What was Develop mode in zyLabs?
It was the ungraded workspace. A 2021 paper by zyBooks staff explains that “Instructors have the option to enable a develop mode for zyLab programming assignments. When enabled, develop mode allows students to write and run their code within the zyBook as often as they choose, before (and after) submitting the assignment for grading.” A 2022 zyBooks paper about its assembly-language labs says the same thing more plainly: “Each execution in the simulator is not graded, and students can make as many changes as necessary to ensure their programs behave correctly.”
Classic labs had an orange “Run Program” button for this. When an instructor turned on the interactive terminal, zyBooks says students could “view the terminal in ‘Develop’ mode of the zyLab” and type input while the program ran. If you never saw Develop mode at all, your instructor probably picked the other setup. The classic lab options let an instructor “Select whether students work in our in-book development environment, or in their own IDE and then upload their files.”
What was Submit mode, and how is a zyLab graded?
Submit mode was where grading happened. zyBooks calls zyLabs “a program assignment auto-grader,” and its 2022 paper calls the graded side submission mode: “In submission mode, an auto-grader tests a student’s program against a set of test cases.” Your instructor gives each test “a title and point value” when building the lab, so your score is the total of the tests you pass. zyBooks’ introduction to zyLabs puts it in two lines: “Students submit and get a score based on the test cases passed. They can re-submit for a better score.”
Instructors can mix three kinds of automatic tests. Input/output tests compare what your program prints with the expected output. Unit tests “call a student’s code to make sure the function is behaving as expected.” Custom bash tests run a script the instructor writes. Instructors can also review your code by hand and “add or deduct points based on that manual review,” so a lab score can change after the autograder has run.
How do classic and advanced zyLabs compare?
| Question | Classic zyLabs (retired) | Advanced zyLabs (current) |
|---|---|---|
| Write and run code | Develop mode, when the instructor enabled it, with a “Run Program” button | “Run will compile and run based on the default file” in a cloud IDE |
| Get graded | Submit (submission) mode sends code to the autograder | Submissions go to “the zyLabs autograder” |
| How many submissions | Instructors could “Enforce a submission limit or submission rate” | Unlimited by default; instructors can cap the number or set a wait between submissions |
| Start over | Not covered in the classic articles we read | “Reset lab to template,” with History to restore files |
| What instructors see | A coding trail of runs and scores | A coding trail, keystroke History and Student Behavior Insights |
| Status | Unusable since July 1, 2026 | The lab type zyBooks supports now |
The classic column draws on zyBooks’ classic-lab articles and research papers, which are still posted. Your instructor’s settings decide most rows in practice, so read the lab’s instructions first.
What happened to classic zyLabs on July 1, 2026?
They stopped working. zyBooks’ deprecation notice says that from August 2025 it would “no longer allow creating, copying, or cloning classic zyLabs,” and that “On July 1st 2026, zyBooks will fully deprecate classic zyLabs. Instructors and students cannot use Classic zyLabs after that deprecation.” zyBooks had already begun moving the labs it maintains to advanced labs, and instructors had to convert labs they wrote themselves before July 2026.
A converted lab keeps its place in your course. zyBooks says “If the classic lab was part of an assignment, the advanced lab will now be part of that assignment,” and the instructions carry over. The original classic lab, “along with its submissions, is placed in the unused chapter,” where it stays readable. If you need code you submitted to an old classic lab, ask your instructor.
How many times can you submit a zyLab?
As many times as you want, unless your instructor sets a limit. zyBooks’ lab guide says: “By default, students can submit as many times as they want to the zyLabs autograder.” Instructors have two controls. They can limit the number of submissions, and they can enforce a minimum time between submissions, which zyBooks describes as a way “to force students to run and test their code before submitting to the autograder.” If the lab makes you wait before submitting again, that second setting is the likely reason.
Lab points also follow the assignment’s due date. zyBooks says assignments can include “lab activities,” and that activity counts “towards that assignment score up until the due date.” Work after that is still recorded, but it isn’t applied to the assignment unless your instructor moves the date or gives you an extension.
What does it mean when not all zyLab tests pass?
Some of your instructor’s tests failed, so you got the points for the tests that passed and none for the rest. zyBooks’ 2022 paper says that when a test fails, “the auto-grader indicates the incorrect results generated by the student’s program.” How much of that you see is up to your instructor, who sets “visibility toggles for the input/output/feedback” on each test.
The zyBooks docs point to three common causes:
- Output that doesn’t match. Output tests compare your output with the expected text. Ignoring case and whitespace are options the instructor sets per test, so when they are off, spacing and capital letters count.
- A timeout. “All tests default to a timeout of 10s. When the timeout is exceeded, the test will report a failure due to that timeout.” zyBooks says this helps flag infinite loops.
- A unit test. These check a function’s result directly, apart from what the program prints, so a program can look right on screen and still fail one.
To fix a failed test, run your program with the test’s input, when it is shown, and compare the output line by line before you submit again. If your instructor turned on AI hints, zyBooks says you can open the “Help me” dropdown for hints on “any output and unit tests that fail on submission.” Hints work for “the current submission only.”
How do you reset a zyBooks lab?
Use Reset lab to template, then bring back any file you need from History. Labs save as you type (zyBooks says “Labs autosave anytime an edit is made”), so you only need a reset for a clean start or after your instructor changes the lab. In advanced zyLabs:
- Open the settings menu. zyBooks says the icon “sits in the bottom left of the IDE or the top left when using VSC or other IDEs.”
- Choose Reset lab to template. “Any changes to files and any additional files will be removed,” and the workspace goes back to the instructor’s template.
- To get code back, open History, move to the point you want on the timeline and click Restore File, which reverts that file “to the timestamp and state visible in the codepad.”
- To see what you turned in, scroll to the bottom of the lab. Past submissions are listed there, and “Open submission’s code” loads your code as it was “at the exact time in submission history.”
Two other options in the same menu do less. Restart virtual environment is for an IDE that stops responding, and zyBooks says it “does not affect data.” Restore lab data resets things like a MySQL database or VS Code settings and leaves your code files alone. You may also need a reset when your instructor changes a lab after you open it: zyBooks says learners “will need to ‘Reset lab to template’ to see any changes if they opened the lab workspace prior to when the template was edited.”
What does your instructor see from your runs and submissions?
All of them. zyBooks says “Both Classic zyLabs and Advanced zyLabs display a coding trail” below your code, where “Each ‘-’ indicates a develop run” and each number is the score of a submission. In advanced zyLabs, “Every keystroke in our CR2 IDE is logged for both instructors and students,” instructors can see “a log of IP addresses for all of a student’s submissions,” and Student Behavior Insights highlights students whose work patterns differ from the class, including pasted code. zyBooks also runs a similarity checker across a class. Model solutions are hidden from students by default, though an instructor can choose to show them.
Where Silent Student fits
We make Silent Student, a desktop app for Mac and Windows from El Dorado Ignition LLC. It does not do zyLabs or code-writing challenge activities, because labs run your program against tests you can’t see and the agent has no code-editor support. On zyBooks it works participation and challenge activities opened from your Canvas course; Silent Student on zyBooks lists what it handles and what it skips.
Questions people ask
What is zyBooks Develop mode?
The ungraded workspace in a classic zyLab. zyBooks describes it as letting students write and run their code in the zyBook as often as they choose, before and after submitting for grading.
What is zyBooks Submit mode?
The graded side of a classic zyLab. Your code goes to the zyLabs autograder, which runs the instructor’s test cases and gives you the points for each test that passes.
Are Develop mode and Submit mode still in zyBooks?
Classic zyLabs, where those modes lived, could not be used after July 1, 2026. Advanced zyLabs keep the same split: Run executes your code without grading, and submissions go to the autograder.
How do I reset a zyBooks lab?
Open the settings menu in the lab’s IDE and choose Reset lab to template. It removes your file changes, so use History and Restore File to bring back any code you want to keep.
Why does zyBooks say not all tests passed?
At least one of the instructor’s tests failed, so you earned points only for the tests that passed. Causes named in zyBooks’ docs include output that doesn’t match, a test timeout (10 seconds by default) and unit tests that check your functions directly.
Can I submit a zyLab more than once?
Yes. By default zyBooks lets students submit as many times as they want, unless the instructor limits submissions or sets a minimum time between them.
Does Silent Student do zyLabs?
No. It works zyBooks participation and challenge activities, not zyLabs or code-writing challenges. Do coding work yourself.
Sources
All fetched and checked October 20, 2026 unless a line says otherwise.
- Classic Labs Deprecation (zyBooks Help)
- How to add and use zyLabs in your zyBook (zyBooks Help)
- How to use Advanced zyLabs in your zyBook (zyBooks Help)
- How to create a new zyLab (Classic) (zyBooks Help)
- How to use the zyBooks interactive Terminal in zyLabs (zyBooks Help)
- zyLabs: Intro and advice (zyBooks Help)
- View/Download past/current lab submissions (zyBooks Help)
- zyLab coding trails (zyBooks Help)
- Cheating detection and prevention for programming tasks (zyBooks Help)
- Viewing challenge activity and zyLab solutions (zyBooks Help)
- How do I get points for an assignment (zyBooks Help)
- zyLabs User Guide (zyBooks)
- The rise of program auto-grading in introductory CS courses: A case study of zyLabs (Gordon, Lysecky and Vahid, ASEE 2021, PDF hosted by zyBooks)
- Analyzing the use of auto-graded labs with a built-in simulator to learn assembly programming (zyBooks authors, ASEE 2022, PDF hosted by zyBooks)
How this guide was made. We read each zyBooks page and paper listed above on October 20, 2026 and quote them directly. zyBooks Help no longer has a student article that defines Develop and Submit mode by name, so those definitions come from the two zyBooks research papers and the classic-lab articles. We wrote the guide with AI assistance and checked each quote against its source.
Related guides: How are zyBooks participation and challenge activities graded? · MyLab Math attempts and partial credit · All guides · zyBooks · Canvas grade calculator
Written by the company that makes Silent Student. Silent Student is not affiliated with or endorsed by zyBooks, Zyante Inc. or Wiley. zyBooks and zyLabs are trademarks of their owners.