Koha Community Newsletter: February 2016
Koha Community Newsletter 
February 2016
Volume 7, Issue 2
ISSN 2153-8328
Edited by Chad Roseburg, Koha Community Newsletter Editor
Please submit news items to 
Table of Contents
- Development
- Community
- Upcoming Events
- Past Events
Development
Koha 3.22.4 Released
by Julian Maurice
The Koha community is proud to announce the release of Koha 3.22.4. Koha 3.22.4 is a bugfix/maintenance release.
It includes 3 enhancements and 32 bugfixes.
Installation instructions can be found at:
- Koha Wiki
- OR in the INSTALL files that come in the tarball
Download: http://koha-community.org/download-koha/
Koha 3.22.4: Packages available
by Galen Charlton
The package for 3.22.4 is now available from the Koha APT repository
debian.koha-community.org. As always, instructions for installing from
the packages can be found at:
https://wiki.koha-community.org/wiki/Debian
New Features and Bugs
Send SMS messages for free!
Kyle Hall announced a new feature coming to Koha 3.24. Free SMS messages using email is in the works. You can read Kyle’s post or check out the Bug report for more information.
Community
Koha to the rescue at Mapua Community Library
From Kathryn Tyree
Beautiful Mapua, near Nelson in New Zealand’s South Island, boasts its own community library. Entirely funded by grants and fundraising, this busy community service is staffed by a 30-strong force of dedicated volunteers.
The library had been running an older version of Koha Library Management System on an in-house server with no problems for years, until disaster struck. The server gave up completely, leaving the library without a library system and worries they had lost all data.
Anne Thompson, Library Coordinator, got in touch with Catalyst to let us know the situation, and we went straight to work getting the system restored.
Within a day, we had recovered the library’s data from a backup, and soon had them on the latest version of Koha running in the Catalyst Cloud. This means we handle all the server maintenance, while the library gets on with business.
As they’re now running a newer version of Koha on faster servers, library volunteers have noted with pleasure the system’s faster running speed, and mobile-responsive capability.
The library soared through the upgrade, and are getting on with business as usual, Mapua style. Anne says, “We have had no issues with the new version of Koha… we are lucky to in such a beautiful part of New Zealand and welcome anyone who wants to pop in and visit. Holidaymakers are welcome to become temporary members.”
New Koha Libraries
Community Gossip
Forthcoming article, “The Kansas Story: A Sea of Koha Green on the Plains”
From Heather Braum
Staff at the Central Kansas Library System, Northeast Kansas Library System, and Southeast Kansas Library System will have an article published in the OCLC Systems & Services: International digital library perspectives journal in late 2016. The article is on how our regional library systems each chose Koha and built consortia catalogs since 2007, the challenges we faced, how we’ve collaborated together, and more. Thanks to publication terms, we were able to put the preprint version of the article in an online repository, and it has been posted to the E-LIS repository, here: http://eprints.rclis.org/28918/. The article is titled, “The Kansas Story: A Sea of Koha Green on the Plains“.
- Danielle Elder discusses the gender gap in technology.
- Chris Cormack reports on three conferences he recently attended.
How To
Barton Chittendon shows you proper koha notice syntax for both overdue and advanced notices.
Vimal Kumar explains how to enable Google Indic transliteration in OPAC search box.
Let Vimal Kumar show you how to troubleshoot email issues with Postfix and Gmail.
Support Provider News
- ByWater Solutions ranks #1 in satisfaction with customer support for medium sized libraries in 2015 Perceptions Survey.
- ByWater Solutions issues $1,500 VoteLibraries Fundraising Challenge.
- Team Members from ByWater Solutions will be speaking at Computers in Libraries.
Upcoming Events
Kohacon16: News Update
by the Kohacon16 Committee
Spread the word!
KohaCon16 poster is ready. You can download, print and put it up on your notice boards!
Call for presentations deadline extended!
Submit your proposals before 7th of March 2016.
Call for sponsorships open!
Grab the opportunity to reach librarians, information specialists and software developers from around the world, who share the vision of openness in systems and information!
We reached a milestone: 100 people have registered already!
Beyond MARC – Koha, MarcEdit and BIBFRAME: March 15th and 16th
by Stefano Bargioni
We would like to invite you to “Beyond MARC, a discussion about Koha, MarcEdit and BIBFRAME” [1].
“Beyond MARC” is a two day conference that examines the evolution of how ILSs are impacted by linked data, RDA and the BIBFRAME project. Cataloguing concepts are moving beyond viewing a resource as a physical entity to viewing them as links between the object, titles, authors, subjects. Methods and tools will require a revision of the MARC format and an evolution of the latter toward a new logic to allow cultural institutions such as libraries, archives and museums to match and link their data with data available on the web, thus contributing to the semantic web. Open source ILSs like Koha and tools like MarcEdit can make a significant contribution to this evolution. The conference includes one day of discussion and analysis and one day of practical training in MarcEdit and BIBFRAME. The conference further marks the upcoming release of the new Koha with Elasticsearch as its new search engine. This conference is promoted by Koha Gruppo Italiano for the international Koha community.
The event is free of charge. You can register to the event through [2] or by e-mail to f.wallner@aur.edu.
[1] http://kohagruppoitaliano.moonfruit.com/download/i/mark_dl/u/4012402918/4626748054/Beyond%20MARC%20flyer%20eng.pdf
[2] https://beyondmarc.eventbrite.com
Koha Hackfest in Berlin
by Mirko Tietgen
Details for the Hackfest in Berlin are now set.
Date is 25–27 May 2016 (Wednesday to Friday) the week before
Kohacon. There are direct flights to Thessaloniki on Saturday and
Sunday.
Location is Büro 2.0, Weigandufer 45, 12059 Berlin.
There will be a Catmandu workshop.
Catmandu is a data toolkit. http://librecat.org/Catmandu/
Size of the location is limited, please let me know if you want to come.
More info: https://wiki.koha-community.org/wiki/Berlin_Hackfest_2016
March General IRC Meeting
The March general IRC meeting will be held on the 9th at 20:00 UTC.
The agenda, links to the minutes, and other information is here.
March Development IRC Meeting
The March Development IRC meeting will be held on the 1st at 15:00 UTC.
The agenda, links to the minutes, and other information is here.
Past Events
Koha Conclave Bangalore
The National Koha Conclave was held on February 17 and 18, 2016.
February General IRC Meeting
The February General IRC meeting was held on the 3rd at 10:00 UTC.
The agenda, links to the minutes, and other information is here.
February 2nd Development IRC Meeting
The first February Development IRC meeting was held on the 2nd at 15:00 UTC.
The agenda, links to the minutes, and other information is here.
February 16th Development IRC Meeting
The second February Development IRC meeting was held on the 16th at 19:00 UTC.
The agenda, links to the minutes, and other information is here.
Editor, Koha Community Newsletter