NAVIGATION

 

The main screen of a Turing’s Craft CodeLab is divided into three main parts: 1) top-level buttons (Announcements, Help, Lab, Roster , Preferences, Change Course, Exit); 2) Table of Contents, or TOC, on the left, just below the top-level buttons; and 3) main work area, occupying the largest portion of the screen, on the right below the top-level buttons.

 

Top-level buttons:

 

Announcements – to read announcements pertinent to your CodeLab

Help – to open up this help system

Lab – CodeLab’s main screen, containing the table of contents and the main work area.

Roster – to see the record of your submissions on the instructor's roster

Preferences – to set user preferences such as password, nickname, etc. (To read more about Preferences, go to the Other Features page.)

Change Course – if you are registered for more than one course, this button displays a list of courses to load.

Exit – to quit CodeLab

 

 

The table of contents (TOC) is used to quickly navigate through a CodeLab course. (If you do not see the TOC, press the Lab button at the top.) The TOC contains the following:

 

• the course name on the green background
• “Sort by Deadline” checkbox (if checked, exercises will be displayed in deadline order)
• “Sort by Ex Number” checkbox (if checked, exercises will be displayed in exercise number order)
• “Hide Completed” checkbox (if checked, exercises that have been completed are hidden from view)
• “Show this topic only” selection box, allowing view of exercises relevant to a specified topic only.
• Topics and exercises within a given course.
• Legend (explains the significance of the little colored green, yellow, and red triangles)

 

Upon clicking a course or exercise name in the TOC, the system displays that topic or exercise in the main work area. Clicking on a right arrow on the left of a topic name expands that topic in the TOC, and subsequent clicking on a down arrow collapses a topic. Topics may contain subtopics; subtopics are expanded and collapses in the same fashion. Exercises do not have arrows next to them in the TOC. To open up an exercise, click on its name.

 

The main work area is used for exercise submissions. (If you do not see an exercise, with instructions and a submission box, keep clicking on the Next button to get through a hierarchy of topics. Some exercises may be nested deep in the course structure.) The main work area displays:

 

• the path to the current exercise on the right, e.g. TOP > QUICKSTART > ex001
• a list of keywords associated with the exercise
• buttons used to navigate through the course without using the TOC (Previous and Next) or print an exercise (Print)
• the deadline and solution viewable date, if assigned
• exercise instructions
• a submission box, for users to type in their submissions
• a Submit button used to process the user’s submission. (The other Submit button below the submission box is identical to the one at the top.)
• two circles above the submission box on the right, used to go through previous submissions supplied for the current exercise (only available when there has been more than one submission.)