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@mao-sz mao-sz commented Jan 15, 2024

Because

People are very commonly concerned when they see their exercise solutions differ from the provided solutions. This is primarily from two parts:

  • Learners are initially directed straight to the relevant exercise directory and not told to read the repo README (where a note about the provided solution is). This has been addressed in #27055
  • The README note on provided solutions, despite saying the provided one isn't the only solution, the rest of the sentence seems to be interpret-able as "if your solution differs, check with the community if it's actually allowed".

This PR

  • Improves the wording of the relevant README note to clarify intent (unified wording with css-exercises repo)

Issue

Closes #27053

Additional Information

In conjunction with #463 from the css-exercises repo

Pull Request Requirements

  • I have thoroughly read and understand The Odin Project Contributing Guide
  • The title of this PR follows the location of change: brief description of change format, e.g. 01-flex-center: Update self check
  • The Because section summarizes the reason for this PR
  • The This PR section has a bullet point list describing the changes in this PR
  • If this PR addresses an open issue, it is linked in the Issue section
  • If applicable, I have ensured that the TOP solution files match the Desired Outcome image

Same change made in parallel with the css-exercises repo to unify
wording.
README.md Outdated
5. Once you successfully finish an exercise, check the `solutions` directory within each exercise to compare it with yours.
- You should not be checking the solution for an exercise until you finish it!
- Keep in mind that TOP's solution is not the only solution. Generally as long as all of the tests pass, your solution should be fine.
- If your solution differs wildly from TOP's solution (and still passes the self-check criteria), that's completely fine. Do feel free to ask about it in the chatroom if there are parts you do not understand.
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I feel like we need to note that the solution ideally should be in line with the concepts that were learned leading up to doing the exercise. For example, if an exercise is assigned after learning about string methods, ideally a user's solution should use string methods (vs loops). That may be a larger conversation/re-evaluating where each exercise is introduced within the context of the curriculum.

Unless you feel adding some verbiage like that would be helpful right now, I only have one nit below:

Suggested change
- If your solution differs wildly from TOP's solution (and still passes the self-check criteria), that's completely fine. Do feel free to ask about it in the chatroom if there are parts you do not understand.
- If your solution differs wildly from TOP's solution (and still passes the self-check criteria), that's completely fine. Do feel free to ask about it in our Discord if there are parts you do not understand.

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My feeling at the moment is that "meeting the exercise requirements" should be sufficient to imply that, depending on what the exercise requirements are. And that if there is an intention for an exercise to be done a certain way based on recent lesson content, then that would be better placed in the relevant exercise's requirements. Thoughts?

For now I'll make that nit change and also rephrase "self-check criteria" to "exercise's requirements", as there technically isn't a "self-check criteria" section in the exercises' READMEs.

@thatblindgeye thatblindgeye merged commit 77363aa into TheOdinProject:main Jan 19, 2024
@mao-sz mao-sz deleted the chore/improve-readme-wording-on-provided-solution branch January 19, 2024 17:44
Oussama5379 added a commit to Oussama5379/javascript-exercises that referenced this pull request Feb 1, 2025
…readme-wording-on-provided-solution

Repo README: Improve wording regarding TOP provided solution
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Foundations: Be more explicit about exercise solutions not being the only solutions

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