Thrilling Linux Promath eductaional program

[Petr Vicherek <petr@ied.com>]

   Hello all,

    I found it some time ago, I do not know who wrote it but it was not me.

Perhaps somebody had it as C exercise, the whole code as 8kByte.

   Before you start laugh, it was tested with a group of children (2)  - my

son and daughter and they were absolutely drawn into the game. It did not

matter that id does not have any GUI at all - that made it look more serious.

Shortly, they are not able to focus their attention to any other game for

such a long time.

   The point I am trying to make is, that it does not have to take months

of GUI design to do a good educational software and even here, less is sometimes

more.

   Judge for yourself:

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Man pages:

ARITHMETIC(6)                UNIX Reference Manual               ARITHMETIC(6)

NAME
     arithmetic - quiz on simple arithmetic

SYNOPSIS
     arithmetic [-o +-x/] [-r range]

DESCRIPTION
     arithmetic asks you to solve problems in simple arithmetic.  Each ques-
     tion must be answered correctly before going on to the next.  After every
     20 problems, it prints the score so far and the time taken.  You can quit
     at any time by typing the interrupt or end-of-file character.

     The options are as follows:

     -o      By default, arithmetic asks questions on addition of numbers from
             0 to 10, and corresponding subtraction.  By supplying one or more
             of the characters +-x/, you can ask for problems in addition,
             subtraction, multiplication, and division, respectively.  If you
             give one of these characters more than once, that kind of problem
             will be asked correspondingly more often.

     -r      If a range is supplied, arithmetic selects the numbers in its
             problems in the following way.  For addition and multiplication,
             the numbers to be added or multiplied are between 0 and range,
             inclusive.  For subtraction and division, both the required re-
             sult and the number to divide by or subtract will be between 0
             and range. (Of course, arithmetic will not ask you to divide by
             0.)  The default is 10.

     When you get a problem wrong, arithmetic will remember the numbers in-
     volved, and will tend to select those numbers more often than others, in
     problems of the same sort.  Eventually it will forgive and forget.

     arithmetic cannot be persuaded to tell you the right answer.  You must
     work it out for yourself.

DIAGNOSTICS
     ``What?'' if you get a question wrong.  ``Right!'' if you get it right.
     ``Please type a number.'' if arithmetic doesn't understand what you
     typed.

SEE ALSO
     bc(1),  dc(1)

                                 May 31, 1993                                1
(END)
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SCREENSHOTS:

The output of "arithmetic -o+-x -r9"

3 x 0 =   0
Right!
3 + 9 =   12
Right!
8 - 4 =   4
Right!
10 - 2 =
Please type a number.
8
Right!
16 - 8 =   24
What?
8
Right!
7 + 6 =   13
Right!

Rights 20; Wrongs 2; Score 90%
Total time 104 seconds; 5.2 seconds per problem

--
                                                    Petr Vicherek

Gloria in excelsis Deo et in terra pax hominibus bonae voluntatis
_/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/ _/