Koha, ILL & FulfILLment™
Hi! A while back there was some talk about adding ILL-functionality to Koha, resulting in this wiki page: http://wiki.koha.org/doku.php?id=en:development:inter_library_loan Then Equinox announced the FulfILLment™ project: http://fulfillment-ill.org/ "FulfILLment will join the basic process of the scalable Evergreen library software with "connectors" to other integrated library systems creating a virtual union catalog for library systems or networks implementing FulfILLment." So my question is this: Do you think this project makes it unnecessary do develop ILL-functionality tightly integrated into Koha? I can't help notice that the (brief) descriptions on the website seems to indicate that FulfILLment™ will only be useful among libraries that use FulfILLment™, there is no indication of talking to the world at large, using some of the protocols mentioned on our wiki page. This may be the result of FulfILLment™ being a sponsored project and the spec from the customer not saying anything about talking to the wider world. And since this is free software it will of course be possible to implement desired functionality once the source is out in the open. My second question: is this worth waiting for or is there enough ILL-momentum in Koha to implement the functionality without waiting for FulfILLment™? Regards, Magnus Enger (a.k.a. magnus on IRC) libriotech.no
My preference is to put energy behind one product that will work for both Koha and Evergreen and as I understand it, FulfILLment is designed to work with not only those two products but others as well. I wish we had direct contact with some of the key players or better yet had a developer with ties to Koha involved in the development project. Personally, I'm trying to find out a bit more about how to get more involved. I'm at the Equinox Conference now and am told by Bob Molyneaux that FulfILLment is due for pilot testing in Ohio in December 2011. He is my source for the above info as well. Lori Ayre 2010/4/23 Magnus Enger <magnus@enger.priv.no>:
Hi!
A while back there was some talk about adding ILL-functionality to Koha, resulting in this wiki page: http://wiki.koha.org/doku.php?id=en:development:inter_library_loan
Then Equinox announced the FulfILLment™ project: http://fulfillment-ill.org/ "FulfILLment will join the basic process of the scalable Evergreen library software with "connectors" to other integrated library systems creating a virtual union catalog for library systems or networks implementing FulfILLment."
So my question is this: Do you think this project makes it unnecessary do develop ILL-functionality tightly integrated into Koha?
I can't help notice that the (brief) descriptions on the website seems to indicate that FulfILLment™ will only be useful among libraries that use FulfILLment™, there is no indication of talking to the world at large, using some of the protocols mentioned on our wiki page. This may be the result of FulfILLment™ being a sponsored project and the spec from the customer not saying anything about talking to the wider world. And since this is free software it will of course be possible to implement desired functionality once the source is out in the open.
My second question: is this worth waiting for or is there enough ILL-momentum in Koha to implement the functionality without waiting for FulfILLment™?
Regards, Magnus Enger (a.k.a. magnus on IRC) libriotech.no _______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha
Hi, On Apr 23, 2010, at 7:46 AM, Lori Ayre wrote:
Personally, I'm trying to find out a bit more about how to get more involved. I'm at the Equinox Conference now and am told by Bob Molyneaux that FulfILLment is due for pilot testing in Ohio in December 2011. He is my source for the above info as well.
The Evergreen Conference, surely. I know of no "Equinox Conference". :) FulfILLment will enable intercirculation between disparate ILSs, and we are keen to have both Evergreen and Koha be among the first ILSs for which FulfILLment connectors are written. We're working on getting more details ready to send out about our vision for it, but certainly I think FulfILLment is a good path to consider to enable resource sharing between Koha and any other ILSs for which a connector can be written. However, it wouldn't necessarily cover everything that a Koha ILL module would need to do, particularly for interacting with brokered ILL services such as those provided by OCLC or ARTEmail/ARTWeb. To answer the broad question: yes, I think FulfILLment could be a way of adding certain forms of ILL support to Koha. However, the details will matter: FulfILLment is still very much under development, i.e., it's not ready to unveil even in a crude form yet, and its primary use case of supporting direct intercirculation between ILSs may not initially cover everything wanted in a Koha ILL module. I'll pass along more details soon, and all of us interested in working on ILL can evaluate what parts it makes sense to implement in FulfILLment and what parts it makes sense to implement directly in Koha. Certainly, if anybody has working ILL code for Koha now or will have it soon, I don't want to forestall using that code in favor of software that, after all, doesn't exist yet. Regards, Galen -- Galen Charlton VP, Data Services Equinox Software, Inc. / Your Library's Guide to Open Source email: gmc@esilibrary.com direct: +1 352-215-7548 skype: gmcharlt web: http://www.esilibrary.com/
Thanks Galen. And yes I did indeed mean the Evergreen Conference! I must admit that what I am interested in is not an ILL product but the "direct intercirculation between ILSs" so I wonder if that piece could be something that would itself be ILS agnostic? 2010/4/23 Galen Charlton <gmc@esilibrary.com>:
Hi,
On Apr 23, 2010, at 7:46 AM, Lori Ayre wrote:
Personally, I'm trying to find out a bit more about how to get more involved. I'm at the Equinox Conference now and am told by Bob Molyneaux that FulfILLment is due for pilot testing in Ohio in December 2011. He is my source for the above info as well.
The Evergreen Conference, surely. I know of no "Equinox Conference". :)
FulfILLment will enable intercirculation between disparate ILSs, and we are keen to have both Evergreen and Koha be among the first ILSs for which FulfILLment connectors are written. We're working on getting more details ready to send out about our vision for it, but certainly I think FulfILLment is a good path to consider to enable resource sharing between Koha and any other ILSs for which a connector can be written. However, it wouldn't necessarily cover everything that a Koha ILL module would need to do, particularly for interacting with brokered ILL services such as those provided by OCLC or ARTEmail/ARTWeb.
To answer the broad question: yes, I think FulfILLment could be a way of adding certain forms of ILL support to Koha. However, the details will matter: FulfILLment is still very much under development, i.e., it's not ready to unveil even in a crude form yet, and its primary use case of supporting direct intercirculation between ILSs may not initially cover everything wanted in a Koha ILL module. I'll pass along more details soon, and all of us interested in working on ILL can evaluate what parts it makes sense to implement in FulfILLment and what parts it makes sense to implement directly in Koha. Certainly, if anybody has working ILL code for Koha now or will have it soon, I don't want to forestall using that code in favor of software that, after all, doesn't exist yet.
Regards,
Galen -- Galen Charlton VP, Data Services Equinox Software, Inc. / Your Library's Guide to Open Source email: gmc@esilibrary.com direct: +1 352-215-7548 skype: gmcharlt web: http://www.esilibrary.com/
participants (3)
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Galen Charlton -
Lori Ayre -
Magnus Enger