[Evergreen-general] questions from a newbie

Sat Aug 22 14:40:21 EDT 2020

Hi Diane,

Thanks for your great question.  We use a software called Hyrax to do
something similar to what you're talking about.  We use it to showcase
our student newspaper, openly licensed teaching materials that our
faculty have created, historical documents, syllabi, etc.  There is
some analytics tracking (# of downloads, etc.), and there is a
community project to get much more detailed analytics through Google
Analytics or Matomo.  It also has fine-tuned access controls so that
you can restrict access to certain materials or groups of materials to
certain users.  We contracted with a company to help us get set up,
but now handle it in-house.  It's still a complex piece of software,
but not as complex as Evergreen.

Here's our Hyrax site: https://libarchive.linnbenton.edu/ -- and you
can find out more about hyrax here: https://samvera.org/ and
https://hyrax.samvera.org/about/

If you search for open source institutional repository software or
digital collections software, you may find some other software
packages that meet your needs more closely.

 -Jane

On Sat, Aug 22, 2020 at 10:13 AM Rogan Hamby
<rhamby at equinoxinitiative.org> wrote:
>
> To echo Jason it doesn't sound like Evergreen is the right match for you.  Perhaps a CMS of your choice with a good analytics tracking package like Matomo would be a good fit.
>
>
>
>
> On Sat, Aug 22, 2020 at 10:11 AM Jason Stephenson <jason at sigio.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hi, Diane!
>>
>> Thanks for your interest in Evergreen! I'm going to be blunt and tell
>> you that Evergreen does not sound like the right tool for your use case.
>>
>> It is designed and implemented for a traditional library setting where
>> physical items are circulated to patrons. It is not geared for managing
>> collections of electronic materials or tracking their use. It requires
>> that records for materials are entered in standard MARC format, familiar
>> to libraries and alien everywhere else.
>>
>> It is difficult to set up and maintain. It requires a certain level of
>> knowledge of GNU/Linux to be able to maintain an Evergreen system on
>> one's own. That said, the knowledge can be acquired, and there are
>> companies that will host an Evergreen installation and maintain it for
>> you, albeit for a fee.
>>
>> You more likely want a dedicated electronic resource management system.
>> I am not very familiar with the software in that area, though I was
>> recently made aware of Archipelago. If you get past the marketing speak
>> on the main page, it sounds like it might be what you're looking for:
>> http://archipelago.nyc/
>>
>> Hope that Helps,
>> Jason
>>
>>
>> On 8/22/20 9:40 AM, Diane Silver wrote:
>> > Dear Evergreen community --
>> >
>> > I stumbled upon Evergreen while researching options for web-development
>> > software to create a small resource library for our organization.
>> > It seems that Evergreen is far more powerful than what we need.  We're
>> > not sure if that will be a hindrance (way too complex for our small
>> > operation), or if it doesn't matter.
>> >
>> > We have a few basic questions, which I'm hoping someone can answer:
>> >
>> > 1) It looks like Evergreen is back-end software for a library catalog of
>> > existing items. i.e., it helps you build your library catalog using
>> > ISBNs of published books or works from the library of congress. It
>> > doesn't look like it's intended for orgs who want to display _*their
>> > own*_ materials. Is this right, or could we use it to create an online
>> > library for our own documents, videos, powerpoints, etc.?
>> >
>> > 2) We don't need to manage circulation.  All of our resources are
>> > electronic, and free.  Our users would just download each file.  We DO
>> > want some analytics to track page views, number of downloads for each
>> > item, searches, and similar usage. And we want access to the site to
>> > require an authorized log-in, so it's not completely open to the
>> > public.  Do you think Evergreen is the right tool?   I know Evergreen is
>> > used by large public library systems.  Would all it's capability get in
>> > the way of the much smaller scope of what we want to do, or could we
>> > just ignore the functions we don't need (like circulation)?
>> >
>> > 3) It looks like getting set up is a bit complicated for non-tech-savvy
>> > folks like me.  I took a peek at the documentation and quickly concluded
>> > that we would need a system administrator to do this for us.  Is this a
>> > function that can be contracted out?  Are there folks out there (maybe
>> > on this list) who would be interested in such a role?  Would this list
>> > be an appropriate place to post an RFP or would that violate the
>> > community culture?  Could this be a discrete contract to set up the
>> > back-end system, and maybe even build the front-end website, and then
>> > once it's built, would it be simple enough to maintain ourselves (i.e.,
>> > add new resources as they get developed, manage users, etc.)?  I imagine
>> > the answer to that is, "it depends," so let's say it would be a library
>> > of 100s but not 1000s of items, and maybe a few hundred users, and we're
>> > pretty proficient at _*using*_ various systems, just not building them.
>> > So I guess the question is, how much technical maintenance would it need?
>> >
>> > 4) What kind of time-frame (ballpark) would it take to set up an online
>> > library with a few hundred items, for someone who has lots of experience
>> > with Evergreen and wouldn't have the steep learning curve that we would?
>> >
>> > Thanks to anyone who can provide some insights for us.  We love the
>> > spirit and intent of the Evergreen community.
>> >
>> > - Diane
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
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>> > Evergreen-general at list.evergreen-ils.org
>> > http://list.evergreen-ils.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/evergreen-general
>> >
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-- 
Jane Sandberg
Electronic Resources Librarian
Linn-Benton Community College
sandbej at linnbenton.edu / 541-917-4655
Pronouns: she/her/hers