It’s been open source for me recently, but I’m not thinking about open source library management systems and VuFind for once.

Something I’ve been talking about is EduApps, an initiative developed by JISC RSC Scotland North & East. EduApps is sbout free portable software in your pocket including bundles of applications specifically designed for teachers and learners, as well as accessibility tools. Currently there are over 90 open source and freeware software applications which can be entirely used from a USB stick on a Windows computer. The software is available in various combinations, and there is an article about the project in the latest edition of ALT-N. It is worth librarians knowing about this and trying it out, but it could be possible to go further e.g. lending memory pens with accessibility software on to students, or with teaching software on for the lecturers. Or you could make sure that some of the software is on the workstations and laptops in the LRC. Let me know about any innovative LRC uses!

I also have a new laptop – a teeny Samsung NC10. It is so portable that it is easy to take to meetings and on visits; yet in the office I just plug in a keyboard, mouse and external monitor and it works like a full desktop. I haven’t installed an open source operating system – it has XP on, and I can’t be bothered changing that at present – but as an experiment I have tried to only use open source software on top of that. So obviously Firefox and Thunderbird for web and email, but I have also tried something I have always meant to do – use OpenOffice in earnest. So I installed it as my only office suite, rather than just as a backup.

So far I have found that I don’t miss Microsoft Office at all, which has been a revelation. ‘Writer’ replaces ‘Word’; ‘Calc’ replaces ‘Excel’; ‘Impress’ replaces ‘Powerpoint’. I have had no problems opening documents (Writer can even open Word07 .docx files by default), or saving in the most common formats. It just works, and is simple to use.

The other thing I like is that OpenOffice resembles Microsoft Office 2003, rather than Office 2007. Great! I like menus; I like buttons that stay the same on a toolbar. So that has been winning me over.

Tip: Don’t use OpenOffice version 3.0.1, only version 3.0.0 or earlier. 3.0.1 has problems with tables in .rtf and .doc files.

One thing I noticed with my new office suite was the absence of Frontpage, so for now I have reverted to a plain text editor when working with HTML (cleaner but slower), until I choose an open source HTML editor.

Over 20 representatives from Welsh HE, FE and Public Libraries gathered in Swansea last Friday to spend a day hearing about “Open Source for libraries- theory and practice”. There has been a definite groundswell of interest in this topic recently (e.g. the recent discussions on library mailing lists) so the day seminar felt very timely.

The slides from the day are all available on Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/Mark_H_Swansea/slideshows and Mark Hughes has added an excellent collection of links for more information.

Speakers Mark Hughes, Ken Chad and Nick Dimant gave their perspectives on the background to open source in libraries – the current environment and reasons for and against looking at open source solutions. In the UK there has not yet been a significant take-up of open source LIBRARY systems although the success of the open source VLE Moodle has gone some considerable way to prove the concept of using open source in education. In other countries, the take-up of open source library management systems (LMS) has been growing fast – the US, France and India in particular. Nick Dimant of PTFS Europe commented on the trend that the growth of open source was linked with the existence of capable local support centres.

After lunch Jonathan Field from PTFS Europe gave a detailed demo and comparison of the 2 major open source systems: Koha and Evergreen. I’d definitely recommend a look at his presentation (combined with the demo versions available on the web) for anyone seriously interested in them – both were really impressive in terms of functionality but, like any system, come with their own pros and cons. Thinking of the need for a Welsh language interface, Koha already has the option to be multilingual and Evergreen is currently being developed further to support bilingual use in Canada.

We also had an excellent overview of the ongoing implementation of the open source VuFind system as part of the Virtual Academic Library project in Wales by Paul Johnson (presentation here). VuFind is being used to provide a common interface for searching 3 universities’ print and electronic resource collections. The project is a good example of how Wales is leading the way on library collaboration and open source development!

Mark Hughes also publicised the useful work that has been done at Swansea with RFID, resulting in the Open RFID in Libraries Specification (ORILS) being published under a Creative Commons licence. This can be re-used by anyone undertaking an RFID procurement process and work is ongoing to build a community of practice to encourage interoperability between the different RFID systems. http://groups.google.com/group/ORILS/web for more information!

The fact that question time at the end ran over reflects the level of interest on the day and also the concerns felt about open source. Some of these – lack of vendor support, handling the procurement process and data migration – can be mitigated by using a 3^rd party support company in place of the traditional LMS vendor. This is an added cost but should still return a big saving overall on paying for a commercial system.

I came away from the day full of enthusiasm and hoping an institution in the UK (Wales?) will take the plunge and implement an open source LMS in the near future. I also felt it could be useful to bring in the experiences from the transition to Moodle in terms of allaying the fears (particularly within HE) in switching to open source. One of the key things that emerged from the day was that open source does not mean going it alone – as well as the support of the community, there is always the option of paying for professional support just to get started or as an ongoing safety net.

NB. The RSC Wales information area on LMS has also been updated with info from the day: http://moodle.rsc-wales.ac.uk/mod/book/view.php?id=2923&chapterid=150

Today I got to visit Coleg Meirion-Dwyfor, Dolgellau Campus. (Google map of colleges in Wales, focused on Coleg Meirion-Dwyfor). It was my first visit, and I was really taken by the small town with stunning views, and all the interesting-looking pubs (that I sadly didn’t get to visit, thanks to the Arriva timetables).

[Two amazing views seen by walking along the river-side towpath to the college, rather than walking along the A470]

It is always interesting to find out what different colleges and their LRCs are doing; to meet the staff who are running these vital services; to find out what issues they face and what innovations they are making; and to get a tour around a new college. Today I met with a number of staff and we discussed a range of subjects, such as open-source library management systems, e-resources, and information literacy. We also discussed the training day that RSC Wales will be running in Coleg Meirion-Dwyfor on 7 May 2008, which will be based around mind-mapping and the importance of integrating e-resources into the curriculum, as well as the role of the LRC and information literacy in developing students’ potential.

It was good to see that the Internet Detective had been embedded into the college VLE. The college is also justifiably proud of the new touch screen technology based in the training kitchen, from which staff and students can download recipes, access the VLE, and upload or download to USB memory stick from the screens.

["Can I help you?"]

Today I gave a talk to undergraduates at the Department of Information Studies, Aberystwyth University. The lecturer, Anoush Simon, had been arranging for speakers to talk about various library sectors for students studying an introductory course – I was asked to talk about the Further Education sector, and the similarities and differences from the Higher Education sector.

The Department of Information Studies is where I did my MSc, so it was interesting to go back and be on the other side of the lecture room!

It was also interesting to actually put together the information for it – to ask the questions such as how to describe the FE sector in Wales? What is RSC Wales? What is my role within RSC Wales? What themes have arisen over the last year or so? What skills are needed to work in this sector? Those were the main five sections to my talk, which took in themes of convergence and collaboration, and the impact of Web 2.0 on learning resources and information dissemination.

[Anoush and myself]

Just as a point of interest, I converted my Powerpoint presentation into a .pdf file for distribution to the students – using OpenOffice. OpenOffice is an open source multiplatform and multilingual office suite. It is compatible with all other major office suites, and is free to download, use, and distribute. I have been using the suite more and more – ‘Writer’ is an excellent alternative for Microsoft Word, and ‘Impress’ is an alternative to Powerpoint. Both can read and save as the Microsoft formats; both have a similar interface so there is no learning curve; and both can save as a .pdf file without having to install plugins (unlike Word!), and that works brilliantly too. You can install OpenOffice alongside Microsoft Office if you want the best of both worlds.

I thought it would be useful to create a summary post – to give an idea of some of the things I have been looking into recently (in no particular order), mostly with regard to learning resource use and the e-learning agenda. The breadth of subjects shows how wide-ranging the area of learning resources is, and how much a librarian needs to know! If you want to know more about any of the topics below then please get in touch with me.

Voting systems

Our Optivote voting system was used in some sessions by Coleg Gwent recently, which were apparently well received. I am thinking of collecting a few case studies on the use of voting systems in FE – please let me know if you would be interested in discussing their use in your college! (This may lead on to perhaps collecting case studies on other aspects of resource use in the future). Our RSC Wales Del.icio.us account has links to voting system suppliers.

[Optivote handsets and receiver]

Information literacy

As you may know, CyMAL has given the FE Learning Resources Managers’ network a sum of money to run more information literacy events, and RSC Wales is helping to organise them. Strand 1 – ‘Skills for success’ will be comprised of two events, one in North Wales (Deeside college, Wed 28th November) and one in South Wales (Swansea College, Fri 14 December). This will be followed by Strand 2 ‘Strategies for Success’, a one-day course aimed at managers and run by Sharon Markless (Thursday 24th January at the University of Wales College Newport Caerleon campus). For the Strand 1 events we want to have a couple of short examples of what librarians are doing to increase the success/impact of information literacy or induction sessions. It might be something online, it might be a classroom based activity, it might be marketing – anything really, as long as you have something achievable that you can show or describe in an enthusiastic way! If you are interested in perhaps talking about something from your college then please let me know. It would also be a chance to disseminate your work across the professional community in Wales. I often hear of interesting innovations (e.g. this September Coleg Powys used the Cephalonian method in their LRC inductions), and it is good to get those messages out to a wider audience.

I am also working on a Moodle module about Information Literacy (currently looking at what other UK RSCs have done) and need to get on with it, but other things have been taking precedence… As the Pet Shop Boys would have said, it is always on my mind…

Our RSC Wales Del.icio.us account has a ‘bundle’ (yes, that is the technical term) set up for information literacy.

Second Life

See my blog entry below. Zombie Greenwood lives! There are many possibilities here. If any FE librarians want to test it out as a communication medium then just let me know and I will teleport over!

Federated Access Management [FAM]

One Welsh FE college has expressed an interest in moving from Athens to FAM, and we are looking into it.

It is possible that there could be a UC&R Wales event on this in Spring 2008.

See the RSC Wales Del.icio.us account Access Management bundle for more information.

RSC Wales Del.icio.us account

You may have spotted the mentions of this above! I have been tidying, removing dead links, repairing broken URLs, updating, re-tagging, adding new categories, merging others etc. If anybody wants to suggest links or changes then just let me know. Hopefully it will be a useful resource. I have a few more routine updates to do when I get the chance. View it here – then feel free to bookmark it!

Welsh Heritage User Group

I had been involved in talks on the future of this group. Ian Cockrill (Swansea College) then did a survey of all Heritage users in Wales to gauge support, but due to the small number of reponses it was decided that, at this point in time, establishing a Wales Heritage User group appears non-viable. However Ian will continue to represent the FE/HE sector and Wales at the national user group, which Heritage users can join, and he offered to raise issues at that forum. There may be an option of a library management system event in the future – something that is under consideration.

RSC Wales website

The RSC Wales website has been updated recently. I have been updating some of the useful documents originally created by Samantha Edwards, and will be making them available on the website as soon as the new access arrangements are finalised. In the meantime subscribers to FE-LRC-WALES will have received some of them (free e-resources etc.)

[The new-look RSC Wales website]

College queries

Obviously these go on all the time, from queries about LMS bids to requests for copyright-cleared image sources.

One interesting query was about accessing electronic copies of articles to store in the institutional VLE. Some of you may be aware of the British Library’s new Higher Education Scanning Service, which could be a really useful resource in Wales, but the HESS service is currently HE only. I have spoken to staff at the British Library who were very helpful and said they would be looking to possibly roll the service out to the FE sector. However there may be some issues that need clearing up with the Copyright Licensing Agency [CLA] first. I have been in touch with the CLA and am awaiting a definitive response on the issue. If I get any news I will inform FE LRC managers.

Open Source Library Management Systems [LMS]

In FE in Wales we have seen proprietary VLEs replaced with the all-conquering Open Source Moodle. Just about every Welsh FE college is using Moodle, or about to, leading to a situation where colleges can easily share resources and be involved in a community-support situation.

Could this happen with Library Management Systems? There are a few possibilities listed on the RSC Wales Del.icio.us account, and a few of our colleges are looking at them. But there are many crystal ball questions: What is the situation elsewhere? Could an Open Source LMS become the de facto standard in FE libraries? Which are the best? What support could RSCs offer? Is the situation similar to what happened with Moodle, or not?

There does seem to be a growth of interest in this area. In the last few weeks I have been in communication with the head of a research consultancy and with a lecturer writing an article, both unrelated conversations, yet both people were interested in the potential for Open Source LMS.

I have raised the issue in the national RSC Forum, and will see what happens, and also what the findings of the lecturer I was in contact with are.

Team meeting

Thursday 27th September was an RSC Wales team meeting in Swansea. A good chance for me to catch up with the rest of the team – and a personal challenge to me, since I have to be up before 5am, and leave the house before 6am to walk into Aberystwyth to catch the X40 bus to Swansea!