Truly Open

The first open source program that I ever encountered was OpenOffice. I could vaguely remember traipsing to the CSSP computer room, just a couple of hours before I had to go to class to submit my paper. I got all the pertinent details handwritten but since our lone computer was acting up, I had to scurry to the room to type it real fast. Aaah, the cramming and frenzied days.

As I was given a spot, with the clock ticking, I sank in the seat with my notes all laid out, raring to work. For some reason, the pressure fired me up to start writing. However, as I started to open the programs that I needed to use to type, first, I was dismayed to find that instead of the usual Microsoft Word program, with the W at the left hand corner that I was accustomed to seeing, it was a program that looked like MS Word, but not quite. That which was Open Office. I had no choice, I was told that the school did not have MS Word and I had to make do with that. Seeing that there was no time to hurry to the Shopping Center, I felt at that time, to be honest, that I wasted precious minutes just figuring out how to use this program in typing out my article.

Perhaps at that time, I was just too much in a hurry that I did not appreciate the virtues of Open Office. Sure, it took a bit of a tinkering, but come to think of it, it was pretty easy to figure everything out. It just needs some time to get used to it, but it was a totally painless experience. Or maybe it is the usual mentality that people have- once one has used something out of habit, the tendency is to stick to it. It is such a burden of having to learn another thing, in this case, another program.

I did not appreciate it then but using Open Office has saved UP from paying thousands of taxpayers' money in installing MS Word programs which is a huge plus. But then at that time, I was just in a situation whereby I lacked both time and positive attitude in learning, the reason why I reacted as I described above.

Open Source is definitely a great option. People, (as I did before) just do not appreciate it so much because we have become used to using licensed software such as MS Word. And it is true, that it is hard to change what we have accustomed to using. (In my case, we had a subject in high school that taught us how to use MS Word- it was a new program at that time).

Thus, Open Source being a good alternative, there must be moves to educate people on its use, and concomitant to that, its practicability. Such must start in different sectors of the society, especially in educational institutions such as elementary and high schools- that which I believe is crucial in changing attitudes towards Open Source. It is not that we totally have to eradicate the use of licensed software in the curriculum, since it was mentioned during the lecture/talk in ICT class that there are some instances that licensed software are really better in some situations. What must be done is that people, especially students at a young age, be made aware of the different options in terms of what programs that they could use- licensed and its free alternative, Open Source, to give them freedom to choose. So that even if, like in my case, in the midst of cramming, one would not be totally be surprised (and irritated) to discover that, nooooo!!! it is not MS Word! Maybe then, instead, when one sees an Open Source program, one will react on the nature of in the tone of, " hey, it's Open Source, that's okay, I know how to use it too...". To accomplish that, the right attitude must accompany one in studying and dabbling with it- the nature of which is truly open.