .QZ file
will be automatically presented to the user once the
program starts. In such cases the "Main Menu" will be
skipped, and the student will be greeted with a prompt to
enter his name, followed by the quiz. In the above example
replace the word "filename" with the actual name of the
quiz you wish to use. If your quiz is called "MATH.QZ"
then you must enter "QUIZ MATH.QZ" on the command line
before running the program.
Command line instructions can be combined or placed in
any order. In other words, the following command line
instructions are all acceptable:
QUIZ TIMEOUT=10 QTY=20
The command line instructions above will cause the
program to end after 10 minutes of play have elapsed or 20
random questions have been attempted, whichever comes first.
The remainder of the command line options are listed
below in ALPHABETICAL order:
------------------------------------------------------------
QUIZ COMMA=x
This command line option is only useful for those
users living outside of North America. Here's the problem
for our international users: In the USA a decimal number
uses a "." period character to separate the fractional part
from the whole number (e.g., "$4.50", or "a 2.0 liter
bottle of Coke". In European countries, however, the
practice is to use a comma "," instead of a "." period. So
in our example above, you would have "$4,50", or "a 2,0
liter bottle of Coke". A problem therefore exists when
teachers are creating "fill-in-the-blank" quizzes since the
comma character is used to separate each possible correct
answer. How then does the program know the difference
between a comma used in a decimal number and a comma used
to separate multiple fill-in-the-blank answers? The answer
is to use the COMMA=x parameter, and replace "x" with the
actual character you wish to use as a separator between
multiple "fill-in-the-blank" answers. We recommend using a
semi-colon "COMMA=;" however you may wish to use another
character if you desire.
QUIZ CONFIRM
For those student of yours who are heavy handed, or
all thumbs, you can give them the opportunity to change
their answer/response to a quiz by adding the command line
parameter "CONFIRM". After the student selects/inputs his
response, a confirmation window will appear asking the
student if he is sure that he wants to accept his response,
with an option to return to the question and choose/input a
different answer. After the student has confirmed his
response, his response will be judged "Correct" or "Wrong".
QUIZ DISPLAY filename.QZ
The above command line instructions force Create A Quiz
into a continuous loop using "filename.QZ". When a player
is prompted for his name, the program will insist that the
user input his FULL name, AND address, city, state, zip and
phone number before they can participate in the quiz
specified by "filename.QZ". This "DISPLAY" command line
instruction (with .QZ file) turns Create A Quiz into an
excellent sales or promotional tool for businesses and
organizations. For example, a company that specializes in
selling and installing home water filters can create a
"WATER.QZ" file that presents several questions that tests
a prospective client's knowledge of tap water, chlorine,
heavy metals, cost comparisons, etc. If Create A Quiz has
been started with the "WATER.QZ DISPLAY" command line
instructions, then WATER.QZ will be presented to each
client that approaches the company's computer display.
Each user's name and address are stored in a file called
"USER.LST". The "USER.LST" file can later be retrieved and
used to print out mailing labels or possible client list.
Should you wonder how to stop Create A Quiz from looping
into eternity in the "DISPLAY" mode, enter "GOODBYE" when
the input window prompts for a user's full name. Of course
you could reboot your computer, but that's not very
graceful...
QUIZ ENFORCE QTY=15
The command line parameter "ENFORCE" when used with
"STOPAT=" or "STARTAT=" or "QTY=" parameters will prevent a
student from exiting the program/quiz until the specified
range or quantity of questions have been attempted.
QUIZ FIBCHAR=x
The way Create A Quiz determines whether a question is
a multiple-choice or fill-in-the-blank type is by use of
the underscore "_" character. If an "_" appears in a
question (anywhere) then that question is assumed to be a
multiple-choice type question. However, there are times
where you would prefer to have a different character
determine this, therefore use the FIBCHAR=x command line
parameter where "x" is replaced with the actual single
character that will determine whether a question is
fill-in-the-blank or not.
QUIZ LOGFILE=xxxx
The command line parameter LOGFILE=xxxx will save ALL
questions and choices presented to the student, AND the
student's response. Replace "xxxx" with a legal DOS file
name. Included in this log file will be the student's
name, quiz name, date, time, and a summary of attempts,
correct responses, etc.
QUIZ LOG1ST
The command line parameter LOG1ST is used in
conjunction with the QUIZ.WHO file (see advanced features
section). LOG1ST will cause the student input prompt
window to appear only once EVER. If the student attempts a
second quiz on another day, there will be no expanded input
prompts to greet them (asking for address, city, phone,
whatever...). How does the program know whether the
student is using the program for the first time? Because
when LOG1ST is used, it will automatically delete the
QUIZ.WHO file if it exists. Since the QUIZ.WHO is used to
determine what input prompts are displayed, if it does not
exist, then no expanded prompts will appear. So in review,
LOG1ST with a QUIZ.WHO file will cause an expanded player
input field window to display the first time the student
uses a quiz. The program will then automatically delete
the QUIZ.WHO file, which means any future uses of the
program will NOT display an expanded player input prompt
window.
QUIZ LPT=filename
This parameter allows you to redirect printouts of
quizzes (from the editor) to an ASCII disk file by using
the command line parameter LPT=filename. Replace "filename"
with a legal DOS file name.
QUIZ NAME=xxxx
This parameter allows you to pass the name of a single
student/user to Create A Quiz. By passing this value the
"Please enter your name:" prompt will not appear when a
student selects a quiz. Example: QUIZ NAME=MIKE If the
name you are using consists of more than one name, then use
an underscore character "_" to connect each name (example:
QUIZ NAME=MIKE_R._JONES).
QUIZ NODOC
This parameter is only valid with the STUDENT'S
EDITION of Create A Quiz. This will prevent access to the
on-screen documentation file (what you are currently
reading).
QUIZ NODUPES
The command line instruction above when used in
conjunction with random question mode will ensure that no
duplicating questions will be given to the student. In
other words, each question presented to the student will
appear only once (i.e., no duplicates).
QUIZ NOEDIT * Not currently available
The NOEDIT command line parameter will remove the
"Create" and "Edit" selections from the Main Menu in the
Teacher's Edition. This is used when you want to prevent
students from accessing or tampering with your quizzes.
QUIZ NOOPTS
This command line parameter will suppress/withhold the
"Play Options Menu". This will prevent the student from
changing the question order, printout, or repeat errors
options. You canNOT currently combine the NOOPTS and
RESTRICT (see above) parameters, since some form of
introductory menu will always be necessary.
QUIZ NOPCT
The teacher can customize what appears on the top
status line with the command line parameters "NOPCT" or
"NOSTATS". The former will display the following:
┌─────────────────────── WHO'S WHO ────────────────────────┐
│ Name: James Attempts: 4 Left: 3 │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
If you wish to suppress all of the status line use "NOSTATS"
and you will instead have the following header:
┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ WHO'S WHO - LESSON 1 - FAMOUS MEN │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
QUIZ NOQS
Adding the command line parameter "NOQS" will turn off
the familiar ? ¿ wallpaper symbols that appear on the
screen.
QUIZ NOREVIEW
When a student takes a quiz in which a multiple-choice
question is presented, the student has to select from a
list of possible correct answers. If the student picks the
wrong answer, the message "xyz IS INCORRECT!" At this point
the student may still not know the correct answer. Also at
this point an instruction prompt at the bottom of the
screen offers the student to reveal the answer (or review
the choices) by pressing the [R] key. Should the teacher
wish to withhold this prompt, and prevent the student from
discovering the correct answer he missed, add the NOREVIEW
parameter on the command line when starting Create A Quiz.
QUIZ NOSCORE
If you DON'T want your students' progress or scores
recorded via the scoreboard, add "NOSCORE" to the command
line.
QUIZ PLAYERS=1
If you would like to skip over the "How many students
are participating?:" prompt when your users begin using a
quiz (particularly when ONLY ONE USER would ever be taking
your quiz), then specify the number of participants on the
command line with "PLAYERS=x" where "x" is replaced with
actual number of participants.
QUIZ QTY=x
The above "QTY=" command line option can be used to
force Create A Quiz to stop and return to DOS after "x"
number of random questions have been attempted by the
student. You can replace the "x" with any positive number
that you wish. For example, "QUIZ QTY=20".
QUIZ REFNOTES
The parameter REFNOTES will AUTOMATICALLY display any
EXTENDED LENGTH reference notes that are associated with a
question during play after the student has entered their
answer. Any reference notes will be displayed in a full-
screen window for easier reading. If REFNOTES is not used
(default), then the student taking a quiz will have to
press the [D] key to manually display any extended length
reference notes.
QUIZ RESTRICT filename.QZ
The additional word "RESTRICT" on the command line
will prevent the student/user from reaching the "Main
Menu". This is useful if you have given the program disk
to a student and have created a batch file to force the
student to use a particular quiz, but you do not want the
student to gain access to the "Main Menu" where he may be
able to change your questions or answers, or peek and
cheat.
QUIZ SCOREALL
The student taking a quiz will be allowed to determine
whether they want their scores recorded to the scoreboard
when they are finished. If the teacher wishes to eliminate
this option, forcing the student's score to be compared to
the top 10 scoreboard instead, then add the SCOREALL
parameter. Although SCOREALL will not guarantee that your
student's score will be added to the top 10, it will
guarantee that the student's score will be compared with
the current scoreboard. If you want to guarantee that your
student's score is recorded to the scoreboard, then delete
the *.SCB scoreboard file before taking the quiz. By
deleting the appropriate *.SCB scoreboard file, your
student's score will definitely be recorded in the
scoreboard since there will be no other scores to compete
against.
QUIZ SCORELOG=ON
Since the scoreboard only records the top 10 high
scores, there may be times when your student/user obtains a
score worth knowing about and yet falls short of making it
into the "top ten" scoreboard. To maintain a record log of
your user's scores (regardless of the score), use the
"SCORELOG=ON" parameter. This will cause Create A Quiz to
maintain a file with all user's scores, along with date and
quiz used. The file generated will be straight ASCII text
and will automatically be named "SCORE.LOG".
QUIZ SCRAMBLE
When taking a multiple choice quiz, you will notice
that the "pick list" of possible answer choices appears
exactly in the same order as the answers were entered by
the teacher when first creating that question. In other
words, if a multiple choice question exists where...
Question: How much is 1 + 1?
Answer: 2
Answer: 4
Answer: 6
Answer: 8
Answer: 11
...when your student is presented this question within a
quiz on the screen, the order of answers "2,4,6,8,11" will
be identical to the order in which the teacher entered
them. If, however, you would like to see the order of
answers SCRAMBLED up, then add the "SCRAMBLE" command line
parameter when starting QUIZ. The scramble that will occur
will vary from moment to moment, so that if a question was
to reappear twice, the order of answers would be different
from the first appearance.
QUIZ STARTAT=10 STOPAT=20
The above combination of "STARTAT=" and "STOPAT="
commands instruct Create A Quiz to start at a specific
question number and to display subsequent questions
sequentially (10, 11, 12,...19, 20). Once the number
designated by "STOPAT=" is reached, the program will exit
to DOS. If you use "STARTAT=" without a "STOPAT="
statement, Create A Quiz will still proceed with questions
sequentially until the very last question is reach, and
then will terminate.
QUIZ SURVEY
Create A Quiz can be transformed into "Create A
Survey", with the command line parameter "SURVEY". What
this parameter does is turn off all scoring (no score
header, no scoreboard), and records all responses from the
student during a quiz in an ASCII file "RECORD.LOG". The
student's name, the quiz, the date and time, in addition to
all the responses to the questions are maintained in the
RECORD.LOG file on the default disk. There are no right or
wrong answer messages displayed when "SURVEY" is used.
QUIZ TIMEOUT=x
The above "TIMEOUT=" command line option can be used
to force Create A Quiz to stop and return to DOS after "x"
number of minutes have elapsed since the first question was
attempted by the student. You can replace the "x" with any
positive number that you wish. For instance, "QUIZ
TIMEOUT=5" will cause the program to end after 5 minutes of
play have elapsed.
QUIZ 4AGRADE
If you as a teacher would like to grade your students'
knowledge of a quiz but do not want them to know how they
scored, then use the command line parameter "4AGRADE".
This command will instruct Create A Quiz to 1) suppress the
"Correct" or "Wrong" result window; 2) suppress the status
header from displaying "Correct:" and "Percent:". The
teacher will find the student's answers/responses in a file
called "RECORD.LOG" and their scores in the "SCORE.LOG"
file.
------------------------------------------------------------
With all the above command line parameters now
available, it can get very crowded at the DOS prompt when
you try to create a custom environment for your students.
To eliminate the lengthy DOS command line startup, the user
can now create a QUIZ.CFG file and enter the parameters
into that file rather than type the parameters at the DOS
prompt. Here's an example... Instead of typing...
QUIZ TESTME.QZ NODUPES STARTAT=1 SCRAMBLE
...at the DOS prompt you can create an ASCII file, and on
line #1 of the QUIZ.CFG file place just the following text:
TESTME.QZ NODUPES STARTAT=1 SCRAMBLE
Next time when you start the program (just type QUIZ)
the QUIZ.CFG will be looked for, and if it exists, the
first line will be loaded and the parameters used.
If you wish to ENCRYPT your QUIZ.CFG file, to prevent
users from modifying your setup, you can accomplish this by
starting the Teacher's version with the following command
line: QUIZ ENCRYPT QUIZ.CFG
The above command will automatically invoke Create A
Quiz and instruct it to take the existing QUIZ.CFG file and
rewrite it to disk as a READ-ONLY, ENCRYPTED QUIZ.CFG file
(with CRC verification), and then exit the program. The
next time you type "QUIZ", the encrypted QUIZ.CFG file will
then be used.
If you attempt to delete an encrypted QUIZ.CFG file,
you will be unsuccessful, since it is READ-ONLY. You must
reset the file attribute with DOS' ATTRIB -R QUIZ.CFG
command. Once reset, you can then delete the QUIZ.CFG and
create a new one.
