[Koha] Live DVD

[Mason James]

On 2013-05-23, at 1:11 AM, Jared Camins-Esakov wrote:

> Lars,
> 
> Unfortunately they often give up, before they really get started. Therefore
>> I want to make the entry level as low as anyway possible. The live DVD is a
>> wonderful way to make more people use Koha. The people that I am dealing
>> with are typically having small school-libraries (with max 10.000 items).
>> They have never been working at a terminal (not even in Windows).
>> 
> 
> This is definitely a problem. However...
> 
> 
>> Suggesting that they should make a manual installation of Koha - because
>> that is better in the long term, is pure theory without ANY connection to
>> reality. It simply will not happen. The only thing you may accomplish that
>> way, is preventing them from using Koha.
> 
> 
> This would be unfortunate. However, there is another side to the coin,
> which is why the developers are practically unanimous in condemning using
> live cds in production: using the live cd in production (*production* not
> "for testing," which is a different beast) is going to result in people
> being dissatisfied with Koha, in a "Koha sucks I hate it way" rather than a
> "well, that was too hard so I guess Koha isn't right for me" sort of way. I
> would prefer neither be the case, of course, but if I have to choose, I'll
> go with option B every time.
> 
> When someone sends a message to the mailing list, they are saying, in
> effect "I want several hundred people to donate their free time in order to
> solve my problem." And we're happy to do it. Otherwise, we wouldn't bother
> reading the e-mail. However, things change a bit when you've installed the
> system in a way that very few (or none) of the developers does. We can't
> help you. That's all there is to it. Any time I see an e-mail that says "I
> am using the live cd," I say "oh, well, no point in reading further." And I
> don't. For proof, consider the fact that I have no idea what the question
> that started this thread was, despite having opened the message. The reason
> I ignore the e-mail is because any advice I might try to offer will almost
> certainly be wrong and counter-productive. I want to help. Above all, I
> want people to be happy using Koha, and that's just not going to happen if
> they're using it in an unusual way.
> 
> That said, I think a live cd is a great idea, absolutely perfect for
> testing, demoing, and generally seeing what the big deal about this "Koha"
> thing is. I've recommended it to many people for just that purpose. But if
> you run a small library, and you run into a problem that takes your ILS
> down, you need to know that someone can fix it, regardless how small your
> budget is. If you want that someone to be someone other than you (the
> general you, not Lars, obviously), that is absolutely legitimate. There are
> vendors. If you want to rely on the kindness of strangers (keeping in mind,
> of course, that strangers may not have time to help in the middle of finals
> week when you have 400 students asking you why the OPAC doesn't work
> anymore), that's fine too. What's a problem is when you want to rely on the
> kindness of strangers, even though none of the strangers are willing to
> help with the system you've set up.
> 
> This will be my final contribution to this thread, but one thing I am
> missed when I skimmed through it (when the conversation is busy enough,
> eventually I'll get curious and actually read live cd-related messages) was
> a clear explanation of why a live cd in production is a problem not just in
> a theoretical sense but also in a "strongly connected to reality" sense.
> 
> Regards,
> Jared
> 
> P.S. My cat would like to say the following: "           vcb cd34
>                             "
> 
> -- 
> Jared Camins-Esakov
> Bibliographer, C & P Bibliography Services, LLC
> (phone) +1 (917) 727-3445
> (e-mail) jcamins at cpbibliography.com
> (web) http://www.cpbibliography.com/
> _______________________________________________
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hi Folks

i think this topic still needs a little more discussion, so i added it to the agenda of the next Koha meeting

 http://wiki.koha-community.org/wiki/General_IRC_meeting,_5_June_2013