Plagiarism –
Old Turnitin Process
At the moment all we have available
are a series of jar files for use with Turnitin. They
will enable you to select a group of files (Word or text) in a directory then
combine them into a single file for submission to Turnitin.
This is NOT intended as a method to cheat Turnitin,
more of a time saving activity for lecturers who would prefer not to leave
submission to their students.
In order to execute jar files you must first install the Java Runtime
Environment (JRE) from Sun It can also be
referred to as the Java VM (Virtual Machine). If you are unfamiliar with jar
files, you may also wish to download the relevant "batch files"
below. These should be placed in the same directory as the equivalent jar file,
and will allow you to run the jar file simply by double clicking on the (batch
file's) icon.
If you distribute or reuse these
programs, please acknowledge their source (Angie Chandler/Lynne Blair at Lancaster University).
To download:
FindFiles jar
FindFiles batch file
FindFiles picture
FetchFiles jar
EditFiles jar
EditFiles batch file
EditFiles picture
DecodeHtml jar
(used with Turnitin trials)
DecodeHtml.jar
(Turnitin -
DecodeHtml batch
file
DecodeJisc.jar (Jisc version of Turnitin)
DecodeJisc.jar
(Jisc –
DecodeJisc batch file
DecodeHtml picture (also use with DecodeJisc)
Antiword
Antiword for
non-windows users (external site)
What to do: Step 1: Install JRE and place antiword.exe
(by Markus Ueberall) in a directory named "antiword" in c: (ie so that
you access it c:\antiword). Place the other downloaded files in the antiword directory as well.
Step 2: Select the relevant student
files. If they are not already in a single directory then make a copy of the
directory you are taking them from on your local computer and run FetchFiles.bat by double clicking on it (make sure you have
installed JRE first) – this will create a directory called codefiles,
all other copied directories can be removed at this stage if you want. The
student files are only likely to be in different directories if they have been
submitted automatically, so I am assuming that the folders you have copied will
bear some relation to the students’ names. You need to select the folder
immediately above the level with the students’ names – either by typing in or
by selecting a file there. FetchFiles still has a
small bug and is unable to select folders without opening them.
Once all student files are in the same directory, run FindFiles.bat
and select any of the files in the directory from there. Click on the convert
to text button at the bottom once you have selected a file.
Step 3: Run toConvert.bat.
You don't need to download this, this will be created
automatically by FindFiles.jar, and will allow you to
convert the word files into text files. toConvert
will be found in the same directory as FindFiles.jar
and will place the text files in a folder named "text" inside the original
folder containing the word documents. It will also create a file named
“matchdocs.txt” which will be used later if you place the results from Turnitin/Jisc on the same computer.
If there are any text files you wish to sample with the word docs, they should
be placed in the "text" folder now. Currently, this program doesn't
convert from any other formats (sorry).
Step 4: Run EditFiles.bat
- double click. This time you must select any file in the "text"
directory, and also Set Sample Size. By default the program will take a sample
of 30% from 10%-40% within each document and then glue these samples all
together. If you wish for larger or smaller samples, or to receive each file
separately and merely use this for anonymisation
(currently automatic) make use of the tick boxes and buttons at the top of the
window. When you are ready, press the Sample text button at
the bottom.
Step 5 (Turnitin):
Go to Turnitin
(register) and submit the entire "joint.txt" file (found in the
"text" folder). Be patient whilst waiting for the text to finish
pasting if your samples are large or some will be missing. Also note that if
you fail to give the document a title (there is a textbox for this) or repeat a
title a minor error will be thrown later. Then wait.
Step 5 (Jisc): Go to Jisc (if you aren’t registered you will need to contact your administrator) and submit the joint.txt file (in “text” folder).
Step 6 (Turnitin):
4-24hours later (unless your file is extremely big) return to Turnitin to
collect your results. When you open the results listing from the Turnitin inbox, go to "View" on the menu and
select "Source". A notepad file will open, save this to your
computer. Anywhere will be fine, although if you repeat this process it is
convenient to keep the results in the same place and to give the file a name
you will recognise.
Step 6 (Jisc): A little later return to Jisc and collect your results. Open the report given, go to “View” on the menu and select “Source”. A notepad file will open – save this to your computer (make sure you know where).
Step 7: Run DecodeHtml.bat
(Turnitin) or DecodeJisc.bat
(Jisc), which runs the last of the jar files. Select
the file which you have just loaded from Turnitin/Jisc
and press Decode (bottom button). When the window closes, this means that the
processing is complete. Return to the folder where you saved the file from Turnitin/Jisc and click on a html
file called Turnitin. If this is your first time, a
single link will be shown to your results, with students listed in order of the
worst plagiarised documents. For multiple links, your
link will match the title input into Turnitin/Jisc.
If you are running DecodeHtml/DecodeJisc on the same computer as you ran FindFiles then you may also convert the student numbers back to student names, and if you wish to compare results using CopyCatch later, you may also wish to download the relevant URLs – these will be placed in a separate folder named comparison. URL downloading is currently under construction, and although operational will be improved imminently.
