A well considered answer. 10x.
Using access is a classic. I used to give hw like these to my students.
I can get it up and running with access in an hr from scratch.
However, a library is not just the books, it's the proceedures and I hope
to find something used in some kids school library in israel.
Of course I have people checking with libraries near us, but I suspect
their software might not be free.
Anyway, I have the personnel to maintain the lib I don't worry about that.
Also, we have parrents voulenteers regularly.
Regards,
tzahi.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Geoffrey
> S. Mendelson
> Sent: Wednesday, November 02, 2005 10:08 AM
> To: linux-il@linux.org.il
> Subject: Re: Library.
>
> On Tuesday, 1 ??November 2005 20:09, Tzahi Fadida wrote:
> > I was wondering if there is a library (books) software out
> there that
> > is free and preferably in Hebrew.
>
> Library software is only a small part of automating a library.
>
> The biggest part is creating the catalog. If all you want is to be
> able to search the catalog any sql database will do that
> supports hebrew
> data.
>
> Obviously you will need some sort of front end, and that would have
> to be in Hebrew. I hate to say this on a Linux list, but an Access
> front end might be the easiest. As you well know Hebrew support and
> Linux in general is not easy for newcomers without a technical
> orientation, and requiring a school full of students to learn Linux
> and the school to have several Linux systems may be too much of a
> battle to fight, just to get the card catalog on-line.
>
> Getting card catalog information is not that difficult in
> English, getting
> it in Hebrew may be almost impossible. All books published in
> a long time
> have a book id number called an ISBN, which you can use to search many
> on-line catalogs.
>
> If you can't find one already in existance, a simple perl script using
> curl or the native perl functions which would go out to an on-line
> database, extract the fields you want and create a file which could be
> loaded into a table would do what you need.
>
> The U.S. Library of Congress and the U.K. equivalent, have
> on-line searchable
> databases. I don't know if Hebrew U. or any other library has such a
> database in Hebrew. You would have to check.
>
> Then becomes the hard part. ISBNs were not designed by a data
> processing
> expert and don't have check digits. So each book in the
> collection will
> have to have it's ISBN entered and double checked to make
> sure you have
> the correct book.
>
> This is a very tedious manual process. Don't even think about
> having people
> type in all the data for a book, such as subject, author, title, etc.
> Unless you have a very small collection, it simply won't
> happen. People
> like to do these things, and you will be able to get volunteers, but
> something like this becomes old very quickly.
>
> While I understand that this is a free software list, and you
> are looking
> for an open source library program, you need to understand
> that the cost
> of the computers and software is a very small part of the cost of
> automating a Library.
>
> If you are adding Linux systems to a place that has none, the
> cost goes
> up significantly, and must be considered. However, the real
> "show stopper"
> is getting the collection cataloged, and maintaining it.
>
> It's also important to note that the time spent on the computer is
> in addition to the time normally spent by the librarian. Many private
> libraries don't expand their collection constantly, they burn
> out their
> new book budget in the first few weeks of the year, but there
> still is some maintaince as books are dropped due to damage or being
> superceeded all the time.
>
> If the software includes patron records and check ins and outs, there
> is a lot more traffic on the system, backups need to be done daily
> and managed, etc.
>
> This all takes the librarian's time and therefore costs money. Is
> the school willing to pay for it? Even if the librarian takes on
> the responsability of automating, every minute they spend on
> the computer
> is one minute less they spend doing other things such as
> helping students,
> checking in and out books, maintaining the collection,
> teaching classes,
> etc. Many schools can not afford to give these things up.
>
> It would be a shame to invest your time and effort in installing a
> system for them that won't be used. Or even worse, one that
> is used but
> is not kept up to date or backed up.
>
> I'm not saying that you should not do this, but you really
> need to understand
> the depth of the project and the commitment needed from
> everyone to make
> it fly.
>
> Geoff.
>
>
> --
> Geoffrey S. Mendelson, Jerusalem, Israel [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> N3OWJ/4X1GM
> IL Voice: (07)-7424-1667 IL Fax: 972-2-648-1443 U.S. Voice:
> 1-215-821-1838
> You should have boycotted Google while you could, now Google supported
> BPL is in action. Time is running out on worldwide radio
> communication.
>
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