Assignment Submission HOWTO This document provides detailed instructions on: 1. How to submit an assignment via Blackboard 2. How to create a zip file and check its contents 3. How to make file extensions visible in Windows Explorer 1. Submitting an assignment via Blackboard Your submission always consists of a zip archive of the required source files, in the correct package directory structure, submitted as an attachment via Blackboard. If you are submitting a preassignment, you should submit the zip archive named SUBMIT_THIS_xxxx.zip that was created by the specchecker. Do not use any other type of archive (e.g. tar or WinRAR). Check the contents of the zip file before submitting. Check that the submission was successful To submit an assignment: 1. In Blackboard, go to the Assignments folder in Course Content and click on the assignment. If is your first submission for this assignment, you ll see the Upload Assignment page as in the screenshot on next page. Scroll down to Assignment Materials and next to where it says Attach File, click on Browse My Computer.
Figure 1 Submitting an assignment: Attach your zip file, and click the Submit button
2. In the file dialog browse to the zip file you wish to submit. Then click the Open button. 3. The file name should appear in the list of attachedd files. 4. The two editor windows should be left blank. Anything you type here will be ignored. 5. Click the Submit button at the bottom of thee page Figure 2 Checking a submission: download the zip file and look at its contents To check your submission 1. In Blackboard, go to the Assignments s folder in Course Content and click on the assignment. If you have already submitted it at least once, you should see the Review Submission History page as in Figure 2. 2. Click on the plus sign to expand the most recent attempt and make sure your zip file is listed there. 3. Click on the filename to download it into a temporary, empty directory. 4. Extract and examine the contents of the zip file and make sure it is exactly what you intended to submit.
To resubmit a previously submitted assignment 1. In Blackboard, go to the Assignments folder in Course Content and click on the assignment. If you have already submitted it at least once, you should see the Review Submission History page as in Figure 2. 2. Click the Start New Submission button and follow the submission instructions above. 2. Creating a zip file Note: These instructions only apply to regular homework assignments. For preassignments, you should just submit the zip file named SUBMIT_THIS_xxxx.zip that was created by the specchecker. The most important thing to remember is: Submit your source files, not the compiled class files! The source files are the ones you typed. These are the files that the instructors and TAs are going to read. The class files are machine instructions generated by the compiler and are executed by the Java runtime. We can t read them! The source files always have the extension.java, and the class files have the extension.class. By default, Eclipse stores the source files in a directory called src and the class files in a directory called bin within the project directory. If you can t see file extensions when you look at your files in Windows Explorer, see Section 3 of this document. You can create a zip archive of your source files in many ways, but this is the simplest. Creating a zip archive using Windows Explorer 1. Navigate to your project directory and find the source files. By default, Eclipse stores these files in a directory called src directly below the project directory. 2. Right-click on the src directory and select Send To --> Compressed/zipped file. 3. Rename the.zip file appropriately, if necessary 4. Open your zip file and check that its contents are correct (see below).
Checking the contents of a zip file In Windows, you can normally just double-click on a zip file to examine its contents in an Explorer window. Make sure you have a directory structure matching the package structure for the project and that you are submitting the.java files, NOT the.class files. Figure 3 Be sure you see the.java extension for files you submit If you cannot see the file extensions to distinguish between.class and.java files, you should change the view settings in Windows Explorer as described in Section 3. 3. Making file extension ns visible in Windows Explorer Most files have an extension (an ending consisting of a period plus several letters) that helps identify what type of file it is. By default, Windows Explorer does not show the extensions for most types of files. In programming we frequently have several files with the same name, but different extensions, and it is crucial to distinguish between them. To make sure you see file extensions you can change the view settings in Windowss Explorer: 1. In Windows Explorer Click on Organize and d from the drop-down menu select Folder and Search Options. (Note: in older versions off Windows or in the Classic view, the Folder Options are under the Tools menu.) 2. In the Folder Options dialog that comes up, click on the View tab. 3. UN-check the option Hide extensions for known file types. (See Figure 4.)
4. Click Apply to Folders and then OK. (If Apply to Folders button is disabled, just click OK. Figure 4 UNcheck Hide extensions and click Apply to folders