22nd of June 2025

This article contains this release's feature updates, user interface changes and bug fixes.

Release date	Environment
5th of June 2025	Stage (stage.ans.app)
22nd of June 2025	Production (ans.app)  Education (edu.ans.app)

 

Updates to important changes

Previously, important changes were communicated alongside the release. From now on, important changes will not be communicated in the release articles or the pre release notes email. Instead, all new important changes will be documented as new articles in our help centre.

This change was made to allow some announcements to be shared earlier, as decisions about different changes are often made at different times.

To receive instant notifications when a new article about a scheduled important change is published, click the "Follow" button in the dedicated important changes section.

Additionally, a separate email providing an overview of new scheduled important changes will be sent on the last Monday of each month, provided there are changes to share.

Changes to the platform

Improvements to editing exercises in an assignment

We’ve improved exercises to make your workflow quicker and easier.

Smooth scrolling in long assignments

Exercises now load automatically as you scroll on the content, grading scheme, and objectives pages. This makes it faster to reach and edit the last exercise, especially when there are many. You no longer need to scroll down in steps, waiting for each set of exercises to load.

Intuitive drag-and-drop

To make it clearer that you can drag to reorder, a drag handle (6 dots) now appears next to exercises or questions where this is supported.

• On written assignments, exercises and questions have a drag handle on the content page
• On digital tests, exercises have a drag handle on the flow page, and questions on the content page
• On hand-in and appraisal assignments, exercises and questions have a drag handle on the grading scheme page

Easier syncing with the question bank

Exercises linked to the question bank now have a yellow border if changes occur. A label displays if your exercise is outdated or the latest version, along with the date it was last updated. This helps to understand which version is newer.

Better flow group control

Flow groups now allow either all exercises or a specific number to be included. New digital tests start with one flow group that includes all exercises by default. When you add a new exercise, it’s placed at the bottom of the flow group. You can then reorder exercises by dragging them, without the need to move flow groups.

If you’re using multiple flow groups, you can choose the desired group when creating or editing an exercise. The exercise will be placed at the bottom of the selected group.

We also now show how points are distributed by displaying the points for each exercise within its flow group.

In addition, the enumeration of exercises and questions has been removed on the left side of an assignment. The change was made in the context of assignments using flow. In those cases, the numbering of exercises in the sidebar doesn’t match the preview when a flow group selects X out of Y exercises. 

Reuse exercises across assignments

Exercises can be copied to any assignment within the current or future school years, even across different courses. If the assignment uses flow groups, easily select the right group to place the copied exercise.

 

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Improvements to the grading experience

The grading scheme for questions that are graded using points per criterion or rubric with levels has been redesigned to improve the grading experience.

Since this redesign involves many changes, users can choose when to switch to the new version. The new scheme can be tried out at any time, with the option to return to the previous version. This allows a gradual transition at each user’s own pace.

Below is an overview of all the changes included in this new experience.

Hand-in assignment layout

For hand-in assignments, all questions for a single exercise were previously shown together, unlike written assignments and digital tests. To align this behaviour across assignment types, the default layout now shows one question at a time. If preferred, the entire exercise or result can still be graded at once using a dialog. This dialog displays all questions using points or criteria, along with the total score at the bottom.

Keyboard grading

Grading using the keyboard already reduced the number of clicks required. The first 9 criteria could be toggled with keyboard shortcuts, and Enter could be used to move between questions. Keyboard grading now also works for questions with more than 9 criteria, using the QWERTY layout. Each criterion is labelled with its corresponding key, and tooltips appear when hovering over buttons to explain the available shortcuts.

The spacebar shortcut, previously used to toggle all criteria with positive points, is no longer supported. This shortcut proved difficult to explain, and with the our plan to support for grading questions that include criteria groups, there is no longer a clear place for it in the interface.

Reduced scrolling

Flags, discussions, and the grading scheme are all listed on the review page. To reduce scrolling and improve focus, more information can now be hidden. In addition to toggling the display of the exercise, question, model answer, and objectives, the description of criteria can now also be toggled using the collapse button or the shortcut “Shift + C.” When collapsed, only the title of each criterion is shown. For rubric questions, this is the level title. For point-based questions—where criteria do not have separate titles—the title is a truncated version of the description. To customise this, a title can be added or edited directly in the criterion settings. Collapsing criteria reduces the space used by the grading scheme and allows more room for flags or discussions.

Sticky total points

In grading schemes with many criteria, toggling a criterion at the bottom of the list required scrolling to the top to see the total score. The total awarded points are now always visible, as the total is sticky during interaction. The colour of the score also changes based on whether the question is ungraded, fully graded, or partially graded. This colour matches the question tiles on the left of the review screen, providing consistent visual feedback.

In-place grading scheme editing

Sometimes the grading scheme needs to be adjusted during the review process, such as changing how points are awarded or deducted. Previously, editing the scheme meant leaving the review page, resulting in lost context. It is now possible to edit the grading scheme directly while grading. Descriptions can be changed, and criteria can be added, copied, or deleted without leaving the review flow.

Reusing adjustments

Previously used criteria comments could already be reused. This is now also possible for point adjustments. Recent adjustments are shown when adding a new one, making it easier to grade consistently and efficiently. When reusing adjustments, both the comment and point value are applied.

Tracking changes after discussions

When the grading scheme is changed after a student starts a discussion, the affected criteria are now marked. A green or red triangle highlights any changes made after the discussion was posted, helping clarify what has changed and when.

Grading time tracking The new grading experience no longer tracks time spent on grading. Tracking was often inaccurate and incomplete, so it will be removed entirely once the old grading scheme is no longer available.

Rollout and availability There is currently no set timeline for making the new scheme the default. Feedback from users will help determine when this change happens. The new grading scheme is only available for digital tests, written assignments, and hand-in assignments. 

 

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Added a new way to generate assignments within a question bank

You can now generate assignments to a specific course directly from the question bank assignments page by creating a custom blueprint. Each blueprint is made up of flow sections with their own filters and defined total points values. The point value represents the sum of all exercises within that section. Because blueprints are linked to your question bank, the number of matching exercises in each section will update automatically when exercises are added or removed.

To improve clarity, the existing blueprint functionality has been renamed to Legacy blueprints and can still be accessed in the fact_check Objectives tab of your question bank. There is currently no set timeline for making the new blueprint the default. Feedback from users will help determine when this change happens.

Previously, assignment generation relied heavily on the use of domains and objectives. Filters had to be re-entered each time, and there was little visibility into whether the final assignment matched the intended criteria. Point values across exercises weren’t always consistent, users had limited control over the exercise order, and enemy relations between exercises were not respected. The new blueprint system removes the reliance on objectives, gives you more flexibility in how exercises are selected, and makes it easier to get started with assignment generation.

To convert a legacy blueprint into a new blueprint, open the legacy blueprint and click on "Convert to blueprint". The blueprint will be created instantly and opened automatically, allowing you to continue working without interruption.

When creating a new blueprint, you can click on "New flow section" to create a new section. Flow sections can be renamed, duplicated or deleted, with duplicated sections retaining their existing filters for consistency and efficiency.

We've introduced a flow section overview on the left side, allowing you to easily navigate between sections, create new ones, and rearrange them using drag-and-drop. Selecting a section will automatically scroll to its position for a seamless editing experience.

In each flow section, you can define the total number of points, filter by question type, set objectives, tags, and labels, and choose whether exercises are fixed or randomised. The number of matching exercises is displayed based on your selected filters, updating in real-time as adjustments are made. This ensures full visibility into available exercises, allowing for precise customisation and selection.

During generation, enemy exercises are automatically excluded, unless excluding them would prevent the group from meeting its required point total.

If a flow section does not have enough matching exercises based on the selected filters or if there is a conflict between sections, a visual indicator will be displayed and the button to generate an assignment will be disabled. A red border and an informative error message will highlight the issue, ensuring you can quickly identify and resolve it.

After setting up your blueprint, you can generate an assignment by clicking the button in the top-right corner. Simply enter a name and select the course where the assignment will be created, or select the current question bank to create a question bank assignment instead.

 

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CLOSED BETA - It is now possible to account for error carried forward in numerical questions

In a digital test, an exercise can consist of multiple questions requiring numerical answers. When a question's answer depends on the response to a previous question, an incorrect initial answer often leads to subsequent incorrect answers. This feature addresses the issue by recalculating the answers to subsequent questions based on the previously provided response.

This feature is currently in closed beta to ensure it is not applied to only a subset of participants. Error Carry Forward (ECF ) will only be applied to assignments created after the beta feature is enabled. Administrators can contact our support team to request to have this feature enabled.

It is important to note that once this feature is enabled, we recommend against disabling it, as any ECF calculations made will not be reverted upon disabling it.

 

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Added a breakdown for obtained points, points subtracted by guess correction, and the total points in the result view

Based on feedback, we learned that many students struggled to understand how guess correction affected their scores. Most didn’t realise they had to hover over an info icon to see their original, uncorrected points. This made it difficult to understand where the difference in their total score came from and often led to unnecessary questions for teachers.

The presentation of points on the result page has been updated to make guess correction more visible and easier to interpret. This builds on earlier changes where question content was aligned to the left and points were moved to the right for better readability.

Questions where guess correction is applied are now marked with an icon. The icon also indicates that the guess chance is shown when the exercise is opened.

The info icon has been removed. Instead, a breakdown is now shown below the exercises: obtained points, points deducted through guess correction, and total points. This provides a clearer overview of how the final score is calculated.

 

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Copy question bank exercises directly into assignments

When adding exercises from the “Add Exercises” dialog inside a course assignment, users have limited search and filter options. To work around this, they often rename exercises just to make them easier to find—at the cost of clarity for students.

It’s now possible to copy exercises directly from the question bank overview. Users can copy to a course assignment, a question bank, or a question bank assignment. When copying to a course assignment that supports flow, users can select an existing flow group to place the exercises in. By default, the last flow group is selected. The exercises are added after any existing exercises in that group. For assignments without flow, exercises are added to the end of the assignment. After copying, users are taken to the destination to confirm the result.

 

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Updated interface for question bank assignments

Updated exercise management and display

The question bank assignment interface has been updated to improve usability across all assignment types. Exercise previews are now shown only where supported, removing unnecessary reserved space in the overview and simplifying the layout. Written assignments, which do not support previews, now have a cleaner display.

To streamline workflows, the preview button has been removed from the exercises table when adding exercises. Instead, clicking an exercise name will open it in a new tab, allowing you to keep your current context and progress.

The assignment view does not support exercise editing. Instead, clicking an exercise name will take you to the original question bank exercise where any changes can be made. Exercises can still be removed directly from the assignment page, one at a time. This replaces the bulk remove option.

Additionally, to help assess suitability at a glance, the unsupported question indicator, exercise relations within the assignment, and the applied label are now displayed at the top of each exercise. To maintain a clean and focused view, details such as the exercise ID, number of times taken, and exercise values are no longer shown on the question bank assignment page.

Flow group support in question banks

Flow groups can now be created and managed directly within digital question bank assignments. This enables you to fully configure them before copying the assignment into a course. Flow groups and their settings are also supported during synchronisation between question banks and courses.

To support flow groups, the digital question bank assignment page now includes separate 'Exercises' and 'Flow' tabs. This lets you preview how exercises will appear to students, without entering the full demo experience of taking the test. Please note that written assignments in question banks do not support preview.

 

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Added support for variables in match questions

To give each student a unique version of a match question and reduce copying, you can now use variables in the row and column content. This allows you to parameterise match questions in the same way as other question types.

 

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The guess chance is now displayed in the grading view for questions with guess correction

In line with the changes made to the exercises overview of a result, we now also display the guess chance for each question in the grading view, if the question has guess correction. This helps in providing more clarity surrounding guess correction information.

 

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Add email confirmation to sign in with Microsoft and Google

As previously announced, users signing into Ans via the 'Sign in with Microsoft' or 'Sign in with Google' button, are now required to confirm access to their email with the code provided in an email.

 

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Added the option to search by course and assignment on the new scan page

Searching by filename alone was often not enough. This was especially true when files from different assignments were uploaded in a mixed order, or when the filename was unknown because someone else uploaded the file or no naming convention was followed. You can now search by course name, code, year, period, and assignment name to quickly find the right scans.

 

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Simplified emoji support in the rich text editor

Previously, emojis were loaded from https://unpkg.com/twemoji@14.0.2/dist/twemoji.min.js, requiring schools to whitelist this URL to enable emoji use in a lockdown environment. Since modern browsers natively support emojis, this dependency is no longer necessary, and we have removed it.

 

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Bug fixes

• Fixed an issue where sorting or searching exercises ignored display limits when adding them to an assignment
  Previously, when sorting or searching for exercises while adding them to an assignment, the list would ignore the usual limit and show an excessive number of exercises. This update ensures that the number of displayed exercises now stays within the expected limit.
  
  
• Fixed an issue where text would exceeded the page boundaries in a written assignment
  Previously, when writing custom LaTeX with \begin and \end syntax, the text would run of the page if the \end was prefixed by two backslashes (indicating end of the line). Now the text is correctly converted to LaTeX and no longer exceeds the page boundaries.
  
  
• Fixed an issue where it was not clear that clicking a row in the question bank exercise table opens the preview
  Previously, it was not clear that rows in the question bank exercise table were clickable to open a preview. Now, the cursor changes to indicate clickability.
  
  
• Fixed an issue where excluding correctly answered exercises did not work for 'Digital test for groups' type of assignments
  Previously, the option to exclude correctly answered exercises from a publication did not work for group assignments and individual assignments if a participant took multiple attempts. Now, the option works correctly when the new grading scheme beta feature is used.
  
  
• Fixed an issue where the total points of a result were shown if an automatically graded question was missing a grading scheme
  Previously, when an automatically graded question was missing a grading scheme, for example a fill-in question without answer options, the result points would be shown if the guess correction was enabled, but not when the guess correction was disabled. Now, the points will not be shown until all automatically graded questions have been graded. This means that for a fill-in question the answer options have to be added before the points of the result will be shown.
  
  
• Fixed inconsistencies in the API documentation
  Previously, the API documentation included inconsistencies between the specifications and the examples provided. Now, the examples have been updated to align with the specifications. The following changes were made:
  - Removed the trailing backslash from /api/v2/requirements/{id} endpoint
  - The config_keys type was changed from integer to string in the assignment response
  - Removed the surrounding quotes from the user_ids example in the group request
  - Removed the surrounding quotes from the course_ids and user_ids example in the class request
  - Corrected the type for created_at and updated_at in the submission response from "date_time" to "string" with format "date_time"
  - Corrected the type for the timeslot type attribute from "integer" to "string"
  - Removed the surrounding quotes from the student_number and role_id example in the user request - Removed the trailing backslash from /api/v2/webhooks endpoint
  
  
• Updated the error message shown when uploading an unrecognised PDF
  Previously, the error message on the scan page inaccurately indicated that only some pages were unrecognised, even when no pages were detected. The wording has been updated to clearly reflect when no pages are recognised during upload.
  
  
• Fixed an issue where colouring multiple choice question answer options changed the layout from horizontal to vertical
  Previously, when applying font colour to a multiple choice question answer option, the options would always be displayed vertically. Now, the font colour is no longer taken into account to determine if the answer options should be shown horizontally or vertically.
  
  
• Fixed an issue where department administrators added as learners would start an assignment in preview mode instead of a real attempt
  Previously, when a department administrator was added as learner to a course in their own department, they would take the digital test in preview mode, instead of a real attempt. Now, the department administrators result is retained and shown in the results overview.
  
  
• Fixed an issue where assignment requirements were kept when the required assignment was removed
  Previously, if a requirement was set for an assignment based on another assignment, and that assignment was removed, the requirement would persist. This meant that students could be prevented from accessing an assignment due to a requirement they could no longer meet. Now, a warning is shown if you attempt to remove a required assignment, displaying the affected assignments. If you choose to proceed, the requirements are removed.
  
  
• Fixed an issue with the formula editor adding unsupported KaTeX expressions when using Cmd + Enter key combination
  Previously, we would use the Mathlive plugin for building equations, but use KaTeX for rendering LaTeX equations. While the majority of functions work in both plugins, there are a few differences, which would sometimes cause issues when rending an equation build with Mathlive. Now, we use Mathlive for both building and rendering LaTeX equations.

  The list of supported LaTeX functions can now be found here: https://cortexjs.io/mathfield/reference/commands/.
  
  

 

Version	Date	Information
v1.0	05-06-2025	Initial version
v1.1	10-06-2025	Clarified that the change "Improvements to the grading   experience" only applies to digital tests, written   assignments, and hand-in assignments.
v.1.2	11-06-2025	Added the change "Added a new way to generate assignments within a question bank".
v.1.3	25-06-2025	Expanded the description "Better flow group control" under the change "Improvements to editing exercises in an assignment".