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Re: open source and librarianship



Eric Lease Morgan wrote:

> I have just finished reading Eric S. Raymond, The Cathedral And The
> Bazaar (O'Reilly, 1999), and I believe the principles of the open source
> movement are similar to the principles of librarianship. What do you think?

I think you've hit the nail on the head. The values and principles of the Open Source
Software movement parallel and reflect the traditional values and principles of
libraries. Open Source software and libraries are an almost perfect match!

>
>
> In the NCSU Libraries we are seriously considering sharing the source
> code to MyLibary@NCState under the GPL. Hopefully we will improve upon
> the MyLibrary by using the open source development model. Consequently,
> I needed to know more about open source, and I read Open Source
> Development With CVS by Karl Fogel (Coriolis Group 1999) and Raymond,
> above. Both texts were an easy, informative read.
>

I would love to see MyLibrary released under the GPL. The benefits would be enormous,
both for other libraries and for NCState.

>
> There were a number of things described in both texts that reminded me
> of librarianship. First and foremost with the idea of sharing
> information. Both camps put a premium on open access. Both camps are
> gift cultures and gain reputation by the amount of "stuff" they give
> away. What people do with the information, whether it be source code or
> journal articles, is up to them. Both camps hope the shared information
> will be used to improve our place in the world. Just as Jefferson's
> informed public is a necessity for democracy, open source software is
> necessary for the improvement of computer applications.
>
> Second, human interactions are a necessary part of the mixture in both
> librarianship and open source development. Open source development
> requires people skills by source code maintainers. It requires an
> understanding of the problem the computer application is trying to
> solve, and the maintainer must assimilate patches with the application.
> Similarly, librarians understand that information seeking behavior is a
> human process. While databases and many "digital libraries" house
> information, these collections are really "data stores" and are only
> manifested as information after the assignment of value are given to the
> data and inter-relations between datum are created.
>
> Third, it has been stated that open source development will remove the
> necessity for programers. Yet Raymond posits that no such thing will
> happen. If anything, there will an increased need for programmers.
> Similarly, many librarians feared the advent of the Web because they
> believed their jobs would be in jeopardy. Ironically, librarianship is
> flowering under new rubrics such as information architects and knowledge managers.
>
> All of this is happening because of an information economy. It sure is
> an exciting time to be a librarian, especially a librarian who can build
> relational databases and program on a Unix computer.

Absolutely!!! The more we share and communicate, the more we accomplish. If, as
librarians, we make the commitment to take what we develop and share it with the
library community and the world, via an Open Source license, then we really are
practicing what we preach. Dan's page currently lists 25 or so library-related open
source projects; Let's keep that list growing, and the number of institutions
contributing to that list growing as well.

-- Jeremy

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Jeremy Frumkin
Meta-data Librarian
University of Arizona Library

jfrumkin@bird.library.arizona.edu
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