- Koha - lists.katipo.co.nz

Re: [Koha] Koha and OpenBook
by COURYHOUSE＠aol.com 14 May '02

14 May '02

open book ...... Yes,... I wonder when it will resurface... I have a feeling it will. Ed Sharpe archivist for SMECC > Subj:Re: [Koha] Koha and OpenBook > Date:5/13/2002 11:46:26 PM US Mountain Standard Time > From:<A HREF="mailto:paul.poulain@free.fr">paul.poulain(a)free.fr</A> > To:<A HREF="mailto:Rob@protovision.org">Rob(a)protovision.org</A> > CC:<A HREF="mailto:koha@lists.katipo.co.nz">koha(a)lists.katipo.co.nz</A> > Sent from the Internet > > > > Rob Campbell wrote: > > >I've been helping with a small non-profit library. They've been needing a > new > >library system and Koha came to my attention. I also heard about OpenBook > >recently and wanted to try it out as well, but it seems that the website > for > >it has been down. Does anyone know where to find OpenBook and what is > going > >on with their website? Also, what are the current differences > feature-wise > >between Koha and OpenBook? Those are the two systems I've been looking at > >lately, but I'm open to any other suggestions that someone may have. The > more > >choices we have, the better. Thank you for your help. > > > OpenBook, from trfoundation is down since at least 3 months now. I've > got no answer to my mails. So I've choosen koha, wich is a good tool ;-) > -- > Paul

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Koha and OpenBook
by Rob Campbell 14 May '02

14 May '02

I've been helping with a small non-profit library. They've been needing a new library system and Koha came to my attention. I also heard about OpenBook recently and wanted to try it out as well, but it seems that the website for it has been down. Does anyone know where to find OpenBook and what is going on with their website? Also, what are the current differences feature-wise between Koha and OpenBook? Those are the two systems I've been looking at lately, but I'm open to any other suggestions that someone may have. The more choices we have, the better. Thank you for your help. Rob Campbell

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schema question
by <s.yeates＠cs.waikato.ac.nz> 14 May '02

14 May '02

Hello I've got a couple of quick questions about the Koha database schema. I think I've worked it out, but just want to double check. I'm working from the CVS version and data. I'm interested in implementing a collaborative recommendation feature which allowed users to see which books other people who borrowed the current book had also borrowed. Both Amazon and Barnes and Noble use a similar feature. In English the query I want is "Which books have been lent to the most people who have also borrowed the current book?" With the restriction that the books I recommend must be available for lending from the current library (it's pointless recommending a book that's not there) and must have more than N borrowers in common with the current book (to protect the privacy of borrowers, N is set to 5 or 10). Logically what I want to do is a join across biblio--> items--> issues--> borrowernumber--> issues--> items--> biblio with SELECT, a COUNT and a SORT. This, of course, gives huge intermediate tables, so I'd have to do several SELECTs as I go. I may also need to factor in a component of "how much has book A been borrowed by borrowers of book B compared to all other borrowers" to prevent very popular items (think Harry Potter) being recommended for every possible book. This effect would be similar to tf-idf ranking from classical information retrieval. My questions are: (1) How do I tell whether a book is 'available'? I think I need to check the items table and make sure that stack, notforloan, itemlost and wthdrawn are all zero does this sounds right?. (2) I don't understand the distinction between items and biblioitems (3) How to I differentiate between children's and adult's books, between fiction and non-fiction? (4) Would collaborative recommendation be useful in a small library catalog? (5) Would the small incursion of user privacy be acceptable in a small public library? thanks for your help stuart -- stuart yeates <s.yeates(a)cs.waikato.ac.nz> aka `loam' "To err is human--but it feels divine." -- Mae West X-no-archive:yes

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user comments
by Ville Huhtala 08 May '02

08 May '02

Hello, how up-to-date http://hlt.katipo.co (or opac) is ? Is it 1.1.2-rc1 ? More recent version allows test driving without installation of my own Koha. Some comments about current test drive installation: 1. Opac advanced search there are subject search (Dewey) and class search (CD roms ... young adult). However, on results page these seems to become Item type e.g. Adult Non-fiction (does not match class search ?) Class Dewey number This seems to be an inconstancy in naming. Confusing. search page results page Subject --> Class Class --> Item type (?) 2. relating to previous comment there is "subject" displayed in results page but the "subject" on search page is for dewey! Oops, just tested, you can use "subject search" for both dewey or subject headings (?) Dewey seems to be used for classification and for location, which is confusing. Why not change search results to something like this: [The atlas of Tolkien's Middle-earth (Fonstad, Karen Wynn)] BIBLIO RECORD Subject: | MIDDLE EARTH (IMAGINARY PLACE) Item Type Class Branch Adult Non-fiction 398.234 Foxton ----- BIBLIO RECORD Subject: | MIDDLE EARTH (IMAGINARY PLACE) Dewey: 398.234 Item Type Location Adult Non-fiction Foxton 398.234 3. There is something funny in database: "Watt, Be" appears on mosts subjects in result page. Also results with only biblio record, rest is missing. 4. Intranet search results display Class hyperlinked but opac does not. I think that hyperlinking also opacs search results Class can offer additional convinient access point to opac users. Same goes for Subject. 5. Minor usability thingy: on opac home page there is "Search the catalogue", search box and "advanced search". So I typed in my search word and clicked "Search the catalogue" - and ended up in advanced search page. And there is button to start search... (sorry for my terrible English) Ville

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Where to report bugs?
by Alan Millar 06 May '02

06 May '02

Hi- I'm trying out Koha to manage my personal book collection. I had problems getting 1.1.1 to work, so I downloaded a recent CVS snapshot and followed the instructions on the Wiki site. The revised instructions are good. I've come across a few bugs here and there. Not doc shortcomings, but things that are actual bugs or "features". Should I post to the list, to the Slashdot site, or some other process? Things I've found in CVS snapshot from May 1 2002: - DB upgrade from earlier version (I love that!) updater/updatedatabase has an error in a column name. In table z3950queue, the column "numercords" should be "numrecords". It definitely doesn't work with the wrong column name... :-) - Simple acquisition module: marcimport.pl doesn't handle branches correctly. The pull-down list for home branch is hardcoded, which should come from the branches table. Worse, the holding branch doesn't even have a form field, it is hardcoded to 'STWE' - Keyword search doesn't work in the simple acquisitions module on my database, because the "biblio" table is missing the "abstract" column. The abstract column exists in database.mysql from CVS, but doesn't appear to be added by updater/updatedatabase Let me know the best way to help in reporting things like this. Thanks! - Alan -- ---- Alan Millar --==> am12(a)bolis.com <==--

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Intro and Questions
by Heath Robinson 03 May '02

03 May '02

Hello. I am the sysadmin for a small international school in France, and we are considering using Koha. However, I do have a couple of questions. We have Windows 2K servers, and I have noticed that someone is working on a port. I am open to doing some testing and small fixes if the port is usable. If the port is not stable, what level of machine would be required to support a library of around 10000 volumes? Secondly, the librarian has asked me about doing inventory with Koha. How does one go about doing inventory with the Koha system? Thanks, Heath

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Re: [Koha] Re: user comments
by Chris Cormack 03 May '02

03 May '02

> > > > Then of course you couldnt see if it was more popular with children or > > adults, or more often borrowed by institions or normal borrowers etc. <snip> > > If you need this information you can have a database table like the > user table but without the actual identifying features when the book is > returned you use that table to identify the borrower rather than the user > table. Round the DOB to year of birth, address to suburb and you can still > do most of your report writing. You might want to even wait until all > books borrowed by a particular day have been returned and use the same > anonymised record---then you can even still do "people who liked XXX also > like YYY" features (collaborative recommendation/filtering). This is true. Well if its feature thats needed by people, (anonymised data that is). I can certainly put it on the todo list. People could anonymise the data themselves by running something like update issues set borrowernumber=0 where returndate is not null; Thered be no way then you could match a borrower with a returned item. So short term fix you could run a cron job to anonymise your issues data each night, (or every 5 minutes even) Long term we can put it on the todo list, and we'll get an option to run with anonymised data into the configuration file Thanks Chris

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RE: Setup costs for database using Microsoft Access
by Rosalie Blake 03 May '02

03 May '02

Hello Aroha, Coralie and Jennifer, First of all my apologies for non-response to your inquiries, and thanks to Jennifer for her response which said most of what I would have said. I broke my wrist (right, dammit!) on the day your inquiry hit the list, and I am only just back to fulltime work, and clearing the bottom of my email bin, now. So I am sorry, but in case it's still useful, here goes: On 18 Feb 2002, at 8:26, Coralie wrote: > > Kia ora koutou > > One of our local iwi research centres has asked me for some help with > putting together a funding application to setup a database for their > collection of reports, papers and maps - approx. 2000 items > (bibliographic detail and keywords). They have some experience with > Microsoft Access so are wanting to use this for the database. > > Has anyone done anything similar that might be help me guage the time > involved in setting up the database. > > Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. > > Regards > > Coralie Campbell-Whitehead > Circulation and Extension Services Librarian > H.B. Williams Memorial Library Ph. 06 867 6709 > PO Box 747 Fax 06 867 9068 > Peel Street Email: > campbell(a)gpl.govt.nz Gisborne > http://www.gpl.govt.nz > On 18 Feb 2002, at 11:18, Jennifer Geard wrote: > Hi All, > > Aroha asked: > > ... I too have an iwi that is wanting to catalogue their library and > > is > wanting information similar to what you have asked. They are also > wanting to know what cataloguing programme would best suit their > needs. Does anyone know what is available on the market for small > libraries such as these and costs? > > Is Rosalie Blake on this list? Yes > Will she have replied by the time my message goes through? She should have, but she didn't! > > Two of the options to consider are Koha http://www.koha.org/ and > Greenstone http://www.greenstone.org/. Both are NZ-built: Koha by > Katipo in conjunction with Horowhenua Library Trust; Greenstone by > Waikato University's NZ Digital Library Project in conjunction with > UNESCO and the Humanity Libraries Project. Both are open-source, > issued under the GNU public licence. Both software packages are > available free of charge. > > Note that you'll need one computer that runs Linux if you want to run > Koha. Greenstone comes in versions for Windows and Unix (the Unix > version works on Linux). Koha for Windows NT is working now. I've taken the liberty of posting this reply to the koha list, where the techies who know about such things lurk. If you want to know more about running Koha under Windows, a message to the koha list will bring results, I'm sure. You may be interested that Te Wananga o Raukawa is installing Koha in their library in Otaki. Katipo is (I think) helping them with their installation and setup. You can contact katipo at www.katipo.co.nz and join the koha list by following links on that site. Cheers, Rosalie Blake Horowhenua Library Trust

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RE: [Koha] A simple question about Class
by Yaogeng Cheng 30 Apr '02

30 Apr '02

>Here it gets tricky > >What you actually see as class on the screen on the item details page is an almagation of >3 fields. > >it goes classification,dewey,subclass > >Looking in the database for the above book >it has classification=J >dewey=612.82 >subclass= > >Hence J612.82 > >So for something like J612.32aa >You'd have >classification=J >dewey=612.32 >subclass=aa Yet, where should/could I put classification (J) into the database from your web interface? I did not find a field called classification or similar in koha web site. Please enlighten. Thanks a lot! Yaogeng

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RE: [Koha] A simple question about Class
by Williams, Olwen - SAL 30 Apr '02

30 Apr '02

I'd be wary of this approach. I don't remember well what happens, but the dewey number is decimal for sorting, and the J will be in a separate field (but I can't remember where precisely. If you are using the Dewey system don't tamper with the datatype. On the other hand if you are using another system feel free to modify the type to suit, but there may be some other validation and formatting that has to change, for example formatting that puts leading zeroes on dewey numbers less than 100. -----Original Message----- From: Roger Buck [mailto:rog@saas.nsw.edu.au] Sent: Tuesday, 30 April 2002 11:07 To: rachel(a)katipo.co.nz Cc: Yaogeng Cheng; koha(a)lists.katipo.co.nz Subject: Re: [Koha] A simple question about Class # From the example koha db tables for <biblioitems.dewey>: dewey double (8,6) default NULL I think this means that the dewey entry is restricted to being a numeric data type (double precision - up to 8 digits displayed, with up to 6 digits following the decimal point)? As far as I know, the Dewey numbers are "labels" - their value is not used for computation - so the dewey number could be entered as a "text" data type? I'd guess that simply changing the db entry to something like: dewey varchar (16) default NULL might cover most of your needs? I am just a newbie at this stuff and the above is all just guess-work - so make modifications at your own risk ;^) R. _______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha(a)lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha

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