This is the one-stop reference page for contributors to the Math Exam Resources wiki. Please make sure to read and understand the content of the yellow boxes first. Green boxes are good-to-know's, while blue boxes give additional details that you can read when you mastered the basics.

For more details see our manual.

Navigation and Features

Wiki Page Layout

Wiki pages are organized in

Namespace (general category). The Math Exam Resources wiki is in Science.
Discussion.
View.
Edit.
History. To revert to previous versions.

More details on Wiki Page Layout

The following image illustrates the anatomy of all pages on the UBC wiki:

1. namespace	2. discussion	When you're viewing the page content under the namespace tab (1), the following 3 tabs will appear towards the right of the screen:
This tab indicates the namespace (general category) where the page is hosted within the wiki. All the pages in the Math Exam Resources wiki are hosted in the Science namespace. This tab is the one that actually displays the content within the page.	Clicking on the Discussion tab reveals a forum page, where you can add/reply to comments on the material shown in the namespace tab.	3. View - self-explanatory, this is the default.	4. Edit - this opens an editing window that allows you to make changes to the page. This is where the work is done. Add content or make your changes, then click Save Page to publish those changes.	5. History - This tab shows you all past edits and who made them. The entire wiki is under [Help:Page_History\|version control]. Using the radio buttons on the left hand side, you can compare any two revisions of the page. This is useful when you're trying to figure out who wrote a solution originally, and who may have edited it. You can also easily undo any changes and go back to any previous version.

MER Question Pages

The pages in the MER wiki, however, have a slight twist on the normal wiki page. If you click on the Edit tab for any question page (see a sample here: Sandbox:MER-manual-sample), you won't actually see any of the math content. Instead, you see

comments.
categories. [[wiki syntax for a category or flag]]
templates. {{wiki syntax for including a template}}

We use the flags for our peer-review system and to organize questions by topic. The template

{{MER Question page}}

is the gateway to the content and is responsible for everything that is actually visible on the page.

For each question page, there is an additional (at least) 3 subpages on the wiki, one containing the question statement, one containing the hint(s), and one containing the solution(s). These pages are included in the "parent" question page via the template listed above.

This video walks you through how the Question page and its subpages are working together.

More details on MER Question Pages
If you want to actually add content to a page, you need to click the edit button on the corresponding box on the parent page. It will take you to an edit window for the specific question/hint/solution subpage that you want to modify. When you save your changes, you will end up on that question/hint/solution subpage, and to get back to the "parent" page where you started, you will need to go up a level, via the page tree just under the tabs. The process will look something like this: Say you click on the edit question box shown above. You enter your changes, then click save. The following page will pop up: Besides the question page template, the other text that appears when you try to edit a "parent" solution page are category flags. We use category flags in two different ways on the MER wiki. Status Flags, to track the status of each question, hint, solution and tag. A sample set of flags from the parent question page looks like this: [[Category:MER QGQ flag]][[Category:MER RH flag]][[Category:MER QBS flag]][[Category:MER RT flag]] For details see Status Flags below. Topic Tags, to organize questions by topic. These tags look like this: [[Category:MER Tag Implicit differentiation]][[Category:MER Tag Differentiate]] For details see Topic Tags below.

Wiki Organization
Questions are sorted by both class and topic on the main page Science:Math_Exam_Resources. All class pages are subpages of this page, exams are subpages of their respective class page, and questions are subpages of their respective exam pages. So if you're searching for the 3rd question of the April 2012 exam for Math 103, the address is (case sensitive): Science:Math_Exam_Resources/Courses/MATH103/April_2012/Question_03 And, given the first paragraph of this section, the hint for question 3 would be at the address Science:Math_Exam_Resources/Courses/MATH103/April_2012/Question_03/Hint_1 Note that page addresses in the wiki are case sensitive and that _ and blank are treated as the same symbol! Subpages of Math_Exam_Resources hold the mathematical content for users. Information only relevant to contributors (like this manual) is listed as a subpage of Science:MER. So MER is like the the control center for Math_Exam_Resources.

Contributing

Permissions
Anyone with a UBC CWL can make a wiki account and leave comments on the discussion tab of a page. To actually edit pages in the MER wiki, you need editing permissions in the Science namespace. Contact `mer-wiki (at) math (dot) ubc (dot) ca` if you would like to be added as an editor.

Peer-Review and Workflow

One of the most important aspects of the MER wiki is our system of peer review. The three main rules of the peer review system are:

Do not review content that you were the last major editor of.
Leave a detailed comment in the discussion tab to explain why you think that the content is "quality bad".
When you addressed a "QB (quality bad)" flag reset the flag to "R (review)" and follow the first rule.

This video shows the peer review and flags in action.

More details on Peer-Review and Workflow
Each question, hint and solution is written by one person, and reviewed and approved by someone else. If the first reviewer thinks a hint/solution needs more work, they can edit it themselves and leave it flagged for review by a third party, or can flag it as a "bad quality" solution. If a reviewer flags something as "bad quality," it is usually helpful to leave a note on the parent discussion page explaining why. Then either the original writer or another contributor will come along, edit, re-flag for review, and the process continues until a reviewer approves the content. The typical workflow for a single exam question will thus go something like this: Contributor A: Adds question text, changes question flag to indicate "needs review." Contributor B: Reviews question text, changes flag to "good quality", also adds hint and solution, changes hint and solution flags to indicate "needs review." Contributor A: Reviews the hint, changes its flag to "good quality." Doesn't like the solution, flags it as "bad quality," leaving a note on the discussion page. Contributor C: Edits solution, changes solution flag back to "needs review." Contributor A: Reviews solution, approves, changes solution flag to "good quality". In reality, everything often happens all at once. You may spend 1 hour working on the wiki and enter 5 question statements, review another solution, add hints to pages that are missing hints, and then fix a solution tagged as "bad quality"...all on 3 different exams.

Status Flags

List of Flags
	C - Content request	R - Review request	QB - Quality is bad or insufficient	QG - Quality is good
Q - Question Statement	CQ	RQ	QBQ	QGQ
H - Hint	CH	RH	QBH	QGH
S - Solution	CS	RS	QBS	QGS
T - Tag	CT	RT	QBT	QGT

This video shows the peer review and flags in action.

More details on Status Flags

Flags are categories used by contributors to identify and request work to be performed on the Math Exam Resources wiki. There are flags for two different page-types on the wiki: exam status flags and question status flags.

There are four kinds of question flags:

Content flags which request contributors to add specific content to a page.
Review flags which request contributors to check pages for Quality control purposes.
Quality flags which is used by a reviewer to indicate the quality of the reviewed content.
Special flags for other purposes.

There are two kinds of exam flags:

In progress flags which make an exam available to students, even if it is incomplete.
Quality flags which indicate that an exam is completed.

Each flag is described in more details below.

Organization of flags

The content, review and quality flags used for exam questions are organized as follow: We identify four different types of mathematical content: Question Statements (Q), Hints (H), Solutions (S), and Tags (T). For each type of content, we have four status: a flag to request the input of the content (C), a flag to request the content to be reviewed (R), a flag for content reviewed as bad (QB) and a flag for content reviewed as good (QG). Using the convention to put the status first and the type of content after; you can now easily imagine the 4 by 4 matrix which describes the 16 flags listed below:

List of Flags
	C - Content request	R - Review request	QB - Quality is bad or insufficient	QQ - Quality is good
Q - Question Statement	CQ	RQ	QBQ	QGQ
H - Hint	CH	RH	QBH	QGH
S - Solution	CS	RS	QBS	QGS
T - Tag	CT	RT	QBT	QGT

How to add or change flags

Question-related flags are listed in the source of the main page of the corresponding question. Eg, the flags for Math 103 April 2012 Question 1(a) are found on the source of Science:Math_Exam_Resources/Courses/MATH103/April_2012/Question_1_(a).

Click "Edit" and you find

[[Category:MER QGQ flag]][[Category:MER QGH flag]][[Category:MER QGS flag]][[Category:MER CT flag]]

which indicates that the Question Statement, the Hint, and the Solution are all reviewed as good, while the Tag is flagged as missing content.

If you were to add a Tag, you would change the associated flag from "missing content" to "review requested", hence change

[[Category:MER CT flag]] to [[Category:MER RT flag]].

Exam related flags are listed in the source code of an exam page. For example, one this exam page, you can see

[[Category:MER Exam QG flag]]

Content flags

Content flags request contributors to keep adding content to a page. Whether you have a few minutes or hours ahead of you, this is where the chunk of the contributions are being made. Before adding content, have a look at the associated discussion page to be aware of previous concerns, demands or issues related to the page you are working on.

Here is the list of all adding flags and their specifics.

Note to new contributors: New blank pages are created with CQ, CH, CS, CT flags at the mother page of the question that contains the question, hint and solution subpages. To change the flag, say, CQ to RQ, go to the mother page to do so instead of the sub-page (i.e. question statement page) you're editing.

CQ - adding a question statement

The title of the page will already identify which course, exam and question is required. You can find pdf file with past exams on the department's website. Once a question statement has been fully written, change the CQ flag into RQ to request review.

CH - adding hints

Providing hints allows students to work on problems for themselves before reading a solution. Please read the Hints page for more information about providing useful hints. Once enough hints have been provided, change the CH flag into RH to request review.

CS - adding solutions

Worked out solutions should provide more than just the answer to an exam question, they should allow students to examine what skills are required to solve the problem and invite them to examine their strenghs and weaknesses. Please consult the Solutions page for more information about writing effective solutions. Once a solution has been provided, change the CS flag into RS to request review.

CT - adding tags

Tags help students identify the relevant skills and topics connected to an exam question. By adding tags, we create the possibility for instructors and students to search for all exam questions with that tag, for example related rates problems. Please consult the Tags page for a precise description of existing tags and ongoing discussions on the creation of new ones. Then change the CT flag into RT to request review.

Review flags

Review flags request contributors to review edited content on a page. This is an important task to guarantee excellence in our quality control. If you want to review content, please read the quality control section of the relevant pages (see below for details) to make sure you are aware of what the task entails. Please also have a look at the associated discussion page to be aware of previous concerns, demands or issues related to the page you are working on.

An important rule of reviewing is that you cannot review content that you added yourself. The purpose of the reviewing process is to ensure at least two contributors examined a given content to ensure high quality on this wiki. To signal that a contributor has reviewed some content, the corresponding review flag is removed and a quality flag is added (see Quality flags below).

Here is the list of all review flags and their specifics.

RQ - review a question statement

Make sure that an exam question actually is the correct one. If so, change RQ to QGQ, otherwise, change to QBQ. You can find pdf file with past exams on the department's website.

RH - review hints

Reviewing hints requires contributors to ensure they are effective and well scripted. If so, change the RH flag to QGH, otherwise, change to QBH. Please consult the Hints page for more information.

RS - review solutions

Reviewing solutions requires contributors to ensure they are effective and well scripted. If so, change the RS flag to QGS, otherwise, change to QBS. Please consult the Solutions page for more information.

RT - review tags

Reviewing hints requires contributors to ensure they match the standards and are well scripted. If so, change the RT flag to QGT, otherwise, change to QBT. Please consult the Tags page for more information.

Quality flags

Quality flags indicates to contributors and students the quality of a specific type of content. For each type of content (Statements, Hints, Solutions, Tags) we will have two kinds of quality flags: B for bad (with errors or mistakes) or incomplete content; and G for good and complete content. Quality flags are added by a reviewer and follow review flags.

Here is the list of all quality flags and their specifics.

QBQ - bad question statement

For Question statements which the reviewer decides to be bad or incomplete, following the guidelines described in the Statements page.

QGQ - good question statement

For Question statements which the reviewer decides to be good and complete, following the guidelines described in the Statements page.

QBH - bad hint

For Hints which the reviewer decides to be bad or incomplete, following the guidelines described in the Hints page.

QGH - good hint

For Hints which the reviewer decides to be good and complete, following the guidelines described in the Hints page.

QBS - bad solution

For Solutions which the reviewer decides to be bad or incomplete, following the guidelines described in the Solutions page.

QGS - good solution

For Solutions which the reviewer decides to be good and complete, following the guidelines described in the Solutions page.

QBT - bad tag

For Tags which the reviewer decides to be bad or inaccurate, following the guidelines described in the Tags page.

QGT - good tag

For Tags which the reviewer decides to be good, accurate, and complete, following the guidelines described in the Tags page.

Exam Flags

There are two kinds of exam status flags.

In progress

The Category:MER Exam IP flag is added to unfinished exams where there is a "sufficient"* level of material for students to use it, despite being incomplete. This flag will add the exam to our "exams in progress" counters.

*Use of this flag is up to the discretion of the tagger. One rule of thumb would be that about half the solutions are present, and of good quality, in order for the exam to be flagged as in-progress. Exams with little (or poor!) content added should not be flagged at all.

Complete exams

The Category:MER Exam QG flag is added to exams where all questions, hints, and solutions are complete and flagged as good quality. This will add the exam to our "exams finished" counter.

Content

Course creation
This is how you can add a new course.

Add Exams and Question Pages
This is how you can add a new exam and create the question pages.

Question statements

Question statements are stated as closely as possible to their original statements on the exam.

More details on Question statements
Question statements are stated as closely as possible to their original statements on the exam. Adding/Editing a question statement Question pages are automatically generated with a blank question statement box. Just click edit to start adding content to that hint. Finding Exam Questions Exams are published on the UBC Math Department website, sorted by course. There should also be a copy linked on an exam page. Quality control : reviewing a question statement Once a question statement has been flagged for review (with a RQ flag), a contributor who has NOT worked on that statement can review its content. There are two possible outcomes of the review: Bad: for a question statement that contains mistakes, typos or formatting errors when compared to the pdf version of the original exam question. In this case, the reviewer has two choices: make the appropriate modifications and leave the RQ flag to invite another contributor to review the new work; OR leave the work as is and change the RQ flag into a QBQ flag to signal the problem to other contributors. In this case, the reviewer is asked to write the reasons for the bad flag in the discussion page to justify and inform other contributors of his decision and the work that needs to be done. Good: for a question statement that is correct and well formatted. In this case, the reviewer changes the RQ flag into a QGQ flag.

Hints

A good hint should be:

Something that helps the student move forward with the problem while revealing as little as possible.
Something that focuses on a conceptual understanding of the underlying mathematics instead of highlighting procedural methods.

More details on Hints
Hints are a critical aspects of the MER project. They constitute our attempt to support student learning by encouraging the students to work on the problems on their own instead of simply copying procedures. Criteria for good hints A good hint should be: Something that helps the student move forward with the problem while revealing as little as possible. Something that focuses on a conceptual understanding of the underlying mathematics instead of highlighting procedural methods. I added a hint, how do I flag it for review? When there is more than one hint present, it is worth adding in the discussion page a mention of which hint should be reviewed, and add additional RH flags if appropriate. Quality control - reviewing hints Once a hint has been flagged for review (with a RH flag), a contributor who has NOT worked on that hint can review its content. There are two possible outcomes of the review: Bad: for a hint statement that contains mistakes, typos or formatting errors OR for a hint that doesn't support well student learning (see the criteria for good hints above). In this case, the reviewer has two choices: make some modifications and leave the RH flag to invite another contributor to review the new work; OR leave the work as is and change the RH flag into a QBH flag to signal the problem to other contributors. In this case, the reviewer is asked to write the reasons for the bad flag in the discussion page to justify and inform other contributors of his decision and the work that needs to be done. Good: for a hint that is correct, well formatted and support student learning. In this case, the reviewer change the RH flag into a QGH flag. A third possible outcome would be that the reviewer thinks there should be more hints. In that case, the reviewer can add the hints him/herself and flag appropriately (see above) or make sure that the Question page has an active CH flag and explain what kind of hint you are looking for in the discussion page.

Solutions

A good solution should be:

Simple given the concepts and tools that are available to a typical student.
Clearly highlight the reasoning that is involved in making decisions when solving a problem.
Spend some time discussing how word problems are modelled. This element is critical for students and constitute one of their biggest weaknesses. As such, extra care should be taken to explain and guide students through that step while explaining alternate and equivalent choices which would also work.

More details on Solutions
Solutions to exam questions constitute the main part of the content this wiki offers to students (for the moment at least). Since our mission is to support student learning, we want to strive for solutions which encourage students to learn and think deeply of their work and the concepts involved with calculus and avoid promoting rote learning and procedural thinking as much as possible. Criteria for good solutions A good solution should be: Simple given the concepts and tools that are available to a typical student. Clearly highlight the reasoning that is involved in making decisions when solving a problem. Spend some time discussing how word problems are modelled. This element is critical for students and constitute one of their biggest weaknesses. As such, extra care should be taken to explain and guide students through that step while explaining alternate and equivalent choices which would also work. I added a solution, how do I flag it for review? When there are more than one solution present, it is worth adding in the discussion page a mention of which solution should be reviewed. Quality control - reviewing a solution? Once a solution has been flagged for review (with a RS flag), a contributor who has NOT worked on that solution can review its content. There are two possible outcomes of the review: Bad: for a solution that contains mistakes, typos or formatting errors OR for a solution that doesn't support well student learning (see the criteria for good solutions above). In this case, the reviewer has two choices: make some modifications to the solution and leave the RS flag to invite another contributor to review the new work; OR leave the work as is and change the RS flag into a QBS flag to signal the problem to other contributors. In this case, the reviewer is asked to write the reasons for the bad flag in the discussion page to justify and inform other contributors of his decision and the work that needs to be done. Good: for a solution that is correct, well formatted AND support student learning. In this case, the reviewer change the RS flag into a QGS flag. As with hints, the third possible outcome is that the reviewer would like to see an additional solution. The reviewer can either write the additional solution and flag for review (see above) or make sure that the Question page has an active CS flag and explain what kind of hint you are looking for in the discussion page.

Style-guide that allows automatic extraction of final answer
A script automatically extracts the final answer from the solution. For this to work well, please follow this guide when writing your solution: Main Assumption: The final answer can be found in the last paragraph and is is either part of a sentence the last term in an align-environment or a picture. 1. Final answer in a sentence If the last paragraph is not an align-environment and not a picture, then we assume that final answer is in the last sentence. However, some questions end with <<which is what we wanted to show.>>, which is not the final answer we want to extract. Therefore, if there is no <math>, the script takes the sentence before the last sentence and so on. This means: Please write the final answer in a <math> environment so that the script recognizes it. Do not split the math environment like DON'T DO THIS! f = 2 <math> \frac{\pi}{2}</math>sin(x) DON'T DO THIS! Instead, wrap everything in a single math environment. <math>f = 2 \frac{\pi}{2}sin(x)</math> Do not use \emph (<i>, <b>, ''text'') for math-environments. If the final answer is in text-form, e.g. (B), then use the \emph-environment for this, i.e. The final answer is \emph{(B)}. If you want to write a note in the last sentence, then don't use math-expressions and no \emph-environments in the note. The script would interpret this as the final answer. 2. Final answer in an align-environment IF the last paragraph is an align-environment the last item on the left hand side will be matched with the last item of the right hand side, as so <math> \begin{align} f(x) &= ab \\ & = cd \\ g(x) & = ef = gh \\ & = ij = kl = mn \end{align}</math> Then the final answer would be g(x) = mn. If the final answer is a picture, then place the figure as last paragraph. If you want to write a note for the figure, write the note below the figure and do not use math-expressions and no \emph-environment in the note. A figure which is not an answer-figure must be placed before the last paragraph and after the figure there is the final answer either as math-expression in math-environment or in an emph-environment. == General note ==The last paragraph of the solution should be self-contained. The last paragraph is separated from the rest by two new-lines: Script won't look for final answer here: Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Integer vestibulum erat sit amet tempus semper. Phasellus sit amet nisi quis mauris bibendum sagittis nec vel sapien. Place final answer in this paragraph instead: Vestibulum interdum non elit sed ultricies. Mauris at sollicitudin erat. Mauris lobortis est at congue venenatis. Maecenas ac augue at orci tempor viverra nec sit amet augue. Integer vitae justo dui. In particular, do not write matrices like this: <math>\begin{matrix} 1 & 2 \\ 3 & 4 \end{matrix}</math> The blank line is really bad! Then the last paragraph is 3 & 4 \end{matrix}</math> which not only gives the wrong answer but introduces lots of latex errors. Similarly with itemize, cases, enumerate.... environments, and curly brackets.

Topic Tags

Tags (another use of wiki category flags) allows us to sort and search for questions by topic. It is nice if you can tag questions as you go, but adding topic tags is not required to "finish" a solution.

This video explains how our tagging system works

More details on Topic Tags

Tags (another use of wiki category flags) allows us to sort and search for questions by topic. It is nice if you can tag questions as you go, but adding topic tags is not required to "finish" a solution.

Adding tags to a question page

Simply add your tag(s) at the appropriate place in the code of the corresponding question page. E.g.

... <!-- WRITE TAGS BETWEEN HERE --> [[Category:MER Tag Set theory]][[Category:MER Tag Prove or disprove]] <!-- AND HERE --> ...

adds the tags Set theory and Prove or disprove to that question. To see which tags can be added to questions, see the tag dictionary below.

After you have added your tags, update the status flag of the question from Category:MER_CT flag to Category:MER RT flag.

Adding a tag to the dictionary

Just use the following creation box to add a new Tag. Please consider the current list of tags before adding a new one.

Create a new Tag
Simply add the title of the Tag at the end of the pre-loaded address in the text-box below (e.g. you add Set theory to obtain for example Category:MER Tag Set theory in the text box.) Naming Conventions Rule 1: All proper nouns get capitalized regardless of where they appear. Rule 2: Tags should always start with a capital letter (uppercase) and the rest of their name should be in lowercase (except for rule 1). Spaces are allowed and recommend when necessary, e.g. Set theory. Rule 3: Respect the spacing of tags; tags need to look like MER Tag Funky topic not MER TagFunkyTopic or MER TagFunky topic etc. . This form loads all the structure of the page; Add content now or later, and click Save page to finalize the creation of this new tag.

Tags Dictionary

How-To's

Formatting Math Text
To format solutions, you need to know LaTeX (see next info box). The only change is that where you would normally use double dollar signs to indicate math mode, you will use html tags <math> f'(x) = \frac{1}{x^2} </math> If you want to just type up your solutions in normal LaTex, you can run them through the converter on this webpage and then enter them into the wiki. Because it can be tedious to be constantly typing the math html tags, if the symbols to be formatted are simple (like a single variable in the middle of a sentence), we simply italicize by using ''y = 0'' Sometimes even when you use the html math tags, the formatting just looks like italicized text. This can be particularly annoying when dealing with derivatives, for example: $f'(x)=0$ . You can't really see the "prime." In order to "force" math mode, use <math> \displaystyle f'(x) = 0 </math> which gives $\displaystyle f'(x)=0$ Indenting equations and math using a colon (:) is nice, but do not indent multiple times in this fashion (e.g., do not type ":::::") since this makes the math hard to read on devices with narrow screens (e.g., phones).

LaTeX

If you've never used LaTeX before, fear not! Most of the symbols used to typeset university level mathematics are not that challenging to learn. This wikibook has a fairly comprehensive list of common symbols (you can avoid the first section on environments). However, the best way to learn the LaTeX needed to contribute to the wiki is just to look at the sample code behind certain questions. Note that since equations are never numbered, mediawiki uses \begin{align} for "\begin{align*}" and gives an error on the latter.

A gentle intro to Editing Math Equations using LaTeX

Content from Help:Editing_Math_Equations_using_TeX

This article is part of the MathHelp Tutoring Wiki

This article is part of the PhysicsHelp Tutoring Wiki

This is how you edit math equations using the TeX syntax to make nice looking equations. Please use TeX when writing math. Trying to put equations directly into the text doesn't look very nice and TeX is very easy to learn.

If you already use TeX, then all you need to know is that your normal syntax must be surrounded by tags:

For HTML rendering if possible

<math> syntax </math>

For forced TeX rendering ( which produces an image )

<math> syntax ~</math>
<math> \displaystyle syntax </math>
<math> syntax \,\!</math>
<math> syntax \,</math>

The above forced rendering are explained in Forced PNG rendering

If you've never used TeX before, here's a crash course:

Fractions

To make a fraction use:

\frac{foo}{bar}

These render as: ${\frac {foo}{bar}}$

Superscript and Subscript

To make superscripts and subscripts, use:

x^2
y_0

These render as: $x^{2}~y_{0}$

Greek Letters

To make greek letters, you just need to know their names. Use a capital for the capital letter, a lower-case for the lower-case letter:

\pi
\theta
\omega
\Omega
\gamma
\Gamma
\alpha
\beta

These render as like: $\pi ~\theta ~\omega ~\Omega ~\gamma ~\Gamma ~\alpha ~\beta$

Trig Stuff

You can use the following to render trig functions without italics so it looks nicer:

\cos(\theta)
\sin(\theta)
\tan(\theta)

These render as: $\cos(\theta )~\sin(\theta )~\tan(\theta )$ , as opposed to:

cos(\theta)
sin(\theta)
tan(\theta)

Which look like: $cos(\theta )~sin(\theta )~tan(\theta )$

In general, if you want to make words not in italics in math, use

\text{foo bar}

Which looks like ${\text{foo bar}}$ instead of $foobar$

Big Brackets

Usually, a normal parenthesis or bracket will do fine:

x^2 (2x + y)

Renders as: $x^{2}(2x+y)$

But if you have big stuff like fractions, it doesn't always look as nice:

(\frac{\pi}{2})

renders as: $({\frac {\pi }{2}})$

Instead, use:

x^2 \left(2x + y\right)
\left( \frac{\pi}{2} \right)

Which looks like: $x^{2}\left(2x+y\right)~\left({\frac {\pi }{2}}\right)$

Notice that these kinds of brackets are always the right size. They also work with square brackets:

\left[ \frac{\pi}{2} \right]
\left[ x^2 (2x + y) \right]

Renders as: $\left[{\frac {\pi }{2}}\right]~\left[x^{2}(2x+y)\right]$

Other

These are some other things that may be useful. In general, if you want to know how to make a type of symbol, you can find many usefuly lists by searching for TeX or LaTeX math symbols.

\sqrt{foo}

${\sqrt {foo}}$

\int_a^b f(x)dx

$\int _{a}^{b}f(x)dx$

\pm

$\pm$

\mp

$\mp$

\approx

$\approx$

One thing you may notice is that adding spaces between symbols will not add more space in the rendered output.

a_0         a_1
a_0 a_1

These will both render as: $a_{0}a_{1}$ $a_{0}a_{1}$

If you want to force spacing between symbols, you have to use the "~" symbol:

a_0~~~~~~~~~a_1

renders as: $a_{0}~~~~~~~~~a_{1}$

Also, it can be useful to note that there as two kinds of math font that the wiki will try to use. One is a smaller font which fits better into a line of normal text, and the other is a larger font which looks nicer when you have an equation on its own line. Whenever you make somthing "big" like a fraction or square root symbol, the wiki will automatically use bigger font. Sometimes you may want to force a line to be bigger because it looks nicer. I have found no nice way to do this other than it just so happens that if you put a "~" at the end of a line that line will be rendered in the bigger font; since the "~" is at the end you won't notice that there is technically an extra blank space there.

A\cos(\omega t)</math>
A\cos(\omega t)~</math>

These will render as:

$A\cos(\omega t)$ $A\cos(\omega t)~$

Lastly, don't be afraid to nest things together to make really complicated looking expressions:

v_2 = \sqrt{\frac{2\left(P_1 - P_2\right)}{\rho \left(1 - {\left(\frac{A_2}{A_1}\right)}^2\right)}}

will render as: $v_{2}={\sqrt {\frac {2\left(P_{1}-P_{2}\right)}{\rho \left(1-{\left({\frac {A_{2}}{A_{1}}}\right)}^{2}\right)}}}$

Adding Pictures
See the UBC wiki help pages about how to add pictures and how to upload files. The convention that we will use is to have these images have a long but similar name to the page they will be used for. Say you want to add a picture to your solution of question 1 (a) of the April 2009 exam of MATH101. The question page is at the address: Science:Math_Exam_Resources/Courses/MATH101/April_2009/Question_1_(a) Then the picture material for that question (for hints, questions, solutions etc.) should be all uploaded under the path: File:Math_Exam_Resources_Courses_MATH101_April_2009_Question_1_(a)_picture_1.png where you can change picture_1 to anything you want and the .png has to match the type of the file you are uploading. Note that when writing the name of the file, you don't write the File: part, the upload will do it on its own, so when in the upload page, when asked for the new filename, just write: Math_Exam_Resources_Courses_MATH101_April_2009_Question_1_(a)_picture_1.png See also Help for adding images and pictures Help for uploading files

Adding WolframAlpha Widgets
This widget allows you to add \| Wolfram Alpha widgets to your wiki page. To insert this widget, use the following code: {{#widget:WolframAlpha\|id=c44e503833b64e9f27197a484f4257c0}} Parameters id - the widget id. Widgets can be found or created at the Wolfram\|Alpha widgets page. Note: all parameters come from the publish page of the Widget Builder. Sample result Adding the code to the Visual editor When you insert a widget code (including YouTube, Slideshare, etc.) to the Visual Editor, copy the code then paste it to the Visual Editor. Then click on the code, and press edit. Then, you can change the parameter and press Apply Changes. Paste the example code to the visual editor. Click on the code, and press edit. Then, change the parameter and press Apply Changes

Adding collapsible tables
To create (basic) collapsible tables, use the following code: {\| class="collapsible wikitable collapsed" width="100%" style="background: #FFFFFF;" ! style="padding-left:1em; text-align: left;" \| TITLE GOES HERE \|- \|style="padding:1em"\| CONTENT GOES HERE \|}

Delete or move a page
Simply add the text `{{delete}}` to the page in question. If not obvious, please explain your reason for deletion in the commit message. The page will be deleted by the UBC wiki administrator 30 days later. Instead of deleting, consider moving the page instead. Eg when you want to rename Question 1 to Question 01. Details on page deletion, Details on page moving.

Where to Contribute

How do you know where to contribute? There are several ways:

If you're interested in a particular class, go to that page. Hopefully there will be an in progress exam to work on. If you click on the in-progress exam page, there should be a grid at the bottom, showing the number of each kind of flag. If you want to add content, look under the first column of flags; to review content, see the second column of flags, etc.
- If there isn't an in-progress exam and you'd like to add one, check with a current admin first, and then see (forthcoming page on adding exams).
If you want to add content to any class/exam, see our list of "content needed" flags for questions, hints, and solutions.
To review or improve content for any class/exam, see our list of "review" flags (questions, hints, and solutions) or "bad quality" flags (questions, hints, and solutions). These are also linked under the currently open tasks section of the MER contributor's page.
In general, any in-progress or completed exam could use more topic tags.
If all else fails, there is usually some sort of task list on the contributor's page.