asim

Creating ASim problems in edX

ASim can be integrated into edX using the Custom Javascript Display and Grading problem type. First, you need to upload ASim itself into the directory of files associated with your edX course:

• in edX Studio, click on the Content dropdown at the top of the page, then select Files & Uploads.

• upload the following files, which you’ll find at the top level this repo:

  • asim.min.js
  • asim.min.css
  • asim_edx.html
  • educore_edx.html
  • educore_pipelined_edx.html

Here are the steps to create an edX student exercise that uses ASim:

• In your course outline, locate/create the subsection where the exercise will be located.

• Click on New Unit, then, in the Add New Component menu, click on Problem.

• Select the Advanced tab, then click on “Custom JavaScript Display and Grading” problem type. This will provide a template that’s initially filled in with an example problem. Here’s the documentation for the Custom JavaScript Problem type.

• In the unit section of your course outline, click on Edit, select and delete the current contents of the editor buffer. Replace with the following:

<problem>

  <script type="loncapa/python">
import json
def verify_checksum(expect, ans): return json.loads(ans)["response"]==expect
  </script>

  <p> This text is displayed before the ASim instance. </p>

  <customresponse cfn="verify_checksum" expect="<checksum>">
    <jsinput title="ASim"
             gradefn="gradefn"
             height="600"
             width="100%"
             get_statefn="getstate"
             set_statefn="setstate"
             initial_state='{"buffers":[<bufferspecs>]}'
             html_file="/static/asim_edx.html"/>
  </customresponse>

</problem>

• If you want to restrict programs to the Educore subset of the ARM instruction set, change the html_file parameter to "/static/educore_edx.html". And if you want the Educore pipelined emulation, change the parameter to "/static/educore_pipelined_edx.html".

• Modify the template, replacing <bufferspecs> with a comma-separated list of JSON objects that specify which files you’d like to have pre-loaded into the ASim editor buffers. For example, to load a file called test.s, you would specify {"name":"test.s","url":"test.s"}. Note that JSON is very particular about the syntax; in particular, when creating an object, you cannot have an extra comma following the final name/value pair as would be allowed in Python or Javascript.

• You will need to upload the referenced files to your course’s file directory using the Files & Upload page described above.

• You can mark a pre-loaded buffer as read-only by including "readonly":true as one of the name/value pairs in the buffer spec. This is useful for instructor-supplied code such as test jigs.

• Edit the paragraph “This text is displayed…” to describe what you’d like the student to do. Note that edX is very particular about the HTML syntax: it must follow the XHTML standard where every tag has a matching closing tag.

• To support grading of your ASim problem, you’ll need to replace <checksum> with the appropriate string. Please see the “Grading” section below.

• While you’re in the editor window, you can click on Settings at top of the editor window and make the appropriate entries for the problem’s attributes, e.g., the display name. If you would like students to see a Save button, you should set the maximum attempts property to a non-zero value.

• When you’ve completed your edits, click Save at the bottom of the editor window. If all is well, you should see a preview of your new problem.

Grading

ASim provides a way to check the contents of particular memory locations after the student’s program has finished running. If the contents of those locations match the specified values, ASim computes a checksum of those values. When the student clicks Submit, any edits made by the student to their program are sent to the edX server, along with the computed checksum. The edX server saves student’s program and compares the student’s checksum to the expected checksum. If the checksums match, the problem is marked correct.

To add checking to an exercise:

• modify your test code to save the results from the various test cases into known memory locations.

• add .mverify directives after your test code. These directives have the form .mverify addr, expect0, expect1, ... where addr is the (starting) address of one or more consecutive 32-bit memory words whose contents should be verified. expect0 is the expected contents of the first 32-bit word, expect1 is the expected contents of the second 32-bit word, and so on. Your test code can include as many .mverify directives as needed.

• the test code should use a HLT instruction to terminate execution. When executed, this instruction requests ASim to verify the contents of the locations specified by .mverify directives. ASim will report any discrepencies to the student. If all the locations contain the expected values, ASim computes and reports the verification checksum.

• in edX Studio, modify the customresponse tag for the problem to include the expected checksum, e.g.,

  <customresponse cfn="verify_checksum" expect="4EF93F78">

Here’s some example test code that calls a strlen routine written by the student, passing the address of a test string in X0. When the student’s code returns an answer in X0, it’s stored at answer: and execution is halted.

// test_strlen.s: testing code for strlen.s

        .text
        .global strlen   // student provides this code...

        mov x0,#string  // pointer to test string
        bl strlen       // call strlen subroutine, answer in x0
        mov x1,#answer  // save result for later verification
        str w0,[x1]     // 32-bit store...
        hlt             // simulator will halt here

        .mverify answer,10   // expected answer is 10

        .data
answer: .word 0
string: .asciz "Hi there!\n"

When this test code is run using a correct implementation of strlen, ASim displays the following status message when execution is complete:

Memory verification successful! (checksum 4EF93F78)

This verifies that the memory location labeled answer: had the expected value (10) when execution was halted. Problem authors can run their test code using a correct implementation to get the expected checksum.

A typical graded ASim exercise includes

• a template file for the student to edit, usually involving a procedure that returns a value or modifies a data structure, and

• a test-jig file that calls the student procedure one or more times, saving the return value(s) for later verification.

For example, the strlen.s template might look like

.include "test_strlen.s"  // include testing code *** MUST BE THE FIRST LINE ***

// Please implement the strlen subroutine, which computes the length
// of an ASCII string whose address is passed in X0.  The length should
// be returned in X0.

strlen:
        // your code here, leaving answer in X0

        RET

To load both the template file and the test-jig file, use Studio to modify the initial-state attribute of the jsinput tag to:

 initial_state='{"buffers":[{"name":"strlen.s","url":"strlen.s"},{"name":"test_strlen.s","url":"test_strlen.s","readonly":true}]}'

Note that the test-jig file has been marked as read-only so that it cannot be modified by the student. In this example, both strlen.s and test_strlen.s should be uploaded in Studio as part of the course files.

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