I have been thinking a lot lately about the nature of relationships. I have been using open source software for years now and it seems that the theme that under girds everything I have done has been to foster the growth and well being of relationships. Let me explain.

Years ago I began using phpBB, an open source bulletin board software written in php (hence the name) that was a robust solution to a problem I had seemingly identified; that there was no one central meeting place for the people I knew to come together and offer or request information. From prayer requests to help with the same software, phpbb served well in handling those needs. I began to see the power in connectedness. This software allowed people to remain connected despite being miles apart.

Clich? though it may sound, the relationships began to mature until one day when I realized that the relationships I had worked so hard to foster were dying away. Folks with whom I had a virtual connection were now but strangers lingering behind a screen name.

That stuck with me as I began to work with a new piece of software I thought would be the solution to creating and nurturing enduring relationships, and since it was built around the same principle (in fact it was developed from the original phpbb source code) I thought it would be the end-all solution. PhpNuke has been far from that. The simple reason is that people?s families kept getting in the way.

Which brings me to why I am even taking the time to mention this in an open-source blog. One of the oft-touted characteristics of the open-source community is that it is, in fact, a community. Support is regularly referred to as rapid because it is handled by someone who has a desire to see the software work and further the impact that it can make if it is functioning as intended.

But at what expense? Whose daughter wants mommy to trade the computer monitor for a picnic? Whose spouse is wondering what time her husband will stop coding and come to bed. I hope not mine.

So this topic of relationships has been circling in my cerebrum for some time now. Simultaneously I have chosen to undertake the daunting task of creating learning communities in my own classroom. I toyed with a number of ways to do so with a dozen or so open source software programs all supposedly interested in helping me create community. I will spare you the exhaustive list because the software itself is irrelevant; it is the underlying principle up for discussion.

The bottom line to this is simply that my own thoughts on relationship are centered on a need for face-to-face connectedness. I am not saying that there is no place for online community, rather that there needs to be time and attention given to intentional relationship building in a live environment in person.

This is not a new idea, though. I can recall some years ago before the World Wide Web reached mainstream popularity I would fire up my 8088 machine and stare at a blue screen while my computer dialed the local BBS. Sometimes I would wait hours for one of the 5 phone lines to disconnect so that I could connect. There was no call queue, just me and my amateur war-dialing to ensure maximum chance of a ringing sound that would liven up my world merely at its sound. One of the announcements that would regularly popup on login would be a list of ?GT?s?. These Get-Togethers were designed to put faces to screen names. It was always an interesting event to see folks walk hesitantly towards the picnic benches at the designated pavilion with nametags bearing their self-proclaimed identity. Introductions were made, albeit very uncomfortably, food was consumed, and then mom would come pick me up. I only went to a couple of these ?GT?s?, I always felt better when I was hiding behind the wall of anonymity offered me by a screen name.

I say all that to say this, you and I as educators have to make building and nurturing relationships an intentional part of our day. I tell my students from day 1 that they are ?mine? and that I am ?yours?. We are in this together.

Let us be purposeful about relationship. I daresay it surpasses the effect of even the most current of technologies. We all have a driving need to know someone, and be known by someone. I do not believe that can happen outside of a face-to-face encounter.

The question I have to ask myself is, are my relationship priorities in order? Am I offering my wife and daughters the husband and daddy they deserve? Or am I wondering what?s going on in the blogsphere/emailsphere/podcastosphere?

So here?s to a reordered set of priorities, intentional relationship building, and some sort of ?GT? sometime soon.

Coffee anyone?

 

 Open Source Classroom dot com Podcast Episode 7 - The nature of relationships in open source [6:16m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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I owe a huge debt of gratitude to the Discovery Educator Network leadership for the inspiration to do this…

At the DEN NLC 06 I heard a keynote presentation from Alan November, who speaks a great deal on our flattening world and how to give our kids a leg up in this changing world. The final straw was what I read during a pretty amazing little PowerPoint presentation brought to fame in the DEN world by the DEN’s own Aaron Smith.

So I decided it was time to teach my sixth graders the power of going from being consumers to contributors of content on the Internet. Their eyes grew wider and wider as time progressed and I told them that there was a chance that real people they did not know might read their blogs.

I didn’t exaggerate too much, I told them that folks might never read their blog, but the truth is at the very least, all their posts would be aggregated for each other to read.

I will keep you posted as to how the experiment goes. That’s really all teaching is anyway, right, one grand experiment where there truly are no constants save for the lack of constants, and the variable change exponentially year by year. That is why we adjust, adapt, and overcome.

Naturally, Drupal is open source, and you can try it on a live tester demo at www.opensourcecms.com, one of my favorite sites in the CMS/LMS, etc realm.

UPDATE: I started a Discussion Board forum on this topic.

 

 Standard Podcast [15:05m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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If you use a CDMA cell phone (Verizon, US Cellular, others) you can use Bitpim, available at www.sourceforge.net to backup your wallpapers, ringtones, sync your calendars, and most importantly for me, transfer your contacts from your old phone to your new one. I have used this proggie for years and find it to be most useful. They constantly put out new versions and it works great on both my Windows and Mac OSX machines, and I intend to test it soon on my Linux box. It does offer Bluetooth support and works well with the bluetooth in my Macbook Pro.

Enjoy the episode and I hope it finds you well!

 

 Open Source Classroom dot com Podcast Episode 5 - Bitpim, CDMA Cell phone syncing software [4:39m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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I listened to a pretty amazing presentation recently from the O’Reilly Media Open Source Conference of 2005 which has audio being only recently released. The talk I listened to was by Kartik Subbarao, who is a high-up in the Enterprise IT market. He also works for Hewlett-Packard. HP has a great method of dealing with open source software because when they improve on a stretch of code, they then release that new code back into the wild, for others to partake. We as educators can often be strictly consumers of open source software and not provide any productive community benefit to the open source community writ large. I propose ways to contribute, even if (like me) you are not a developer and the idea of looking at source code causes your head to swim. I am no programmer, not since the days of Logo. I know a good bit about HTML and PHP, but don’t delve much past that. I spent too much time screaming at the Borland C++ screen some years ago and I think that traumatized me.

So on that happy note, here is podcast episode 4. Enjoy, and as always please feel free to comment or begin a discussion in the forums off to the right.

 

 Open Source Classroom Podcast 4 - Defining Open Source [14:33m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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First let me say that I have fixed my feed issues…you can subscribe using iTunes using the links to the right. Yes the first two are the same, but I am fighting with the music store to get my feed included.

This episode is all about Clam, a free and open source antivirus software. The main website is www.clamav.net and the Windows port can be found at www.clamwin.net.

Bottom line? I like it alot, and I use it. Now, I really only use it on my Windows PC but it is installed on my Linux machine as well. I am experimenting with the Mac OS X port, but really only for my own learning process.

Clam doesn’t deal with spyware/malware/greyware so you will need some other solution for that, as I am sure you are already aware.

And for the record, I still do an occasional online scan using Trend Micro’s Housecall.
So there it is, happy listening!

Chris

 

 Open Source Classroom dot com Podcast Episode 3 - Let's go clamming! [8:38m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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In this show I talk all about Wordpress, an open-source blogging software that is either available for local hosting, paid for hosting, or they will give you a free blog!

 

 Podcast Episode 2 - Wordpress [13:10m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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I have created and mastered the first episode of the Open Source Classroom dot com podcast! It was a laborious process as I can tend to be a bit of a perfectionist. I am truly joking considering this episode is purely stream-of-consciousness and straight from the heart. It was fun to do but I found myself watching the clock too much. Well, here’s to learning more and more as time progresses. I would love comments! Thanks for listening…

 

 Episode 1 [5:17m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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