LMS development

I've been invited onto the group Ken Chad's pulling together to have a look at what comes after the UK Core Specification for library management systems, which is a flattering and interesting opportunity to try and put something positive into the library pot. At Rochdale we've no plans to change our LMS any time very soon so you may wondering why I'm bothering to get involved and potentially get some additional homework. The answer is: enlightened self-interest. The suppliers I'm working with have finite development and support resources and I would prefer to have them working on something that would add value for us looking forward rather than addressing scores of variations on the theme of "requirements that libraries have identified as missing from UKCS." 

I'm not going to tell any tales out of school but the first telephone conference meeting this morning felt really positive. The more so given the size, scope and — let's be honest — vagueness of the job in hand. So that bodes well.

If all that comes out of the work of this group is that libraries and suppliers aren't diluting scarce resources with redundant requirement iterations then that would be no bad thing. More than that, it's been interesting to see how quickly the idea of replacing or revising the UK Core Specification for library systems has evolved over the past few months from a change of specification into a change of methodology and this seems to be a group that could pick up on that, with the potential for some very useful medium-term benefits.