[Web4lib] Koha

[Thomas Krichel]

  Ross Singer writes

> On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 7:40 PM, Thomas Krichel <krichel at openlib.org> wrote:
> 
> >  As far as I understand, LibLime/PTFS sell a forked version of koha
> >  that is not freely downloadable open source.
> 
> Thomas, please stop with your speculation and FUD:
> http://koha.org/news/liblime-a-division-of-ptfs-announces-201charley201d-a-new-stable-release-of-koha-available-for-immediate-download
> You could at least Google this stuff before you hit reply.  It's,
> seriously, like the first hit.

  On this old thread, we have today a statement from 
  Paul Poulain that shed light on the facts. I allow myself
  to quote what he wrote to the koha list.

| Le 17/02/2011 15:34, Tom Hanstra a =E9crit :
| > I hope I'm not kicking a hornet's nest here.  I'm just trying to get a =
| 
| > handle on how compatible these are and how to decide which version might =
| 
| > best meet our local needs.
| Definetly, and without any doubt : the koha-community version.
| Definetly yes it's a hornet nest. So I'll try to answer clearly and
| without awakening sleeping hornets ;-)
| 
| Just to be clear : I'm Paul Poulain, from France, served as Release
| Manager for Koha 2.0 and 2.2. I've founded BibLibre in France 3 years
| ago. I have nothing against PTFS/LL but I think their strategy won't be
| successfull. I think Koha project loosed many time with those problems,
| but it's behind us now.
| 
| A small history history :
| * at the beginning (2000), koha.org was managed by katipo, where chris
| C. and some other were working (katipo was the Koha v1 author)
| * in 2007, LibLime bought koha.org, the katipo Koha dev team and katipo
| New Zealand customers
| * one year later, the katipo-now-LL ppl resigned from LL
| * in 2008 PTFS started his involvement in Koha. They were coldly
| welcomed by the community & LibLime (LL & PTFS are operating in US) They
| sended some patches but were considered as a wolf in a sheepfold, so
| patches were included, but always with a cold welcome. Note the
| technical relationships have always be better than the strategic
| relationships.
| * in 2009, some/many devs from LL resigned as well and, in sept, 11th LL
| announced LLEK, a hosted version that is not OpenSource because the
| source is not distributed (reminder : koha.org is "owned" by LL...)
| * in late 2009, early 2010, PTFS bought LL
| * in early 2010, the koha community (ie : everybody except LL & PTFS)
| decided to move to http://www.koha-community.org because we had no
| control & easy access over the content of the other website. All
| developers tools were also moved for the same reason.
| 
| So, as of today :
| * PTFS/LibLime has a LLEK software that is not Koha, and you can't download
| * PTFS/LibLime has a "Harley" release of Koha, that is OpenSource,
| patches have been submitted, I think 50% of them are now in Koha. But it
| is not Koha and unless i'm mistaking, it does not evolve (and is based
| on 3.0.2 version of Koha). The remaining 50% may be included in Koha, or
| replaced by someone else dev that achieve the same goal.
| * Koha-community.org has the "uptodate" version of "the community".
| 
| Hoping I answered you questions.
| 
| -- =
| 
| Paul POULAIN
| http://www.biblibre.com
| Expert en Logiciels Libres pour l'info-doc
| Tel : (33) 4 91 81 35 08
| 

  I always noted that I am not an expert on the matter. But I believe
  I am (was?)  basically right to distribute here what Ross labeled
  "FUD".

  Conclusions: Get Koha for http://koha-community.org. Avoid http://koha.org.
  And if you install on Debian, enjoy my installation guide

http://openlib.org/home/krichel/courses/lis9012/doc/koha_installation.html

  that I put together for a class "building an integrated library system".

http://openlib.org/home/krichel/courses/lis9012/

  at the Palmer School of LIS. If you find a mistake in the installation
  guide, I will buy you a beer when you make it to NYC. 


  Cheers,

  Thomas Krichel                    http://openlib.org/home/krichel
                                http://authorclaim.org/profile/pkr1
                                               skype: thomaskrichel