File: $PLAGCHECK/AAREADME.txt
Tool: Plagiarism Checker
Version: 1.0.0

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Change Log:
(20221226) initial version
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This directory contains a tool that detects plagiarism in software.
To learn more about the technology behind this, please go here:

 https://theory.stanford.edu/~aiken/moss/

This directory contains a script that makes it relatively easy to run the
MOSS tool and interpret the output.

A. WHAT'S NEW

Version 1.0.0:
 + initial release

B. INSTALLATION REQUIREMENTS

Python code unfortunately often depends on a large number of add-ons, making
it very challenging to port code into new environments. This tool has been
tested extensively on ece-000 running Python v3.9.x.

Additional Python tools required in addition to the base Python Anaconda
install include:

 o bs4: https://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/
 o requests: https://requests.readthedocs.io/en/latest/

A requirements.txt file is included in the release that helps you automate
the process of updating your environment. With pip, you can easily install
all the necessary packages with this command:
  
  pip install -r <root>/requirements.txt

C. USER'S GUIDE

The easiest way to learn how to use this tool is to execute the following
commands on ece-000:

 cd /data/courses/ece_1111/TOOLS/plagcheck/v1.0.0
 ./bin/plagcheck -l c -d example_cc
 ./bin/plagcheck -l python -d example_py

The tool can be run from any directory as follows:

 /data/courses/ece_1111/TOOLS/plagcheck/v1.0.0/bin/plagcheck -l <lang> -d <dir>

You can get a detailed help message by adding the "--help" option:

 /data/courses/ece_1111/TOOLS/plagcheck/v1.0.0/bin/plagcheck --help -l <lang> -d <dir>

This message is attached at the bottom of this readme.

The "-l" option specifies the language. The "-d" option specifies the directory
tree to be searched. It is best to place all student work underneath a common
directory:

 .../ece_1111/homework/hw_01/smith_jordan
 .../ece_1111/homework/hw_01/smoth_alex
 ...

You would then specify ".../ece_1111/homework/hw_01" with the "-d" option.

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If you have any additional comments or questions about the data,
please direct them to help@nedcdata.org.

Best regards,

Joe Picone

====
ece-000_[1]: /data/courses/ece_1111/TOOLS/plagcheck/v1.0.0/bin/plagcheck -l c -d foo --help
name: plagcheck
synopsis: plagcheck [options]
descr: uses Stanford's MOSS site to check for code plagiarism

options:
 -h, --help: display this help message and exit
 -l, --language: the programming language [c]
 -t, --threshold: the minimum similarity threshold [75]
 -u, --usage: display a usage message
  
examples:

 plagcheck -l c /home/user1/code /home/user2/code

  searches the specified directories for C code (ending in .c) and
  analyzes the files for similarities

 plagcheck -l python -t 80 /home/user1/code

  searches the specified directories for python code (ending in .py) and
  analyzes the files for similarities of 80% or higher

notes:

(1) The list of languages supported are:

     c: for C/C++ files that has the extensions [".c", ".cc", ".cpp"]
     matlab: for MATLAB files that has the extensions [".m", ".matlab"]
     python: for Python files that has the extensions [".py]

    The value shown is the value you should specify for "--language".

(2) The threshold option allows you to specify the minimum threshold for
    similar files. A threshold of 50 would display all scores with a
    similarity score of 50% or higher.

(3) This tool connects to the Stanford MOSS server: moss.standford.edu.
    If the server is down an error message will be displayed/.

(4) To learn more about Standford's Measure of Similarity Software (MOSS),
    go here: https://theory.stanford.edu/~aiken/moss/