Online Exams – Can they Survive the Load?
CAT is all set to go online this year and the exam will be conducted in 32 cities through 105 testing centres. While aspirants figure out the challenges with new format, the most important question for CAT to answer is on the server load.
IGNOU tried the online entrance exam and the entire online infrastructure collapsed within few minutes of the exam (Yahoo! was the infrastructure provider and IGNOU has asked Yahoo for a detailed report/explanation on the collapse).
The IGNOU exam had only 9,350 students (CAT is expected to have 2.42 Lakh students) and while it questions the entire infrastructure/capacity planning, it does throws some perspective/expected challenges to CAT authority (CAT will be held in two sessions each day for 10 days, between November 28 and December 7).
As far as CAT is concerned, Prometric which won the contract (close to $40mn deal) has partnered with NIIT for the operational support.
But as far as the online infrastructure is concerned, it’s a different ballgame. If Yahoo servers couldn’t handle 9,000 candidates – do you see a need for fallback (OMR?) option during the CAT exams?
Are exam authorities jumping the gun by going online too soon?
About the author - Manish is an engineering student and is currently working on his startup idea.
Hi,
I think it is very well possible to conduct on-line exams for more than 25,000 on-line users. Cloud provides the highly scalable, high concurrent platform to scale out. Yahoo / Any other company might also have failed to provide / size requisite hardware infrastructure for the IGNOU on-line exams. We at Excel SOft Technologies are specialised in providing highly scalable platforms for High Stake / High Concurrency tests.
Hello all,
Sorry,
It is not ‘I think’ , We are capable of conducting such huge on-line test & assessments concurrently. Feel free to contact rajashekar.s@excelindia.com for more details
Thanks
Rajshekar
Well scaling to 10K users is not a very big thing and I think they would have tested against this much load before the actual test.
As per the news article that you have linked to, sabotage is also being considered as an option.
In any case we need to move to the web based test system at some point and its good that some institutes are leading the way. And surely, like for any technology, there would be hiccups and a learning curve.
I dont know the architecture and the details of server etc. So I can not comment.
Online testing is not easy, but, not impossible as well.It is possible to conduct online tests to any number depending on clients.
We have been conducting BITSAT, the test for BITS pilani for the last 5 years without any errors. This year we administered the 3 hour test for 120,000 students in 20 centers over 30 days. If required, we can conduct online test for 300,000 students over 10 days in 100 centers.
Every thing can fail in an online test – Power, internet, PC, Server, mouse, key pad, Air conditioning, switches, network! But if you know what can go wrong, you can address! All one needs is a committed team, good infrastructure and will to deliver. We have done it, doing and can do it.
Ramesh
CTO
Eduquity
@Rajshekahr – why the hell people like you Advertise your companies in each and every possible forum. Grow up man, don’t be that desperate. Stop shi#ting at every place
Hello My dear fellow Indian,
First of all do have guts to say who you are when expressing your thoughts? It is very easy to write a blog like yours by any other fellow indian who does’nt have job. I feel you are not getting place to S##t??.
What’s wrong in telling technical capabilities of a company??. Whole world runs on commerce & opportunities. If you are an exception, better have a ball in this world. Don’t get to much bothered about so many millions of blogs around the net. Some one else in this world may be requiring solutions to survive his business.
What i am more interested in knowing – why can’t the CAT be a round the year exam – like GMAT.
I have seen major performance issues on the Mock CATs that time gives out. It takes close to 5 seconds before the next question loads.
The biggest worry to me, more than the server overload, is the bandwidth of colleges. I studied in RVCE – on of the centers for CAT this year. They had a miserable broadband, and I don’t think other colleges are miles ahead. Even if the server can handle it, will my question reach me on time??
– dheeraj
@moderator – suggestion: removing te posts by “Indian” and reply by Rajsekhar would be good. They are hijacking the point of this post.
Yes Dheeraj, you are correct that bandwidth availability across testing centers is equally important for faster delivery of contents(questions). But, as off now TIME works off line too.i.e only during starting and ending of the test internet connection is required else not. Yes, initially Mock tests offered by TIME was having some outages, but since 2-3 months it is fully stabilized.
I guess the fact that I haven’t used Time tests in so long is a problem of its own
The last time i did use it, the offline mode was slow too – but that might have been some browser compatibility issues (I was using Firefox 3.5/Safari4.0)
The CAT (by IIM) still remains to be seen, I for one don’t trust my college bandwidth, and if it is an on;line test, you have the usual “paper leak” issues.
Dheeraj, it is a general perception that on-line tests thinks of security / paper leaks etc. It is possible deliver on-line tests in a highly secure mode…keeping network security rules set and also keeping the contents (questions) secured (defining the access rules).
A well tested deployment architecture before the main event will suffice(preparation).
You are right that we all may need to wait & watch the success of CAT 2009 final exams.
Normally, such failures can be attributed more to the effects of corporate-jugglery and less to the servers and technicalities.
I sat an online exam on Friday at a Prometric Testing Centre in London. After 2 hours I had completed all the questions and was reviewing over my answers (with 1 hour and 20 minutes on the clock remaining). The systems crashed, with the staff indicating a server issue in the US. After waiting around for 5.5 hours under exam conditions we were told to go home and reschedule the exam. Online exams sound good in theory, but when there is no contingency when things go wrong, it is an absolute disaster. I am confident that I have a stong pass, but due to technology failures, and the inability for the company to have a contingency with such matters I am a passing candidate having to reschedule and resit the exam from scratch.
Martin, sad to know abt your experience. Any on-line exam provider needs to have multiple backup plans either in application level (offline solution) or ensuring high availability by designing alternative deployments. One needs to do their homework before exams !!!!. is it??. One needs to understand the gravity of on-line exams where the students career is at stake. Each click matters a lot.
I do not know how such articles can be published here… supposedly the meeting place for all geeks.
Please verify your info. CAT is not going ‘online’. Its only getting computerized. What that means, is that CAT will be merely taken on a computer which will contain the questions.
Please do not cast aspersions or doubts when your facts themselves are wrong.
OMG! So you say they are dumb terminals?
‘Online’ means connectedness and not always internet! Hope you understand the diff.
Connectedness =>Servers/Connectivity/Instant results as well.
Dear Abhishekam,
You are right that CAT is NOT on-line (this year), but computer based exam. The idea of this article is can it be made on-line? the challenges which will be faced by doing so.
One need lot of preparation and planning to go on-line such high stake exams comprising huge numbers. Moving forward I think IIM’s will be in favor of on-line exam, more economical solutions, which can be addressed in less number of days.
All said and done, the result is out – >
server crashes ( who said they were dumb terminals..??) and systems getting “hanged” were common problems faced across india.
IIM should have learnt a lesson from the fact that XLRI had previously attempted such a feat and failed too.
…. you just cant experiment when so many people’s hard work and career is at the stake.
Prometric has tremendous experience though. It’s surprising that they failed so miserably.
I think Prometric is professional / Capable enough to pull out of this crisis. It is very easy to pass comment on failures. Lets see ahead of today and strengthen the process of examination instead of wasting time on criticizing this event. Thanks for understanding.
Its only 7 centers out of 105 centers faced this problem(as I know) & all the students who are affected are rescheduled to take exams on Sunday. Ultimately what matters is, students are not deprived of taking tests and competing in the exams. Until the core objectives are met, I think we all should support for the cause.