Alternate ‘problem’ Environments

$\newenvironment {prompt}{}{} \newcommand {\ungraded }[0]{} \newcommand {\works }[0]{\par }$

How they work

There are a number of alternative variants of the problem environment. The key thing to know is that they are literally the same as the problem environment in every meaningful way (they use the same commands and formatting macros under the hood as the problem environment), the only way they differ is the displayed name. Currently there are the following problem-style environments:

problem
question
exercise
exploration

There are ways to create new forms of these problem-style environments with different names, although it requires some minor alterations of the Ximera.4ht file, so if you want to do this you would need to dive into the code and/or talk to one of the developers for specifics.

Numbering

The problem-style environments share a counter by default in order to minimize student confusion when they ask about “problem 7”, to avoid the situation where they really meant the seventh problem on the page, versus specifically “problem 7”, as this case there is only one problem-style environment with that number, making it easy to determine which problem the student is (theoretically at least) referring to.

Optional Arguments

The problem environment does not, at the time of this writing, have any optional arguments.

Examples

Example 1: Numbering

Notice the numbering of the following problem-style environments:

This is a problem, and the answer is 1! $\answer {1}$

This is a problem, and the answer is 2! $\answer {2}$

This is a problem, and the answer is 3! $\answer {6}$

This is a problem, and the answer is 4! $\answer {24}$

Best Practices

Why have different problem environment names?

Typically authors use the different types of problem environments to represent different styles of problems. For example, one might make any problem with sub-questions an “exploration” problem to tip students off that there are subproblems involved even before they see them. Likewise, a “problem” might be a difficult problem, an “exercise” might be a mechanical-only skillset problem, and an “exercise” might be an easier level problem. Again this is up to the content author, the option is there if you are interested, but it need not be used.

Potential Pitfalls and Problems

As of the writing of this guide there are no (non-obvious) issues with the alternates to problem environments - as they are essentially just a renaming/wrapper for the regular problem environment.

2024-06-24 13:19:11

Press...	...to do
left/right arrows	Move cursor
shift+left/right arrows	Select region
ctrl+a	Select all
ctrl+x/c/v	Cut/copy/paste
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ctrl+left/right	Add entry to list or column to matrix
shift+ctrl+left/right	Add copy of current entry/column to to list/matrix
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shift+ctrl+up/down	Add copy of current row to matrix
ctrl+backspace	Delete current entry in list or column in matrix
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Type...	...to get
norm	$\|\|\blue{[?]}\|\|$
text	$\text{\blue{[?]}}$
sym_name	$\backslash\texttt{\blue{[?]}}$
abs	$\left\|\blue{[?]}\right\|$
sqrt	$\sqrt{\blue{[?]}}$
paren	$\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
floor	$\lfloor \blue{[?]} \rfloor$
factorial	$\blue{[?]}!$
exp	${\blue{[?]}}^{\blue{[?]}}$
sub	${\blue{[?]}}_{\blue{[?]}}$
frac	$\dfrac{\blue{[?]}}{\blue{[?]}}$
int	$\displaystyle\int{\blue{[?]}}d\blue{[?]}$
defi	$\displaystyle\int_{\blue{[?]}}^{\blue{[?]}}\blue{[?]}d\blue{[?]}$
deriv	$\displaystyle\frac{d}{d\blue{[?]}}\blue{[?]}$
sum	$\displaystyle\sum_{\blue{[?]}}^{\blue{[?]}}\blue{[?]}$
prod	$\displaystyle\prod_{\blue{[?]}}^{\blue{[?]}}\blue{[?]}$
root	$\sqrt[\blue{[?]}]{\blue{[?]}}$
vec	$\left\langle \blue{[?]} \right\rangle$
mat	$\left(\begin{matrix} \blue{[?]} \end{matrix}\right)$
*	$\cdot$
infinity	$\infty$
arcsin	$\arcsin\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
arccos	$\arccos\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
arctan	$\arctan\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
sin	$\sin\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
cos	$\cos\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
tan	$\tan\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
sec	$\sec\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
csc	$\csc\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
cot	$\cot\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
log	$\log\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
ln	$\ln\left(\blue{[?]}\right)$
alpha	$\alpha$
beta	$\beta$
gamma	$\gamma$
delta	$\delta$
epsilon	$\epsilon$
zeta	$\zeta$
eta	$\eta$
theta	$\theta$
iota	$\iota$
kappa	$\kappa$
lambda	$\lambda$
mu	$\mu$
nu	$\nu$
xi	$\xi$
omicron	$\omicron$
pi	$\pi$
rho	$\rho$
sigma	$\sigma$
tau	$\tau$
upsilon	$\upsilon$
phi	$\phi$
chi	$\chi$
psi	$\psi$
omega	$\omega$
Gamma	$\Gamma$
Delta	$\Delta$
Theta	$\Theta$
Lambda	$\Lambda$
Xi	$\Xi$
Pi	$\Pi$
Sigma	$\Sigma$
Phi	$\Phi$
Psi	$\Psi$
Omega	$\Omega$