[Koha] Summary of Open session at KohaCon13 - with a focus on Funding the Future of Koha.

[Joel Sasse]

Brendan,

Excellent post and analysis of the current situation and the path forward
for Koha, both for users and developers.

 I was just considering putting forth the idea of a Midwestern US Koha users
and developers conference, perhaps just more of an informal get together,
and gauging the level of interest. Regardless of the title, everyone would
certainly be welcome.  Although technology can facilitate distance
collaborations, I don't believe it can ever substitute for face to face
human interaction. After attending KohaCon 13, I can attest that great ideas
came not just from the planned events of each day but also from the informal
social gatherings in the evenings. I also learned a lot more in those seven
days interacting with all of the excellent attendees than I ever would have
from simply surfing Koha info on the Web.

An Ohio hack fest is an awesome idea. What can we do to help?

Plum Creek is willing to aid in the effort to get us together again as often
as possible. I don't think a formal non-profit organization is needed in the
short term to just get us together under one roof.

I truly believe open source and Koha are the future of library automation
worldwide and I am always willing to share my knowledge and enthusiasm for
Koha with anyone willing to listen.

Thanks,

Joel Sasse
Network Systems Administrator
Plum Creek Library System
507-376-5803

-----Original Message-----
From: koha-bounces at lists.katipo.co.nz
[mailto:koha-bounces at lists.katipo.co.nz] On Behalf Of Brendan Gallagher
Sent: Wednesday, November 06, 2013 9:39 PM
To: Koha Devel; koha at lists.katipo.co.nz
Subject: [Koha] Summary of Open session at KohaCon13 - with a focus on
Funding the Future of Koha.

Hello All -

I'd like to give a summary of a open discussion that occurred at KohaCon14
in Reno.  A spot opened up from a presenter not being able to attend - so I
volunteered to lead a discussion on Funding the future of Koha.   First we
invited all current and past RM's of Koha up to the front of the room, to
educate the audience on some of the "plumbing" needs in the code.  When I
use the term "plumbing" - I really mean portions of the code that need to be
"rewritten", "updated for current coding practices", and a "plan for placing
newer technologies and practices into the code".  Mainly plumbing = what do
we need to get completed in the near future and how are we going to get that
done.

Many of these "needs" are larger projects that not a single organization or
library can fund, as we would really need to dedicate an expert programmer
some uninterrupted time to accomplish these goals.  Not one support vendor
can brunt the front of the plumbing needs that need to happen.  We need to
work together to fund this and we need to have a place and plan going
forward "now".  Let's do this for Koha!

Points that were raised.

Many attendees felt that a clear plan on what path Koha should be developing
towards would be a useful project.  Although setting a ridged path is a
difficult thing with a community like ours, maybe a place for everyone to
get or stash ideas for future paths would be a good thing to organize.
An important comment here from the attendees was that when someone is
funding a development - they should not just fund the code, but also plan
for time and funding for the Sign-Off process and the QA process.
Funding and how would we organize this?  Since many in the audience were
from the USA - there was discussion of getting a users group going again OR
creating some sort of "non-profit like org" where libraries could pool
funding towards projects.  An organization like this would be able to apply
for grants etc.  Something where we could crowd-source funding and then fund
a developer for a number of hours towards a project.


My thoughts on some things that we can do in the USA.

Have a hackfest in Athen's Ohio next summer.  Next year will be 10 years
since Koha migrated to the US and I think it's about time we have a hackfest
here.  I have briefly talked with Owen Leonard about putting this together
for next summer and would love for help and encourage those from overseas to
join us.  (Also a commitment here that we will be sending a few employees to
the France Hackfest in March and will continue to do this every year that we
can - that also being right around a feature freeze for releases it's
important to have a solid week dedicated to hacking koha only) Gauge the
interest of a North American Koha users group so at least we are having more
of the community meeting together and sharing practices and ideas.  Comments
from Galen "As far as a US or North American user group
goes: I think a relaunch should start off with just the goal of hosting a
US/NA conference, as it would /not/ be necessary to set up a nonprofit first
to run conferences.  We'd just need willing hosts and, if necessary, a firm
willing and able to act as a fiscal agent.  That's not to say that such a
group couldn't pursue nonprofit status later, but we can get a lot of
education and user-connecting done without ever having to have a formal
organization."

Thanks all - this is to promote discussion and hopefully we can all do this
together!
Brendan

--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------
Brendan A. Gallagher
ByWater Solutions
CEO

Support and Consulting for Open Source Software Installation, Data
Migration, Training, Customization, Hosting and Complete Support Packages
Headquarters: Santa Barbara, CA - Office: Redding, CT Phone # (888) 900-8944
http://bywatersolutions.com brendan at bywatersolutions.com
<info at bywatersolutions.com> _______________________________________________
Koha mailing list  http://koha-community.org Koha at lists.katipo.co.nz
http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha