Counters, Macros, Random Text Insertion

Counters

Counters can provide useful data or grossly inflated numbers depending on how the counter is set up. Currently, the OWL counters are located on the main Online Tutoring page, on the response page students receive after sending a paper, and on the response page students receive after sending a question.

The counter on the Online Tutoring page is not too useful since the page is accessed by students, tutors, and visitors during orientations and presentations. We just thought it would be fun to see how many times the main tutoring page is accessed. The counters for sending papers and questions are incremented only after sending a paper or question. The counters are located on the response pages students receive after sending a paper or question.

The counters are incremented but not displayed on the pages. Instead they are displayed on the Statistics page for comparison purposes.

Macros

A macro is a block of text, usually HTML, that is defined in a single place which may then be used repeatedly in any document. This gives us the ability to create a section of HTML text once and then use it repeatedly on many different pages on our server. Macros are stored in separate documents and inserted dynamically into web pages when the server sends our web pages to browsers.

The OWL pages use macros for the background graphics, headers and footers. This ensures a consistent look and feel and helps eliminate errors. Site maintenance is a snap since we make changes in just one place. Tutors and student assistants can easily add to the site pages that maintain the chosen look by adding a single tag for the header and another for the footer.

Random Text Insertion

This function allows randomly selected text to be inserted into web pages. The use of random text insertion allows the OWL to offer dynamic web pages customized to a particular user. Users see this when a paper is submitted for online tutoring.