[Koha] Going completely on-line with Koha

[MJ Ray]

On 2003-12-23 02:04:53 +0000 ed sharpe <esharpe at uswest.net> wrote:

> perhaps we could also hope   that there are some programmers on this 
> project
> for purely altruistic reasons and not trying to milk $$ from  each 
> line of
> code....   sometimes things need to get done just for the pure reason 
> they
> need to get done....

I am quite uphappy about this email. I may as well write that "we 
could also hope that there are some librarians who work for purely 
altruistic reasons and not trying to milk $$ from each collection". We 
all know that programmers need money to live, just like librarians, so 
why be so hostile to the idea?

Library free software interests me. There are some libraries which are 
real assets to their communities and could benefit from it, but I have 
no grant funding any more. I have to make money to live and koha-based 
projects are part of that. There is a lot of koha work that I do for 
free, including things that "need to get done" but no-one will pay 
for. I cannot afford to help everyone for free, so I pick a few things 
at a time which look like fun, good ideas and worthwhile. I hope that 
someone appreciates it, even if you don't.

The paid work is on top of that, extra to the time that I would spend 
on koha anyway. If we've no paid work on koha, that time gets filled 
with other paid work because it has to be. Payment brings extra 
programmer time to koha. (Don't worry about my email writing: I type 
very quickly.) Those priorities are determined by what the payer 
wants, so if your idea doesn't get worked on for free and it's 
important to you, consider trying it commercially.

Maybe smecc can't afford to do that. I can't find details about staff 
or funding on its web site. Off the top of my head, I can't recall 
what they contributed or offered to koha. A quick search for smecc on 
the lists gives the LoC request many times, including some BLOCK CAPS 
SHOUTING, links to other projects, and an unhelpful "we're not using 
koha" reply to a survey, cc'd to the developers (to annoy them?). I 
think people wanting free help need to be more open about their 
institution and reasons, and nicer to potential helpers. I suspect it 
will be the same with any of Pat's suggested groups. No-one donates to 
people who offend them, even a charity.

> (remember folks to make it  print out the library of congress catalog 
> number
> instead of the Dewey number it is  just  one field you are dealing 
> with! )

I don't know/remember what's required for this. I probably won't do it 
unless I need it, because I've other things to do and it now makes me 
think of this unhappy exchange. I think you should reconsider your 
methods of motivating people. Maybe you can find out what has to be 
done and record it on bug report 498.

-- 
MJR/slef     My Opinion Only and possibly not of any group I know.
Please http://remember.to/edit_messages on lists to be sure I read
http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ gopher://g.towers.org.uk/ slef at jabber.at
  Creative copyleft computing services via http://www.ttllp.co.uk/