Maintaining Web catalogs?

[Holly Gordon]

We are about to purchase a web catalog (and probably migrate to a new
automation vendor as well) and I have questions about what questions I
should ask vendors.

We presently have a very basic web catalog, written in Perl.  We have no
one on staff who can maintain this catalog, and probably never will (it
is very difficult to hire technical people in Austin with what the State
is willing to pay).

So my questions are:
--Do you have a web catalog purchased from a vendor, or one you wrote
yourself?
--How difficult is your web catalog to maintain locally (i.e. staffing,
hours, and skill level required, both initially and on going)?  
--Are there any questions in particular you feel I should ask vendors as
I'm evaluating web catalogs?

Many, many thanks in advance for any help.  If you know of good sources
of info (besides you folks) I've missed and should look at, please
direct me.   I realize this is a pretty broad, and basic request, so
thanks also for your patience.




************************************
Holly Kendall Gordon,  System Administrator
Texas State Library     (512) 475-3369 
Geac PLUS 2.5.5p8    IBM RISC/6000 PowerPC
AIX  4.1.4   INFORMIX - SQL 5.06
hgordon at tsl.state.tx.us