[Imc-tech] FWD: RE: [Openbook-l] cataloging module

[jacobs]

Hey Techstas!  Below is the response that I received from the software 
developer regarding technical requirements for the online catalog software. 
Perhaps I can come to a tech meeting to pitch the idea after I've met with 
Laura at ISEN? Any librarians want to help out with this? I think a community 
catalog is a great idea and hope that we can work together to get it up and 
running!

James Jacobs

>===== Original Message From "Willem Scholten" <willem at trfoundation.org> =====
Database size:

There are two factors which limit this: First the MySQL database size - that
is really dependent on your OS, but under Linux I doubt you would run up
against a boundary! The second factor is the OpenBook itself, right now we
know it will handle 100,000 Bibliog. graphic records and it s associated
copy records (an average of 3 per bibliographic record) fine, and we are
doing scaling test to optimize towards a potential size of approximately 1
million bibliog. graphic records and around 3 million holding/copy level
records.

Clearly most of this is driven by your machine and OS layout and tuning of
file systems when you get that big :)  More practically, we run a nice test
system in house, which is a 700Mhz Celeron with 256Mb of memory and 20GB
EIDE drive, nothing fancy, with RedHat linux 7.1 and 25,000 bibliog. graphic
records, 75,000 copy level records without any problem.  This is just a
plain old "chop shop" bought no name machine we purchased for $500 including
a CD-R for backup and 10/100 3COM Ethernet card.

As to cataloging question, I'll drop you a note, we are more then willing to
let you take a look and we would love to talk to your professor.  There area
few other schools who are starting to use it for cataloging classes.

Hope that helps!

-Willem.

-----Original Message-----
From: openbook-l-admin at seattle.trfoundation.org
[mailto:openbook-l-admin at seattle.trfoundation.org]On Behalf Of jacobs
Sent: Friday, November 23, 2001 10:14 AM
To: openbook-l at seattle.trfoundation.org
Subject: [Openbook-l] cataloging module


Greetings,

I am a grad student in LIS at the U. of Illinois. I am interested in using
the
OpenBook software for the library that I have helped build at the
Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center
(http://urbana.indymedia.org/library). I have plans to expand the catalog to
any community organization that is interested. Presently there are 2 others
that are excited about the possibility of a community catalog.

I have 2 questions for folks:

1) How many records can the MySQL DB comfortably handle? Right now, we have
about 2000 items but we'd like to be able to expand to over 10,000. Is that
viable?

2) I'd like to take a look at the cataloging module. There's a possibility
that a prof. here would use the project as hands-on experience in her
cataloging class. Is anyone out there willing to give us a peek at the
cataloging module? In addition, how straight-forward is the module? I have
cataloging experience, but the community orgs. generally run with volunteers
who have little or no experience. Is there a huge learning curve or is the
GUI
interface pretty clear--author, title, publisher,...?


I'm sure there are other questions, but these will gett the ball rolling.
Thanks for any information!

Regards,

James Jacobs

James R. Jacobs
Graduate Reference Assistant
Education/Social Science Library
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Home: 303B1 Paddock Drive
Savoy, IL 61874
(217)359-9283
jacobs at uiuc.edu
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  {|||8-
   (/

**********************************************************
"Librarians, Dusty, possess a vast store of politeness.
These are people who get asked regularly the dumbest
questions on God's green earth. These people tolerate
every kind of crank and eccentric and mouth-breather
there is."
--Garrison Keillor, "Lives of the Cowboys"
**********************************************************
"But to live outside the law you must be honest." R.Zimmerman
**********************************************************

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James R. Jacobs 
Graduate Reference Assistant 
Education/Social Science Library
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign                        
Home: 303B1 Paddock Drive  
Savoy, IL 61874           
(217)359-9283
jacobs at uiuc.edu
   (\
  {|||8-
   (/
		 	 
**********************************************************
"Librarians, Dusty, possess a vast store of politeness.
These are people who get asked regularly the dumbest
questions on God's green earth. These people tolerate
every kind of crank and eccentric and mouth-breather
there is." 
--Garrison Keillor, "Lives of the Cowboys"
**********************************************************
"But to live outside the law you must be honest." R.Zimmerman
**********************************************************