Draft report of a meeting convened by the Digital Library Federation on October 5-6, 2001 in Washington DC to consider Open Source Software for Libraries

Notes by D Greenstein
October 22, 2001

Present: Dave Bretthauer (University of Connecticut), Rachel Cheng (Wesleyan University), Daniel Chudnov (MIT), David Dorman (Lincoln Trail Libraries System), Jeremy Frumkin (University of Arizona), Daniel Greenstein (DLF), Marilu Goodyear (University of Kansas), Martin Halbert (Emory University), Thom Hickey (OCLC), Eric Lease Morgan (University of Notre Dame), John Ockerbloom (University of Pennsylvania), Victoria Reich (Stanford University), Art Rhyno (University of Windsor), Kyle Fenton (Emory University), Aaron Trehub (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign), Beth Warner (University of Kansas), Joan Frye Williams

I. Executive summary

The meeting was convened to consider how to assess various claims made for open-source software and, if appropriate, to identify steps to move OSS activity into the mainstream of digital library development in a manner that might appeal to all sectors of the library community.

The meeting focused almost exclusively on the assessment agenda and accomplished the following:

  1. Seven testable hypotheses about open source software and its impact on libraries that might focus some review and assessment
  2. Development of a review, assessment, and publication agenda designed to test those hypotheses and to inform decisions about open source that need to be taken by a range of key stakeholders in the library and related communities
  3. Specification of a functional requirement for a "library of open source software"
  4. Initial contemplation of a development agenda for those interested in open source software for libraries
  5. Identification of immediate next steps to accomplish these aims

The report on the meeting is set out under these five heads.

II. Hypotheses

The meeting identified seven testable hypotheses about Open Source Software (hereafter OSS). The first three of these hypotheses (1-3 below) reflect claims made for the economical and functional importance of OSS for libraries and stem directly from the values that OSS developers bring to their work. A further four hypotheses (4-7 below) attempt to explain why OSS development remains in the hands of a few activist developers and is not more a part of the library's mainstream.

  1. OSS is an economical alternative to libraries' reliance upon commercially supplied software. That is, despite the real costs involved in the development, maintenance, and use of OSS software but these are lower than those associated with library reliance upon commercial software. Accordingly, OSS economical is not free opens an economical alternative to reliance upon commercial software
  2. OSS is essential if libraries are to develop software and systems that meet their patrons' needs. With OSS the IT infrastructure that is essential to library operations and services can be:
  3. OSS ensures that library systems and online services will be more functional for libraries and their patrons and as such be good for library patrons. This hypothesis is posited because, through OSS developments, libraries:
  4. OSS can lack formal support making it difficult for libraries without significant capacity in their systems department to participate in OSS development or to use OSS.
  5. OSS needs to develop a participatory organizational model that allows many to contribute perhaps in different ways to OSS development.
  6. OSS is not always easy to use. It is therefore largely inaccessible to the many libraries and library system departments that require plug-and-play software that is well documented and supported and can be easily installed (and uninstalled).
  7. OSS initiatives do not always do enough to get non-systems librarians and library patrons involved in design and testing of OSS. As such, they are seen as being something that exclusively offers benefits to and holds interest for library systems staff and not for the wider library community.

III. Research and publication agenda

The group recommended the development of two publications that would test hypotheses developed above and inform decisions about OSS as need to be taken by members of key communities. The aims, objectives, contents, and target audiences of these publications are set out below.

Publication 1. OSS. A critical review and assessment

Aim: To raise awareness about the potential value of OSS and to encourage informed decision making about potential investments in its development and use.

Contents of publication: This publication would

Where appropriate, the study might also review some of the barriers to library's more effective exploitation of OSS and how those barriers might be reduced.

Target audience: The report should be written principally for the following audiences giving preference to library directors and to decision makers and program officers at both federal and philanthropic agencies that invest in libraries, digital libraries, and mechanisms that support scholarly communications

Possible development process: The background, inventory, and assessment could be commissioned from a single author, while case studies could be commissioned from a variety of authors as appropriate. In order to ensure the study was written for and responsive to the interests and needs of its target audience, it might be developed in consultation with an advisory or editorial board.

Publication venue: The study should be published by a creditable journal or organization such as Library Trends, CLIR/DLF, etc.

Publication 2. OSS. An introduction for systems librarians

Aim: To support informed decision making about OSS by library systems and other technical staff who are involved in the day-to-day development or management of operational IT services in or for libraries.

Content of publication: The report should:

Target audience: The report should be written principally for:

Production process: to be resolved

Publication venue: a creditable publisher of similar texts

IV. An OSS Library or Portal

The group identified the potential value of an OSS library or portal service

As a library, the service might maintain an organized catalog of selected and consistently documented persistent and accessible OSS for libraries. In addition, it could:

In these several capacities the OSS library or portal could:

In addition, the library or portal's very existence could supply a number of vital functions almost as byproducts. Use of the library or portal would:

Remaining questions as yet to be resolved

V. OSS research and development agenda

Recognizing the likelihood that much OSS would support specific library functions, the group focused on the requirements for integrating these tools in any library environment. Although no concrete research agenda emerged, emphasis was given to the following:

VI. Next steps

  1. Discuss the meeting and its outcomes with stakeholders who may have an interest in and might wish to participate in some way in the review, assessment, and publications, activities contemplated above in section 2. Candidates for consultation include representatives from Educause, CNI, ARL, NLM, IMLS, NSF, Mellon, the Urban Library Council, the Oberlin Group, ICOLC.
  2. Identify, in part through that discussion, support for and authors of relevant component parts of those activities
  3. Work on the repository might be conducted along a parallel track. Alternatively, it might be formed by the review, assessment, and publications effort that could in effect act to develop a feasibility study for such a repository
  4. Participants also agreed to undertake specific actions, for example to initiate development of a prototype portal, develop content appropriate to the research and publication agenda, explore outreach and awareness-raising opportunities e.g. at the ALA conference in summer 2002