[WEB4LIB] will OSS impact library automation?

[Jerry Kuntz]

One might also make a distinction between the library applications and the database that underlies them. Although robust, integrated OSS library systems may not arrive any time soon, OSS databases are here, and there's no reason I can think of why the current automation vendors couldn't offer to accept them.
I've been pricking at epixtech to ask why PostgreSQL or MySQL couldn't be used instead of the Sybase they want to package to us (more out of an interest in saving money than any pure dedication to the Open Source movement.) About 2 months ago, someone here on Web4lib cited a article that NASA had ditched Sybase in favor of MySQL.

---------- Original Message ----------------------------------
From: Eric Hellman <eric at openly.com>
Reply-To: eric at openly.com
Date: Thu, 22 Mar 2001 10:59:21 -0800 (PST)

>I was browsing though the program for the "e-libraries" conference in 
>May (NYC), and I saw this statement in the abstract of a talk by 
>Marshall Breeding, "Library Technology Officer" at Vanderbilt:
>
>       " The Open Source movement has stirred a lot of discussion, but 
>it will not make a huge impact in
>          library automation"
>
>I suppose one terribly unfair translation of this is "Although most 
>libraries will run web servers on Apache, listservs on something else 
>free, databses on MySQL and much of the the code will be written in 
>Perl, library administrators should continue to focus their attention 
>and money on getting proprietary systems to do what they want them 
>to."
>
>Obviously, he doesn't mean to say "Perl will not have a huge impact 
>in library automation" but rather something like "Don't expect to see 
>gnuOPAC anytime soon".
>
>Eric
>Eric Hellman
>Openly Informatics, Inc.
>http://www.openly.com/           21st Century Information Infrastructure
>Openly Jake- the library of the future                http://jake.openly.com/
>

--
Jerry Kuntz
Electronic Resources Consultant
Ramapo Catskill Library System
jkuntz at rcls.org
Author, KidsClick! Web Searching Skills Guide, http://www.neal-schuman.com/db/3/173.html
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