simmotech

Well, I pity the kids in the school you describe. My wife is a professional librarian who covers 5 schools in our area - half days in some, full days in others. None of them are large and a couple are in relatively deprived areas. She maintains the libraries and classes come in one at a time to borrow books. The kids absolutely love it, and the teachers and heads love it too. It has proved so successful, she is now looking to recruit additional resource because other schools have heard about it word of mouth and want to do the same. She weeds the books, buys new stock (when there is budget) and promotes a love of books and learning to the kids. She is the reason I wrote the software - she was so sick of the schools spending a large amount each year on crappy software that was slow, crashed virtually every day and getting no support. It was written for her type of scenario (per class visits though the class teacher can act as librarian); it has a per-class view so you can see all the kids in one go. She now has fast and reliable software so can spend more time helping the kids with their books.

If you don't have library software (or a written logging system) then you don't really have a library - just 'some books'. I take you point that most primary schools won't have a full-time librarian but enlightened ones may well have a part-time librarian. And failing that it will be down to the teacher or TA to be responsible for the books that their class pupils borrow. Borrowing and returning books is quite easy - just a couple of barcode scans typically. This just makes it easier to have the up-to-date pupil details in place ready for those barcode scans. Doing it manually would take a long time and be prone to errors.

I have now actually got hold some actual data that MLS sends out when you cancel your subscription - it is a zip file containing just 4 csv files. Whilst they seem to have changed from quoting every field regardless of whether it needs it or not, they are still not escaping embedding quotes properly! Useless. I have emailed them asking them about this and attaching a copy of the email I sent to them a year ago with the few lines of codes to correctly write values. I also asked them whether there would normally be additional files included in the zip file for Reservations/Reviews - my customer didn't happen to use them so it is unclear whether they just didn't include them for that reason or whether they don't include them at all.

So who is interested in trying out SmartLibrarian to see what I have to offer? You will need a PC with SQL Server Express installed. Any version will do (2016 and higher requires 64-bit) and I can provide instructions on how to download and install it. The application itself is a Click-Once application (and has a signed certificate). Takes only a few minutes to install. There is a built-in Test database with 17K+ resources and I have included an option to turn on a Barcode scan emulation menu (since you won't have the real resources to scan). Or, if you prefer, I can export and import your actual data from Junior Librarian (including photos!) for fuller testing including using your own Barcode scanner. Currently, the application is specifically designed for a single Librarian to Issue and Return/Renew books. Special support is included for processing a class at a time which is the situation most prevalent in Primary Schools. There is a lot of support to tidy and rectify the data you import from Junior Librarian. What I am looking for is for people to try it out and confirm:- - it is quick - it is reliable - that the Admin tools do everything they need to - provide guidance on how future versions should incorporate per-pupil logons that reflects how their school works. - provide guidance on reporting etc. Support is available at Login Required | SmartLibrarian and documentation will be built up on there starting this week. As a Click-once application, I can release updates very quickly and the application will automatically check for them on startup.

I don't have any - I'm a software developer But I would imagine that small junior schools would have a single machine but larger junior schools plus secondary schools would have more. Why not publish additional licence costs online with the rest of the prices? I've downloaded the manual for later perusal but I had a quick glance and got the impression that:- - the software was originally a generic asset tracking app that has been extended for libraries (text like 'Units in Stock' and 'Reorder Level') - it is designed for only a librarian/administrator to use and no functionality to allow students to do self-checkout or login to review their loans and write reviews etc. Am I wrong?

Just be aware that the £157pa price is per computer. +1 for Stored locally

It would appear that MLS, via their Capita parent, are willing to take legal action unless the full notice to terminate is given to them in writing despite their software only working half of the time - verbally is no good it would seem. Bunch of b*stards IMHO. I can't believe they would send a letter like that to a primary school and tie them in for another year. I've been trying to help them get their shitty software just doing the basics like exporting correctly in CSV but they refuse to even acknowledge anything is wrong... "The hosted version of the library system have been around for nearly 10 years. Of which time you are the first person to comment on the csv file export with double quotes causing issues." Unbelievable arrogant! So I sent them some C# code which produces correct files (a dozen lines or so) but I won't hold my breath on them fixing it soon. But the gloves are off now.

Thanks for that info LeMarchand - on what basis did you get them to finally accept the cancellation? (or had you given notice in writing within the time)

Said Primary school just received an invoice for MLS for another year for nearly £600 Apparently, there is a 90 day notice period required to not renew for another year! They were told verbally that the school was definitely not going to renew and we believe this was followed up in writing (need to check). MLS also spoke to my wife last week at another of her schools where they were trying to harass the head into going with their online version using crap such as "Microsoft no longer support it and it will stop working." I've tried not to have a go at MLS (after comments in this thread) and even offered to help them with the bugs I reported to them but now they are taking my customer, well I can't let that go. Any advice/experience about unfair contract terms etc. would very welcome.

That could still be done using a Tag or membership of a Group, rather than a specific checkbox I guess but either way, another question arises... Would a child be upset or offended if another child saw they were flagged as 'Pupil Premium' as I understand that it means the child is considered "disadvantaged whether by income or by family upheaval" and/or "adopted; or in care"?

I guess they do but I can't get at them to see what's already there (and what size/resolution/format etc.). I don't have access to a SIMS setup and its not likely to be included in an export anyway IMHO. Junior Librarian - well being a web app I can just copy an existing image off the web page but that would be fixed at 183 high x 141 wide. They do have a webcam button and it does take over my webcam but it doesn't show an image unfortunately. It does however have a nice 'target area' for a dialogue box which I'll try to get my control to emulate at some point.

Free School Meals - not relevant so not included. Pupil Premium - although my wife points out schools with Pupil Premium pupils enables them to pay for her very reasonably priced services, I can't see how it is relevant in running a library so not included. Special Educational Needs - JL just has a checkbox for this but it sounds like a whole range could be included. Language - Not sure what it means - Surely English is what is being taught, so does it mean the main language of their families? Ethnicity - There could be a shitstorm here if my dropdown doesn't cover a particular ethnicity - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self_defined_ethnicity - would rather not go there!** All 'Persons' in my database can have Tags associated with them. Some of these Tags are built-in but others can be added. I think it would be better if I left Special Education Needs/Language/Ethnicity out for now and let librarians add custom Tags to more clearly define what they want to identify. ** Already had a telling off from my 14yr daughter because the boy/girl default Avatars I had were too light-skinned' - she told me they should be Yellow by default like Emojis in iPhones. And she was right! UTS #51: Unicode Emoji so I fixed that up. My cheapo test webcam works well but the controls I have are extracting a single-frame from the live video sequence and I haven't worked out how or even if it is possible to get a proper snapshot at photo resolution that would work on all webcams. Also, being a video recording, the images are landscape where we would need a portrait image. I may have to split this into two parts - one to get an image and then one to crop a certain size out of it. Luckily, my first customer didn't use photographs so I can spend a bit more time on this later.

Free School Meals, Pupil Premium, Special Educational Needs; Language; Ethnicity Is there any reason a school library would make use of the above fields?

Well, it seems I have my first customer! A Primary school is refusing to renew their upcoming MLS Junior Librarian subscription because their cloud-hosted system is down more than it is up and very, very slow at the best of times and too expensive. So my development is now focused on providing solely what they need for that initial release mid-April:- - I have already (mostly*) extracted their data from the cloud in XML and have an Importer to read it all in. - I just ordered a cheap and cheerful webcam from Amazon so that that initial release will support images of the kids. (* can't export photos from JL easily that I can see). - For now, circulation will be hosted by class - ie a single screen showing everyone in a given class and allowing the Librarian to return their books and let them choose new ones. This simple requirement means I should be able to get what they need working by mid-April and I can write more the more complicated stuff later.

I had to look this up and there are dozens of definitions of GMD - to which were you referring?