Can a single R/Markdown file contain all exercises for R/exams?

Is it possible to have all exercises of an exam in the same R/Markdown file for R/exams? From what I have read, each question has to be in its own file. Sure, I can split, by using R, a R/Markdown file with several questions into files containing a single question, but wouldn't it be easier to have exam2xyz doing that?

Solution

It is a fundamental design principle in R/exams that 1 exercise = 1 file (either .Rmd or .Rnw).

At first this might seem a bit overcomplicated, especially if you are used to putting together written exams with static exercises in a particular order. Users who do so often apply some manual randomization as they include small variations when they re-use exercises from old exams.

In contrast, R/exams is designed for a different workflow. The goal is to write exercises that already include some level of randomization so that they can be re-used without modification in different contexts, e.g., in different combinations of exercises in written exams or as one of many similar exercises in an item pool in a learning management system etc.

Therefore requiring that every exercise is a different file facilitates:

Building a large pool of independent exercises.
Working on the exercise pool collaboratively, e.g., in a version control system.
Thorough stress testing of dynamic exercises to make sure that they work in many random variations.
Re-using the same exercise file in different contexts.

If you feel that this does not suit your workflow well, that's fair enough. In that case I would choose some separator line between different exercises in the same file. Then you can write a small function creates files in a temporary directory with the split up files. Feel free to ask for feedback on this if you're struggling with that. But before you do I would encourage you to try to go along with the separate files.