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Module Ratings & Past Exams

Peer feedback from students who already completed a course is one of the most valuable sources of guidance when planning upcoming semesters. At the same time, preparation with past exams (Altklausuren) requires clear handling of copyright and faculty policies.

This document details OSCAR's module rating system and the architecture decision regarding the past exam archive (Issue #43).

1. Module Ratings & Difficulty Feedback

Features

Every student can evaluate modules they have attended directly within Discord:

  • Overall Rating (1–5 Stars): From 1 (poor) to 5 (excellent).
  • Subjective Difficulty (1–5): From 1 (very easy) to 5 (very hard / demanding).
  • Review & Tips (Optional): Helpful advice for subsequent cohorts (e.g. recommended prerequisites, exercise workload, or exam format tips).

Access Points

  1. Interactive Button on Module Card: When viewing any module via /module or /filter, click the green ⭐ Bewerten / ⭐ Rate button to open the submission modal dialog.
  2. Slash Command /rate: Directly rate any module with autocompleted choices: 
    /rate modul:Algorithmen und Datenstrukturen bewertung:5 schwierigkeit:4 kommentar:Sehr gutes Modul, wöchentliche Übungszettel frühzeitig anfangen!
    If bewertung or schwierigkeit are omitted, OSCAR automatically displays the interactive modal popup.

Display on Module Overview

The aggregate statistics are automatically shown directly on the module card: 

⭐ 4.3/5 (7 ratings) | 🏋️ Difficulty: 3.6/5

Data Privacy & Integrity

  • One Vote per Student: Each student (user_id) has exactly one vote per module. Submitting a new rating updates the existing entry (ON CONFLICT DO UPDATE).
  • Anonymous Aggregation: Discord IDs and user names are never displayed alongside ratings or aggregated statistics.
  • GDPR Compliance: Under /my_data, any ratings submitted by the student are included in their personal data export and completely wiped upon account deletion (Database.delete_user_data).

2. Past Exams & FaRaFIN Klausurenarchiv

The Question from Issue #43

Issue #43 asked:

Who holds the copyright on an exam paper? Whether the faculty allows redistribution at all? Where the files would live? How a wrong or harmful upload gets removed?

The Decision

Hosting uncurated exam PDFs directly in Discord attachments or on a bot-managed server introduces severe legal liabilities: 1. Copyright: Exam papers are intellectual property of the examining chairs and professors, not the students. Redistribution without explicit written license from the examiner is legally prohibited. 2. Storage & Expiration: Discord CDN attachments expire, while local server storage requires moderation, malware scanning, and takedown procedures. 3. Established Infrastructure: The student councils already run the archives. FaRaFIN keeps the computer science one at farafin.de, FaraWiwi the FWW one at farawiwi.ovgu.de, and FaraMath the maths recollections at faramath.ovgu.de.

Implementation

  • Direct Integration: Every module card contains a 📚 Altklausuren / 📚 Past Exams link button navigating directly to the official portal.
  • Slash Command /klausuren: Explains how to log in with your CS student credentials (FIN account) and how to submit exam recollection protocols (Gedächtnisprotokolle) to FaRaFIN after taking an exam.