Quiz

Run quizzes on your website. Visitors type their name, answer against the clock and land on a leaderboard. Quiz is a Pro Tool, and can be gifted to a site.

What it does

• Four kinds of question: one right answer, more than one right answer, true or false, and a typed answer (case, accents, punctuation and a leading "the" do not matter, and you can accept more than one spelling).
• Timing kept by the server. A time limit for the whole quiz, a default per question, or a time on any single question. The clock starts when the question is shown, so a slow connection or a reload does not cost or gain anyone time.
• Marking on the server. The right answers never reach the visitor's browser until they have answered.
• Leaderboards for today, this week, this month and all time. Each name appears once, with its best go. Equal scores are split by time.
• Your choice of when to show answers: after each question, at the end, or never.
• Shuffling: questions, answers, or a random draw of so many questions from a bigger bank.
• Opening and closing times, and a limit on goes per name.
• The sidebar badge shows how many quizzes have been finished today, and you get a notification when someone takes the top spot.

Getting started

1. Switch Quiz on in Tools.
2. Open Tools > Games > Quiz and choose New quiz.
3. Give it a title and add your questions. Tick the right answer (or answers) on each one.
4. Press Test and play it yourself (see below).
5. Set the status to Open and save.
6. Put it on any page:

[quiz id="capitals" /]

id is the quiz's short name, shown in the list and under the title in the editor.

Testing a quiz

Test (in the editor, on each quiz in the list, and on its Plays screen) plays the quiz right there in the admin, exactly as your players will see it: the same clock, the same marking, the same screens, and the answers shown when the quiz shows them.

• It plays the version you last saved. With unsaved changes the button says Save and test, and saves first.
• It works whatever the status, so you can try a draft before anyone can see it, or a closed quiz.
• A test go is never saved to the leaderboard. It is not in the Plays list, it does not count towards the goes each name is allowed, and it does not raise a notification. At the end it tells you where it would have come.
• Each new test clears away the one before.

Moving quizzes between sites

Export a quiz from its menu in the list (right-click it, or ⋮), or from the download button at the top of its editor. Export all at the top of the list puts every quiz in one file. The file holds the quizzes, their questions and answers, and their settings - never who played them.

Import… at the top of the list adds the quizzes in such a file to this site:

• Each arrives as a draft, so nothing goes on show until you open it. Test it, then set it to Open.
• Nothing already here is changed. A quiz whose short name is taken gets one of its own (capitals-2), so check the shortcode before putting it on a page.
• Importing the same file twice makes copies.
• Anything in the file that a quiz cannot have is cleaned up as it comes in, the same as when you save. A quiz that still is not valid (no title, say) is skipped, and the message says which and why.
• Up to 50 quizzes at a time. A crossword file belongs in Crossword.

A leaderboard on its own

The quiz shows its own leaderboard at the end. To show one somewhere else, for example on your home page:

[quiz-leaderboard id="capitals" period="week" limit="10" title="This week's best" /]

period is today, week, month or all. Visitors can switch period on the board.

Board or no board

The [quiz] shortcode shows the quiz and, below it, its leaderboard. board changes that:

• board="hide" - the quiz on its own.
• board="only" - just the leaderboard, where the quiz would be.

The leaderboard's period

Leaderboard shows (under Rules and leaderboard) picks the period a board opens on - today, this week, this month or all time - wherever it appears. A shortcode's period wins over it.

Every Game's leaderboards on one page

[games-leaderboards /]

shows the leaderboards of every Game on the site that has one (Quiz, Crossword, Word Search, Daily Word), grouped by Game. games="quiz,crossword" keeps it to some of them, and period and limit work as above.

Hints

Switch on Let players have hints to give each player a few (Hints a play, 3 unless you change it). A hint on a question with answers to choose from takes two wrong answers away (always leaving at least one wrong one in); on a typed answer it gives the first letter. True or false questions have none, and each question has one hint at most. Every hint adds Seconds added for each hint (15 unless you change it) to the player's time, so the leaderboard stays fair - and it marks plays that used hints with a small H and the number. The Plays screen shows them beside the name. Test goes can use hints too.

Animations

Animations (under Rules and leaderboard, on unless you switch it off): the answers pop in one after another, a right or wrong answer pulses, a hint pops, and the finished screen and leaderboard rows pop in. Visitors who have asked their device for less motion, or switched motion off in the site's footer, never see them. They never slow the quiz or its clock.

The finished screen

Players see their score and time, where they came, their personal best under that name ("New personal best!" when they beat it) and a Share button that copies a summary - the quiz, the score and the time, never the answers.

Players and fair play

• Players only give a name: 2 to 24 letters, numbers, spaces and . ' - _. Rude names are refused.
• A play belongs to the browser that started it. Reloading carries on where they were.
• Running out of time on a question marks it wrong and moves on. Running out of time on the whole quiz ends it, and the time counted is the limit.

Looking after the board

Open a quiz's Plays to see every go (your own test goes are not shown). You can hide a play from the leaderboard (it stays in the list), delete it, or reset the whole leaderboard, for example before a new quiz night.