Style, Linting and Autograder Guide

General Layout Guidelines

  1. Make sure to include a file Docstring and author variable.
    • A Docstring should be surrounded by triple quotes, have no spaces on at the beginning and end, and end in punctuation.
    • An author variable should have two underscores (a dunderscore) on either side of author and be equal to your PID in String format.
  2. Named constants follow the Docstring and author variable. They should be all capitalized and already initialized.
  3. Every function and class should have it’s own Docstring as the first line. There should also be two newlines of space in between each function or class.
    • Every function must be declared with a unique name, it’s parameters and a return type.
    • Note that add_one returns an int and therefore must have a return statment. However print_word returns None and therefore a return statement is not required.
"""This is a Docstring."""

__author__ = "123456789"

NAMED_CONSTANT: int = 1


def add_one(num: int) -> int:
    """Adds one to a given number."""
    return num + NAMED_CONSTANT


def print_word(word: str) -> None:
    """Prints out a given word."""
    print(word)

How to Read the Autograder

If you don’t recieve full credit when submitting to the autograder, there will likely be error messages outputted. Understanding how to read these messages can be key to figuring out what is wrong with your code.

Basic Failed Test

Below is an example of a possible autograder error message if your code did not pass a functionality test.

  • graders/exercises/ex02/cipher_test.py:38 tells you which line of the grader found the missing functionality in your code. Since you cannot see the grader, you can ignore this part.
  • AssertionError: assert 'n' == 'njml' tells you that your code outputted 'n' but the autograder was expecting 'njml'.
  • ` - njml, + ntells you the same thing,njmlwas missing from your output butn` was present.

Code Style and Linting Errors

Below is an example of a possible autograder error message for a style issue.

  • exercises/ex02/cipher.py tells you that it was the cipher.py file that threw the error and that the file is located in exercises/ex02.
  • 10 tells you that this error originated from line 10 of the given file.
  • 43 tells you how far (how many characters) into the line the error occured.
  • E225 is a flake8 linter error. Linting helps identify formatting issues in your code. You can view these error codes here.
  • missing whitespace around operator gives you a brief summary of your formatting issue.

Most autograder errors will follow this general pattern. You should familiarize yourself with reading autograder errors to help you get full points on exercises, projects and quizzes.

Specific Autograder Errors

This section contains errors unrelated to linting and styling and some possible fixes to try.

  • The file won’t upload, or when it uploads the autograder doesn’t seem to recognize the files.
    • Delete all your old submission zips, then create a new submission zip making sure to check for punctuation or spelling errors in the command.
  • No tests or only Lint - Code style, documentation, formatting is showing up.
    • Check that your file is in the correct location.
    • Make sure your folder and files are named correctly.
    • Confirm all functions are properly named and declared.
    • Check for any unclosed parenthesis, quotation marks or other small syntax errors.
  • module <_file_path_> has no attribute '__author__'
    • Make sure your __author__ variable has TWO underscores on either side.
    • Make sure your __author__ variable is a string.
Contributor(s): Ezri White