Solution references

[mhagander]

This again goes to the build system and what's possible.

A number of places refer to "if you need help, yu can look at the solutions". This has two problems that should be fixed if possible:

There is no reference to which solution. The numbering in the solutions chapter is entirely independent from where the exercises are. Making this somehow use the same numbering would make it a lot easier to flip back and forth. Or if that's not possible, then something like "see section 19.4 for a solution", where 19.4 actually matches the individual solution to this exercise.

If at all possible it would be even better if the reference could point to the actual page number for the solution as well.

[dridi]

I'd rather have it as before, with solutions right after the exercise. In the slides going back and forth between the exercise and the solution is as simple as hitting next and previous, no awkward long jumps.

If the concern is about trainees being tempted to look at the solution instead of doing the exercise, I'll ignore it. I don't care about undisciplined trainees (for the record, a tiny minority in my experience) and it actually helps comfortable trainees that like to compare their solutions to the proposed ones (and often interesting questions spring from them).

@huayra didn't we decide that we'd revert the "solutions as appendices" change last month?

[mhagander]

Now that you mention it I recall that being the case when I did the training before yeah.

I see no problem moving them to right after the exercise. If the trainees aren't there to learn, there isn't much we can do anyway.

If possible it would be good to make sure they're not printed on the same page in the book, and just insert a blank page to push the solution over so you at least have to flip the page (but just one page). But I have a feeling that would also possibly be more work than it's worth.

[fgsch]

There are reasons to have the solutions separately. e.g. users reading the solution by mistake because it's either in the following page or part of the page where the exercise is.
This is not related to the trainees looking at the solution.

This is a common practice. Many books with exercises have it either in a separate booklet or at the end.

[franciscovg]

There have been many training sessions after this issue was opened. Is this still an open issue? What are the current opinions and arguments to keep it open?

[gquintard]

I think that this ticket is still quite valid, there's no immediate way to find the solution of one exercice.

[huayra]

I think that we totally need an easy way to reference a solution from the exercise, thing is I do not understand (remember) entirely why this is not done. is it too hard?

Would adding an exercise_#reference per exercise and then use an exercise#_solution for the corresponding solution fix this issue?