| In-class Exam Experience | |
| Remote Exam Experience | |
| Tips and known issues | |
| CalBar Prep | |
Did you know that Examsoft has a state bar page? For all SCU LAW alums, we wish you the best of luck on your upcoming bar exams. We've prepared a special laptop prep video just for you, but it also can help our current SCU LAW students prepare for their upcoming exams as well. Best of Luck! | |
| It is highly recommended that you have your computer in good working order before your next scheduled exam. | |
| Before your Exam | |
| Get the latest information on the current exam period at Office of Assessments Exam page. |  |
| Verify that you can log into your Examsoft Portal Registration site. You will be sent an email from SCU Law's Office of Assessment that includes your Examsoft portal registration credentials. Make sure your 11-digit student ID and password will allow you to access the online portal registration page. You will be prompted for these credentials later when you complete your local installation of Examplify or when you need to upload any take-home exams to SCU Law's exam portal. | |
| Seek out support well in advance. Examsoft has stated that it provides 24/7 support ( U.S. and Canada: (866) 429-8889 ext. 3) for Examplify. Please note that Examsoft Support may take up to 48-72 hours to get back to you. SCU Law students seem to have better luck using their online Exam Support Chat to get a hold of a live person. If your computer is having hardware issues and still under warranty, then contact your computer vendor (or your local authorized repair shop) asap and have it repaired. Lastly, Law Technology does support Examplify to a certain extent, but the vendor, Examsoft, is ultimately responsible for providing primary support for their product, Examplify. | |
| Learn to Install the Exam Taking Software | |
| Learn to Install Examplify (Windows) | Learn to install Examplify (Mac OS) |
| Learn all that you need to know about the exam process | |
| Learn all that you need to know about the exam process. For 1Ls (2Ls, 3Ls, 4Ls too!), refresh your SCU Law Exam process knowledge by reviewing the Exam Info Session presented by the Office of Assessment (currently version 4/2022). The Office of Assessment will conduct these presentations as often as needed for your benefit so take advantage of them. | |
| Understand the Exam Taker Warnings displayed by Examplify |  |
Run all Operating System (OS) updates prior to your exams. This is important. Make sure your computer is up to date. Do not attempt to perform any major OS updates on the day of your exam or you may have issues. Warning: Major OS upgrades, on the other hand, are different, and Examplify may not be compatible with new OS upgrades. So before you do a major OS upgrade (e.g. Windows 10 to Windows 11, Mac OS 12 to Mac OS 13); you need to verify with the vendor (Examsoft), Santa Clara University IT, or Law Technology to see if Examplify is fully supported. Failure to do so will result in Examplify not running optimally or not at all. Minimum OS for 2023-2024 Mac OS: Big Sur (11), Monterey (12); Ventura (13) and Sonoma (14) Windows: Version 10 22H2 - vVersion 11 23H22 | |
| If you are a Mac user and are using Mac OS 13.x (Ventura), then know how to enable Examplify to run in the background. The latest Mac OS upgrade Ventura requires Examplify to run in the background or it will not function properly. Got to this FAQ on how to enable Examplify to run in the background for Mac OS Ventura. | |
| Check to see if your OS is supported by both Santa Clara University and Examsoft. We often have users that want to be on the bleeding edge of technology. Companies like Apple and Microsoft will want you to test their latest Beta OS. We highly discourage running Beta operating systems with Examplify. Beta versions of operating systems are not supported by Examsoft, Santa Clara University IT and Law Technology. | |
Check to see if you have you restarted your computer lately. We have found that the majority of students do not restart their computer for weeks, even months! It is important to restart your computer at least once a week. Most exam issues have been resolved with a computer restart, which could have been avoided entirely if the computer had already been restarted beforehand. It is recommend that your computer be restarted prior to launching your exam to dedicate as much resources to Examplify. Also, make sure to back up your data often. | |
Update to the latest exam taking software version. Have the latest update installed for your exam software. If there is a new update, Examplify will notify you upon launch (or re-launch). NOTE: For the Fall 2023 final exams, the minimum version you need is 3.3 or later. If your computer is working fine with 3.X and you ran all mock exams without issues, then use your current setup for finals. Otherwise, seek consultation with Law Technology helpdesk and/or Examsoft Support. | |
Check the permission settings for Examplify with Exam ID and Exam Monitor, if feature is enabled. If the Office of Assessment has notified you that your remote (scheduled) close book exam will be using Exam ID and Exam Monitor feature of Examplify, then make sure to review what Exam ID and Exam Monitor our FAQ and check your permissions. ATTENTION: Law School will not be implementing the Exam ID or Exam Monitor feature for any SCU Law exams until further notice. | |
Run all mock exams. After successfully registering and installing Examplify, the most important thing you want to do is run all the mock exams provided to you. There are different mock exams ranging from "open book" to "secure." Each mock exam if formatted differently and also behaves differently, so make sure to run them all and get familiar o how your computer works with Examplify. Running mock exams will also uncover any anomalies and provide enough time to seek help on how to fix those issues. Also, it's ideal to take your mock exam where you plan on taking your actual exam. For example, if you taking a remote exam outside of the US, make sure that all the mock exams can successful launch and upload from that time zone. All exams are conducted in the Pacific Standard Time zone. | |
| Make sure you have the best resolution before launching your exam. During any mock exams, if for any reason that your question box or answer area text is cut off or does not fit even after resizing, then exit the mock exam and adjust your resolution and test again with all three mock exam types. Resolution of 1280 x 768 or higher, but 1920 x 1080 is recommended. See Examsoft FAQ on this topic. If your resolution is higher that what is posted here and you still have issues, then contact Examsoft support at 866-429-8889 to seek consultation and/or remote assistance. | |
| Check to make sure your have enough local storage. If you have not taken an audit of your data files, then do so before your first exam. We recommend having at least 25 Gigabytes or more free. If you have download a bunch of extraneous files (PDFs, install files, etc.), then back them up (or delete them if not needed) to an external source and save yourself the headache. For older computers, you need to provide as much local storage to allow the CPU to use the local disk as a temporary cache area so the more local storage the better. | |
Before you take your exam, you'll want to close all unnecessary applications. Streaming apps like Spotify, any email applications, web browsers, etc; all these apps take up resources on your computer prior to the launch of Examplify. *For secure (closed-book) exams, you will want to close all applications down completely before you launch or start your exam. **For open or semi-secure exams, you will want to close all applications and only keep the applications open that you will use for your notes before you launch/start your exam. Be mindful of the number applications that are opened since Examplify will have to compete for memory resources during your exam. | |
| Address missing time remaining issues. Check your settings so that is doesn't condense information at the top of the screen. Examsoft support suggest reviewing their knowledge base article, here. If your timer is displaying correctly in your mock exam, then no need to make any changes to your display settings. Again, always run the mock exams to uncover and address those anomalies before your taking your real exams. | |
| Examplify may have issues with multiple external monitors. While having two or even three monitors connected to your notebook computer is helpful for online hybrid classes, you will have issues with Examplify in an exam scenario, especially a remote exam. Exampify requires a dedicated output to a single video display so it is recommend that only one external monitor is needed for your exams. You can test your multiple monitor setup by running all three types of mock exams to best determine your optimum setup. However, once the exam has started, it will be hard to revert changes if the multiple monitor setup has issues. We highly recommend only using one external monitor for remote and/or take-home exams. | |
| Learn how to troubleshoot that Virtual Machine error after a routine Examplify update on your Windows computer. 2023 Update: For 2023 exam takers, if you are still getting an error, then download and install the latest version, currently 3.X or later. | |
| Double account profiles in your OS will block Examplify from launching. You simply restart your computer and only log into the main local profile to run Examplify. | |
Learn the power of clearing your web browser cache. You might not know it, but clearing the cache on your web browser will help to resolve those upload/download issues with take-home exams when submitting your exam answers to the Examsoft web portal. Check out our FAQ here to learn how. If clearing your cache doesn't work, then open a new tab in INCOGNITO mode and uploading your assessment again. | |
| For those who are submitting exams via the Examsoft portal, then reveiw the video to learn how to submit an exam via the Examsoft "dropbox method." If clearing your cache doesn't work, then open a new tab in INCOGNITO mode and uploading your assessment again. | |
| Write or print out important exam information. For remote exams, make sure to have your anonymous grading ID (AGID); Examsoft portal/registration credentials (11-digit ID and password); resume codes for each exam; correct passwords for each exam, and exam instructions near by and at the ready. | |
| Check to make sure your RTF files are read properly. When you get an RTF copy of your exam with comments and/or feedback, you may run into an issue of missing information. For Mac OS users, review our tech tip to see how to resolve this issue. | |
| Application Service Unavailable error - Examplify sometimes will have this error come up on both Mac and Windows versions. Click on the link that matches your OS to learn how to resolve this issue. | Application-Service-Unavailable-Mac-Examplify Application-Service-Unavailable-WIndows-Examplify |
| Examplify & Core Isolation Memory Isolation issue. For some Windows 10 and 11 users, you may run into this issue when you are trying to update and/or install Examplify. | |
| Learn how to resolve the VM error/alert | |
| During your Exam | |
| Avoid large copy/cut and paste actions during your exams. Examplify already takes up a lot of memory and doing a large cut and past action during your exam may cause Examplify to have performance issues, which may cause Examplify to freeze up. Use your best judgement on how to copy/cut and paste manageable chunks, preferably 1 page (about 250 words) or less, to avoid the dreaded application freeze. Otherwise, you need to recover from a frozen screen. | |
| Learn how to recover from a frozen screen during an exam. As frightening as that sounds, Examplify does have a mechanism to recover itself in the event that the application freezes up. Review our FAQ on how to recover from a frozen screen. | |
| Don't wait until the last moment to upload your remote or take-home exam.Yes, it is important to download your exam template on time, but it is also important to upload your exam answer file on time. When you are given ample time to complete your exam, don't wait until the last moment of your due date and time to upload your exam answer file. Examsoft portal site, at times, can be overwhelmed, especially during exam periods. Time management is key so please plan accordingly. Late uploads will be reported and reviewed by the Office of Assessment. | |
| If you need to add special characters in Examplify, then go to Format, then Insert, and then Special Character. | |
| What is this prompt telling me to acknowledge by the Academic Integrity Policy? This is a normal status prompt, and Examplify will require you to acknowledge the prompt by selecting "Next" until the prompt goes away. Any time that you are doing action that requires it, i.e. Word Count, etc; then this prompt may |  |
| After your Exam | |
| Restart your computer. If you find that Examplify can't upload your exam due to your WiFi adapter not accessing the Internet, then restart your computer and then relaunch Examplify to initiate your exam upload process again. Also, even if you submitted your exam answer file without any issues, it is always good to just restart and refresh your computer's memory. | |
| Background picture has changed and perhaps your desktop icons are missing? After you have submitted your exam answer file and then Examplify goes back to your desktop, Examplify is suppose to run a utility to switch all your old settings back to your previous desktop settings. However, Examplify sometimes does not run this process correctly so you may need to run the utility on your own. Click on the icons / links below to find how to resolve this issue. For Windows computer laptops, review this FAQ to resolve your background issue  For Mac computer laptops, review this FAQ to resolve your background issue.  * If the workaround fixes mentioned above do not work, then contact Examsoft Support immediately on their 24/7 support line at 866-429-8889 | |