Overview

Flex-Tasks provides a faster, more flexible method for creating exercises in our e-learning platform Autotool, removing the need to touch the core codebase for every new idea.

Goal

Normally, tasks must be added directly to Autotool’s code by implementing a task interface. Flex-Tasks instead let you define tasks through a configuration file, which is interpreted at runtime to create an exercise.

Why

Flex-Tasks speed up development and make Autotool more accessible to educators and student assistants. By removing the need to modify Autotool’s internals, they lower the barrier for experimenting with new exercise formats.

Use Cases

It's not immediately obvious when you would want to use Flex-Tasks instead of a traditional Autotool task. Here are some scenarios where they could be more convenient:

When	Advantage
Prototyping completely new tasks	See changes right away instead of recompiling Autotool each time.
Adding variations of existing tasks	Reuse functionality without writing the usual Autotool boilerplate.
Working without access to Autotool’s codebase	Design exercises via Flex-Tasks’ simplified interface.

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