Frequently Asked
Questions

Yes, but only after a one-minute countdown that displays a bright purple screen to draw proctors’ attention.

A student who leaves a locked-down activity cannot rejoin without a proctor’s help. On reopening it, they face a red lock screen that a proctor must unlock. This preserves students’ freedom to close an app while making it impractical to cheat by closing and reopening activities.

MATCHA prevents students from navigating away from the quiz in its browser until they have submitted it.

Yes. We plan to release quiz-taking for Moodle and Blackboard sometime in October 2026.

It depends. If MATCHA is licensed by the instructor or university using course or activity seats, students do not need accounts. They enter their personal information in the project so the instructor can attribute the submission, but this does not create an account with us. When using privacy level 2 or higher, this information is not accessible to us. If, however, MATCHA is licensed through individual plans, students need to create accounts with us to maintain these plans. It remains the case that we cannot associate submissions with students if privacy level 2 or higher is used.

AI credit charges directly reflect the costs charged to us by AI model providers, which are a direct function of token usage. The credit cost for correcting an essay depends on multiple factors, including the model and reasoning level selected, the number of words, and the number of corrections to make.

As a guideline, correcting a 1000-word essay with the smallest model costs between 1 and 15 credits depending on the number of errors corrected. The cost increases with errors because output tokens are much more expensive than input tokens, and few output tokens are required for essays with few errors. The smallest model is generally adequate for grammar work, but the larger models are required for more advanced work.

Due to mainstream Linux distributions not providing a kiosk mode like Windows and macOS provide, this is not currently possible (even with a virtual machine). We are working on a workaround.

If you are using Windows, you may have better luck using the Microsoft Store installer.

Alternatively, temporarily disable your antivirus while installing MATCHA, then turn it back on.

Yes. MCHA can be used as a local text editor with editing history. Stronger integrity guarantees require supervised workflows.

In principle, yes. As an edit-tracking editor, MATCHA is free, and you can ask your students to use it for their coursework. However, some key features commonly used for coursework require a paid plan on either the instructor or student side (see our Licensing page). These include Complete Work History (used to make at-home assignments AI-resistant) and Locked-Down Mode (used to secure in-class activities). Managed follow-up quizzes also only work with instructor-led activities, which require licensing. MATCHA is much cheaper than alternative academic integrity solutions. Talk to your educational technology team about licensing. We also offer free seats to get verified instructors started.

It is the least intrusive means of securing writing in the age of generative AI. Editing and browsing histories are local to a participant's computer. They are only shared with an instructor if the instructor requests .mcha submissions, which is optional (the summary statistics added to DOCX submissions are normally enough to ascertain the amount of work and the authorship). In comparison, other edit-tracking editors store editing histories on the cloud, and an instructor typically has to have access to them to get any editing information.

MCHA is also much less intrusive than typical locked-down browsers and other proctoring tools, which take over a participant's computer using administrator privileges. MCHA has the ability to secure writing activities without taking such intrusive measures.

This means that the project has no or limited history and that the latest snapshot is a locally signed one. Locally signed snapshots are used for instructor-led projects at privacy level 3 or higher because MATCHA does not send texts to MATCHA certification servers at that level. Since locally signed snapshots are not considered safe against tampering or faking, a project created at level 3 or higher and stripped of history will show this warning. This is normally the case for feedback copies returned by an instructor. Bottom line: if you want to continue working on your project and preserve your authorship evidence, don't use this copy.

This message appears when your installed version of MCHA is older than the minimum version currently required to keep editing documents. This can happen after a MATCHA update rolls out and older versions are retired. To continue editing, update MATCHA from the MATCHA menu and then reopen your project.

MATCHA saves projects using its own .mcha file format. Documents can be exported as signed .docx files and (unsigned) PDFs (via LaTeX). MATCHA can also import .docx and LaTeX files (imperfectly).

MATCHA uses memoir if the document contains chapters or parts; otherwise, it uses article. We plan to add support for other types in the future.

These are recovery files used by MATCHA. You should keep them because MATCHA can use them to recover changes that are not fully committed to the project file if the project is not saved properly. After closing MATCHA normally it is safe to delete any remaining wal and shm files.

Use the "Verify .docx" feature from the File menu or the Instructor menu (on the start screen). As a convenience you can also verify an entire directory of .docx files.

A MCHA integrity check confirms that a project file is a genuine MCHA file produced in accordance with the rules associated with any activity data it contains. The .mcha storage format alone does not prevent other programs from creating or modifying files with arbitrary content. Instead, cryptographic signatures protect all key parts of genuine projects, including the activity configuration, other metadata, and recorded editing and browsing events. An integrity check verifies these signatures and other key facts about a project, including that the current document state can be derived from its history and that check-ins, if used, cover all recorded work. If a project fails an integrity check and you are unsure whether it was tampered with, contact support with a copy of the project.

Use the MATCHA Dashboard to create, configure, and manage activities.

Yes. Instructors can extend an activity browser allowlist with university library sites, proxy domains, and subdomains. The easiest first pass is to sign in to MCHA Writer with your Dashboard account and use the Instructor Menu workflow to create a browser configuration and allowlist by browsing. Visit the library pages students will need, and MCHA saves the visited page domains to the new configuration.

You can then refine the configuration in the MATCHA Dashboard, including domain/path rules and wildcard patterns such as **.library.example.edu when a library uses many subdomains. The default academic allowlist already covers many common sources, so you may only need to add the institution-specific pieces.

Yes, when the PDFs are reached through approved pages in the built-in browser. MCHA opens those PDFs inside the app and, when Complete Work History is enabled, records reading activity for the Reading Analysis Report.

Students can add supported PDF sources to their library with Add to library, or use supported citation flows such as copying from the PDF or source page. When supported citation data is available, MCHA can connect the reading history with the cited work. PDFs read entirely outside MCHA cannot be included in MATCHA work history.

MCHA can export PDFs, but the integrity certification is attached to signed .docx exports and .mcha project/history submissions, not to PDFs. If your Canvas or LMS workflow requires PDF annotation, use the PDF for grading while also collecting a signed .docx or .mcha submission for integrity review.