Verifying Submission Method

This can be done with some support from the submit command. As there is no other convenient builtin method, it is possible to misuse submit's file_filter capability, as explained at FileFilterSubmitMethodCheck. This article assumes the directory naming convention used there.

Say there's a directory within the in hierarchy called N. It either must inherit the external language from a parent directory, or have (language external) in an options.ss file at that level. There should also be a test.exe file in this directory, with contents such as the following (which can be extended if/when other submit methods become possible, such as via a button extension inside of DrScheme):

#!/usr/bin/env bash

outputdir="/u/$course/submethod_log"
method="$1"

if [ -e "$outputdir/$student.$method" ]; then
   echo '100' >&3
   echo '' >&4
else
   echo '0' >&3
   echo "No evidence of submission with $method found" >&4
fi

Then, subdirectories of N can contain options.ss files with contents like

(args "odyssey")
(desc "Detection of submission with the Odyssey web system")

or

(args "submit")
(desc "Detection of submission with the command-line submit command")

This can be of particular use in a public test for assignment 0, when students are going through an orientation with the various tools at their disposals.

An alternative which combines these into a single test can be to use a setup like the following; however, with a check for more than two items, something more clever should be done to minimize code bloat:

#!/usr/bin/env bash

outputdir="/u/$course/submethod_log"

file1="$outputdir/$student.odyssey"
file2="$outputdir/$student.submit"

if [ -e "$file1" ]; then
   if [ -e "$file2" ]; then
      echo '100' >&3
      echo '' >&4
   else
      echo '50' >&3
      echo 'Odyssey was used to submit the assignment, but the command line was not.' >&4
   fi
elif [ -e "$file2" ]; then
   echo '50' >&3
   echo 'The command line was used to submit the assignment, but Odyssey was not.' >&4
else
   echo '0' >&3
   echo 'No evidence of submission was found.' >&4  # !????
fi

Note that the final else case should never happen. No supporting arguments from the options file are required.