Library Technology Guides

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Statistical Report for Koha -- ByWater Solutions

Statistics according to type and size categories

The following table presents the 2015 results according to the type and size of the library.

1 Responses for Koha -- ByWater Solutions in 2009

0 Responses for Koha -- ByWater Solutions in 2008

0 Responses for Koha -- ByWater Solutions in 2007

2023 : gen: 7.64 company 8.00 loyalty 8.04 support 7.82

2022 : gen: 7.92 company 8.22 loyalty 8.02 support 8.20

2021 : gen: 7.94 company 8.18 loyalty 8.04 support 8.14

2020 : gen: 7.84 company 8.10 loyalty 8.13 support 8.26

2019 : gen: 7.87 company 8.28 loyalty 7.89 support 8.27

2018 : gen: 7.77 company 8.06 loyalty 7.92 support 8.09

2017 : gen: 7.75 company 7.94 loyalty 7.41 support 7.93

2016 : gen: 7.74 company 7.94 loyalty 7.78 support 7.90

2015 : gen: 7.43 company 7.62 loyalty 7.34 support 7.70

2014 : gen: 7.34 company 7.61 loyalty 7.26 support 7.63

2013 : gen: 7.61 company 7.83 loyalty 7.48 support 7.84

2012 : gen: 7.78 company 8.11 loyalty 8.02 support 8.05

2011 : gen: 7.61 company 8.07 loyalty 7.98 support 8.17

2010 : gen: 7.86 company 8.41 loyalty 8.73 support 8.44

Comments

we have migrated to Koha using Bywater Solutions as our hosting company and are entirely satisfied with their support and the ILS implemented, we have no plans to change this in the future. (Type: Academic)

Koha is a work in progress and I love it's customization. It also helps that our consortium is AWESOME and we are perpetually coming up with ways to make the system better. (Type: Public)

We continue to enjoy the flexibility of open-source and are fortunate to have a staff person who can manage the coding to customize to fit our needs. (Type: Public)

Koha has been very effective for us. There have been minor issues with a certain functionality that we'd like to see implemented, but nothing that affects us on a regular basis. Most of those issues were an attempt to solve a human (staff) problem with the ILS. ByWater Solutions has been fantastic. It does seem (though I haven't recorded this so it's just my overall impression) that customer service response times have increased a bit in the past year. Still, we're getting good service. (Type: Consortium)

Koha does the job. Occasionally I need reports that I ask Koha staff to provide for us. They have been very good in responding to requests for unique reports as well as troubleshooting problems. (Type: Public)

Koha is a very stable and easy to manage ILS. ByWater Solutions support is very responsive and knowledgeable. They have a friendly and helpful approach. The Koha-Community is a very active group. (Type: Public)

Good luck with your results. A good and useful tool! (Type: Public)

We are very happy with the service and tech. support Bywater Solutions provides us. (Type: Public)

Improved Search functions would be nice. Electronic resource management would be easier if we could batch delete, but we understand that ByWater prohibits this function as a safety measure. System administration is good, reliability for upgrades is much improved from our initial experience. But customer support can be frustrating, reported problems are not always promptly fixed, responses don't fully answer the questions. (Type: Medical)

Already have an open source ILS - Koha (Type: Academic)

We remain very pleased that we moved to Koha. We are no longer at the mercy of an ILS that is gobbled up by another company with fears of an uncertain future. The cost is a fraction of the previous and this is more of an investment. This ILS will outlive us and only continue to improve. By librarians for libraries.. (Type: Public)

Koha is great. Bywater is fair. Bywater is quick to answer the phone and great for system down but migration of other libraries into the consortium is awful and questions to resolve non urgent issue is not quick. (Type: Public)

[...] (Type: Public)

We are very pleased with our relationship with ByWater. Their communication and training with/for us are really top-notch; it's nice to not feel any hesitation about bringing up questions/issues with them. Koha is serving the needs of our physical and electronic collections quite nicely! (Type: Medical)

We would be considering a separate discover interface in addition to an ILS if we could afford one. (Type: Academic)

Mill run no longer supporting our system as they have joined ByWater Solutions (Type: Public)

Our Koha Consortium is great - I love it! (Type: Public)

Koha works well for a small subject-specific research library with extensive special collections holdings. (Type: Museum)

Koha has a support staff that communicates often and personally. I'm impressed with that aspect. The catalog isn't the sleekest looking, but that is expected for an open source product. Reports I find to be challenging compared to big companies like Follett who have rather user-friendly options. You need to build basic code in Koha to make the reports initially. There are also few options for global deletions of records with no items and old patron accounts. These issues would really help out cleaning up our records. Though these issues are prominent currently, overall, Koha does what we need it to do and the customer support is very strong. The pros are greater than the cons. (Type: Public)

Bywater's KOHA ILS is unsatisfactory and does not meet student, faculty or librarian needs. Check out, check in and searching of all kinds are very slow in both the staff client and OPAC. Keyword search results are not accurate. The most relevant records do not appear at the top of the search results. Brief summary bib records are incomplete, omitting subtitles and series volume numbers. Search results limiter choices are confusing. Last year the Bywater staff turned off ILS access at one of the 5 schools in our consortium without notifying any consortium librarians. They turned it off because they failed to correctly interpret system activity. Bywater staff will not fix bugs or make changes paid for by open source community members until a new version is released, which causes delays of several months. (Type: School)

[...] (Type: Public)

The Koha system was purchased by the school without really considering the needs of a library that is 99 percent electronic. It is almost never used by anyone but the library director. (Type: Academic)

[...] is a small academic consortium with some libraries only having a few staff to handle all aspects of the ILS. Prior to migration we assessed that not all ILS functionality was being used by members due to small staff sizes. However, that being said, it has been an adjustment to lose certain functionality our libraries had come to expect, namely indexing and authority control. We'd like to see Koha thrive into the future and be a true alternative for all kinds of libraries but especially academic libraries. For that to happen libraries themselves need to try and step up and contribute to improving that ILS. We hope to see better indexing over time as that's the number one shortcoming. The serial and acquisitions modules are also lacking. We would like to help shape Koha over time. With some strides over the next two-three years it could be a true option for small academics. Most are contemplating ILS moves right now so developments in 2016 are crucial as then the wave of ILS changeover may subside. ... (Type: Consortium)

ByWater Solutions has surpassed my expectations as an implementation and support provider. I couldn't be happier. (Type: Theology)

I personally am not happy with the Koha system. The patron side is great and user friendly, but the administrative side that I use, is very combersome and does not offer reports that work properly for what I need the accounting side is awful and causes extra work for me and others. If we ask to get it fixed, it costs to do that and it is not important to the company that provides the service. I feel they are trying to make the patrons happy, but the the ones who need it and wont listen to us when we tell them what we need. (Type: Public)

We've been using the open source Koha ILS for almost a year. We're very pleased with it so far. Flexibility is very important to us and using an open source product has allowed us to make many customizations, especially to the user interface. We have library staff who have been able to do some of this for us. And we have also received quite a bit of support from ByWater Solutions. Working with them to make our changes to the system and with other support issues has been great. (Type: Law)

ByWater was terrific when the library was migrating and training to use Koha. They continue to be responsive to all of our concerns. (Type: Public)

I inherited an open source system and do not care for the lack of functionality, slow servers and that every upgrade needs to be paid for before it can even be started. I would personally never choose an open source program but I am stuck with it as part of a consortium. I would love there to be a better option for software but I have to put up with the current system and have no other choices. (Type: Public)

We are overall satisfied with the ILS but it runs very very slowly at times. (Type: Public)

Koha is wonderful open source product. We are still relatively new to the system and there is still more to explore to get the most from it. I enjoy seeing our patrons using the system and having a vested interest in their library. More power to the patron! (Type: Public)

As part of the [...] , we are migrating to Bywater Solutions' Koha ILS, however the migration is not yet complete and we have not yet "gone live." So far, our experience with Bywater has been excellent. Their staff is enthusiastic, knowledgeable and supportive. We believe the Koha ILS will be a significant improvement, especially for our patrons. (Type: Public)

We are a member of the [...] . We use the Open Source Koha with hosting and support via Bywater. Tech support if first within our consortium then to Bywater if not solved. (Type: Public)

I really think open source is an excellent way for libraries to go. Since there are great companies, like ByWater Solutions, around to help it is easy for large and very small libraries to use open source products like Koha. (Type: Public)

We just migrated to Koha hosted by Bywater Solutions after over 20 years with Millennium from III. We have been truly impressed by the service the Bywater team provides and with the capabilities of Koha, particular the opportunities it provides for integration with other systems and platforms. (Type: School)

We are a member of on open source Koha consortium with hosting and support from ByWater Solutions. We are happy with our ILS for the most part, but frequent upgrades sometimes seem to disrupt functions that have been working well. Invoicing from ByWater has been irregular and they have been unresponsive to our questions about costs from them that have not been billed for months (to our advantage). (Type: Consortium)

it is wonderful experience working with ByWater Solutions - getting the benefits of proprietary ILS product with this support. (Type: Academic)

Bywater support does a good job. Koha lacks some of the functionality we had when we used a commercial ILS, but it's much less expensive. Overall, we are well satisfied. (Type: Academic)

After 18 years with Verso (we were were one of the original public libraries to use it) we switched to Koha/Bywater this year. The transition was much easier than we expected, thanks to the support of both Bywater and Autographics. Open source? We have successfully used open source software on our public access computers for many years, so Koha was not something we feared. The public adapted immediately. Bywater helped us customize the catalog interface so that it fits seamlessly within our web pages. The staff had a slightly more difficult transition as most of us had never used any ILS system other than Verso. A couple of features we liked are missing (particularly the slick ways Verso handles (Type: Public)

The product is very much a work in progress. We have contributed to development and it takes a very long time. Customer service from ByWater has improved over the past year, but only because we have been very vocal about our needs, almost to the point of being obnoxious. (Type: Public)

ByWater's customer support responsiveness was slower this year, but I believe it may have been due to understaffing/vacant positions. In the later part of the year there were marked improvements in response time for tickets. We have had a long and successful relationship with ByWater, and are pleased overall with their services. We already have an open source ILS, and are happy with it. Therefore I answered question #15 from the position that we would consider open-source ILS again, should be decide to move to another ILS. The "number of items" listed above is the number of "volumes" or physical books that we have, per 2014-2015 NCES data. (Type: Academic)

The Library installed Koha originally [...] . This is the most awesome easy install. It installed in about 15 minutes following the instructions. Books were imported in about 45 minutes after editing with Marc Edit. this took days but only as a result of having to figure out the format and fields to properly import. The virtual drive makes instant backup easy and re-installation a flash. (Type: Public)

We are extremely happy with ByWater Solutions. While Koha may have room for growth, every ILS does, it works for us very well and we appreciate being able to suggest and support future development projects to improve it, giving us ownership and participation in the Koha community. (Type: Public)

Customer service was already very good to excellent, so question asking to rate worse or better is answered as neutral because service remains very good to excellent. (Type: Public)

With open source, it is not just the ILS that matters, but the support vendor. ByWater does well for our consortium, but they cannot keep up. And many of the things we'd like to implement are "developments" and cost plenty of money. It would have been nice to know more about that aspect before the launch date. (Type: Academic)

We recently (prior to Fall15 quarter) migrated from Insignia to Bywater's Koha and are still working on setting up the ILS to meet our needs. Bywater has exhibited great customer service in this regard. I expect that the functionality of and our satisfaction with Koha will increase as we work together. How effective is this product in managing your library's print resources? The library's print resources include course reserves which are highly utilized but not all of them are currently checking out to the appropriate due dates- manual selection of due date & time are someitmesrequired. How likely is it that this library would consider implementing an open source ILS? Bywater Koha is an open source ILS. (Type: Academic)

August 2015 we migrated from SirsiDynix Symphony to Koha 3.18 with support from ByWaterSolutions. Overall, it has been a good experience. (Type: Academic)

We changed from OCLC because we could no longer afford to use it, we now have Bookware Suite which suits our needs fine. Since we are so rural, we have not used ILL in three years due to costs. We now have Zip Books a grant program from the State. Zip Books grant ends this year, however I am hoping it will continue somewhat with a shared cost. (Type: Public)

Much happier with the enhancement process with open source ILS. (Type: Public)

Kohi ILS is remarkably slow, which I suspect is a communication issue. When combined with the convoluted workflow it is very frustrating. Also, it often makes transpositions in the database- which could also be caused by the communication issues. I would recommend any library considering this ILS so self host, maybe eliminating some of the transaction delay. I would also suggest to the developers that someone start working on some kind of script or app type ported interface. This would be quicker than HTML, and the workflows could be designed much better. (Type: Public)

It seems like a long time to fix "bugs" in our system. (Type: Public)

Koha doesn't seem to work well for our public schools. So many basic reports and functions that seem to be commonly used in the publics schools either aren't available and have to be created, or they don't work. It is not an easy or convenient system to use. It's also been unreliable. I would prefer a pre-made package that is especially for the elementary school. Bywater has been great, but I just feel that Koha isn't the right fit for us (Type: School)

The system is not designed for school libraries and we don't want to be the ones to develop the program. We would like a program that is already developed and works effectively in a school setting. There has been some confusion on who we go to for support - it has been mostly directed in house. Now that we are aware of how easy it is to contact ByWater we will do that first. ByWater has been good with training and trying to troubleshoot issues but we would like a program that is fully developed for an elementary school. (Type: School)

Bywater is fantastic to work with, but their rates for ongoing support are steep for small libraries. We will probably have to drop support soon. A minimal support option at a greatly discounted rate would be wonderful once the initial difficulties are settled, or ramped up training to allow libraries to continue on their own. Teach a librarian to fish... (Type: Public)

We are generally satisfied with Koha and BWS. Primary problems are in the area of development and old, uncorrected software bugs. Based on our experience, the existing model of development with BWS leaves much to be desired due to poor communication and lack of collaboration with clients. These problems are compounded when development is slow or behind schedule. A new development process should be implemented that emphasizes better communication and customer involvement. A possible improvement could be the creation of formal design specifications that include a description of the work to be done and the costs (client should pay for this analysis). Once develpment is funded, BWS should collaborate and work with the customer(s) during development to ensure that a workable solution is developed. If the development requires significant or complex pages, users should be included in the screen design. The emphasis on communication and collaboration may also keep projects on time. (Type: Academic)

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Library Technology Guides is a service provided by Marshall Breeding, independent consultant, author, and speaker.