[Using Sakai] Character limits and HTML coding

[Karen Tsao]

Hi Chris,

I understand your concern but this is the current behavior. If you want to
overwrite the 4000 limit, you need to make some code changes.

The reason for the 4000 limit is from Oracle's 4000 character limitation on
VARCHAR2 fields. Therefore, if you are using Oracle, you have to change the
column type and increase the validateLength in JSF files. For MySQL, because
there is no limitation from db side, you can just increase the length of
that column and the validateLength in JSF.

We have implemented http://jira.sakaiproject.org/browse/SAM-756 in Samigo
2.8. However, we didn't alter the Model Short Answer field. I will discuss
with other team members to see if we  can extend that field too.

Thanks,
Karen


On Sun, Sep 26, 2010 at 7:44 PM, Christopher Heard <
christopher.heard at pepperdine.edu> wrote:

> Dear Sakai users,
>
> Hello! I've been using Sakai for about a year, but I'm new to this mailing
> list. Is this the right place to report problems with existing Sakai tools
> and/or to post feature requests/wish lists?
>
> Just in case I'm in the right crowd, here's my issue: when I use the Source
> option in the rich text editor to write Questions and Model Short Answers
> for essay/short answer questions, either the editor or Sakai rewrites my
> code, formatting it in a way that appeals visually to somebody behind the
> curtain but that introduces a whole bunch of space characters that take my
> code over the 4,000-character limits in the relevant text areas.
> Specifically, I use a lot of HTML coding to provide important information in
> a tabular format to my students. In particular, I use the Model Short Answer
> text area to provide a rubric for each essay question, so that students can
> informally self-assess before they get the official assessment from me. I
> present this information in an HTML table. I keep blank spaces and even
> carriage returns to a minimum to conserve characters, but either Sakai or
> FCK Editor insist on putting in a bunch of carriage returns and spaces (to
> simulate tabs). The effect can be quite significant. In one case, the code I
> wrote occupies only 3,616 characters in my HTML editor, but when I paste it
> into Sakai, the forced reformatting takes the character count up to 4,007
> characters. The surplus 391 characters are all carriage returns and blank
> space used to simulate tab stops—pleasing to some programmer's eye but
> completely irrelevant to the browsers interpreting the code. In essence, the
> reformatting robs me of 11% of the characters I could use to communicate
> with my students.
>
> Does anyone know of a way to shut off or override this behavior?
>
> Thank you!
>
> Chris
> --
> Christopher Heard
> Associate Professor of Religion
> Pepperdine University
> Malibu, CA 90263-4352
> Web Site: http://faculty.pepperdine.edu
> Personal Blog: http://higgaion.heardworld.com
> Online Research Resources: http://www.iTanakh.org
>
>
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