The following article is to inform you of feature updates, user interface changes and bug fixes of the latest release on our production environment (ans.app). This article consists of the following topics:
- Changes to the platform
- Open beta changes
- Custom roles feature additions (this will be a separate topic until it's released to open beta)
- API additions
- Upcoming important changes
- Bug fixes
Release dates
| Release date | Environment |
|
28th of April 2023 |
Stage (stage.ans.app) |
| 14th of May 2023 | Production (ans.app) Education (edu.ans.app) |
Changes to the platform
Added the option to generate a one-time password for all taking stages
We have added the option to generate one-time passwords when a participant has already started or submitted their assignment. This covers the use case where a student has to re-enter their assignment from a different computer, for example.
There is no change to the existing functionality of generating a one-time password.
Text will now be wrapped in tables
We now wrap longer text in certain tables instead of clipping off the end. This means exercises with longer names or alternatives are now displayed in full.
This change affects tables in the following places of the platform:
- Assignment questions insights
- Question bank assignment questions insights
- Question bank assignment exercise overview
- Question bank assignment overview
- Question bank exercise overview
Merging articles in the help center
In the upcoming weeks, we are going to make changes to the structure of the help center.
Currently, the integrations articles are in a separate category within our help center. The categories are divided into sections for each integration. Each section contains articles that are relevant for both administrators (such as configuring an integration) and for employees (such as enabling the integration in an assignment). We have decided to allocate each article to either the administrator section or the employee section of the help center. Once the articles are moved to the relevant category, the integrations category will be removed.
To better reflect the Ans platform, we will also be merging & rearranging certain sections in the employee part of the help center. This will result in less articles and a better structure of the help center.
Renaming of multiple elements in the platform
Based on your feedback, we are working on multiple interface inconsistencies and improvements. Below you can find the element(s) that have been renamed, including the place in the platform where it changed. The change is applied to all translations of the platform unless indicated otherwise.
- Renamed 'Description' to 'Text' when clicking 'New description' when creating an exercise. This applies to the English version of the platform only.
- Renamed 'Beschrijving' to 'Tekst' when clicking 'Nieuwe content' when creating an exercise. This applies to the Dutch version of the platform only.
- Changed 'analyzed' to 'analysed' on the Turnitin assignment integration page. This applies to the English version of the platform only.
- Changed 'excercises' to 'exercises' in the prompt shown when all results of an assignment have been reviewed. This applies to the English version of the platform only.
- Changed abbreviation of two-factor authentication from TFA to 2FA in the school security settings. This applies to the English version of the platform only.
- Changed 'schoolyear to 'Schoolyear' in the Schoolyear settings of an assignment.
- Renamed the dropdown menu 'year' to 'school year' in class settings. This applies to the English version of the platform only.
- Renamed 'All school years' filter to 'All curriculum years' in the classes overview. This applies to the English version of the platform only.
Open beta feature changes
Beta features are features which can be enabled and disabled on school level. Our available open beta features can be found in the school settings of your school. By default, all open beta features are disabled upon release. Only administrators can view and activate open beta features. As beta features are eventually released as feature which is enabled by default for all users, we encourage administrators to enable and test open beta features on the stage environment. Your feedback can help shape the feature before it is moved out of beta.
Freeze attachments linked to an assignment via the question bank
We no longer display question bank assignment attachments with an assignment if it was archived before the attachment was added in the question bank.
Added changes to the assignment type to the assignment log
We have added changes to the assignment type to the assignment log.
Added descriptions to logs
We have added changes to descriptions to the question bank exercise and assignment logs.
This includes changes to:
- Content and content type of descriptions
- Images: full image width and caption
- Code: coding language
- Video: Youtube URL
Custom roles feature additions
Added custom role restrictions for asking a question to Ans support
We have added the option to hide the 'Ask a question' option for users with a custom role.
Some organisations have a first line of support that they would prefer their teachers to get in touch with before getting in touch with Ans. This change makes it clearer to users as to where to ask for help.
Some organisations have a first line of support that they would prefer their teachers to get in touch with before getting in touch with Ans. This change makes it clearer to users as to where to ask for help.
API updates
We have added the following extensions to the API V2:
- Add 'Learners can join or leave' and 'This group can start or hand in a group assignment' option to the Groups API
We have expanded the Groups API to allow the possibility of setting the options 'Learners can join or leave the group' and 'This group can start or hand in a group assignment'. With this change, more automatisation options are possible with the Groups API.
The following attributes are included:- 'can_start_assignment' represents the 'This group can start or hand in a group assignment' option.
- 'learners_can_join_or_leave' represents the 'Learners can join or leave' option.
- Added logging for schools and users to the API
- School logs
Added the school logs endpoint to the API. This endpoint will return logs of changes to the student privileges and mark calculation settings.
The following attributes are included:
allow_students_to_be_author,
allow_students_to_be_instructor,
allow_students_to_be_invigilator,
allow_students_to_be_publisher,
allow_students_to_be_reviewer,
enforce_sso,
grade_formula,
grade_lower_limit
grade_upper_limit,
guess_correction,
guess_correction_lower_bound,
sso_account_creation_disabled,
student_number_length,
students_can_edit_email,
students_can_edit_profile
With this addition, schools will be able to see changes that happen to the student privileges as well as the mark calculation. - User logs
Added the user logs endpoint to the API. This endpoint will return logs of changes to all attributes that are visible in the user show endpoint. Additionally, the attribute current_sign_in_at is visible in both of these endpoints and indicates a login from that specific user. The following attributes are included:
active,
alumni,
current_sign_in_at,
email,
first_name,
last_name,
middle_name,
role,
role_id,
school_id,
student_number,
uid
With this addition, schools will be able to see changes that happen to its users. This includes the changing of attributes as well as the current_sign_in_at attribute.
- School logs
Important changes
No new important changes have been added this release. The overview of all important changes that may require an action from administrators can be found here.
Bug fixes
- Fixed a visual issue where the location icon would be shown for written assignments if the assignment was copied from a digital test with locations
This change impacts all assignments, so older written assignments will also not display any locations anymore. - Fixed an issue where 'New version available' will be shown after copying the question bank assignment in a course
We have added an improvement to recalculate the differences that are used for comparing the versions between the assignment and the question bank. We have noticed that most of the issues regarding the incorrect showing of 'New version available' came from the relations not having the correct comparison.
Previously when making changes, we would only calculate the differences for the level where the changes were made, now we also recalculate the differences of the relations that belong to entity where the change was made.
For example if the content of a multiple choice question would be changed then previously we would only recalculate the differences that are directly on the question. Now we also recalculate differences of the relations, such as the choices in that question as well.
This change only applies after pulling or pushing changes from the assignment/exercise to the question bank. - Fixed an issue where a second timeslot for a second attempt would not be shown in the 'Scheduled assignments' section
After the student had participated in one timeslot and put in a group that used a second timeslot that was scheduled at a later date, then the assignment would not be visible in the "Scheduled assignments" section.
This fix is directly applied and impacts older and newly created assignments to correctly show the scheduled assignment. - Fixed an issue where it was not possible to add a missing page when scan issues were found
When clicking 'Fill with blank page', nothing in the 'Scan issues' dialog would happen. - Fixed an issue where it was not possible to download attachments in a digital test
Downloading an attachment was not possible for students and teachers during grading. When attempting to download, no download would be triggered and the first tab of the attachment would always be displayed.
This change applies to all assignments, so it's possible for older assignments to correctly download attachments - Fixed an issue where it was not possible to upload .m files, even though there were no restrictions prohibiting their upload
Due to a recent change, it was no longer possible to upload .m files even though there were no restrictions prohibiting their upload. It is now again possible to upload .m files in a digital test and a hand-in assignment. - Fixed an issue where it was possible to create new students in the class import when 'Allow all employees to invite new students' would be disabled
It is no longer possible to create new students with the class import when 'Allow all employees to invite new students' has been disabled in the employee privileges. New students would have only been created if the given email or student number could not be found. - Fixed an issue where the counter of question bank assignments in the question bank overview would show a negative number after deleting large number of assignments
In some instances when deleting a question bank assignments in bulk, a negative number would be shown for the amount of question bank assignments within the question bank. - Fixed an issue where the incorrect amount of flow groups would be created when planning a question bank assignment
This issue occurred when planning multiple assignments at the same time from different question banks and using the same domains and objectives, but the domains and objectives are ordered differently in the question bank.
This change only impacts newly planned assignments. So older assignments are not affected by this change - Fixed issues with numerals being displayed incorrectly for a question bank exercise and its questions
The change is impacted on page load when generating the preview for the question bank exercise. So all exercises should correctly display the numerals now. - Fixed an issue where the export of school analytics would send an email without attachment
When attempting to export the school analytics, an email would be sent without the attachment containing the export. This has been fixed so the attachment is sent alongside the email. - Fixed an issue where the API documentation would state that the 'objective_ids' in a PATCH request for the Questions API would have to be a collection within a collection of ids
The API documentation stated that the 'objective_ids' should be sent within a nested collection. This is was a typo and has been corrected to a single collection of objective_ids. - Fixed the usage of a 30 seconds grace period after the deadline has passed
Ans has a 30 second grace period after the deadline has passed to allow student answers to be saved if there was a network issue around the deadline. In the last release this grace period was ignored and we have now reinstated it again. - Fixed an issue where changing the script in the code editor of an exercise didn't recalculate the submission of students
When changing the script in the code editor after the test has been taken, then the submission of the student would still be compared to the old script. Now we recalculate the students points if any change to the script happens.
This change is only applicable when changing the script of the code editor after this fix has been deployed. Submissions of older assignments won't be recalculated unless the script changes again (or other triggers for recalculating the points like setting a question to bonus).
Schools with affected assignments will be contacted next week. - Fixed an issue where the user would be redirected to an non existing page after sending grades with LTI 1.1
After pressing the 'Send grades to LMS' button and the grades were sent successfully to the LMS, then the user would be redirected to a non existing page within Ans.
The user will now remain on the result overview page after the grades have been sent to the LMS. - Fixed a visual issue where the calculator would overlap with the cells in a worksheet question
When using the calculator in a worksheet question, the calculator and question overlap each other, preventing them from being used properly. This has been fixed, making sure the calculator is usable again in combination with the worksheet question. - Added a description for timeslots in the review options for a peer reviewed digital test
It now says: "Timeslots: Configure the period in which participants can review the assignment." - Fixed an issue where flow was not taken into account to determine the maximum mark in the results histogram
Earlier, we did not take into account the flow when calculating the maximum mark in the results histogram. Now we do.
Note: usually the maximum mark is also limited by the mark calculation settings, which prevented this issue also. - Fixed error where 'added by' column for users was empty due to a missing log attribute
This is visible in tables with an 'added by' column, such as the members overview of a course. - Fixed issue where the 'exercises in- and outside assignment' links on the question bank assignment blueprint page would not apply a filter on objectives in the exercise overview
We fixed the issue where the 'exercises inside assignment' and 'exercises outside assignment' links on the question bank assignment blueprint page would not apply a filter on the respective objective in the exercise overview. - Fixed issue where the maximum points of an assignment with flow were not shown in the insights when there were no results
We fixed the issue where the maximum points of an assignment with flow were not shown in the insights when there were no results. Now the maximum points will be shown, even if there are no results. - Fixed the issue that links to assignment insights in question bank exercise insights did not work
We fixed an issue where links to assignment insights in question bank exercise insights did not work. Now all of these links do work again. - Removed coding assignments from the assignment type filter
The filter is now only available for schools that are using the legacy coding assignment feature. - Removed the double horizontal scroll bar when viewing question bank exercise overview on a smaller screen size
We removed the double horizontal scroll bar when viewing the question bank exercise overview on a small screen. - Fixed issue where instructors could not preview the comment functionality of a digital test
We fixed an issue where instructors could not preview the comment functionality of a digital test. - Fixed issue where question analysis of an exercise in a question bank was not recalculated when unlinking a question in an assignment from the question bank
We now recalculate the item analysis when unlinking a question from the question bank. - Aligned warnings of scanning issues on the scanning page and in the assignment
These warnings could be inconsistent between the assignment and scanning pages, which has been fixed. Additionally, we now use the banner instead of the red text for the warning. - Fixed issue where the high contrast style would not be applied to the background of drawing questions in a digital test
We fixed an issue where the high contrast style would not be applied correctly to the background of drawing questions in a digital test. - Fixed issue where the inactive edit and delete actions were still visible after the question bank assignment attachment has been archived
A question bank assignment is 'archived' when there is a linked assignment with that attachment that has been archived. - Added error message when adding users with an invalid role_id to a course through the API
Added the error message "You don't have permission to assign this role" when adding users with an invalid role_id to a course through the API. - Fixed issue that the 'Edit question bank exercises restriction' would not disable the editing of the question bank exercise labels
| Version | Date | Information |
| v1.0 | 14-05-2023 | Initial version |
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