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What happens when a control cannot decide

Three controls, and a rule for doubt

StudyDrome Exam Manager gates a session with three independent controls: an access code determines who can start, an address rule determines where it can be started, and device binding ties an attempt to the browser it began in. Each is optional, and each behaves predictably when it cannot decide.

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How do the three controls fit together?

Three controls appear in a single step of the exam wizard, and each is optional. Switch on the ones the sitting needs and leave the rest alone.

Control

What it decides

Access code

Who can start. No code, one code shared by the cohort, or a code of their own per candidate.

Address rule

Where they can start from. A list of permitted addresses, each one a single address or a range.

Device binding

Which browser they carry on in. The attempt binds to the one it began in.

Codes are the exam office's daily business, and the exam-office page covers issuing and handing them out — including the part that matters most on the day, which is that codes belong to the exam rather than to one publication of it. Correcting a paper never forces you to redistribute.

A fourth setting joins them on a scheduled sitting: a start window. That one is below.

What these controls establish, and what they leave to a test center, is a question about the category rather than about StudyDrome. Proportionate exam integrity sets it out.

When is a candidate's location checked?

An address rule is not a door you walk through once.

It runs when a candidate prepares the exam. It runs again when they start an attempt. It runs again every time they resume one. A candidate who leaves an approved network partway through is caught when they return to the paper, rather than waved through because they were approved at the start.

The checks belong to those three moments. Nothing watches the connection in between.

A rule with no addresses in it does not restrict anything. Switching the rule on is not the same as setting it, and an empty list means "no restriction" rather than "refuse everyone".

What happens when a control cannot decide?

Every control has to answer a third question, and it is the one nobody demonstrates: what happens when it cannot tell?

An address rule fails closed. An address the system cannot read is refused, not waved through. So is a blank one, and so is one that arrives labeled "unknown". A blank line inside your own list is skipped rather than read as a wildcard. An entry that is not a valid range simply never matches — it does not throw an error, and it does not open the door.

Device binding fails open. Some browsers block the signal a binding is built from. When that happens, the candidate sits the exam. A privacy setting is not misconduct, and shutting somebody out of a paper over one is the wrong trade.

The asymmetry is deliberate. The address rule protects the exam, so doubt resolves against entry. The binding protects continuity inside a sitting, so doubt resolves in the candidate's favor. Both are worth knowing before you switch either one on.

How does device binding behave across a session?

Binding is a property of the attempt. The browser an attempt starts in becomes the browser it carries on in.

Starting sets that binding. Resuming tests it. A candidate who reopens the paper somewhere else is told to go back to the browser they started in, in those words.

When the move is legitimate (a laptop dies halfway through), a proctor clears the binding from the Monitor screen. One candidate, several at once, or everyone still working. The next resume binds to whatever device the candidate is on now. Nobody touches a database, and the sitting carries on.

Results come back as they actually happened. If a reset worked for some candidates and not others, the screen says which.

When does the start window apply?

A scheduled sitting can require candidates to begin within a number of minutes you set.

The clock runs from the time they are sitting. On an exam that repeats, this is the sitting for this week rather than the first in the series.

It governs starting. A candidate who began within the window and dropped out can resume afterward — the window closed on late arrivals, not on those already working.

The window belongs to a scheduled sitting. An exam you leave open without a schedule is governed by its availability dates instead.

What does exam access control guarantee?

A control you cannot explain at an appeal is a liability rather than a safeguard. These are the properties you can explain.

  • Every control is optional and set per exam. A sitting carries only the ones you switched on for it.

  • An address the system cannot read is refused, never waved through.

  • A blank line in your address list is skipped rather than read as a wildcard.

  • An address rule with nothing in it does not restrict anything.

  • Device binding is tested when a candidate resumes. Starting an attempt is what sets it in motion.

  • A proctor can clear a binding for one candidate or for everyone still working, and the next resume re-binds on its own.

  • The access-code mode applies to every publication, so the rule a candidate meets is the rule the exam was published under.

Who needs exam access control?

  • Exam offices are running a sitting that has to happen on campus.

  • Invigilators who need a candidate back on a paper after a hardware failure.

  • IT reviewers are asking what each control does with input it cannot read.

  • Anyone who has had to explain afterward why one candidate was let in, and another was not.

Frequently asked questions

How do you stop a candidate from sitting an exam from anywhere?

Add an address rule to the exam and list the addresses you allow, each one a single address or a range. The rule is checked when the candidate prepares for the exam, when they start an attempt, and every time they resume an attempt. Leaving an approved network part-way through is caught when they return to the paper.

What happens if the system cannot read a candidate's address?

It refuses. An address that cannot be read, one that arrives blank, and one that arrives labeled as unknown are all treated the same way: the candidate does not start. A blank line inside your own list is skipped rather than read as a wildcard, and an entry that is not a valid range never matches anything.

Can a candidate move to another computer mid-exam?

Not while device binding is on, unless a proctor allows it. The attempt binds to the browser it began in, so resuming from elsewhere prompts the candidate to go back. When a laptop genuinely dies, a proctor clears the binding from the Monitor screen, and the next resume binds to the replacement.

What happens if a candidate's browser blocks device fingerprinting?

They sit the exam. Device binding fails open by design: when the signal it relies on is unavailable, the candidate is let through rather than shut out of a paper. A privacy setting is not misconduct. The control protects continuity inside a sitting, so doubt is resolved in the candidate's favor.

When does the start window apply?

On a scheduled sitting. Candidates must begin within the number of minutes you set, counted from the time they are seated rather than from the first in a repeating series. It governs only the start, so someone who began within the window can still resume later. An exam with no schedule uses its availability dates instead.

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