[Koha] Greenstone cost

[Galen Charlton]

Hi,

2009/4/18 M L  N <soscalling at gmail.com>:
> My name is Linh and i'm a final year Library student, for my final project i
> have to build a Integrated library system. I don't really have a budget for
> this project and that is why i decided to use opensource. I was just
> wondering if there are any addition cost involved with running Koha?

Koha is free software both in the gratis sense (you don't have to pay
anybody to download it) and the libre sense (you are free to use,
modify, and redistribute it under the terms of the GPL).  However, if
you're budgeting any ILS, open source or proprietary, for use by a
library, there are always costs to consider:

* hardware to run Koha
* data migration or retrospective conversion
* training staff on how to use Koha
* preparing your patrons for the new catalog, and marketing it to them
* supporting your users
* if desired, enhancing or customizing Koha
* fixing bugs

Depending on the library's circumstances, those costs could be paid
for in many ways:

* time you spend yourself
* time library staff spends
* volunteer time you convince somebody to give you
* money you pay to a third party to do or help out with one of these tasks

In your case, if you're asking about how much it would cost you to
install and deploy Koha for your class project, you can do it without
spending any money, but it will of course take time and effort on your
part.  If you're asking more generally about cost models for ILSs, my
summary is a (brief) starting point; feel free to ask more, but I also
suggest looking at some of the results that turn up if you do a web
search for "free as in kittens".

Galen
-- 
Galen Charlton
VP, Research & Development, LibLime
galen.charlton at liblime.com
p: 1-888-564-2457 x709
skype: gmcharlt