Page 84 - DLIS007_LIBRARY AUTOMATION

Unit 4: Problems, Evaluation and Trends in Library Automation Software

module. Creating budget and proper allocation of funds will help to give control over Notes
library finance. About 22.22% rated this module as excellent and about 33.33% rated is as
good.
Serials Management
Serials management module does not connect with budget and it lacks article indexing
feature. Due to these reasons, serials management module could find much acceptance
among Koha users. Only 7.41% of users rated it as excellent and 11.11% of users stated that
the serial management module is poor.
Koha Open Source library management system is a new candidate in Indian library
automation market. Survey result shows that majority of the libraries (52.94%) which
adopted Koha had no automation system before and other segment of users (47.06%)
migrated to Koha from proprietary systems. It indicates that Indian libraries have
recognised the capabilities of Koha features and its suitability to implement in any type of
libraries. To a certain extent, availability of Koha Live CD is a factor behind the popularity
of Koha in India. About 30% of libraries installed Koha using Live CD. Koha Live CD
gives opportunity to try Koha in libraries without technical support.

According to majority of users, data migration from legacy system to Koha is a hard nut
to crack in implementation stage. Other barriers while implementation stage are Internet
connectivity, protest from staff and approval from organisation. Koha users (61.76%) are
satisfied with the overall performance of Koha. Circulation module is the most favourite
module of Koha and 51.72% of users have expressed excellence about the performance of
this module. Financial management of periodicals is not possible and users are not satisfied
with serial management module.
Implementation of Koha in reputed libraries in India has given enough publicity among
library professionals. News regarding Koha implementation in Delhi Public Library,
Mysore University, British Libraries and Connemara Public Library etc. has appeared in
popular online discussion forums like LIS Forum and has come to the attention of library
professionals. A few library science departments and institutions in India have already
started teaching Koha.

Questions
1. Write down the case facts.
2. What do you infer from it?
Source: http://nopr.niscair.res.in/bitstream/123456789/15700/1/ALIS%2059(4)%20223-230.pdf

4.4 Summary

In the digital environment, both hardware and software have critical roles to play.

The tempo of automation and modernisation of libraries is largely affected by the
bottlenecks created by these issues, and the professionals are finding it difficult to sort out
such problems.
Technological problems include both the hardware, i.e., the computer as an instrument
for information processing and the software, i.e. the methodology which is applied.

The major obstacle for any innovations in developing countries is the lack of resources.
In India, libraries and information centres are attached to government organizations or
research institutions, so library services cannot be calculated on a profit/loss basis.

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