Technology Subcommittee Minutes

In Attendance:
Tari Keller, Charlene Davis, Aleeah McGinnis, Nelda Sims, Gary Flanagan, Bob Glass, Elsie Pritchard, John Detwiler, Roberta Kirby, Perry Bratcher, Margaret Muncy Willingham, Miko Patty, Susan Brown, Paul Fuller

Agenda:
1. Updates on Voyager Implementations. 2. Updates on SiteSearch-WebZ and other KCVL projects affecting the technology area. 3. Progress reports from the two groups working on tasks regarding Voyager Hub Site Support.

Updates on Voyager Implementations. A report was given for each site represented at the meeting. The sites that are in production are busy preparing for the 99.1 upgrade scheduled for March 14-16. Efforts are concentrated on having WebVoyage customizations ready for the new version. Elsie said that Morehead had received only one copy of the documentation. She called EISI and was promised a second copy as stated in the contract but has not received it yet.

Sites that are implementing this Spring are in various stages of receiving functional and modular training. Tari reported that Dave had been told by EISI that the upgrade will begin at 9:00 CST on Tuesday, 3/14/00 and last in their best estimate two and a half days. Perry announced that Don Frank, currently an assistant director at Georgia Tech, has been hired as the new library director at NKU and will start this summer.

Issues that emerged during the reports and received some discussion follow.

• 99.1 clients. People are uncertain about the best way to go about getting the clients. If libraries want to use offline circulation, it is recommended that they use the 99.1 client. The clients will be available on the server but no one knows for certain when they will actually be available for download from the server. Miko offered to represent the consortium to EISI on this issue.
• EISI visit. Miko is arranging the second of our planned quarterly meetings with EISI staff. She wanted to know if the committee members could meet with them on April 27 but the sites implementing this year were scheduled for training. She tried to check on the 28th but wasn't able to get an answer during the meeting. We can set the agenda for this meeting. The group agreed to hold to try to arrange to have this meeting at Elizabethtown Community College to save the western institutions some drive time.
• SQL/Report writing training. The group decided to go ahead with the session scheduled for Wednesday, March 29, but drop the second day that we had previously reserved. The remaining session will be held at the EKU library. Margaret and Greg Mitchell will make the local arrangements. Parking permits will probably be made available to attendees at the front desk. WKU will send 3 people, KSU 1, EKU 2 and KCTCS 4.
• Follow-up training. CPE purchased follow-up training sessions that we should begin planning soon. Committee members were encouraged to be thinking of topics that they would like to have covered.

Update on SiteSearch/WebZ. Beth Kraemer has version 4.1 files are ready to go into the test region of the gateway server. This version may not actually be put into production. Version 4.1.1. is due in April and we may wait for it to move to a new version.

Susan is working with Beth on phase two of resource sharing which is patron-initiated ILL. This will be a phased implementation of a complex undertaking.

Progress reports from Voyager Hub Site Support working groups. Two Groups have been established: one on troubleshooting procedures and another on setting performance standards.

The first group (Elsie, Cindy Page and Roberta) is charged with developing problem solving procedures to including trouble-shooting scripts, problem report forms, and communications protocols.

Elsie and Roberta have been working independently on describing troubleshooting scenarios. They each had a handout with examples. These are in an if/then format in which problem conditions are described and then remedial actions given. They will now decide on the best format and refine them with the lay person in mind as the target audience. They are also considering including common error messages.

The second group (Tari, Gary and Paul) is charged with determining performance level benchmarks including definitions of what is to be measured and procedures for developing acceptable standards. The members have begun gathering information and discussing strategy for their task.

Gary presented a relevant section from Morehead's RFP for their last library system. Tari has been looking at as many RFP's as possible and passed out a document with sections from half a dozen. Paul reported on searching the Voyager-L archives for relevant posts of which he found a few dealing with specific aspects of system performance.

A general discussion on response time ensued. Roberta expressed an interest in comparative response times at different sites. All were encouraged to use the listserv to communicate about response time and other system performance issues. Miko asked the committee to help her by gathering data on performance so that she can give feedback to Dave Ballard, Ron Moore and others.

Funding Request. Miko reported on the funding request. The test server would have a one-time cost of $88K and recurring cost of $12K for annual maitenance. Institutions would have to cover the latter. The citation server would have a one-time cost of $70K and recurring cost of $10,500 annually. Miko mentioned the need for a contingency fund that she would like to include in the budget request.

She is also working on the cost scheme for new client libraries. She is preparing a draft that she will send to UK and UofL for reaction. She still has not gotten cost estimates from the hub sites.

Next Meeting. We will try to meet next in conjunction with our meeting with EISI, the date of which has not been finally determined. The committee will likely meet before the session with Endeavor personnel.

This page was last updated March 15, 2000.

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