Re: [WWdevel] parser fun_cmp() error?

[Michael G. <ga...@ma...>]

Hi all,

I added the debug option so that I could see what was going wrong in  
various problems with fun_cmp.  I've slowly been modifying
the debug display so that it is more readable.  It is still a bit too  
verbose however, since it is supposed to be useful for
any type of answer evaluator.  Adding specialized features to debug  
(e.g. when debug = 2 instead of 1) might give
only some of the debugging information, such as the points and values  
where the students answer and the instructors answer are compared.
This would be easier to interpret for most instructors.  A graph  
would be even better, but a bit more work.

I have no objection to retrofitting the current debug facility to  
accommodate a wider variety of debugging output -- including the two  
types mentioned above.
The current debug facility was meant as a stub to get the ball  
rolling and is by no means written in stone.  Let's make it more  
useful and easier to use.

Take care,

Mike
>
> This problem has got me thinking about whether it would be possible  
> to help the professor out with analyzing their functions and  
> telling them if they are nearly linear, for example, or if the  
> values are very large or very small, or if the value of the  
> function varies greatly if the constants are varied slightly, and  
> other such things that could cause numeric instability.  It would  
> be possible to set a flag that starts "testing mode" and have the  
> answer checker report these sorts of potential problems.  Even just  
> producing a graph of the function on the default range might be  
> illuminating.  Do you think this might be helpful?
>
> Davide
>