How to catch a cheater... in Blender.

Support Basics & Interface
1

Hey Guys,
Not sure if this is the correct location for this thread.

I use Blender 2.49a and was wondering if there is a way to check how a model was constructed, or how materials, or textures were obtained. Anything to check to see if someone made things on their own or imported them in.

I’m a Teaching Assistant for a class that educates on the use of Blender, and I/my boss need to know if there is a way to catch cheaters.

Thanks, for the time and hope to hear back soon.

Linco

2

Instruct your students to make everything in class?
Delete the import export scripts from the version of Blender you give the students.
Disallow flash drives, mobile phones, cameras, cd’s, dvd’s or any other portabable storage devices.
Turn off the internet.
Then your pretty right to go.

And you could actually watch the students doing their work.
That’s what you & your boss get paid for, is it not?

3

This is an architecture class, so we are using blender to model and animate architecture. We use the dxf import function to import polylines from another cad program (i.e. Archicad, Autodesk) the class meeting time is once a week for lecture, they work on their assignments/weekly exercises at home.

But to answer your question. No, I am not paid to watch students complete work, I am paid to devise a course curriculum and to teach students how to follow said curriculum. It is close to impossible to watch every student complete their work and the man hours that that method would require is inefficient and pointless.

External devices are an efficient way to transport data, not to mention a requirement.

Students need to learn the basic ways of modeling first, so that they can grasp the inner workings of blender, importing premade models to save time is a method taught later in the curriculum. There needs to be an efficient way to ensure/check this so that the students actually learn how to use a tool to further them instead of relying on external/premade work which is limited.

4

well, there’s really no way, as you know, to stop students cheating if they want to.
I would look at setting up the curriculum in such a way that you can minimize this.
Providing them with set task tests that must be preformed in class, especially for the basics, should be easily achieved.
For more complex tasks that require homework, well, the same rules can apply to a point, a certain amount of work must be completed in class.
Those that cheat, will come unstuck.
Remind them also that cheats don’t get far in the cg industry. they get caught or have crappy reels & won’t get employed anyway.
You also need a certain amount of trust.
Are the people doing the course because they paid to learn?
then they will be less likely to cheat.

5

in some countries which shall remian nameless

cheating at the university level is a major problem for every course given

there are even site that specialise in where to check for copied text or work done before ect

so finding cheaters is a job in itself not easy at all!

so basic safety principals as indicated by Meta Androco are minimum
but there is always a limit n the trust that you can have

so in the course description you should include a close saying that any cought cheaters
risk to be expulsed of the course or even the school !

so that should give a stiff warning to cheaters if they are cought

good luck

6

Thanks Meta-Androcto.
This is Undergraduate work, so yes they paid, but for some students Modeling can be difficult and they are prone to copying each other, or looking to the net for a quick solution which would harm them in the long run. Our department is accredited, and we like to keep it that way, and the best way is to weed out those that don’t/can’t put forth an effort. As of now, our only methods of determining someone as being false is by visual comparison, checking values, and using a hex-editor which allows access to code in a file.

Thanks, the idea of completing a certain percentage of work in class may prove to be helpful.

Linco

7

Thanks Ricky.

They method has already been pushed. We stated the first day of class(last week) that if anyone is caught, they would receive an F for the semester.

8

Hi,

Ask for them to save their working as separate files and include them in their submissions. It won’t solve the problem, but it might make it harder to cheat.