Does Turnitin Check Code : Can Code be Plagiarized?

There are many questions regarding Turnitin. But one of the most common is if Turnitin checks code. This question might have bogged your mind whether you’re a beginner or an expert software code developer.

And because you do not want to come off as a plagiarist, understanding if Turnitin checks code is a must-do. This will help you in your code development and writing. Further, it will help you know how to escape the common pitfalls other students make.

Let’s journey together to know if Turnitin can check codes if the codes can be plagiarized, and what constitutes cheating in coding.

Does Turnitin Check Code

Turnitin checks your code for plagiarism. That means that it searches the internet and other sources for matching text.

Turnitin checks code files submitted to it by students, teachers, and schools. Turnitin checks code with its algorithm. It does not check for plagiarism on the internet. It checks for similar documents that have been submitted to Turnitin before.

Also see: can Turnitin catch paraphrasing

It does this by using a database of documents previously submitted to Turnitin and then comparing new submissions to them. If there is too much similarity between those documents, your submission will be flagged as potentially plagiarized. The more similar your codes are to one or more previous submissions, the more likely your submission will be flagged as potentially plagiarized.

Turnitin, a course plagiarism software, checks code as well. They have a computer system that will compare your code with other people’s to see if they match up. It will also check for identical lines of text or blocks of code within your document. If Turnitin finds any matches, it will flag them and give you an alert letting you know plagiarism occurred in your paper.

Can Code be Plagiarized?

Codes are not immune to plagiarism. Although they are intended to be used uniquely, someone can copy your code and use it as their own.

If you copy a piece of code from another program and use it in your own, Turnitin will flag the code as plagiarized. Even if you change something about the copied code, such as changing a few characters or adding a line of code, Turnitin will still flag the file.

However, there are many cases where copying code from other programs is acceptable, and there are no penalties for doing so. These instances are;

• If you are using someone else’s game engine, for example, Unity, but making changes to make it unique and your creation
• If you’re working with an open-source project and publishing your results as part of that project

Even if students have not plagiarized their work, there are some legitimate reasons this might happen. A student may have downloaded some sample code from another website and then forgotten to change it before submitting it into Turnitin. This means that there is nothing wrong with the actual content of their paper, but it still gets flagged by Turnitin because it was copied from somewhere else.

Is it Cheating to Copy Code?

To come out as a cheat when you’ve copied a code depends on where and how you copy the codes.

So if you’re copying code from other people’s projects, whether from GitHub or the local library, you need to make sure that you give them credit for their work and explain how it’s been used in your project.

If you are using someone else’s code in your project, then it’s important to make sure that you follow their license requirements. If they have a free license, then there shouldn’t be any problems, but if they have a restricted license, then you need to check what restrictions they place on their code before using it in your project

Programming is a complicated skill, and most students are not taught how to program until college.

That means that most people learning to program today do so without background knowledge of computer science or software engineering. It also means that there are many places where someone can find ready-to-use code; open-source websites such as GitHub make it easy for anyone with access devices such as laptops or phones to start writing programs right away without needing any formal training.

What is Considered Cheating in Coding

The answer is a bit subjective. Cheating varies depending on the programming language and environment being used, but some commonalities can be found across all languages.

The following instances qualify as cheating in coding.

Copying someone’s source code or using someone else’s code as your own. While this may seem obvious, there are other ways that students attempt to cheat without actually using someone else’s source code. Some examples of these include:

• Copying and using a code developed written by someone else
• Seeking someone to write a code for you and presenting it as your own
• Using code snippets or everything from a program someone else has written
• Using code found on the internet
• Using code found in textbooks and any other texts where the author did not explicitly permit you to use their work.
• Reading someone’s codes before embarking on your development
• Working with other individuals on the lower level algorithms

Despite these, the following do not count as cheating

• Seeking help from other individuals on whether your code has a problem
• Seeking help on the formulation of specific constructs
• Seeking assistance on why a certain construct in a language doesn’t work
• Asking how a particular construct in a language works

How Do You Avoid Getting Caught Plagiarizing Code?

The best way to avoid getting caught plagiarizing code is to not plagiarize in the first place. In most cases, plagiarism happens if you are writing a code containing many comments, which will show you may have copied the comments from another source. However, if your code is short, then it’s unlikely that Turnitin will check that part of your submission.

But if you must copy a code, the following ways will help you avoid getting caught.

First, make sure that your code is complete and fully functional. Ensure all the functions are working properly and all the tests are passing.

Remove any comments from your code (or comment them out). If you don’t understand how some part of your code works and there is no documentation available online or in other sources, leave it as an exercise for yourself and revisit it later when you know more about it.

Don’t submit any code that has been copied verbatim from another source without changing anything. Ensure you properly cite the code and use the right citation style if you cannot avoid copying. You can do this by adding a reference at the end of the program.

Conclusion

Plagiarism cuts across all areas, even in code development. However, it is quite different, and some instances are not regarded as plagiarism, while others are. You can copy and ask for assistance when coding without the actions being regarded as cheating.

On the other hand, if you copy without citing or copy a code where restrictions have been placed, your actions come out as cheating which may land you in problems. But in all these, you can follow the highlighted measures to escape being tagged as a coding cheat.