Re: [Koha] [Koha-translate] [Koha-devel] Announcing ... Newkoha.org Website based on Plone
I'm going to put in a ME Too to agree with Eric. The new site is lovely. However, the site really needs to be vendor independent or small libraries are going to turn away under the impression that they need to use a vendor to install and use the software. As for contributions, I think Eric is correct that contributions by a paid company should be attributed to the people who actually paid for them. Perhaps something that states the contribution was paid for by ... and programming/development by ... One quick CSS fix...the documentation link in the top tabs overruns the right hand line. Thanx. Lenora StreamNet Regional Librarian Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission http://www.fishlib.org
Chris Cormack <chris@bigballofwax.co.nz> 5/8/2009 2:21 PM >>> 2009/5/9 Eric Bégin <Eric.Begin@inlibro.com>: Hi,
First, I want to raise my hat to LibLime team for the new website.
Yes me too.
I also want to thanks Thomas for the time he spent to analyse the new
site
and for bringing those worth to discuss points.
Definitely, also I would like to thank you and MJ for your input also.
Here is, briefly, my comments.
My main point here is that the Koha.org website should be as vendor-independant as possible. I really think that the Alphabetical order is the best way to reach that goal.
I agree it should be vendor independent. And I also agree with the suggestion to have a separate page detailing contributions. Chris _______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha
On Mon, May 11, 2009 at 12:25 PM, Lenora Oftedahl <OFTL@critfc.org> wrote:
The new site is lovely. However, the site really needs to be vendor independent or small libraries are going to turn away under the impression that they need to use a vendor to install and use the software.
As for contributions, I think Eric is correct that contributions by a paid company should be attributed to the people who actually paid for them. Perhaps something that states the contribution was paid for by ... and programming/development by ...
I sent a reply earlier in the thread that went into moderation and I'm not sure it ever got through. So at the risk of repeating myself (and perhaps appearing in reverse order), I'll reply to this point. Citing feature sponsors, while useful and appropriate for a page about Koha history, or in the "About" section of the software, has nothing to do with the "for pay" support page. Let's be sure to keep these ideas separate. The desire to have this attribution is not a proposal to modify the "for pay" page: we'd be talking about building or augmenting a different page/resource (fine by me, btw). I'll explain why. The companies listed are those with demonstrable Koha expertise who are available for hire. Having sponsored a feature does not make the sponsor any more capable of providing Koha support, or even remotely interested in entering into financial relationships with users around the world to do so. The correlation is more likely to be precisely the opposite: that people who sponsored a feature specifically DO NOT want to provide Koha "for pay" support or development to others, since they themselves were paying another party for that service. And that makes sense to me. Sponsors typically have their own real libraries to run, and even assuming they wanted to, most municipal and academic institutions would be prevented from performing commercial developer/host functions (at least, not without a lengthy legal review process). So that's why the "for pay" page is concerned with feature *implementation*, not sponsorship: because it's readers are interested in available expertise. -- Joe Atzberger LibLime - Open Source Library Solutions
Lenora wrote:
As for contributions, I think Eric is correct that contributions by a paid company should be attributed to the people who actually paid for them.
Joe replied:
The companies listed are those with demonstrable Koha expertise who are available for hire. Having sponsored a feature does not make the sponsor any more capable of providing Koha support, or even remotely interested in entering into financial relationships with users around the world to do so. ... So that's why the "for pay" page is concerned with feature *implementation*, not sponsorship: because it's readers are interested in available expertise.
I agree with this 100%. Let's have a separate page that lists sponsors (like the About page in Koha itself) but let's keep the "for pay" page exclusively for companies in the Koha community wishing to offer their services. -- Owen -- Web Developer Athens County Public Libraries http://www.myacpl.org
I agree with this 100%. Let's have a separate page that lists sponsors (like the About page in Koha itself) but let's keep the "for pay" page exclusively for companies in the Koha community wishing to offer their services.
Yep - and I see no contradiction with a company saying the features that they've developed - it's good to show what their expertise is, which is what people are interested in - I think it's between them and their clients as to how they are "allowed" to discuss a feature publicly (What got paid for/sponsored etc), so I don't think we want to get in the middle of that. Cheers Rachel -- ----------------------------- Rachel Hamilton-Williams General Manager Katipo Communications Ltd Phone: +64-4-934 1285 Mobile: 021 389 128 E-mail: rachel@katipo.co.nz Web: www.katipo.co.nz
Reply inline: On Tue, May 12, 2009 2:01 am, Rachel Hamilton-Williams wrote:
I agree with this 100%. Let's have a separate page that lists sponsors (like the About page in Koha itself) but let's keep the "for pay" page exclusively for companies in the Koha community wishing to offer their services.
1. FAILING TO SHOW EXPERTISE.
Yep - and I see no contradiction with a company saying the features that they've developed - it's good to show what their expertise is, which is what people are interested in
Showing expertise by identifying features which support companies have developed or to which they have made significant contributions is important. However, the new presentation of such information in the pay for support page is not representative of the work actually done and the multiple parties which have contributed significantly to that work as a community project. The presentation over-represents the work of some and under-represents the work of others. That presentation is unfair to both 'major contributors' and 'minor contributors'. The presented contributions of one 'major contributor' are overrepresented relative to the contributions of the other 'major contributor'. Some 'minor contributors' have contributed major features and made major contributions to features originally developed by others, but the presentation does not distinguish them by any contribution. Most of all the presentation is unfair to the Koha project itself which is a community project to which everyone is expected to contribute. Consequently, the presentation does not adequately identify the expertise which it supposedly intended to show. People are interested in knowing the expertise of companies but the actual information presented is counter-informative. Much less information is presented than would be needed to be informative and not be very misleading. A proper full presentation of significant contributions to Koha does not belong in a directory of support companies because giving due attributions for significant contributions would transform a directory of support companies into a feature list. Only a separate contributions page or set of pages would have the space to properly represent significant contributions. Such a contributions page or set of pages could be linked from the pay for support page. 2. ANNOTATION VALUE LISTS. Some set of annotations constrained by value lists for which there is real consensus may be helpful on the pay for support page. Annotations from constrained value lists would be very different from what is presented currently where some of the annotations do not seem to have any objective criteria applied for their inclusion or omission. 3. ATTRIBUTION PAGE OR PAGES. Contributions should certainly be acknowledged with appropriate attribution but they must be fairly presented where there is proper space to present them fairly. In a fair presentation, the contributions of the 'major contributors' would be appropriately seen to be enormous but they would not detract from the contributions of others or the community nature of the project. People contributing to Koha are working towards a common goal. As they pursue their own particular interests for their own contributions they help others and create a better system which everyone can use and on which everyone can build. 4. FAIRNESS AND BEING SEEN TO BE FAIR. Supposedly historical ordering which is not actually historical is a worse problem than the inadequate presentation of contributions because it is more obviously inaccurate. Yet, every problem of unfair presentation needs to be addressed. We should not impute people's motives much as we may wonder and try to understand them. We should merely encourage others not only to pursue their interests fairly but also in a manner which is seen to be fair. This fundamental respect and fairness towards others despite private differences and problems has always been a self-evident characteristic of the Koha community from the beginning. [...] Thomas Dukleth Agogme 109 E 9th Street, 3D New York, NY 10003 USA http://www.agogme.com 212-674-3783
Reply inline:
On Tue, May 12, 2009 2:01 am, Rachel Hamilton-Williams wrote:
I agree with this 100%. Let's have a separate page that lists sponsors (like the About page in Koha itself) but let's keep the "for pay" page exclusively for companies in the Koha community wishing to offer their services.
1. FAILING TO SHOW EXPERTISE.
Yep - and I see no contradiction with a company saying the features that they've developed - it's good to show what their expertise is, which is what people are interested in
Showing expertise by identifying features which support companies have developed or to which they have made significant contributions is important. However, the new presentation of such information in the pay for support page is not representative of the work actually done and the multiple parties which have contributed significantly to that work as a community project.
The presentation over-represents the work of some and under-represents the work of others. That presentation is unfair to both 'major contributors' and 'minor contributors'. The presented contributions of one 'major contributor' are overrepresented relative to the contributions of the other 'major contributor'. Some 'minor contributors' have contributed major features and made major contributions to features originally developed by others, but the presentation does not distinguish them by any contribution. Most of all the presentation is unfair to the Koha project itself which is a community project to which everyone is expected to contribute. Can you please list some specific examples of support vendors on that
On Tue, May 12, 2009 at 12:39 PM, Thomas Dukleth <kohalist@agogme.com> wrote: page who's contributions are under-represented? That would really help because we could add those contributions directly to the page. Cheers, Josh
Consequently, the presentation does not adequately identify the expertise which it supposedly intended to show. People are interested in knowing the expertise of companies but the actual information presented is counter-informative. Much less information is presented than would be needed to be informative and not be very misleading.
A proper full presentation of significant contributions to Koha does not belong in a directory of support companies because giving due attributions for significant contributions would transform a directory of support companies into a feature list. Only a separate contributions page or set of pages would have the space to properly represent significant contributions. Such a contributions page or set of pages could be linked from the pay for support page.
2. ANNOTATION VALUE LISTS.
Some set of annotations constrained by value lists for which there is real consensus may be helpful on the pay for support page. Annotations from constrained value lists would be very different from what is presented currently where some of the annotations do not seem to have any objective criteria applied for their inclusion or omission.
3. ATTRIBUTION PAGE OR PAGES.
Contributions should certainly be acknowledged with appropriate attribution but they must be fairly presented where there is proper space to present them fairly. In a fair presentation, the contributions of the 'major contributors' would be appropriately seen to be enormous but they would not detract from the contributions of others or the community nature of the project.
People contributing to Koha are working towards a common goal. As they pursue their own particular interests for their own contributions they help others and create a better system which everyone can use and on which everyone can build.
4. FAIRNESS AND BEING SEEN TO BE FAIR.
Supposedly historical ordering which is not actually historical is a worse problem than the inadequate presentation of contributions because it is more obviously inaccurate. Yet, every problem of unfair presentation needs to be addressed.
We should not impute people's motives much as we may wonder and try to understand them. We should merely encourage others not only to pursue their interests fairly but also in a manner which is seen to be fair. This fundamental respect and fairness towards others despite private differences and problems has always been a self-evident characteristic of the Koha community from the beginning.
[...]
Thomas Dukleth Agogme 109 E 9th Street, 3D New York, NY 10003 USA http://www.agogme.com 212-674-3783
_______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha
-- Joshua Ferraro SUPPORT FOR OPEN-SOURCE SOFTWARE CEO migration, training, maintenance, support LibLime Featuring Koha Open-Source ILS jmf@liblime.com |Full Demos at http://liblime.com/koha |1(888)KohaILS
Reply inline: On Tue, May 12, 2009 4:50 pm, Joshua Ferraro wrote: [...] 1. SUPPORT COMPANIES FOR WHICH SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTIONS ARE UNDER-REPRESENTED.
Can you please list some specific examples of support vendors on that page who's contributions are under-represented? That would really help because we could add those contributions directly to the page.
I only know of significant contributions in the parts of the code which I have studied and taken a particular interest. Contributions of LibLime, BibLibre, and Tamil are certainly under-represented. I suspect that at least half of the companies listed under pay for support are under-represented for significant contributions. 2. NO SMALL FIXES ADEQUATE. The absence of information in the current presentation is not helpful in distinguishing expertise. However, the abundance of information which would be necessary to fairly distinguish one company from another for contributions would transform a support companies directory into a features list. Such information should be moved to an attribution document. A reasonably constrained set of annotations specified according to an agreed formal set of rules and supplied or calculated from value lists wherever possible should be substituted for the current presentation of contributions from support companies. An attribution document should be developed to give everyone due attribution for significant contributions. 3. DEVELOPMENT GOALS. Ideally, we should all hope for a Koha development community which would become so rich and vibrant that even the most major contributor would have not even contributed 1% of the code base. The current presentation of information in the pay for support page is not the way to encourage the development of such a rich and vibrant Koha community. 4. RECOMMEDATION FOR THIS MOMENT. Until there is a consensus in favour of a particular presentation or set of presentations, the pay for support page should reverted to the previous presentation which was certainly not ideal but allowed people to do their work without being bothered excessively about how it was presented. 5. MORE IMPORTANT PROBLEMS. Major navigation and browser compatibility issues should be receiving more attention at this time. They have not been receiving the attention they deserve because of the divisive instance on going live with a new website which has not been properly tested and for which some important content has no consensus. The top navigation links are not even readable in Internet Explorer which is still the majority web browser in the world and one which many libraries force upon patron and librarian terminals alike. Who would be choosing Koha when they cannot even navigate the Koha website? What impression of Koha does the failure of the website to function properly give to most potential visitors? [...] Thomas Dukleth Agogme 109 E 9th Street, 3D New York, NY 10003 USA http://www.agogme.com 212-674-3783
Reply inline: On Tue, May 12, 2009 7:16 pm, Eric Bégin wrote:
Hi all,
I still think that the community web site should be vendor-independent.
Certainly, the website should be as vendor independent as possible and still be functional. The website should contain vendor independent Koha demonstrations as well. The community website should not become an advertisement for anything other than Koha and the Koha community at large. A support companies directory should serve no significant purpose beyond identifying which support companies exist to allow users to find them. A concern for demonstrated minimal competence in setting up an installation of Koha should be sufficient to ensure that a support company has some knowledge of Koha sufficient to protect the good name of Koha. Beyond an assurance of simple competence, we should allow the users to seek their own information about the different experience and capabilities of different companies which a simple document could never adequately capture. Once we as a community start to treat some support companies as more equal than others then we have left the communitarian path which has made participating in the Koha project a great pleasure.
4. RECOMMEDATION FOR THIS MOMENT.
Until there is a consensus in favour of a particular presentation or set of presentations, the pay for support page should reverted to the previous presentation which was certainly not ideal but allowed people to do their work without being bothered excessively about how it was presented.
Agree. On the other hand, a description of the company, contact and web site info should be enough on this page. Maybe we could add a logo. Each company has a lot of room on their respective websites to write their contributions.
Contact information, a brief description, and a logo should be sufficient with the page organised in manner which helpfully serves the purpose of a support companies directory. Individual company websites have more than enough space to list their contributions in whatever manner they find suitable. There is a credits page which is part of Koha itself for those who seek some information about contributions. I have only noticed my own name there now and note that my attribution is over-inclusive.
User interested by support usually goes on vendor's web site of their geographical location. I don't beleive they are doing a choice only at looking at Koha's web site.
I like the model used by Moodle: http://moodle.com/support/
The Moodle support page seems reasonable. I prefer to see more contact information as Koha has always had on the pay for support page. Thomas Dukleth Agogme 109 E 9th Street, 3D New York, NY 10003 USA http://www.agogme.com 212-674-3783
participants (7)
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Eric Bégin -
Joe Atzberger -
Joshua Ferraro -
Lenora Oftedahl -
Owen Leonard -
Rachel Hamilton-Williams -
Thomas Dukleth