FreeLibre Open Source Software an idea whose time has come

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(No Transcript)
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Free as in freedom, not as in beer

• Richard Stallman
• Open source software is first and foremost about
  the freedom to innovate, inspect, fix and use
  software however you like and share, not about
  driving down costs.
• Open source promotes open standards and
  interoperability.
• Open source gives you direct control over product
  features.
• Open source is driving innovation and
  competition.
• You use it every day, it is changing your world
  right now.

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4 kinds of Freedom

• The freedom to run the program, for any purpose.
• The freedom to study how the program works, and
  adapt it to your needs. Access to the source code
  is a precondition for this.
• The freedom to redistribute copies so you can
  help your neighbour.
• The freedom to improve the program, and release
  your improvements (and modified versions in
  general) to the public, so the community
  benefits. Access to the source code is a
  precondition for this.
• It is all about your freedom to use it as you
  like and to also help your neighbour ?

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Licensing GPL / Others

• Most common license is the Gnu Public License,
  but be aware there are over 100 OSI approved
  licenses. Always read the fine print -) Not all
  licenses ensure derivatives are distributed for
  example.
• Open source licensing allows commercial product
  development. MySQL (which uses an OSI approved
  dual license) was sold for US 1 Billion last
  year.

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Why should I care?

• Buy Australian do your country a favour - ICT
  trade deficit stands at 21 billion... 80 of our
  total trade deficit (Houghton 2007).
• It is big business - 500 Million a year industry
  in Australia (Waugh partners, 2008). 2 Billion
  US worldwide (very conservative).
• Its enterprise ready - 61 of customers of open
  source companies in Australia are large
  enterprises of 200 employees (Waugh partners
  2008).
• Its everywhere - the total number of open source
  projects are growing at an exponential rate
  (Riehle 2008).
• The total amount of source code and the total
  number of projects double about every 14 months
  (Riehle 2008).
• Serious competition helps all of us ?
• You use it every day, its changing your world
  right now ?

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AGIMO (good enough for the feds)

• 86 of government agencies like Open Source and
  have growing use of it.
• Agencies choose Open Source on a fit for purpose,
  value for money basis. Assessing functionality
  was the highest priority, not cost savings
• 90 surveyed expected growth of Open Source in
  Web applications, science and education,
  middleware and back office systems at all levels
  of government
• Agencies understand adopting Open Source
  standards and solutions protects their investment
  in ICT systems, data and software
• 90 of agencies agree Open Source and
  proprietary software can coexist productively
• Agencies want to be vendor and format
  independent using Open Source seen to drive
  flexibility, innovation and transparency.

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ILS vendors use it (everyone does)

• Lucene
• Java
• Jboss
• Solr
• Linux
• This is an increasing trend across all IT service
  providers large and small in all industries.
• The more you dig the more you find ?

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Exponential growth

• Conservative estimate was 18,000 actively
  developed projects (2006)

• Growth in projects per month 50 per month _at_ Dec
  06

• Growth in lines of code per month 60 million _at_
  Dec 06

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Growth in Open Source ILS uptake

• Library Journals Automation Systems Marketplace
  2007 reported that of the 607 ILS contracts
  signed in 2007, 57 of those, or roughly 9.4,
  were LibLime customers implementing open-source
  ILS solutions with Koha.
• Marshall Breeding, acknowledged recently that
  this figure may represent the beginnings of a
  major trend (Library Technology Reports Chicago,
  Nov/Dec 2008 Vol.44, Iss.8, p.19).
• The upcoming Automation Systems Report covering
  2008 is likely to confirm an increase in this
  trend.

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Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt
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Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt

• High Risk
• Enterprise readiness / maturity
• Hobby software / chaotic / anarchic / uncertain
  future
• Need serious in-house IT skills to use
• Software communism / socialism
• High proprietry software returns drive RD. No
  money, no RD.
• Poor quality code / security
• Patent / legal issues

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All software has costs and risks

• All software has large costs in integration,
  support and maintenance open source or otherwise.
• Open source integration effort maybe greater
  initially but outputs can benefit the community
  as well. As the community grows this mutual
  benefit should scale well.
• Open source allows freedom to select support
  wherever the skills exist, you are not tied to a
  single vendor. This model promotes real
  competition for your support/integration and
  development dollar.
• Open source is not be-spoke internal development.
  To get full benefits development is done in
  consultation with the community. You maintain two
  relationships, with your support with the
  community.
• Open source tookits are driving service and
  product innovation and competition in commercial
  systems as well (ILS included).

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Technology evangelism
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Framing the context - Challenges

• What challenges do we face right now in
  libraries?
• Rapid pace of change in information management.
  Explosion in new ways of accessing, using and
  managing information.
• Change largely driven outside libraries. How do
  we maintain relevance in this environment?
• Traditional library automation market not growing
  and dominated by a few large players selling
  monolithic systems based on 10 year old
  architecture that don't offer the flexibility,
  nimbleness and ease of integration we need.
• Recent widespread consolidation among leading ILS
  firms influx of venture capitalist ownership
  are we likely to see the expenditure on RD to
  drive real innovation in a market like this?
• High cost of migration between proprietry systems
  difficult to justify in publicly funded
  institutions. Everyone having budgets squeezed by
  rising resource costs and cuts from funding
  bodies.
• Ever increasing demand for IT driven online
  access to services from clients.

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Framing the context - Strengths

• What strengths do we have?
• Libraries are a strong worldwide community.
• We have common problems to solve.
• We know our clients and how we deliver value to
  them in their contexts.
• We understand the importance of timely, usable
  and targeted information.
• We care about equity and universal rights to
  access information.
• We are willing and able to act decisively.

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Asking the right questions

• Where do we add most value for our clients?
• How do we leverage the strengths we have?
• How much risk is acceptable where?
• What are the IT goals of the institution?
• How important is flexibility control ?
• What support is available?
• What is our back-out strategy?
• What is the maturity of the software, companies
  and communities involved?
• What features do we really need (being realistic)?

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CDU Library Now

• 90 of our 20 servers are Linux virtual machines
  in a VMWare ESX server farm (including Horizon).
• We developed a flexible PHP framework for
  authentication of our web forms web submission
  of purchase requests into Horizon.
• Use apache for our web stuff (for now).
• Finishing Fez/Fedora institutional repository, we
  added handle.net persistent identifers
  http//eSpace.cdu.edu.au. We sometimes blog about
  it here http//technology.blog.library.cdu.edu.au.
  
• Playing with a test instance of VUFind, further
  exploration needed. Setup evergreen once will
  likely have another look.
• Wordpress blogs http//blog.library.cdu.edu.au/
• MediaWiki staff wiki (not publicly accessible).

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CDU Library 2009 onwards

• Flexibility in repurposing and presenting
  information to add more value for clients.
• Proper separation between content / logic and
  presentation layers flexible and open
  interfaces in our information systems is becoming
  very important.
• Content not containers is where we need to be,
  repurposing data from anywhere to where we need
  it and away from existing siloed systems
  architectures. Open standards and
  interoperability becoming critical.
• Seriously looking at all options and are very
  interested in exploring partnerships /sharing
  ideas with other institutions with similar needs.
  We think use of open source solutions is likely
  to grow at CDU library.
• Strategic, workforce and ICT plans being
  redeveloped this year to try and meet some of our
  challenges and prepare for a more flexible and
  nimble service environment.

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What it is all about
Open Source is an integral piece in the ICT
puzzle, it should always be considered and always
selected on merit.
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Find me some

• OSS4Lib find OSS software for your library -
  http//www.oss4lib.org/
• Code4Lib get involved in library OSS
  development - http//code4lib.org/ (check out
  the wiki really interesting)
• Libworm mine the blogosphere for news
  (including OSS) - http//www.libworm.com
• Sourceforge hosts 150,000 OSS projects -
  http//sourceforge.net/
• Freshmeat.net directory of OSS projects -
  http//freshmeat.net/
• Ohloh emerging OSS directory complete with code
  license analysis, community ratings and more -
  http//www.ohloh.net/

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Lets have a taste

• Koha - http//www.koha.org (ILS fed search)
• Evergreen - http//www.open-ils.org/ (ILS)
• VUFind - http//www.vufind.org/ (new OPAC)
• SOPAC - http//www.thesocialopac.net/ (OPAC w/
  social data layer)
• eXtensible Catalog - http//www.extensiblecatalog.
  org/ (fed search)
• LibraryFind - http//www.libraryfind.org/ (fed
  search)
• MasterKey - http//liblime.com/products/masterkey
  (fed search)
• BlackLight - http//blacklight.rubyforge.org/
  (new OPAC)
• LibX - http//www.libx.org/ (Browser plug-in
  nice features)
• reSearcher suite of products -
  http//researcher.sfu.ca/
• Biblio open source catloguing -
  http//biblios.org/
• Index Data open source middleware -
  http//www.indexdata.dk/

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Get help / info

• Open Source Industry Australia -
  http//www.osia.net.au
• Open Source Victoria group of 80 local firms -
  http//www.osv.org.au/
• Linux Australia - http//www.linux.org.au
• Liblime - http//liblime.com/
• Equinox - http//www.esilibrary.com/esi/software.p
  hp
• AGIMO Open Source resources - http//www.finance.
  gov.au/e-government/infrastructure/open-source-sof
  tware.html
• AGIMO - Open Source Software in Government
  Innovation and Shared Experience -
  http//www.finance.gov.au/e-government/better-prac
  tice-and-collaboration/events/2007/open-source-sof
  tware-in-government.html
• Ask-OSS Strategy and case studies from the
  Australian Service for Knowledge of Open Source
  Software - http//ask-oss.mq.edu.au/index.php?opti
  oncom_contenttaskcategorysectionid2id17Ite
  mid61

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Tell me more (Im really, really keen)

• Open Source Initiative OSS Definition -
  http//opensource.org/docs/osd
• Open Source Initiative OSS licensing
  http//opensource.org/licenses/
• Free Software Foundation advocacy, philosophy,
  policing legal OSS use - http//www.fsf.org/
• Open Source - http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_so
  urce
• Free Software - http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_
  software
• Community Source - http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Co
  mmunity_source
• Producing Open Source Software some good
  insights into how Open Source projects function
  - http//producingoss.com/
• OSS watch UK OSS advisory service -
  http//www.oss-watch.ac.uk/
• OLE project - http//oleproject.org/

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Contact me

• If you want to chat about Open Source or what we
  are doing at CDU drop me a line anytime. If you
  find yourself in Darwin come by for a chat and a
  coffee -)
• Anthony HornbyAssociate Director CDU
  Libraryanthony.hornby_at_cdu.edu.au(08)89466011Go
  ogle map reference http//tinyurl.com/any9k5
• This is me http//tinyurl.com/asba9g

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Bibliography (because I should)

• The Total Growth of Open Source - Amit Deshpande
  and Dirk Riehle SAP Research, SAP Labs LL
  http//www.riehle.org/publications/2008/the-total-
  growth-of-open-source/In Proceedings of the
  Fourth Conference on Open Source Systems (OSS
  2008). Springer Verlag, 2008. Page 197-209.
• ACS Releases 2007 ICT Trade Update Houghton -
  http//www.acs.org.au/index.cfm?actionnoticenotI
  D746temIDnoticedetails
• Open Source 2010 Reflections on 2007 - Brad
  Wheeler - http//tinyurl.com/bexwwr EDUCAUSE
  Review, vol. 42, no. 1 (January/February 2007)
  4867.
• Considering Open Source A Framework for
  Evaluating Software in the New Economy - Lois
  Brooks (Stanford University) - http//tinyurl.com/
  dhzuoe
• Australian Open Source Industry Community
  Report 2008 indicator of the size of the local
  OSS industry - http//census.waughpartners.com.au/
  census-report-2008-r1.pdf
• Automation system marketplace 2008 Opportunity
  Out of Turmoil - By Marshall Breeding -- Library
  Journal, 4/1/2008 http//www.libraryjournal.com/ar
  ticle/CA6542440.html
• Open Source Integrated Library Systems - Library
  Technology Reports Chicago, Nov/Dec 2008
  Vol.44, Iss.8, p.19 - http//www.techsource.ala.or
  g/ltr/
• Educause articles on open source -
  http//tinyurl.com/d6436k

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Bibliography (no I didnt use a referencing
style)

• Mitigating the Risks of Big Systems - Business
  Officer Magazine - July/August 2007 - Brad
  Wheeler and JoanneDeStefano - http//www.nacubo.or
  g/x9218.xml
• AGIMO Open Source Software Overview 2007 -
  http//www.finance.gov.au/e-government/infrastruct
  ure/docs/Open_Source_Software_Overview_November_20
  07.pdf
• Marshall Breeding Open source -
  http//www.abuc.org.ar/portal/archivos/Open20sour
  ce.ppt (found this after doing mine and quite
  like it he is better at powerpoints than me ?
  )