Replacing simulation with interactivity
AStudentForLife
I gather from the ongoing discussion in this group that many of
the posters (including me, of course) are trying to make use of the
OSCATS software to create a tool that can be used to administer a test
in an interactive fashion. In other words, I would like to create a
web based application where questions can be presented to an examinee
and his/her responses can be collected to determine his/her ability
using the OSCATS library. But it seems that (and correct me if I'm
mistaken) the primary focus of the OSCATS software is to aid in
research by performing simulation.
A brief overview of the examples and source code indicates that if one
desires to use this software in an interactive fashion, one can use
the OSCATS_TYPE_ALG_SIMULATE class (simulate.h / simulate.c) to create
a new class / algorithm. This class registers the "administer" signal.
The implementation of the "administer" function would allow this new
algorithm to perform any custom work (like presenting the item to the
examinee and collecting the response). This way, the interactive
application can make use of the rest of the good work you have
implemented in this library.
I would like to find out if the following strategy would work:
1: Initialize an item bank with items and and their difficulty.
2: Use 1PL model and OSCATS_TYPE_ALG_ESTIMATE
3: Implement an algorithm that implements "administer" signal (similar
to OSCATS_TYPE_ALG_SIMULATE). This function may present the user with
the item and collect the response.
4: At the end of the test, find out the est_theta.
Thanks.