Hi Koha Users,<br><br>I am a US librarian considering Koha. A friend of mine sent me the following email when I shared this and I wanted to check with other libraries to see if this is how everyone handles developments. Are you working on your own or with a support company? Are all new develpments you pay for making it into the public Koha? <br>
<br>Thank you for info<br>Cheryl<br>
<br>---------- Forwarded message ----------<br>From: Vicki Teal Lovely <<a href="mailto:vtl@scls.lib.wi.us" target="_blank">vtl@scls.lib.wi.us</a>><br>Date: Thu, Jul 30, 2009 at 9:43 AM<br>Subject: [LibLime-Users] LibLime Users Meeting at ALA<br>
To: <a href="mailto:liblime-users@lists.liblime.com" target="_blank">liblime-users@lists.liblime.com</a><br><br><br>Good Morning Everyone,<br><br>By now you have probably read the announcement that there was a user<br>group meeting at ALA. Debra Denault took notes at this meeting and you<br>
will see them below. I was present at this meeting and this is an<br>accurate transcription of the discussion that occurred there. Please<br>keep in mind that no decisions were made at this meeting--it was only<br>the beginning of some discussions that LibLime customers need to have.<br>
The email list was created as a forum for us to discuss topics such as<br>these (among other things), so let's start discussing. Joshua Ferraro<br>has suggested that we may want have a meeting to discuss these topics in<br>
person--perhaps in a virtual forum.<br><br>Thanks,<br><br>Vicki Teal Lovely<br><br><br>LibLime Users Group Meeting, ALA, July 13<br><br>Attendees: LibLime (Josh, Debra, Maria)<br> WALDO (Rob, John, Becky)<br>
Walden University - Michele<br> INCOLSA - Becki Whitaker<br> Highland Park - Jane Stanley<br> SCLS - Vicky Teal Lovely<br> Masscat - Nora Blake<br>
St. John's University - Charles ?<br><br>Josh presents:<br><br>Why are we here?<br>Challenges we face<br><br>*Jane Stanley said that she would be amenable to extra maintenance to<br>support the gap between cost and expense of development<br>
<br>LibLime user group proposal<br><br>air dirty laundry<br>expand development exchange<br>get to know other LibLime customers<br>improve communication of software releases<br>improve communication of new and info to LibLime customers<br>
LibLime committed to launch a listserv next month<br><br>1. Incorporation<br>2. Membership<br>3. Funding<br>4. 2010 users group conference<br><br>Feedback:<br><br>John Stromquist - always find emergence of user's group when there is<br>
a strategic relationship between customer and vendor. Evaluate vendors<br>performance, encourage them etc which shouldn't interfere with a<br>broader community group. More difficult challenge of funding of future<br>
development. Exercise option by searching for solutions to the funding<br>
problems for development. Get a funding stream for development through<br>membership dues etc.<br><br>Jane - Hard for a small library that can only contribute a small<br>amount to get anything done. Perception is that LL is too committed to<br>
these large projects to let the small guys have a say.<br><br>Josh - have membership fee x% of contract value to go towards user<br>group as well as development decisions<br><br>Vicky - she would hate to see a small library with a small amount of<br>
money who has committed money to large pool and not get what they want<br>done ... would prefer to see a) people need to see what dev projects<br>are out there but who is going to keep it up - maybe a user group<br>responsibility b) wishlist - we want this done can we cosponsor. Do<br>
not want to be locked into a voting situation. Kudos want to do it on<br>larger scale but no where near being able to do it.<br><br>John S - lots of ways we can approach this - some money toward larger<br>scale but understand there are small development needs that could<br>
exist in parallel. Do a credit against funding toward positive<br>suggestions and central fund could match it.<br><br>Vicky - can't see their libraries putting there money somewhere where<br>they do not have control over it . Nora concurs from Masscat<br>
<br>John S - libraries want to see service out of where their money is<br>going. WALDO sees the benefits of it.<br><br>Josh - 15% wouldn't necessarily be pooled but can be. But libraries<br>could band with others to do projects separatey. Needs to be a metric<br>
by which to measure how participation is going.<br><br>John S - libraries need to know it's an equitable process<br><br>Vicky - To Josh - is getting this money what LL needs to make it more<br>stable. Help out others that may not be able to afford something<br>
specifically. Get folks together and do it.<br><br>Josh - How can we make this work?<br><br>Jane - Can we get a quote for LL and post to the listserv if others<br>would want to share.<br><br>Vicky - Thinks that would be better than pooling it together.<br>
<br>Jane - It's the large consortia versus the little guys and they would<br>have the budget to do things on their own and the small guys need the<br>help.<br><br>Josh - but WALDO could help in in any situation<br><br>
Becki - value of a group like this would be the method to share what<br>we are doing and important step to be able to share our developments.<br><br>Vicky - very first step - who's doing what. But we want to work with our<br>
vendor<br><br>Rob - now that we are all shareholders in this and in LibLime there is<br>a risk in sharing the development and that the investment is safe<br>(i.e. from other vendors in the space) Need to maintain a level of<br>
discretion in involvement of other groups.<br><br>Josh - if user group would like to take over and run the development<br>exchange that would relieve our staff. Specification process is a line<br>item. Is there a committment when a request is made for a sponsored<br>
project to be done?<br><br>Vicky - Maybe two lists - one for committed project and one for good<br>ideas and have projects move along a spectrum.<br><br>Josh - LL is working on a new LibLime website that will have a login<br>
for customers to log in access<br><br>Vicky - Koha bugzilla db - use that for enhancements - ??? how much do<br>LL customers want to share with outside world what will be done.<br><br>Jane - was told can't pay for bugfixes -<br>
<br>Josh - need to figure out membership dues - just do freeform - need to<br>figure out how it all works - can reevaluate this yearly.<br><br>John - would like to propse some kind of statement of intent or<br>recognition as a open source LL user that there is an obligation to<br>
contribute to ongoing development and money needs to be set aside for<br>this so system can continue to grow. Not just a free lunch<br><br>Vicky - part of their philosophy is we have money for development and<br>they are contributing and they would hate to force any library to<br>
contribute to development. Doesn't want it to be part of membership<br>requirements<br><br>Josh - related to funding we at LL are interested too as we have made<br>a significant investment in Koha and that has been at the expense of<br>
profit for us and we want to make sure development is working as<br>sufficiently as possible.<br><br>Becky - significant improvement in that a customer can be recognized<br>for their contribution.<br><br>Josh - Any thoughts on a conference?<br>
<br>Rob - could be dependent on going live dates etc.<br><br>John - alot of chatter about the community of Koha by developers need<br>librarian input and we are looking for an organization that talk about<br>library issues.<br>
<br>Vicky - too soon to have a conference. Don't think folks could afford<br>it for such a small group. Do a half day for LL users off KohaCon as<br>automation libraries cannot go to ALA. Should be off a kudos annual<br>
conference.<br><br>Jane - how does that contradict our committment to LL.<br><br>Josh - part of our goal with LL users group is to build stronger legs<br>where we can compete with other companies. Not that we are against all<br>
the other competitors - have great relationship with ByWater but there<br>are some out there acting like sharks putting us in a difficult<br>position<br><br>Vicky - puts us in a difficult position not to be able to share with<br>
other community to users and the LL pool is too small in her opinion.<br><br>Josh - well LL users contributes 97%<br><br>Vicky - you will cause a rift in your customer base and there are<br>enough that want to work with Koha users that it is going to happen.<br>
<br>John - but there doesn't need to be a choice to be made. The kudos<br>committment is a higher level participation.<br><br>Josh - not saying can't go to the kudos or participate in kudos but we<br>need the LL user's group conference because of other reasons.<br>
<br>Kate - what kind of attendence of LL customers - 60% of customers - 100<br>people<br><br>Josh - at a LL user group meeting customers can be more open and<br>honest than if at a shared event.<br><br>Charles - i'm a low level player but what he sees is a .com<br>
organization talking to a bunch of .edu organizations with different<br>philosophies. Where/when does this mean a split in the product.<br><br>Josh - 1. that's already happened . Koha by LibLime different already<br>
than what others delivered. 2. getting considerable pressure by<br>
sponsored developments to embargoing the code. 3. LL cannot change the<br>philosophy to contribute to the community. Need to have a timed<br>release that gives us a strategic advantage.<br><br>Nora - this is very upsetting and disconcerting to us. That's not why<br>
we joined on.<br><br>Josh - we would still give you all the community stuff<br><br>Becky - but that breaks the value of open source<br><br>Rob - the conditions have changed in being able to support the model.<br>The user community has to answer why are we uncomfortable sharing and<br>
how the community is having adverse effect on why we got together in<br>the first place.<br><br>Vicky - would like to explore more positive ways for getting LL<br>funding rather than break the community model of Koha.<br>
<br>Josh - not making it not opensource - but we will hold it back.<br><br>Nora/Vicky - don't like it - won't fly.<br><br>Vicky - Kings County is splitting Evergreen to their own code and<br>Vicky has been telling everyone how proud we are not in a position of<br>
having to do that.<br><br>John -<br><br>Jane - if there is another company underbidding are they sustainable<br>themselves<br><br>Josh - but this company has deep pockets and can sustain the loss. We<br>have no capital backing<br>
<br>Rob - learning a lesson from a shark that may not do much damage but<br>what about the next shark.<br><br>John - obligation to his consortia members who have contributed 750K<br><br>Vicky - still share with everyone and want what they have. All of<br>
Wisconsin may all become LL customers.<br><br>Rob - what we are grasping with is it open or not? It's not that it's<br>not open but rather when does it become open.<br><br>Charles - holding open source back - what period of time do you have in mind<br>
<br>Josh - not made a concrete decision on this yet. Not intent to talk<br>about it today but bottom line is the problem is the cost to expense<br>ratio of development and we cannot subsidize it with other services.<br><br>
Vicky - how are those decisions to develop those made if didn't have<br>funding.<br><br>Becki - if we had known then that 3.2 is not till the fall they would<br>have bought into it back in the spring. If intent is to have a product<br>
that there are delays in releasing customer needs to know more<br>concrete dates.<br><br>Rob - development exchange can address these needs by gathering<br>funding from smaller sources to be applied to these types of big<br>
projects.<br><br>Vicky - instead of you saying it's a good project a library will front<br>it you are suggesting this needs to be done who will front it.<br><br>Vicky - if you are asking for the money to get closer it needs to be<br>
Koha related not other 3rd party projects and the software needs to be<br>brought to a level that other libraries will migrate it to it.<br><br>John - it's a timing issue<br><br>Vicky - LL needs to offer stable support and need to prove that we can<br>
do it and show evidence it can be done. Do not want to withhold code.<br>It would be a hard sell for me to go back and have my library agree to<br>that.<br><br>Josh - well of course there is time involved before the customer even<br>
approves code - make it longer term quality assurance testing first<br>with customer then LL customers then to the community at large. Other<br>thing that needs to be considered is that LL has been leading the Koha<br>community but there seems to be an uprising amongst other Koha<br>
developers so we won't be holding those positions of quality assurance<br>/ release management of Koha and that will mean a detrimental effect<br>on the quality of the product - trying to address that eventuality.<br>
<br>Jane - do you see LL version diverging from the community<br><br>Vicky - isn't there a group of folks<br><br>Josh - yes but release manager has final say and if we lose that<br>capability then what if our customers are not served by the product.<br>
We are not dedicated to the Koha community to a fault. Our customers<br>come first and need to have stable good code.<br><br>WrapUp<br><br>It's been a valuable conversation. Need to continue the dialog to address.<br>
Will establish LL mailing list .. appropriate time to have a group meeting.<br><br>Meeting adjourned 12:06 p.m.<br><br><br>On Thu, Jul 23, 2009 at 10:51 AM, Joshua Ferraro<<a href="mailto:jmf@liblime.com" target="_blank">jmf@liblime.com</a>> wrote:<br>
<br>--<br>Vicki Teal Lovely<br><br><a href="mailto:vtl@scls.lib.wi.us" target="_blank">vtl@scls.lib.wi.us</a><br><br>Software Applications Supervisor<br>SCLS Automation<br>201 W. Mifflin St.<br>Madison, WI 53703<br><br>(608)261-9109<br>
<br>
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