Could a senior editor please resolve an enigma regarding "fill in the blank" type quizzes.

Are the answers case sensitive or not?

I have received at least 6 correction notices recently, stating that the member got the question correct, but was marked wrong because they used capitalisation - all my answers are in lowercase.

I have tested all of my quizzes, using both lower case and capitalisation in the answers, and have had results returned correct on both methods.

So - why does this error seem to occur with some members and not with others?

Also, can someone tell us if there is any recommended proportion of 'fill in the blanks' questions in a quiz?
I, personally, don't like them (I'm an Aries, I don't have the patience).
A couple of times recently I've found myself facing five-question quizzes - each with five 'fill in the blanks' questions.

Delboy, FITB questions are NOT case sensitive.

Darksplash, we no longer allow 5-question quizzes, so the ones you've come across are older ones. That's probably also why the authors were allowed to have so many FITB questions. Brain teaser quizzes are allowed to consist entirely of FITB questions, but most other categories limit it to only a few per quiz.

Leau, editor

They are NOT case-sensitive, and never have been. "SMITH" equals "smith" equals "sMiTh".

ozzz2002- Editor

Thank you to the editors that have replied - next time I get a correction notice claiming the person got it wrong due to capitalisation, and stating that I should have been specific in my intro - I will yell loudly at them :P
Actually - I will simply refer them to this thread :-)

I found this ihttp://www.funtrivia.com/quizzes/general/quiz_creation_guidelines/fill_in_the_blanks__fitbs.html

Generally, I try not to have more than one FITB question. Usually when it's a fairly easy answer. I suppose it's down to the individual editor. On a personal level, I'm not keen on True or false answers either, although as a Libra I suppose I should appreciate the balance.

As far as I know, apart from the brainteasers category, quizzes with all FITB answers are no longer allowed.

What seems to happen is that players are marked wrong, and cannot see any difference between their answer and the correct one. Often it's a spelling error - we can see this when they cut and paste the "wrong answer" message, with the incorrect spelling there for all to see. Sometimes, though, it is harder to spot. Two spaces between a word, say, or a space before the word, will mark the answer as incorrect, even when to the naked eye there is no difference.

If the error is on the part of the player, nothing really can be done. If it is on the part of the author, it usually becomes obvious pretty quickly, as the correction notes start streaming in. If you get more than one complaint about your FITB on the first day, then there is probably something wrong, and it's worth taking a look. The trouble is not case sensitivity, but it's SOMETHING.

You are quite right agony. I sometimes have one or two correction notices that are valid, and correct them within seconds of receiving the note - and in that instance I ALWAYS send a thank you note to the eagle eyed member :-)
I also often send congratulation notes to members who score a 10 on my "not so easy" quizzes :-)

I have reworded the intro to make it quite clear to players that the answers are not case sensitive, and that if they are marked wrong it is THEIR error.

"Rearrange the words in the anagram to reveal a country and its capital. Answers are CAPITAL followed by COUNTRY, with a space between. They are NOT case sensitive, but the addition of extra spaces or punctuation will render your answer wrong."

In the Television category, we do not allow more than half of the questions to be fill in the blank.

Brain Teasers is an exception when it comes to FITBs- not only does BT allow quizzes that are all FITBs, in many cases it requires them. Such is the nature of word games

Cris - so glad you are online dear lady - whilst editing my quiz, I inadvertantly took it offline - PLEASE put it back! lol

Edit - No sooner had I posted this - the quiz is back online!

Cris - you ought to get a job in a US government department - WOW are you efficient or what! lol

Talking about streams of correction notices - agony you are so right, if you make the error they come flooding in.

I had a maths quiz which had a punctuation problem with the use of the curly brackets { and } - the system didn't like the use of them and went haywire - I went to college and by the time I got back my inbox had about 10 correction notices staring me in the face! Took a while for me to sort that mess out, so, you always hope that it is the player that is in error

Please, please avoid FITB (except where essential). Just imagine an FITB question like 'Which European country ruled most of India till 1947?'

Obviously, when devising multiple-choice questions use some ingenuity. At least one incorrect answer should be tempting, and not more than one should be obviously absurd.

FT Editor

Call me a cynic, but I think the reason a lot of people don't like fill in the blank type questions, is that you cannot go through the quiz in 8 seconds, clicking randomly, and score 4 or 5 correct out of PURE LUCK. I have had people score a big fat zero on my quizzes, purely for that reason - they haven't even attempted to answer the questions, because they don't like FITB's.

Except on word games, avoid them like the plague for the reasons above. FITBS produce more correction notes than any other type of answer.
I used to put one on each quiz to vary the type of questions, but I don't do it often.

This isn't a pencil and paper type quiz we're doing here, nor a game in which everyone can quickly type in the response, nor is it a pub quiz where people can say it out loud. Therefore, the FITB doesn't work as well for us at FT.

It seems obvious to me Bruyere, that you are one of those people who do not like FITB type quizzes.
As an editor, I find your comment "Avoid them like the plague", to be rather alarming, and more than a little insulting to those of us who take the time and trouble to create GOOD QUALITY FITB quizzes!
As crisw (senior editor) pointed out previously, there are many quizzes in which the creator has no choice but to make the questions FITB.
The problem with these type of questions is that the player must take CARE when answering them - ensuring that spelling, and so forth is CORRECT.
I can fully understand that these quizzes produce a lot of errors, and increases the workload for the editors, - but the problem is not with the type of question, - the problem lies with authors who do not take the time, or have the skills, to ensure accuracy on their quiz submissions.
In the Brain twister category, the quiz template clearly states that it is a RESTRICTED category, and that only exceptional quizzes will be considered - and I know from experience that if there is so much as a comma out of place, crisw will return it for correction.
The key therefore, to having good quality quizzes online, is a good working relationship between author and editor.

I think I'm a weird quiz player - I like quizzes that make me fill in the blank, and I like 20 or 25 question quizzes! Things that supposedly quiz players don't like... I don't know why

"I have had people score a big fat zero on my quizzes, purely for that reason - they haven't even attempted to answer the questions"

Hi delboy,
I got a big fat zero on one of your quizzes - not because I flashed through it, but because I misread the directions (doh!) and put the words in the wrong order, i.e., Carson City Nevada, instead of Nevada Carson City. (Still enjoyed the quiz, even though I slapped myself roundly.) So, there are other reasons for getting a zero. Besides, there is no bonus for being fast on regular quizzes, so I'm not sure that speeding is really a reason for many of the goose eggs.

I think in fairness to Bruyere, and I happen to agree with her, she is saying that ONLY in brain teasers does a uniform FITB format work. She is saying outside of those boundaries, it will not. If I was playing a sci/tech quiz (and I have played about 550 of them), if a quiz is all FITB, I get annoyed and generally back out of the quiz never to look at it again - you spend more time worrying about spacing and spelling, rather than testing your knowledge and learning - as well as the enjoyment of ruling out possible answers! To back up what Bruyere is saying, I don't think blanket FITB quizzes are allowed anywhere except the teasers category.

I'd agree with Bruyere in most cases. However, I recently played an old quiz. It was about film stars. It had 25 FITB questions and it was really well done. I scored well and had a great sense of achievement doing it. I do understand that it was probably the exception rather than the rule though.

The Word Play subcategory in Movies also allows all FITB questions, as they are essentially Brain Teasers. I believe this goes for most Word Play subcategories.

It depends on the type of question as well. I'd say I use FITBs fairly often in, say, a television quiz, on "Which character did this..." type of questions, as long as the name is fairly easy to spell. I figure if you're taking the quiz, you probably have at least a little bit of knowledge of the show, or have seen the episode, and therefore should know the main characters' names. And if you're taking the quiz, having never seen or heard of the show before, well... you're free to do this of course, but I don't think it's fair to get mad because I haven't provided you with options.

I have a few FITB in my quizzes and I usually put an "obvious wrong" option in the answer too. That sounds odd lol but things like if the hint says "no apostrophe" for something that usually always has one, or a name of say a ship, so there's a "The" ordinarily, then I will put the answer with and without apostrophe (or 'the') just in case someone types it automatically. That way they don't lose the point because they slipped up even though they knew the answer. It definitely takes much more thought to write a good FITB question than a multiple choice, for me anyway.