# IRC log for #webwork, 2012-11-16

All times shown according to UTC.

Time Nick Message
00:48 djun joined #webwork
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01:18 JohnTravis mgage:  Hi
01:32 mgage JOhn_Travis: hi
01:32 JohnTravis Hey.  Long time...
01:33 JohnTravis I've been continuing through the prealgebra course and hove well over 200 new problems.
01:33 mgage yeah -- I've been pretty focused on the CS classes this semester. (Have my midterms done now -- still have a lot of projects to do :-)   )
01:33 mgage wow -- that's great
01:33 JohnTravis ...and extra lots of department chairing stuff.
01:33 JohnTravis Quick question.
01:33 mgage i'll bet
01:33 mgage sure
01:34 JohnTravis Formatting fraction answers with only one part needed...can that be done w/o multianswer?
01:34 JohnTravis The idea is to give a ratio a/b = c/d with one of the terms left as an answer blank.
01:34 mgage explain a bit futher --
01:34 JohnTravis But formatted top over bottom
01:35 mgage you can do that if you use MathJax -- it's a bit hard to embed answer blanks in tex in general
01:36 mgage let me see
01:36 JohnTravis I do use mathjax but haven't been able to find out how.  The ugly version I came up with for one problem was to use a table!
01:36 JohnTravis Multianswer just seems to be way overkill.
01:38 mgage look at PGbasicmacros   tex_ans_rule   around  line 756 -- see if that is what you need -- you also should ask on the forum and in particular Paul Pearson because they might have slicker techniques
01:39 JohnTravis This is why Paul is on the problem authoring workshop!  :)
01:39 JohnTravis Thanks.
01:41 JohnTravis I'll give it a try.  If that works then it will be a much easier fix.
01:42 JohnTravis BTW, one of the reasons I have stuck with this project is so that I am forcing myself to learn techniques.
01:42 mgage I'm not sure that multi-answer i such an over kill  see http://webwork.maa.org/wiki/AlgebraicFractionAnswer1
01:43 JohnTravis Just didn't want to past in a 20 line function that I wasn't really sure how it worked.
01:43 mgage in particular if you do a lot similar problems like this you can capture the common code and put it in a macro package
01:43 JohnTravis I haven't gotten to the adding macros stage yet.  That will come.
01:44 mgage the best way to do it is write several problems first and then when you see you are repeating complicated bits of it too much put them in a macro package
01:44 JohnTravis However I still have issues with remembering to put a comma after adding another macro.  Very frustrating.
01:44 mgage :-)
01:45 JohnTravis Just did that.  Right now working up a word problem that requires the student to enter a formula for the expressed retio and then solve it.
01:46 mgage cool
01:46 JohnTravis Mistake somewhere.  WW said it could not find a solution to #/# = x/# .  :)
01:48 JohnTravis all I want is the formula and not a solution.
02:11 JohnTravis FYI, the problem I'm working on is at http://math.mc.edu/webwork2/PreAlgebra/C06-S02-Proportions/2/ .
02:49 mgage JohnTravis:
02:49 mgage I'm back
02:50 JohnTravis Hey.  Just posted a question to the forum.  Apparently tex_ans_rule does not work from within tex
02:51 mgage yeah -- it's pretty old -- I was looking at the code and it does work in tth (which we no longer use) and probably should work in jsMath and MathJax, but no one has written the code that makes that possible.
02:52 mgage not sure I will have the time right now either -- but bring it up with Davide after Thanksgiving (he is going to have much more time after Thansgiving when his trimester ends) and I think something elegant will get done
02:52 JohnTravis Aha.  If you look at the problem, a really pretty error message shows up in place of the answer box.  That's better than having an page of errors...
02:54 JohnTravis That's ok.  I know that I "could" get it done with multianswer and have it solved the standard way (here is the formula, enter the correct answer below).  Shortcut method would be useful in may instances so I'm still looking...
02:54 mgage brb
02:57 mgage I think it can be arranged -- it's a matter of rewritting the tex_ans_rule() macro so that it does the write thing in MathJax and jsMath nodes -- no one has bothered until now
02:57 mgage right thing
02:58 JohnTravis :)   Code camp!  :)
02:58 mgage yep
02:59 JohnTravis Different subject...when are you planning to arrive in SAN
03:12 mgage ask Davide if he can include the \begin{rawhtml} environment in MathJax -- then I think you can use tex_ans_rule() -- but there may be a better way.
03:12 mgage I'll be coming in Tuesday
03:13 JohnTravis Gotcha.  The pricing is pretty steep from Jackson...$670. I'll be there early since my wife is planning to come and I'd love for her to meet these guys I talk about... 03:14 mgage Jan 8 leaving Sat Jan 12 evening 03:14 mgage I'm getting in to San Diego about 6pm Tuesday 03:14 JohnTravis Red Eye on the 12th. At this moment, trying to decide if the$59 for the Economy Comfort seat up front is worth it.
03:15 mgage Glad she'll get a chance to visit San Diego -- it's a nice place to have a convention
03:15 mgage me too -- red eye coming back
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17:57 Paul_Pearson Mike?
17:58 Paul_Pearson I'm writing a macro to help out JT.
17:59 Paul_Pearson What's the difference between MODES(HTML=>...) and MODES(HTML_dpng=>), and is there a "MathJax / jsMath mode"?
18:00 Paul_Pearson I'm assuming that MODES(HTML=>...) is always applicable when viewing from within the browser, but MODES(HTML_dpng=>...) is not always applicable.  Is that a correct interpretation?
18:01 aubreyja Hi Paul  - MODES(HTML_dpng=>…) is deprecated.  Now, you just need HTML=> and LaTeX=>.  LaTeX always goes to the math engine whether it is images or mathjax
18:01 mgage you can just create one and add it to the tex_ans_rule  place -copying the tth mode is your best bet -- don't now if MathJax has the \begin{rawhtml} environment   look also at the DISPLAY fallover macro in PGbasicmacros.pl -- this tells how things decay -- HTML decays to HTML_dpng which gives an error message when using tex_ans_rule
18:02 mgage you and jason may want to rethink this.  I'm just leaving for my parents house (bit of a crisis there) so I'll be off the air until this evening
18:02 mgage ttyl
18:02 aubreyja ttyl
18:04 Paul_Pearson Have a safe trip.  I hope everything is OK.
18:04 Paul_Pearson Jason: is TeX=> deprecated?
18:05 aubreyja sorry TeX => that's what I meant
18:05 aubreyja not LaTeX=>
18:09 aubreyja btw, if you've got a chance,  you should check out my install script when I finish it.  If everything goes according to plan, it will not only install webwork on any server, but if the server doesn't exist yet, it will go out to newegg.com order a server, assemble and plug it in when it arrives, install an OS, then install webwork.  It will even convince university IT directors and math department chairs to adopt webwork.  All using not
18:09 aubreyja but core perl modules.
18:14 Paul_Pearson It should also order a bag of chips (so that it's really "all that and a bag of chips").
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18:15 aubreyja Nice!  That's a great idea.
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20:36 Paul_Pearson Does anyone have an explanation for why MODES(HTML=>'<table>.... produces a table on a new line (rather than inline?)
20:38 Paul_Pearson More specifically, how can I produce an inline table?
20:54 Paul_Pearson Nevermind.  I think I've found the answer to my own question.
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