Do you speak my language: O is for Object, Open Source, Operating System

O is for Object, Open Source, Operating System

My choice here is Open Source.

What is Open Source?

Open Source is 'programming in the public domain', that is, a group of individuals get together to write and produce extremely useful software, and then make all the code (and hence all their hard-work) available for free for anyone to use (there may be some licensing restrictions on what you can do with it, but generally it is free), contribute to, and modify.

Some example open source projects include PHP (see P in this series), Linux (see L - [Do you speak my language: L is for Language, Linux, Log File, Load Balance), Apache (see A - [Do you speak my language: A is for AJAX, Apache, API, Array, alpha software), Wordpress (see W in this series), Moodle (a VLE, see V in this series). This list is endless.

Open Source in Teaching

Again, the chance are you already use open source software, and are just not aware of it.

Apache (see A - Do you speak my language: A is for AJAX, Apache, API, Array, alpha software) and PHP are both open source, and without them I would not be able to deliver the eLearning that I do.

In teaching one of the most well known, and widely used, piece of open source software has to be Moodle, which is a very powerful and very useful virtual learning environment. And as the software is open source it has attracted a great user community that are very active in promoting good use and developing tools for use with Moodle.

So there are plenty of opportunities to use open source software in your teaching, and their are plenty of open source software solutions out there that may help you become a better eEducator and provide your students with a better learning experience.

The other Os in the list:

Object: This is an interesting concept, and one that took me an embarassing amount of time to understand. I now look back and think 'how didn't I get that?'. Objects (in this context) have nothinhg to do with teaching, but the word 'object' may be used by your local IT guys.

If your local IT guy starts talking about an object it is usually followed with the words 'orientated programming'. Object orientated programming (OOP) is, for want of a better term, a 'style' of programming.

When I learnt to program the OOP 'style' didn't exist. If it did, I certainly wasn't aware of it, and we certainly weren't taught it.

In OOP you 'package' certain parts of program in 'objects'. The advantage is that once you have created the code that define an object you can easily reuse the code in the current program, or in later different programs.

Objects in OOP aren't really 'objects' as in 'everyday object', it is just a way of thinking about things. For example, a dog. A dog is an object (well, an animal). A dog is a dog is a dog. All dogs have the same parts (e.g. a leg at each corner, a tail, ears, eyes, fur etc. - these could be called attributes) and all dogs carry out the similar functions (e.g. run, bark, jump, fetch a ball, wag their tail etc. - these could be called functions).

In computing terms you would create a 'dog object' that would have the attributes (a leg at each corner, a tail, ears, eyes, fur) and functions (run, bark, jump, fetch a ball, wag their tail) listed above. The functions would make the dog do things, for example you could say 'dog run' and the dog would run, and the attributes would describe the look of the dog, e.g. long legs, short black fur, brown eyes, short tail. Once you have written all the computer code for one dog object you could then reuse that object multiple times in your program to create every sort of dog imaginable, from Poodles to Great Danes.

Operating System: The program, or OS for short, that sits between you, the user, and the hardware (see H - Do you speak my language: H is for htaccess, hacker, host, http, https, html, hardware). Examples of OSs are: Windows, Linux (see L - Do you speak my language: L is for Language, Linux, Log File, Load Balance), Mac OS X, and we are likely to see more in the future, in particular OSs specific for mobile devices (Daily Telegraph: Operating systems: the future is fragmented).

Protein: 3DQB

Dog Image: Wikimedia

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