Information Scotland

The Journal of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals in Scotland

August 2004 Volume 2 (4)

Software

Shared endeavour

Clare Whittaker explains the collaborative working within the Scottish Endeavor Consortium.

The latest marketplace review [1] of integrated library software highlighted the following trend: "Libraries are increasingly entering into a shared ILS rather than operating their own independent system... This move toward collaborative implementations is driven by interests in providing greater opportunities for sharing collections and by needs to reduce operating costs." (p9)

Scotland has a strong tradition of working collaboratively and consortially across all sectors of the profession, so it is no surprise that the Scottish Endeavor Consortium has grown to meet the needs of academic and special libraries since its inception. The Consortium was founded (as the Scottish Voyager Consortium) in 1999, when the National Library of Scotland and Edinburgh University Library jointly bought Endeavor's Voyager software to replace their existing VTLS and Geac library management systems. Since then, the Consortium has expanded to include more members and other Endeavor software. To reflect this, the Scottish Voyager Consortium changed its name to the Scottish Endeavor Consortium in early 2004.

It should be noted that the SEC does not include all sites in Scotland using Endeavor products: Strathclyde University Library Services and the Advocates Library are both Endeavor customers who are not members of the Consortium. Nor is it the only such grouping of libraries working together to share elements of their library automation – recently the nine libraries of the Glasgow Colleges Group have opted to share a single Horizon database.

In addition to the founder members, the National Library of Scotland and Edinburgh University Library, the The Scottish Endeavor Consortium currently consists of the Signet Library, Edinburgh College of Art, Royal Observatory of Edinburgh, Heriot-Watt University, and the University of Abertay, Dundee (which is implementing Voyager this summer). With this gradual expansion imposing increasing demands on staff time, the Consortium required a professional member of staff to provide coordination and liaison between the Consortium Board, Endeavor and all partners. I was appointed as its first Consortium Support Officer in 2003.

Member libraries of the Consortium maintain their own separate Voyager databases (in some cases, more than one database) and web catalogues. Facilities management and technical coordination is provided by the Consortium on dedicated hardware based at the University of Edinburgh. The infrastructure has proved very reliable, with the Voyager systems available for 99.8% of their advertised time. Member libraries and their users access the service using Scotland's metropolitan area networks. The National Library of Scotland and Edinburgh University Library operate as hubs for special and academic members respectively, providing first level technical and functional support.

When the Consortium was formed, the two founding libraries were clear about the benefits, including economic savings, a strategic alliance, and resource sharing [2]. Newer members echo these advantages. At the launch of Heriot Watt University's Voyager system earlier this year, Michael Breaks noted that: "...for a relatively small library like ourselves, the management overheads of installing and running our own library system can be disproportionately high. By joining the Consortium, we were only required to purchase some additional space on an established server environment for our data, and to purchase additional software licences at the reduced Consortium rate."

For some libraries, it can be a way to buy a more sophisticated library management system at a lower cost than might be otherwise possible. Karen Moran of the Royal Observatory Library feels that buying a library system via a consortium has provided good value for her limited budget: "...if this small, specialised library had not joined it would have perhaps been too burdensome (financially and in terms of effort) to keep abreast with state-of-the-art developments."

Audrey Walker of the Signet Library observes that membership of such a consortium is valuable to a special library as "...the librarian does not need to be IT specialist, cataloguer, systems manager and librarian but can use the experts that the Consortium already employs." Furthermore, the consortium's resources brings greater resilience and reliability than an individual library could.

For larger organisations, a decision to join this type of consortium may feel like a loss of autonomy, as central systems tasks and responsibilities are contracted out to the Consortium. However, at library level, the seven libraries use Voyager independently on their own databases; they choose their own system parameters to suit their own library workflow and practices; they set up their own web catalogues to suit their own requirements. (For examples of how different the catalogues can be, see the Consortium website.) Library and ICT staff meet regularly across the Consortium to exchange experience and to discuss use and development of the system. In recent months, the NLS demonstrated their work on Voyager cataloguing utilities to other members; statistical reports required by external agencies have been shared, and Edinburgh College of Art and the University of Edinburgh are pooling expertise as they work on the dynamic integration of borrower information with their respective institutional portals. More widely in the Scottish library community, the CASS database is one of those hosted and supported by the Consortium.

For many Consortium members, the Voyager software running their core library operations is the main focus. Others are working within the Consortium on innovative systems for managing electronic resources, such as Endeavor's Encompass, which are in the implementation stage at the National Library of Scotland and Edinburgh University Library.

Until now the Scottish Endeavor Consortium has concentrated on the successful deployment of library technologies and on sharing costs for software, support, hosting and infrastructure. This is only one model of running a consortium for integrated library software, and one which has been developed to meet the specific needs of a cross-sectoral group with a distinct purpose. Similar consortia elsewhere in the world often undertake a wider remit, and this may be something that the Consortium considers in the future.

Clare Whittaker is Scottish Endeavor Consortium Support Librarian. Website: www.nls.uk/sec

References

1. Integrated Library Software: a guide to multiuser, multifunction systems. Library technology reports. Jan/Feb 2004 (Vol 40. no. 1).

2. Sheila Cannell, Fred Guy. ‘Cross-sectoral collaboration in the choice and implementation of a library management system: the experience of the University of Edinburgh and the National Library of Scotland.' Program, vol 35, no. 2, April 2001, pp135-156.

Information Scotland Vol. 2 (4) August 2004

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Last updated: 14 September 2004