Migrating from Innovative Interfaces' Millennium to Koha

Abstract

Purpose -This paper aims to explain the circumstances, methods and outcomes of the New York University Health Sciences Libraries' (NYUHSL) migration from their previous Integrated Library System (ILS), Innovative Interfaces, Inc.'s Millennium, to the open-source ILS Koha. Design/methodology/approach -Over the course of three months, the NYUHSL installed, tested, and configured Koha to match with its existing policies and procedures. Migration was performed at the close of the fiscal year, to reduce the amount of acquisitions data to migrate, as well as for contractual reasons. Training was purchased from a Koha support vendor, ByWater Solutions. After migrating, the staff of the NYUHSL identified areas of improvement for Koha, and began discussing how to implement enhancements. Findings -The paper identifies several areas of development for Koha, including electronic resource management, course reserves, and cataloging client enhancements. It proves that a migration from Millennium to Koha can be done very quickly, if the library is properly motivated. Originality/value -This paper provides libraries considering the move to open-source with a real-world success story, as well as many factors to consider. In particular, libraries considering the move from Millennium to Koha stand to benefit from the NYUHSL's experiences.

A comparison between select open source and proprietary integrated library systems

“…They noted further that some libraries were reluctant to fully use all of the modules in Koha. Walls (2011) records that Koha's Catalog module is less-usable for importing OCLC bibliographic records, lack of course reserves module, and has no electronic resource management. Conversely, Walls (2011) considers at least one function, the report formulation using SQL, as a strength of Koha.…”

Librarian as data migrator: a functional pathway from Millennium to Koha

“…At the time this project was undertaken in late 2014, few detailed accounts of Millennium to Koha data migrations were available. Our major source of inspiration was a 2011 article documenting the first recorded Millennium to Koha migration at the New York University Health Sciences Library (Walls, 2011). While NYU completed the same task within a similarly tight timeline, our data handling processes were significantly different.…”

“…To reduce server lag and create manageable files, this process was completed in five batches based on location codes (Archives, Main Library, Education Library, Special Collections, and Branch Campus). While the NYU migration team briefly explored this option, it was ultimately rejected, noting that "exporting as a list was not feasible due to the complexity of completely capturing all the MARC fields in a comma-delimited format" (Walls, 2011). While it is true that this technique does not capture complete MARC records, it can be used to export a set of descriptive elements that can be reassembled into MARC format.…”

Experiences of Migrating to Open Source Integrated Library Systems

“…In current studies, training can be done in two ways: either by buying training from a vendor, or doing it internally. 20 Dennison and Lewis found that having staff work on the system together at first and then try it independently was the most successful. 21 They had a demonstration system to practice, which also helped.…”

“…16 This time includes installation, testing, and configuration. One interesting decision they made was to migrate at the end of the fiscal year in order to limit the amount of acquisitions data to be migrated.…”