old.kete.net.nz

Topic: Kete Community Day Notes - Wednesday 25th November 2009

Topic type:
Topic

A summary of topics discussed at the Kete Community Day on 25th November 2009

Kete Community Meeting - 2009-11-25

Present

Walter McGinnis, Richard Anderson, Kieran Pilkington (Katipo Communications)
Joann Ransom, Barbara Lucas, Beth Bolton (Horowhenua Library Trust)
Claire Hall, Honiana Love, Robin McLaughlin (Te Reo o Taranaki)
Jolene Russell, Robin Young, Tennille Maxey (Upper Hutt Library)
Fiona McGregor, Magalie Le Gac (Wellington City Libraries)
Paul Sutherland (Christchurch City Libraries)
Kaye Foran, Kay Duncan (Kapiti Coast Libraries)
Sandy Green, Jona(?) (Masterton Library)
Ngai Deckard(?) (Central Hawkes Bay Libraries)

Kete Community Meeting Morning – Introductions

Walter requests attendees write ideas they'd like to see covered for the day. They include:
- How to encourage community contributions
- Private extended field data in public items
- Tips and tricks – working with content
- Release management and governance structure
- Better Macrons support.
- Video and rich media embedding

Morning – Report from Interim Governance Committee and Discussion

Last years community meeting, and this years April governance meeting was encouraging, and while some good feedback was collected, not much else came as a result of it (the setup of the governance group didn't progress, funding for various enhancements wasn't arranged). Hopefully this meeting will have some better results.
There is a consensus that in the coming year, we should group little ideas together into bigger tasks, rather than focusing on little features, as each little feature comes with their own management costs. However, the focus of todays meeting should be on how to make these features come about, rather than which features should be implemented.
Jo mentions the issues the Koha community has been facing recently (put a link to discussions about it). Kete and old.kete.net.nz safe, and not likely to be plagued by same problems. HLT attempting to get Koha back. In order to ensure Kete doesn't face the same issues, HLT needs to write a statement of stewardship, declaring that they are holding the source code in a trust for the Kete community at large.
Walter mentions that this year Katipo has no money to support the release management of Kete 1.3, and that the previous release come out of pocket. All attendees seem keen to help support the release by a voluntary donation. Discussion of an optional nominal fee from most clients that would support miscellaneous bug fixes and release management.
Discussion about a voluntary billing system, where Katipo sends out maintenance invoices, which clients can optionally pay or not pay depending on their current funding situation. Any left over funding from these donations may be used to fund feature enhancements.
Concerns that APNK may not participate in this model for funding. They need to assess who should pay. Themselves, or the organizations of the Kete they host. Paul volunteers to contact APNK and try and get the ball rolling to help build an understanding of how this could work. Note that Margaret Garland is leaving soon and Mark Lawrence will be filling her place as interim head.
Paul mentions that the Christchurch Libraries have very little I.T budget to spend. The amount they have is small and they are very keen to see go toward the feature for embedding rich media (audio/video) into the Kete item show pages. Walter mentions additional features like playing from the browse/search results would be a nice addition. Both Paul and Jo agree that the very basic features should be implemented first, to get things started.
A draft document was discussed, that pointed toward a 'buy in' approach for the Governance Group. The more your support, the more say you have in the softwares direction. The idea being that users need to direct the softwares direction, not the developer. Discussion of a user group that encourages voting of what should be added. Walter requests more collaboration on the old.kete.net.nz website rather than dividing discussions further.
Walter mentions that old.kete.net.nz could use a strong editor to organize the homepage, make information more accessible, highlight the user group (or other discussion medium), and to point the public to possible enhancements for funding.
Request to continue discussion of the governance group online. Topic on old.kete.net.nz where attendees can collaborate. Discussion of whom should be included. At least one person outside of the library profession, needs to be on the group, to give their perspective. Also mention of some Kete users from overseas. Means of communication are discussed. Face to face meetings with the group are preferred, but IRC, Skype, Google Groups, and of course Kete, are listed as possible options.

Afternoon – Review of Kete features with Q&A, and features for future releases

Walter shows attendees features of the upcoming Kete 1.3, and points out where things could be improved. He also lists various enhancements for future release of Kete 1.3.5 and Kete 1.4. Later versions (Kete 1.5 onward) are not discussed.
During demonstration of 'browse by map' functionality, Jo points out that West Coast Kete would enjoy this functionality for a ''what to do in this area' approach to using Kete. Walter mentions it would be good for that.
Discussion about integration with DigitalNZ mapping service. Walter says it's still fairly new. Holding off for now.
Suggestions of refinements of google maps (marker setting improvements, clustering of points around the same spot) are brought up by Walter.
Attendees agree that support of macrons in searching would be a nice feature to have (where a search with macrons would search for it and variations of the search term without macrons).
Better support of bi-lingual sites (rather than multi-lingual sites) is discussed. Idea that there should be an admin option to display languages in the top right of the page as links, and not as a dropdown, is well received.
Paul requests that screenshots of Kete 1.3 features be posted online for viewing after the meeting.
Paul enquires if taking the choices setup on ACL Kete would be difficult. Ability to export choices for browse by category stuff was discussed, but not top priority.
Jo asks for a list of enhancements of existing features which organizations could fund to see improved. Walter mentions he tries to post all ideas on old.kete.net.nz, and points to a topic on the site that contains various ideas that require funding (http://old.kete.net.nz/site/topics/show/212-enhancement-ideas-for-kete). Walter mentions that some of the ideas there are already implemented, indicated by the 'Implemented Enhancement' tag before topic titles.
Request to able to more easily embed youtube video via tinymce button in same way images are done.
Make embedding images from kete into another website easier, some JS to place a “copy image url” button over images when hovering over them? Most browsers have this functionality on right click of images.
WCL suggested integration with screencasting software, to be able to record and have it instantly be published to kete when saved.
Talk about some times when people can get away from workplace, to just focus on Kete, learning how to use it, etc.

Recap:

Katipo to release meeting notes, along with topic about governance group, on old.kete.net.nz where meeting attendees and public can communicate thoughts. A deadline for ideas on the forming of the governance group set to end of January next year.
Katipo to setup regular maintenance donation to help fund release management. This will be sent out in the form of an optional bill. As part of this, Katipo will post a topic on old.kete.net.nz detailing some various features of the release in the form of screenshots.
Finalize the Governance Group (deadline is set for around February-April next year). They are than to decide on the best communication method, and proceed to set clear goals as to where the software is heading, so that whatever funding is receive is directed to where it will be best used.
HLT or the new Governance group are to draft a statement of stewardship.
Paul to talk to APNK, try and get some funding support from them. Any funding may go into feature for rich media embedding.