[CODE4LIB] Experience with codeIgniter?
I'm helping some folks find a new platform for their web site, and someone has suggested codeIgniter as being simpler than Drupal or Wordpress. Anyone here have anything to say about it, good or bad? The site is small and light weight but it does have a database that needs to be managed. Thanks, kc -- Karen Coyle kco...@kcoyle.net http://kcoyle.net ph: 1-510-540-7596 m: 1-510-435-8234 skype: kcoylenet
Re: [CODE4LIB] Experience with codeIgniter?
Are your 'folks' looking for a content management system, Karen? As Mark just mentioned, CodeIgniter is a web application development framework -- that is, a set of reusable programming code that makes it easier for programmers to build applications for the web. The key terms there being programmers and build. That is a very different kind of thing from Drupal or WordPress, which are systems (that have already been built) to manage content for a website. You don't have to be a programmer to use either of those. --Dave - David Walker Library Web Services Manager California State University -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Mark Jordan Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 6:08 AM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Experience with codeIgniter? Karen, I used CI for a project last summer, and thought it was easy to learn if you had done some PHP programming before and were familiar with MVC architecture, well documented, and had a fairly rich feature set. However, my impression is that it had a very small plugin/module ecosystem compared to Drupal or Wordpress. Before recommending it, you should review the categories under 'Contributions' at http://codeigniter.com/wiki to see if you can identify any glaring holes. But, overall, I'd say it's a pretty good PHP MVC framework (not that I've compared a lot of them). Mark Mark Jordan Head of Library Systems W.A.C. Bennett Library, Simon Fraser University Burnaby, British Columbia, V5A 1S6, Canada Voice: 778.782.5753 / Fax: 778.782.3023 / Skype: mark.jordan50 mjor...@sfu.ca - Original Message - I'm helping some folks find a new platform for their web site, and someone has suggested codeIgniter as being simpler than Drupal or Wordpress. Anyone here have anything to say about it, good or bad? The site is small and light weight but it does have a database that needs to be managed. Thanks, kc -- Karen Coyle kco...@kcoyle.net http://kcoyle.net ph: 1-510-540-7596 m: 1-510-435-8234 skype: kcoylenet
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 11:31 AM, Chris Fitzpatrick cf...@stanford.edu wrote: I just had a Howard Beale moment with Apple. I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore. I'm curious what people can suggest for linux laptop? Any suggestions for distros and hardware? thanks. b,chris. I've been using Arch Linux for quite a while. If you're already comfortable with Linux, you may want to try it. But it's a little more hands on than most distros. I've been using one or another Asus laptop (currently UL50A) for many years now, and have always been happy. /dev
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 11:31, Chris Fitzpatrick cf...@stanford.edu wrote: I just had a Howard Beale moment with Apple. I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore. I'm curious what people can suggest for linux laptop? Any suggestions for distros and hardware? I've been using Ubuntu since 2006 or so on all kinds of different hardware, and I'm pretty pleased with it. Each release has been more polished than the last, generally, but still, you should be comfortable with a certain amount of tinkering, IMO. Some of us do this anyway, so it's easy to forget the time we spend tweaking and futzing. As for hardware, I've mostly had Ubuntu on Dell hardware at work. My latest box at home is a Lenovo IdeaPad Y570. My experiences with it are similar to Chad's -- works just fine despite some video issues under 11.04. -Mike
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
I'll throw in another +1 for Ubuntu. Among the mainstream distributions, it's the one that makes the most effort to set things in the Do What You Want way that Apple is so good at. Regarding hardware: remember that ALL computer hardware these days is insanely over-specced. So buy last year's model at half the price of this years, and smile happily at the knowledge that (A) you really won't miss the other 0.3 GHz of processor speed; and (B) the standard Ubuntu distribution will have mature drivers for all your hardware, which may not be the case for a latest-and-greatest model. In my experience, the things that make the biggest difference to the quality of experience when using a laptop are (1) screen resolution -- not physical size; (2) memory, which you should be able to upgrade as needed, and (3) the big surprise for me, quality of pointing device. The trackpad on new MacBooks is excellent, but those on most other machines are terrible, so try before you buy. I also get on well will ThinkPad nipples, but not everyone likes them. Hope this helps, -- Mike. On 14 December 2011 17:00, Jon Stroop jstr...@princeton.edu wrote: I've run Ubuntu on Dell, Sony, and (presently) Alienware laptops, all without a problem. Ubuntu tries extra-hard to make sure that this is the case with wireless, Bluetooth, webcams, etc. so as far as distros go that might be your best option, but since it's all I've ever run my perspective lacks scope. I'd say back into it--spec a laptop you'd like, and then have a poke around the web and see if anyone is having problems, remembering that no news is probably good news in this case. -Jon On 12/14/2011 11:51 AM, Ellen Wilson wrote: I have an Acer laptop that I bought for $298 at Walmart, so it's hardly top of the line. However, I installed Ubuntu on it with absolutely zero problems. On the Windows side, it runs Portal, so I'm happy. Ellen Ellen Knowlton Wilson Instructional Services Librarian Room 250, University Library 5901 USA Drive North University of South Alabama Mobile, AL 36688 (251) 460-6045 ewil...@jaguar1.usouthal.edu - Original Message - From: Chris Fitzpatrickcf...@stanford.edu Date: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 10:32 am Subject: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU I just had a Howard Beale moment with Apple. I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore. I'm curious what people can suggest for linux laptop? Any suggestions for distros and hardware? thanks. b,chris.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting
It's a shame you have to be registered even to see the shirts. :( Ralph -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Angie Beiriger Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:00 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Last Call for T-shirt voting Hey Code4Libbers, have you cast your vote for the 2012 Conference t-shirt design yet? Visit http://vote.code4lib.org/election/22 to view the designs and rank your favorites. You must be registered for a Code4Lib user account to vote. New users should go to http://code4lib.org/user/register to sign up for an account. Click on the designer's name to see their submissions. Voting will be open through Friday, December 16th. Thanks and happy voting! Angie Beiriger Reed College Portland, OR beiri...@reed.edu
Re: [CODE4LIB] Experience with codeIgniter?
It seems to me that WordPress would be good for the simple and lightweight part of their website. It would allow them to easily create, delete, and update pages for the site. Plus, if they have press releases or other types of newsy content, WordPress is a second to none for blogging. But you could say much the same for any CMS, really. The real trick here, it seems, is what to do with this database they have. In order to manage that, you really do need to create some kind of specialized application. Drupal, and some of the other CMS's, have tools for creating those kinds of applications. But, depending on what this database actually consists of, in some respects, it can be easier just to build something from scratch. And if the consultant is going to do that for this organization using CodeIgniter (or any other programming framework), then that certainly makes sense. --Dave - David Walker Library Web Services Manager California State University -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Karen Coyle Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 6:54 AM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Experience with codeIgniter? Thanks, Dave and Mark -- this is exactly what I needed to hear. The folks are one of those extremely poor non-profits with almost no staff and zero technical skills. A consulting company is pushing them in this direction saying that Drupal is buggy and WordPress is ... well, I don't know. Dang! I hate being in the middle of this. I still think they'd be better off going with one of the known CMS packages. kc Quoting Walker, David dwal...@calstate.edu: Are your 'folks' looking for a content management system, Karen? As Mark just mentioned, CodeIgniter is a web application development framework -- that is, a set of reusable programming code that makes it easier for programmers to build applications for the web. The key terms there being programmers and build. That is a very different kind of thing from Drupal or WordPress, which are systems (that have already been built) to manage content for a website. You don't have to be a programmer to use either of those. --Dave - David Walker Library Web Services Manager California State University -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Mark Jordan Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 6:08 AM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Experience with codeIgniter? Karen, I used CI for a project last summer, and thought it was easy to learn if you had done some PHP programming before and were familiar with MVC architecture, well documented, and had a fairly rich feature set. However, my impression is that it had a very small plugin/module ecosystem compared to Drupal or Wordpress. Before recommending it, you should review the categories under 'Contributions' at http://codeigniter.com/wiki to see if you can identify any glaring holes. But, overall, I'd say it's a pretty good PHP MVC framework (not that I've compared a lot of them). Mark Mark Jordan Head of Library Systems W.A.C. Bennett Library, Simon Fraser University Burnaby, British Columbia, V5A 1S6, Canada Voice: 778.782.5753 / Fax: 778.782.3023 / Skype: mark.jordan50 mjor...@sfu.ca - Original Message - I'm helping some folks find a new platform for their web site, and someone has suggested codeIgniter as being simpler than Drupal or Wordpress. Anyone here have anything to say about it, good or bad? The site is small and light weight but it does have a database that needs to be managed. Thanks, kc -- Karen Coyle kco...@kcoyle.net http://kcoyle.net ph: 1-510-540-7596 m: 1-510-435-8234 skype: kcoylenet -- Karen Coyle kco...@kcoyle.net http://kcoyle.net ph: 1-510-540-7596 m: 1-510-435-8234 skype: kcoylenet
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 10:31 AM, Chris Fitzpatrick cf...@stanford.edu wrote: I just had a Howard Beale moment with Apple. I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore. What caused this moment? If you're thinking man, OS X is so dodgy or this is some crap quality hardware then a switch is probably not going to make you happy. If you're thinking good lord this is expensive gear or I want to configure everything on the planet then yeah, it might. Linux is great. My experience with linux laptops is that there are quite a number of 'mad as hell' moments to be had there, though. Computers in general are great at generating those. -n
Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting
Yes, my feeling exactly. In fact, I WAS registered, once a upon a time, but it seems the system has forgotten my old username/password. And I really don't want to re-register just to look at T-shirts. -- Mike. On 14 December 2011 17:10, LeVan,Ralph le...@oclc.org wrote: It's a shame you have to be registered even to see the shirts. :( Ralph -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Angie Beiriger Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:00 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Last Call for T-shirt voting Hey Code4Libbers, have you cast your vote for the 2012 Conference t-shirt design yet? Visit http://vote.code4lib.org/election/22 to view the designs and rank your favorites. You must be registered for a Code4Lib user account to vote. New users should go to http://code4lib.org/user/register to sign up for an account. Click on the designer's name to see their submissions. Voting will be open through Friday, December 16th. Thanks and happy voting! Angie Beiriger Reed College Portland, OR beiri...@reed.edu
Re: [CODE4LIB] Experience with codeIgniter?
On 12/14/2011 08:14, Karen Coyle wrote: I'm helping some folks find a new platform for their web site, and someone has suggested codeIgniter as being simpler than Drupal or Wordpress. Anyone here have anything to say about it, good or bad? The site is small and light weight but it does have a database that needs to be managed. I built an app several years ago [1] in Kohana 2.3, which was a fork of CodeIgniter. Since then CI has become more of what made me opt for Kohana instead of CI to begin with: they dropped legacy support for PHP4 (which they had been ideologically hanging onto) and became more OO. I liked it. It was a lean full framework, featured without being a massive superpower like symfony. (FTR most of my work is in symfony.) It's easy to grok and extend core, and includes utility classes to help, for example, construct forms. syfmony2 and CI are both very flexible, but CI is much simpler, so miles easier to jump into. That said, I don't think any framework (as one usually understands the term) will work well for a small library to build a regular content website - hosted WordPress sounds typical of a good match for these folks. [1] https://github.com/yitznewton/emeraldview -- Yitzchak Schaffer Systems Manager Touro College Libraries 212.742.8770 ext. 2432 http://www.tourolib.org/ Access Problems? Contact systems.libr...@touro.edu
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
You just cannot do the technical futzing easily on mac or doze, I too am a Ubuntu user on my desktop and servers getting stuff done web wise is faster that way.I expect to run the apache,php,mysql and replicate systems that are servers windows and mac screw with stupid things like case in the file system! Dave Caroline
Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting
Well, I'm going to just throw it out there and say that image gallery is out of scope for the diebold-o-tron. Editing the interface to allow non-logged in people to view ballots isn't something I have the time or energy for (it would be much faster for you to request a password change at: http://code4lib.org/user/password). In the past, we generally aggregated the designs on the wiki, which seems like the best solution for future access to all of the designs. -Ross. On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:14 PM, Mike Taylor m...@indexdata.com wrote: Yes, my feeling exactly. In fact, I WAS registered, once a upon a time, but it seems the system has forgotten my old username/password. And I really don't want to re-register just to look at T-shirts. -- Mike. On 14 December 2011 17:10, LeVan,Ralph le...@oclc.org wrote: It's a shame you have to be registered even to see the shirts. :( Ralph -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Angie Beiriger Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:00 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Last Call for T-shirt voting Hey Code4Libbers, have you cast your vote for the 2012 Conference t-shirt design yet? Visit http://vote.code4lib.org/election/22 to view the designs and rank your favorites. You must be registered for a Code4Lib user account to vote. New users should go to http://code4lib.org/user/register to sign up for an account. Click on the designer's name to see their submissions. Voting will be open through Friday, December 16th. Thanks and happy voting! Angie Beiriger Reed College Portland, OR beiri...@reed.edu
Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting
I might be wrong but I think people just want the images to be displayed somewhere where they can just see them - not necessarily voting and seeing ballots there. So posting images on a wiki page probably would suffice like in some previous years. ~Bohyun From: Code for Libraries [CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] on behalf of Ross Singer [rossfsin...@gmail.com] Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:22 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting Well, I'm going to just throw it out there and say that image gallery is out of scope for the diebold-o-tron. Editing the interface to allow non-logged in people to view ballots isn't something I have the time or energy for (it would be much faster for you to request a password change at: http://code4lib.org/user/password). In the past, we generally aggregated the designs on the wiki, which seems like the best solution for future access to all of the designs. -Ross. On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:14 PM, Mike Taylor m...@indexdata.com wrote: Yes, my feeling exactly. In fact, I WAS registered, once a upon a time, but it seems the system has forgotten my old username/password. And I really don't want to re-register just to look at T-shirts. -- Mike. On 14 December 2011 17:10, LeVan,Ralph le...@oclc.org wrote: It's a shame you have to be registered even to see the shirts. :( Ralph -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Angie Beiriger Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:00 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Last Call for T-shirt voting Hey Code4Libbers, have you cast your vote for the 2012 Conference t-shirt design yet? Visit http://vote.code4lib.org/election/22 to view the designs and rank your favorites. You must be registered for a Code4Lib user account to vote. New users should go to http://code4lib.org/user/register to sign up for an account. Click on the designer's name to see their submissions. Voting will be open through Friday, December 16th. Thanks and happy voting! Angie Beiriger Reed College Portland, OR beiri...@reed.edu
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
How much futzing around is required on MacOS since it doesn't have a good package manager? On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:25 PM, Dave Caroline dave.thearchiv...@gmail.com wrote: You just cannot do the technical futzing easily on mac or doze, I too am a Ubuntu user on my desktop and servers getting stuff done web wise is faster that way.I expect to run the apache,php,mysql and replicate systems that are servers windows and mac screw with stupid things like case in the file system! Dave Caroline
[CODE4LIB] Kaltura and Institutional Repository connector
Hi all, **Please excuse the cross-posting of this email** Here at Northwestern University we are currently evaluating Kaltura's video streaming service. There has been some discussion between some institutions and Kaltura regarding Kaltura building a connector to use with different institutional repositories (e.g. Fedora, DSpace, ContentDM). I'm trying to compile a list of institutions that would be interested in using such a connector. If you're interested, I'd greatly appreciate you replying to me (m-strom...@northwestern.edumailto:m-strom...@northwestern.edu) with your institution and which repository software you're using. We need your responses very soon (if possible, before the holiday break) in order to bring this information to Kaltura in a timely manner. Feel free to pass this email along to other lists. Thanks very much, Mike Stroming Senior Software Developer, Enterprise Systems Library Technology Division Northwestern University Library (847) 491-8345
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:25 PM, Dave Caroline dave.thearchiv...@gmail.com wrote: You just cannot do the technical futzing easily on mac or doze, I too am a Ubuntu user on my desktop and servers getting stuff done web wise is faster that way.I expect to run the apache,php,mysql and replicate systems that are servers windows and mac screw with stupid things like case in the file system! FWIW, both of my macs have case-sensitive filesystems, but, true, it is not enabled by default. -Ross.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:39 PM, Ethan Gruber ewg4x...@gmail.com wrote: How much futzing around is required on MacOS since it doesn't have a good package manager? /usr/bin/ruby -e $(curl -fsSL https://raw.github.com/gist/323731)
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:42 PM, Mark A. Matienzo m...@matienzo.org wrote: On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:39 PM, Ethan Gruber ewg4x...@gmail.com wrote: How much futzing around is required on MacOS since it doesn't have a good package manager? /usr/bin/ruby -e $(curl -fsSL https://raw.github.com/gist/323731) +1 HomeBrew keeps any futz factor to apt or yum levels. -Ross.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On Dec 14, 2011, at 11:46 AM, Ross Singer wrote: On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:42 PM, Mark A. Matienzo m...@matienzo.org wrote: On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:39 PM, Ethan Gruber ewg4x...@gmail.com wrote: How much futzing around is required on MacOS since it doesn't have a good package manager? /usr/bin/ruby -e $(curl -fsSL https://raw.github.com/gist/323731) +1 HomeBrew keeps any futz factor to apt or yum levels. ++ homebrew -Tod
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
Thanks everyone for all the recommendations. I know this would be this list to ask. Sounds like Ubuntu is the overwhelming favorite. In the past when I've used a linux in a non-server computer, there are always some annoying problems... things like the laptop not waking from sleep mode, power consumption problems, or the microphone not working. So, I wondering about specific laptop brands/models and linux distributions/versions that people have found to work really well. A Dell or ThinkPad with Ubuntu seems to be the popular choice? But, yeah, I know i started it, but I'm going to avoid going deeper into my opinions on Apple vs. Windows vs. Linux and the implications vis-à-vis productivity, copyright, social justice, and the plight of the polar bear. If only out of concern that introducing this discussion might cause the poor mail server at ND to meltdown….. b,chris. On Dec 14, 2011, at 9:25 AM, Dave Caroline wrote: You just cannot do the technical futzing easily on mac or doze, I too am a Ubuntu user on my desktop and servers getting stuff done web wise is faster that way.I expect to run the apache,php,mysql and replicate systems that are servers windows and mac screw with stupid things like case in the file system! Dave Caroline
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On 12/14/2011 12:18 PM, Bill Dueber wrote: The question you should ask yourself -- AND PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, LET'S NOT HASH IT OUT ON THIS LIST!!! -- is, How much of my time spent futzing around with Linux instead of Getting Shit Done is voting-with-my-feet worth to me? Is Linux so nice as all that? asked the Mole shyly. Nice? It's the only thing, said the Water Rat solemnly. Believe me, my young friend, there is nothing--absolutely nothing--half so much worth doing as simply futzing around with Linux. Simply futzing, he went on dreamily, futzing -- about -- with -- Linux...
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
Check out the below companies. I have no experience with them, but were I in your shoes, I'd take a thorough look. http://www.system76.com/ http://zareason.com/shop/home.php http://www.emperorlinux.com/ Roy Zimmer Western Michigan University On 12/14/2011 11:31 AM, Chris Fitzpatrick wrote: I just had a Howard Beale moment with Apple. I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore. I'm curious what people can suggest for linux laptop? Any suggestions for distros and hardware? thanks. b,chris.
[CODE4LIB] Any ideas for free pdf to excel conversion?
Just looking to preserve column structure. -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
At Wed, 14 Dec 2011 09:54:09 -0800, Chris Fitzpatrick wrote: Thanks everyone for all the recommendations. I know this would be this list to ask. Sounds like Ubuntu is the overwhelming favorite. In the past when I've used a linux in a non-server computer, there are always some annoying problems... things like the laptop not waking from sleep mode, power consumption problems, or the microphone not working. So, I wondering about specific laptop brands/models and linux distributions/versions that people have found to work really well. A Dell or ThinkPad with Ubuntu seems to be the popular choice? But, yeah, I know i started it, but I'm going to avoid going deeper into my opinions on Apple vs. Windows vs. Linux and the implications vis-à-vis productivity, copyright, social justice, and the plight of the polar bear. If only out of concern that introducing this discussion might cause the poor mail server at ND to meltdown….. For what its worth, I run Ubuntu happily on my old (2007) macbook. The only real tricky part is the lack of 2 pointer buttons. So you don’t need to get rid of the mac to switch off OS X. That said, I would not buy a mac again, if only because Apple has gone into full-bore evil mode. Finally, in my biased experience, a system running Ubuntu is now more usable than a system running OS X. This is my experience, and I am not going to argue about it. :) I imagine it works even better if you buy a system that is certified or pre-installed. And if you are interested in a netbook, although Ubuntu has discontinued the Ubuntu Netbook Edition, I think the Unity interface is pretty slick on a small netbook screen. best, Erik Sent from my free software system http://fsf.org/. pgpPAb27CWp55.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting
I tried to add these to the wiki, but I HATE WIKI SYNTAX! So, I put them up here: http://lenny1.gsu.edu:82/c4ltees/ However, this will not be around forever as it is a dev box. If someone with access to the code4lib website wants to just steal the html, please do or if you want the really ugly 8 minute php, it's yours. Chad Chad Nelson Web Services Programmer University Library Georgia State University e: cnelso...@gsu.edu t: 404 413 2771 My Calendar From: Code for Libraries [CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] on behalf of Bohyun Kim [k...@fiu.edu] Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:27 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting I might be wrong but I think people just want the images to be displayed somewhere where they can just see them - not necessarily voting and seeing ballots there. So posting images on a wiki page probably would suffice like in some previous years. ~Bohyun From: Code for Libraries [CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] on behalf of Ross Singer [rossfsin...@gmail.com] Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:22 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting Well, I'm going to just throw it out there and say that image gallery is out of scope for the diebold-o-tron. Editing the interface to allow non-logged in people to view ballots isn't something I have the time or energy for (it would be much faster for you to request a password change at: http://code4lib.org/user/password). In the past, we generally aggregated the designs on the wiki, which seems like the best solution for future access to all of the designs. -Ross. On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:14 PM, Mike Taylor m...@indexdata.com wrote: Yes, my feeling exactly. In fact, I WAS registered, once a upon a time, but it seems the system has forgotten my old username/password. And I really don't want to re-register just to look at T-shirts. -- Mike. On 14 December 2011 17:10, LeVan,Ralph le...@oclc.org wrote: It's a shame you have to be registered even to see the shirts. :( Ralph -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Angie Beiriger Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:00 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Last Call for T-shirt voting Hey Code4Libbers, have you cast your vote for the 2012 Conference t-shirt design yet? Visit http://vote.code4lib.org/election/22 to view the designs and rank your favorites. You must be registered for a Code4Lib user account to vote. New users should go to http://code4lib.org/user/register to sign up for an account. Click on the designer's name to see their submissions. Voting will be open through Friday, December 16th. Thanks and happy voting! Angie Beiriger Reed College Portland, OR beiri...@reed.edu
Re: [CODE4LIB] Any ideas for free pdf to excel conversion?
Are you sure the pdf has any structure that can be used. Dave Caroline On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 6:08 PM, Matt Amory matt.am...@gmail.com wrote: Just looking to preserve column structure. -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] Experience with codeIgniter?
Hi, Karen, my own experience with Drupal is, you need to keep it updated. For anyone building with Drupal, I hear tell [1] the best practice these days is to use DRUSH (Drupal Shell) to provision and deploy your site... Keeps upgrades nice and smooth. Also, my experience has been, for small projects, Wordpress makes a very nice CMS, and is hugely popular as a CMS [2]. Two other alternatives for you to consider in the lightweight CMS category are TextPattern [3] and SilverStripe [4]. But really, there are good reasons Wordpress is winning this fight. See [2] for details. [1] discerning readers will note the vagueness of this recommendation, it comes secondhand from someone who maintains Drupal sites on something other than RHEL5. Ubuntu Server, I believe. Long story short, DRUSH is handy, if you can get it to run on your OS. http://www.drush.org/ [2] http://wp.smashingmagazine.com/2011/11/29/wordpress-cms-crown-drupal-joomla [3] http://textpattern.com/ [4] http://www.silverstripe.org/ -- HARDY POTTINGER pottinge...@umsystem.edu University of Missouri Library Systems http://lso.umsystem.edu/~pottingerhj/ https://MOspace.umsystem.edu/ Don't undertake a project unless it is manifestly important and nearly impossible. --Edwin Land On 12/14/11 8:54 AM, Karen Coyle li...@kcoyle.net wrote: Thanks, Dave and Mark -- this is exactly what I needed to hear. The folks are one of those extremely poor non-profits with almost no staff and zero technical skills. A consulting company is pushing them in this direction saying that Drupal is buggy and WordPress is ... well, I don't know. Dang! I hate being in the middle of this. I still think they'd be better off going with one of the known CMS packages. kc Quoting Walker, David dwal...@calstate.edu: Are your 'folks' looking for a content management system, Karen? As Mark just mentioned, CodeIgniter is a web application development framework -- that is, a set of reusable programming code that makes it easier for programmers to build applications for the web. The key terms there being programmers and build. That is a very different kind of thing from Drupal or WordPress, which are systems (that have already been built) to manage content for a website. You don't have to be a programmer to use either of those. --Dave - David Walker Library Web Services Manager California State University -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Mark Jordan Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 6:08 AM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Experience with codeIgniter? Karen, I used CI for a project last summer, and thought it was easy to learn if you had done some PHP programming before and were familiar with MVC architecture, well documented, and had a fairly rich feature set. However, my impression is that it had a very small plugin/module ecosystem compared to Drupal or Wordpress. Before recommending it, you should review the categories under 'Contributions' at http://codeigniter.com/wiki to see if you can identify any glaring holes. But, overall, I'd say it's a pretty good PHP MVC framework (not that I've compared a lot of them). Mark Mark Jordan Head of Library Systems W.A.C. Bennett Library, Simon Fraser University Burnaby, British Columbia, V5A 1S6, Canada Voice: 778.782.5753 / Fax: 778.782.3023 / Skype: mark.jordan50 mjor...@sfu.ca - Original Message - I'm helping some folks find a new platform for their web site, and someone has suggested codeIgniter as being simpler than Drupal or Wordpress. Anyone here have anything to say about it, good or bad? The site is small and light weight but it does have a database that needs to be managed. Thanks, kc -- Karen Coyle kco...@kcoyle.net http://kcoyle.net ph: 1-510-540-7596 m: 1-510-435-8234 skype: kcoylenet -- Karen Coyle kco...@kcoyle.net http://kcoyle.net ph: 1-510-540-7596 m: 1-510-435-8234 skype: kcoylenet
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
Possible bridges to whatever you decide to get: - Use Ubuntu on VirtualBox on your Mac (yes, I did see the using 'linux in a non-server computer' concern -- thus the bridge qualification). - Depending on the issues and languages you're using, use in-language package-managers. For example, we have a library of python repository code with three python-package dependences: fcrepo, lxml, and solrpy. Using 'pip' (a python package-manager), we've created a simple requirements file, so that, when I run, on my mac, a pip-install command for our repo_utils, it automatically web-downloads and installs those packages if necessary (even specific versions if desired). And this'll work the same on your Mac, VBox, and a possible eventual linux laptop. -Birkin --- Birkin James Diana Programmer, Digital Technologies Brown University Library birkin_di...@brown.edu On Dec 14, 2011, at 12:54 PM, Chris Fitzpatrick wrote: Thanks everyone for all the recommendations. I know this would be this list to ask. Sounds like Ubuntu is the overwhelming favorite. In the past when I've used a linux in a non-server computer, there are always some annoying problems... things like the laptop not waking from sleep mode, power consumption problems, or the microphone not working. So, I wondering about specific laptop brands/models and linux distributions/versions that people have found to work really well. A Dell or ThinkPad with Ubuntu seems to be the popular choice? But, yeah, I know i started it, but I'm going to avoid going deeper into my opinions on Apple vs. Windows vs. Linux and the implications vis-à-vis productivity, copyright, social justice, and the plight of the polar bear. If only out of concern that introducing this discussion might cause the poor mail server at ND to meltdown….. b,chris.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting
Thanks, Chad! Ralph -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Chad Benjamin Nelson Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 1:51 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: Last Call for T-shirt voting I tried to add these to the wiki, but I HATE WIKI SYNTAX! So, I put them up here: http://lenny1.gsu.edu:82/c4ltees/ However, this will not be around forever as it is a dev box. If someone with access to the code4lib website wants to just steal the html, please do or if you want the really ugly 8 minute php, it's yours. Chad Chad Nelson Web Services Programmer University Library Georgia State University e: cnelso...@gsu.edu t: 404 413 2771 My Calendar From: Code for Libraries [CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] on behalf of Bohyun Kim [k...@fiu.edu] Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:27 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting I might be wrong but I think people just want the images to be displayed somewhere where they can just see them - not necessarily voting and seeing ballots there. So posting images on a wiki page probably would suffice like in some previous years. ~Bohyun From: Code for Libraries [CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] on behalf of Ross Singer [rossfsin...@gmail.com] Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:22 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Last Call for T-shirt voting Well, I'm going to just throw it out there and say that image gallery is out of scope for the diebold-o-tron. Editing the interface to allow non-logged in people to view ballots isn't something I have the time or energy for (it would be much faster for you to request a password change at: http://code4lib.org/user/password). In the past, we generally aggregated the designs on the wiki, which seems like the best solution for future access to all of the designs. -Ross. On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 12:14 PM, Mike Taylor m...@indexdata.com wrote: Yes, my feeling exactly. In fact, I WAS registered, once a upon a time, but it seems the system has forgotten my old username/password. And I really don't want to re-register just to look at T-shirts. -- Mike. On 14 December 2011 17:10, LeVan,Ralph le...@oclc.org wrote: It's a shame you have to be registered even to see the shirts. :( Ralph -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Angie Beiriger Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 12:00 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Last Call for T-shirt voting Hey Code4Libbers, have you cast your vote for the 2012 Conference t-shirt design yet? Visit http://vote.code4lib.org/election/22 to view the designs and rank your favorites. You must be registered for a Code4Lib user account to vote. New users should go to http://code4lib.org/user/register to sign up for an account. Click on the designer's name to see their submissions. Voting will be open through Friday, December 16th. Thanks and happy voting! Angie Beiriger Reed College Portland, OR beiri...@reed.edu
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
Thanks! Evil doesn't really concern me. If I could run Ubuntu on a laptop made in the pits of hell by the dark lord himself, I would certainly do it. Just as long as I never have to say the words Genius Bar, I will be happy. On Dec 14, 2011, at 11:30 AM, Birkin Diana wrote: Possible bridges to whatever you decide to get: - Use Ubuntu on VirtualBox on your Mac (yes, I did see the using 'linux in a non-server computer' concern -- thus the bridge qualification). - Depending on the issues and languages you're using, use in-language package-managers. For example, we have a library of python repository code with three python-package dependences: fcrepo, lxml, and solrpy. Using 'pip' (a python package-manager), we've created a simple requirements file, so that, when I run, on my mac, a pip-install command for our repo_utils, it automatically web-downloads and installs those packages if necessary (even specific versions if desired). And this'll work the same on your Mac, VBox, and a possible eventual linux laptop. -Birkin --- Birkin James Diana Programmer, Digital Technologies Brown University Library birkin_di...@brown.edu On Dec 14, 2011, at 12:54 PM, Chris Fitzpatrick wrote: Thanks everyone for all the recommendations. I know this would be this list to ask. Sounds like Ubuntu is the overwhelming favorite. In the past when I've used a linux in a non-server computer, there are always some annoying problems... things like the laptop not waking from sleep mode, power consumption problems, or the microphone not working. So, I wondering about specific laptop brands/models and linux distributions/versions that people have found to work really well. A Dell or ThinkPad with Ubuntu seems to be the popular choice? But, yeah, I know i started it, but I'm going to avoid going deeper into my opinions on Apple vs. Windows vs. Linux and the implications vis-à-vis productivity, copyright, social justice, and the plight of the polar bear. If only out of concern that introducing this discussion might cause the poor mail server at ND to meltdown….. b,chris.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
I have ubuntu linux running as a dual boot on my Gateway Laptop. It runs pretty nicely - I leave it run for days when I' m doing some Web testing and such. Nic. -Original Message- From: Code for Libraries [mailto:CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU] On Behalf Of Mark Diggory Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 2:41 PM To: CODE4LIB@LISTSERV.ND.EDU Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop If Apple is evil, I'd look more towards hardware and its environmental manufacturing impact rather than software/OS/culture. Everyone puts up a good face: http://www.apple.com/environment/ http://www.lenovo.com/social_responsibility/us/en/index.html But recent news is a bit alarming... http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/oct/04/apple-chinese-pollution-concerns http://valuestream2009.wordpress.com/2011/09/02/chinese-ngo-claims-apples-supply-chain-sustainability-is-rotten-to-the-core-will-consumers-agree/ Apparently it is difficult to capture statistics on the full supply chain. However, if your interested you can pickup the first Carbon Neutral Footprint laptop from ASUS *http://tinyurl.com/d6lb76g* Mark On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 10:25 AM, Erik Hetzner erik.hetz...@ucop.eduwrote: At Wed, 14 Dec 2011 09:54:09 -0800, Chris Fitzpatrick wrote: Thanks everyone for all the recommendations. I know this would be this list to ask. Sounds like Ubuntu is the overwhelming favorite. In the past when I've used a linux in a non-server computer, there are always some annoying problems... things like the laptop not waking from sleep mode, power consumption problems, or the microphone not working. So, I wondering about specific laptop brands/models and linux distributions/versions that people have found to work really well. A Dell or ThinkPad with Ubuntu seems to be the popular choice? But, yeah, I know i started it, but I'm going to avoid going deeper into my opinions on Apple vs. Windows vs. Linux and the implications vis-à-vis productivity, copyright, social justice, and the plight of the polar bear. If only out of concern that introducing this discussion might cause the poor mail server at ND to meltdown….. For what its worth, I run Ubuntu happily on my old (2007) macbook. The only real tricky part is the lack of 2 pointer buttons. So you don’t need to get rid of the mac to switch off OS X. That said, I would not buy a mac again, if only because Apple has gone into full-bore evil mode. Finally, in my biased experience, a system running Ubuntu is now more usable than a system running OS X. This is my experience, and I am not going to argue about it. :) I imagine it works even better if you buy a system that is certified or pre-installed. And if you are interested in a netbook, although Ubuntu has discontinued the Ubuntu Netbook Edition, I think the Unity interface is pretty slick on a small netbook screen. best, Erik Sent from my free software system http://fsf.org/. -- [image: @mire Inc.] *Mark Diggory* *2888 Loker Avenue East, Suite 305, Carlsbad, CA. 92010* *Esperantolaan 4, Heverlee 3001, Belgium* http://www.atmire.com
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
+1 Would love to get tight hardware integration without the social nail polish... On 12/14/2011 11:45 AM, Chris Fitzpatrick wrote: Thanks! Evil doesn't really concern me. If I could run Ubuntu on a laptop made in the pits of hell by the dark lord himself, I would certainly do it. Just as long as I never have to say the words Genius Bar, I will be happy. On Dec 14, 2011, at 11:30 AM, Birkin Diana wrote: Possible bridges to whatever you decide to get: - Use Ubuntu on VirtualBox on your Mac (yes, I did see the using 'linux in a non-server computer' concern -- thus the bridge qualification). - Depending on the issues and languages you're using, use in-language package-managers. For example, we have a library of python repository code with three python-package dependences: fcrepo, lxml, and solrpy. Using 'pip' (a python package-manager), we've created a simple requirements file, so that, when I run, on my mac, a pip-install command for our repo_utils, it automatically web-downloads and installs those packages if necessary (even specific versions if desired). And this'll work the same on your Mac, VBox, and a possible eventual linux laptop. -Birkin --- Birkin James Diana Programmer, Digital Technologies Brown University Library birkin_di...@brown.edu On Dec 14, 2011, at 12:54 PM, Chris Fitzpatrick wrote: Thanks everyone for all the recommendations. I know this would be this list to ask. Sounds like Ubuntu is the overwhelming favorite. In the past when I've used a linux in a non-server computer, there are always some annoying problems... things like the laptop not waking from sleep mode, power consumption problems, or the microphone not working. So, I wondering about specific laptop brands/models and linux distributions/versions that people have found to work really well. A Dell or ThinkPad with Ubuntu seems to be the popular choice? But, yeah, I know i started it, but I'm going to avoid going deeper into my opinions on Apple vs. Windows vs. Linux and the implications vis-à-vis productivity, copyright, social justice, and the plight of the polar bear. If only out of concern that introducing this discussion might cause the poor mail server at ND to meltdown….. b,chris.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 2:45 PM, Chris Fitzpatrick cf...@stanford.edu wrote: Thanks! Evil doesn't really concern me. If I could run Ubuntu on a laptop made in the pits of hell by the dark lord himself, I would certainly do it. Will this do? http://ubuntusatanic.org/screenshots.php.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 11:54 AM, Devon dec...@gmail.com wrote: On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 2:45 PM, Chris Fitzpatrick cf...@stanford.edu wrote: Thanks! Evil doesn't really concern me. If I could run Ubuntu on a laptop made in the pits of hell by the dark lord himself, I would certainly do it. Will this do? http://ubuntusatanic.org/screenshots.php. OMG...ROTFL Ok, the real ASUS link available for all, regardless of belief system. http://www.asus.com/Notebooks/Superior_Mobility/U53SD/ Mark
Re: [CODE4LIB] Any ideas for free pdf to excel conversion?
I'm not sure what structure the pdf has internally, but some free/nagware apps preserve the column structure. I'm looking for a way to pull 29 pages of pdf tables into excel so I can munge the data into an excel project and all my free trials so far have only converted a few pages at a time. thx On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 2:03 PM, Dave Caroline dave.thearchiv...@gmail.comwrote: Are you sure the pdf has any structure that can be used. Dave Caroline On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 6:08 PM, Matt Amory matt.am...@gmail.com wrote: Just looking to preserve column structure. -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239 -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
On 14.12.2011 11:31, Chris Fitzpatrick wrote: I just had a Howard Beale moment with Apple. I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore. I'm curious what people can suggest for linux laptop? Any suggestions for distros and hardware? thanks. b,chris. INSTALL GENTOO
Re: [CODE4LIB] Any ideas for free pdf to excel conversion?
On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 6:08 PM, Matt Amory matt.am...@gmail.com wrote: Just looking to preserve column structure. I'd probably try something like ps2ascii and then sed it into a csv which I understand that excel can load like libreoffice/openoffice can. More webbily, maybe scraperwiki.com can help. In general, it is rather like trying to rebuild a pig from sausages. :( Good luck, -- MJ Ray (slef), member of www.software.coop, a for-more-than-profit co-op. http://koha-community.org supporter, web and library systems developer. In My Opinion Only: see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html Available for hire (including development) at http://www.software.coop/
Re: [CODE4LIB] Any ideas for free pdf to excel conversion?
I'm looking for a way to pull 29 pages of pdf tables into excel so I can munge the data into an excel project and all my free trials so far have only converted a few pages at a time. copy and paste? If it needs to be somewhat automated pdftotext - some cut paste / sed / regex - open in excel? You might need to fiddle with the pdftotext settings, but I've been pretty successful with that before doing something else. Jon G.
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
Bill Dueber b...@dueber.com Because, really, you'll spend time futzing with linux, trying to get stuff to work, cursing the many clipboards and config files and losing productivity up the ying-yang because you're using a different (and, few would argue, degraded) user environment. I don't see how anyone would argue with a straight face that a good GNU or lovely Linux is an upgrade from the Windows 7 Starter bad joke... but I know that's not the starting point here. I humbly suggest that long futz times are only necessary these days when most of the following combine: 1. unsupported/hard-to-support hardware (maybe bought for compatibility with another even-fussier operating system?); 2. control-freakery (it must work/look exactly THIS way RIGHT NOW without me doing much); 3. not good at asking for technical help online or being patient with LUGs; 4. not willing to find and/or pay local experts; 5. not willing to search/read the copious fine manuals or debug logs. But maybe my view is coloured by using the MacOS-like gnustep on debian for aaages (so good package management more than makes up for a bit of configuration... it's basically the same package management system as ubuntu or mint use), so I can set up the basics fairly quickly and I'm quite tolerant of X11/GTK apps like firefox being common on my desktop. I guess newcomers still have to get used to basics like having 5 or more useful mouse buttons instead of 1... Regards, -- MJ Ray (slef), member of www.software.coop, a for-more-than-profit co-op. http://koha-community.org supporter, web and library systems developer. In My Opinion Only: see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html Available for hire (including development) at http://www.software.coop/
Re: [CODE4LIB] Any ideas for free pdf to excel conversion?
ABBYY Finereader can do this. http://www.abbyy.com Also, typing the company name can teleport you to different parts of the dungeon. Simon On Wed, Dec 14, 2011 at 1:08 PM, Matt Amory matt.am...@gmail.com wrote: Just looking to preserve column structure. -- Matt Amory (917) 771-4157 matt.am...@gmail.com http://www.linkedin.com/pub/matt-amory/8/515/239
[CODE4LIB] Equinox offering two scholarships for the 2012 Code4Lib conference
[Please excuse the cross-posting. Potential applicants should be aware of a new piece of information since the initial announcement: as part of our overall sponsorship of the conference, Equinox had one attendance slot that was reserved for an Equinox employee. We are now using that slot in order to make the scholarship of benefit to somebody who would otherwise not be able to attend the conference. If you meet the eligibility criteria and either didn't register for the conference yet or are on the waiting list, we encourage you to apply for the scholarship.] Equinox Software is offering 2 scholarships to the code4lib conference in February. The scholarships will reimburse travel and accommodation expenses up to $750.00 USD for a full-time employee from public libraries using either Evergreen or Koha to attend the Code4Lib Conference in Seattle, Washington, USA, from February 6-9, 2012. The awardees will also receive (depending on their circumstances) free registration to Code4Lib or reimbursement of an already-paid registration. ELIGIBILITY The applicants must be presently working in a public library that is currently using or is actively committed to moving to either Evergreen or Koha as their ILS. The applicants must indicate any amount and source of additional funding which, combined with the Scholarship, will permit them to cover their expenses to attend the Conference. (This will not reduce the amount of the award.) Preference will be given to underfunded libraries or libraries in budget crisis. DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONDecember 31, 2011 The email application should include a current resume, including all contact information, education, and experience, along with an essay as described below. The applicants will write up to 750 words of narrative in English to address the following: •Description of the library’s mission and commitment to open source solutions •How attendance may benefit the applicant •How the applicant intends to share the benefit of the experience with colleagues •Description of funding constraints, budgetary limitations, or travel/hiring freezes pertinent to the applicant’s situation APPLICATION ADDRESS: Please send resumes and essays to Grace Dunbar before December 31, 2011 by email attachment to c4lgr...@esilibrary.com NOTIFICATION: The successful applicants will be notified by January 5, 2012. Feel free to re-post this announcement and/or our press release (http://esilibrary.com/esi/newsitem.php?id=2182) Regards, Galen -- Galen Charlton Director of Support and Implementation Equinox Software, Inc. / The Open Source Experts email: g...@esilibrary.com direct: +1 770-709-5581 cell: +1 404-984-4366 skype: gmcharlt web:http://www.esilibrary.com/ Supporting Koha and Evergreen: http://koha-community.org http://evergreen-ils.org
[CODE4LIB] Q: best practices for *simple* contributor IP/licensing management for open source?
Also posted on my blog at: http://bibwild.wordpress.com/2011/12/14/practices-for-simple-contributor-management/ So, like many non-huge non-corporate-supported open source projects, many of the open source projects I contribute to go something like this (some of which I was original author, others not): * Someone starts the project in an publicly accessible repo. * If she works for a company, in the best case she got permission with her employer (who may or may not own copyright to code she writes) to release it as open source. * She sticks some open source License file in the repo saying “copying Carrie Coder” and/or the the name of the employer. Okay, so far so good, but then: * She adds someone else as a committer, who starts committing code. And/or accepts pull requests on github etc, committing code by other authors. * Never even thinks about licensing/intellectual property issues. What can go wrong? * Well, the license file probably still says ‘copyright Carrie Coder’ or ‘copyright Acme Inc’, even though the code by other authors has copyright held by them (or their employers). So right away something seems not all on the up and up. * One of those contributors can later be like “Wait, I didn’t mean to release that open source, and I own the copyright, you don’t have my permission to use it, take it out.” * Or worse, one of the contributors employers can assert they own the copyright and did not give permission for it to be released open source and you don’t have permission to use it (and neither does anyone else that’s copied or forked it from you). == Heavy weight solutions So there’s a really heavy-weight solution to this, like Apache Foundation uses in their Contributor License Agreement. This is something people have to actually print out and sign and mail in. Some agreements like this actually transfer the copyright to some corporate entity, presumably so the project can easily re-license under a different license later. (I thought Apache did this, but apparently not). This is kind of too much over-head for a simple non-corporate-sponsored open source project. Who’s going to receive all this mail, and where are they going to keep the contracts? There is no corporate entity to be granted a non-exclusive license to do anything. (And the hypothetical project isn’t nearly so important or popular to justify trying to get umbrella stewardship from Apache or the Software Freedom Conservancy or whatever.(If it were, the Software Freedom Conservancy is a good option, but still too much overhead for the dozens of different tiny-to-medium sized projects anyone may be involved in. ) Even so far as individuals, over the life of the project who the committers are may very well change, and not include the original author(s) anymore. And you don’t want to make someone print out sign and wait for you to receive something before accepting their commits, that’s not internet-speed. == Best practices for a simpler solution that’s not nothing? So doing it ‘right’ with that heavy-weight solution is just way too much trouble, so most of us just keep ignoring it. But is there some lighter-weight better-than-nothing probably-good-enough approach? I am curious if anyone can provide examples, ideally lawyer-vetted examples, of doing this much simpler. Most of my projects are MIT-style licensed, which already says “do whatever the heck you want with this code”, so I don’t really care about being able to re-license under a different license later (I don’t think I do? Or maybe even the MIT license would already allow anyone to do that). So I definitely don’t need and can’t really can’t handle paper print-outs. I’m imagining something where each contributor/accepted-pull-request-submitter basically just puts a digital file in the repo, once, that says something like “All the code I’ve contributed to this repo in past or future, I have the legal ability to release under license X, and I have done so.” And then I guess in the License file, instead of saying ‘copyright Original Author’, it would be like ‘copyright by various contributors, see files in ./contributors to see who.’ Does something along those lines end up working legally, or is it worthless, no better than just continuing to ignore the problem, so you might as well just continue to ignore the problem? Or if it is potentially workable, does anyone have examples of projects using such a system, ideally with some evidence some lawyer has said it’s worthwhile, including a lawyer-vetted digital contributor agreement? Any ideas?
Re: [CODE4LIB] Linux Laptop
FreeBSD FTW! ;) -Juan On 12/14/11 5:09 PM, Alexander Johannesen alexander.johanne...@gmail.com wrote: MJ Ray m...@phonecoop.coop wrote: I humbly suggest that long futz times are only necessary these days when most of the following combine: Hmm. 1. unsupported/hard-to-support hardware (maybe bought for compatibility with another even-fussier operating system?); Yes, this is the big offender, however I've never met an Ubuntu first install that didn't work good on the first try. It's only when you start tweaking stuff it seems it falls down a little. 2. control-freakery (it must work/look exactly THIS way RIGHT NOW without me doing much); Yes, hackers tweak, it's in their nature. They also know the consequences of hacking and tweaking, so I'm not sure this is bad thing per se. I personally went Linux *because* I like tweaking and then fixing my messes (my blog is full of angry anecdotes and stories about just this, some sillier than others), and there is one difference between (at least) the Windows world and the Linux world; fixing a broken Linux is tons easier than fixing a broken Windows, so even if we do talk about stuff getting broken the fixes are not even comparable. 3. not good at asking for technical help online or being patient with LUGs; Hardly ever used this. 4. not willing to find and/or pay local experts; I pay myself all the time. 5. not willing to search/read the copious fine manuals or debug logs. The amount of fragmented and irrelevant information out there is inverse proportional to the time you thought it would take to fix your problem. I guess newcomers still have to get used to basics like having 5 or more useful mouse buttons instead of 1... With the (reasonably) few mishaps I've had while updating and installing Ubuntu versions, I'm still a happy hacker that never regretted the move, even if the journey has been bumpy at times. However, a word of warning about Ubuntu is that it is moving in a direction that, to me, is completely wrong, so I'm switching to Mint (with that Gnome 3 layer that makes it Gnome 2 compatible). Unity is a travesty, and the people who hate it the most are ... the tweakers and hackers. Just sayin' Regards, Alex -- Project Wrangler, SOA, Information Alchemist, UX, RESTafarian, Topic Maps --- http://shelter.nu/blog/ -- -- http://www.google.com/profiles/alexander.johannesen ---
[CODE4LIB] Kindle Lending Programs
Hi all, I was recently charged with re-vamping our Kindle lending program. In the middle of this my 6 Kindles updated to the 3.3 firmware which threw a gigantic DRM wrench into my workflow. So, if you are thinking about doing Kindles (not Fires by the way) you might want to give this a read: http://code4lib.org/node/426 Questions, corrections, comments all welcome. Thanks, Pat
Re: [CODE4LIB] Q: best practices for *simple* contributor IP/licensing management for open source?
Trying to post inline in GroupWise, apologies if it ends up looking like crap... I*m imagining something where each contributor/accepted-pull-request-submitter basically just puts a digital file in the repo, once, that says something like *All the code I*ve contributed to this repo in past or future, I have the legal ability to release under license X, and I have done so.* And then I guess in the License file, instead of saying *copyright Original Author*, it would be like *copyright by various contributors, see files in ./contributors to see who.* I wouldn't suggest imagining new things when it comes to legal issues ;) I would suggest considering the Developer's Certificate of Originality (DCO) process as adopted by the Linux project and others (including Evergreen). When Evergreen was in the process of joining the Software Freedom Conservancy, that process was considered acceptable practice (IIRC, the Software Freedom Law Center did take a glance) - no doubt in part because it is a well-established practice. And talk about lightweight; using the git Signed-off-by tag indicates that you've read the DCO and agree to its terms. For a recent discussion and description of the DCO (in the context of the Project Harmony discussions which were focused primarily on the much heavier-weight CLA processes), see http://lists.harmonyagreements.org/pipermail/harmony-drafting/2011-August/99.html for example.
