Aiken format

The Aiken format is a very simple way of creating multiple choice questions using a clear human-readable format. (The GIFT format has many more options and perhaps is less prone to errors, but doen't look as straight-forward as AIKEN. ) The question must be all on one line. Each answer must start with a single-letter character, followed by a period '.' or a bracket ')', then a space. The answer line must immediately follow, starting with "ANSWER: " (NOTE space after : !) and then giving the appropriate letter. Here is an example of the format:

NOTE: The answer letters (A,B,C etc.) and the word "ANSWER" must be capitalised as shown otherwise the import will fail.

What is the correct answer to this question?
A. Is it this one?
B. Maybe this answer?
C. Possibly this one?
D. Must be this one!
ANSWER: D

Which LMS has the most quiz import formats?
A) Moodle
B) ATutor
C) Claroline
D) Blackboard
E) WebCT
F) Ilias
ANSWER: A

Both these examples imported into Moodle (1.9) gave questions looking like:

Which LMS has the most quiz import formats?
Choose one answer.
  a. Blackboard 	
  b. WebCT 	
  c. ATutor 	
  d. Moodle 	
  e. Claroline 	
  f. Ilias  

so it apparently accepted even F) and ignored if it was a or A.

Importing

When importing there is a bunch of options, but I don't think any of these influence Aiken Format import:

  Get category from file [_] 
  Get context from file [_]
  Match grades [Error if grade not listed/Nearest grade if not listed]
  Stop on error [Yes/No] 

Hints and Tips

• Use a text editor, like PSPad, (Windows "notepad" may not save with right encoding) to write the file with questions and save as a TXT file in UTF-8 format. Use only simple ' not slant ones ´ ` ! Avoid other exotic characters like … HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS (http://www.fileformat.info/info/unicode/char/2026/index.htm, three dots as a single character).

See also

• Import questions
• GIFT