[Koha-devel] KOHA version 3.0, my question is about the advantages of KOHA 4

[James, Mason]

On 2011-06-7, at 6:19 AM, Clay Fouts wrote:

> On Mon, Jun 6, 2011 at 10:48 AM, Chris Nighswonger <cnighswonger at foundations.edu> wrote:
> standard. In the Koha community that standard has long been the code
> base in the main repo. So every fork is by definition only as nearly
> "Koha" as it conforms to that standard. Thus, the larger the delta
> between the fork and the main repo, the less the fork can be said to
> be "Koha." Its an inverse relationship if that is clearer. At this
> point in history, LibLime's fork has a pretty large delta and so is
> less "Koha" than other forks.
> 
> You speak like you haven't looked at the BibLibre diffs. I don't know that they're at any less of a delta than LibLime, and it's only getting larger. They are a very productive group. Where is your indignation when they call their product Koha? Software Coop, who apparently has no ambition to back port their own code, sells "Koha" support. Do you tell people that their software isn't really Koha? 

> These folks are obviously selling work that differs remarkably from "Koha" as you've defined it, and to my knowledge they don't even differentiate it with a "BibLibre Koha" or a "Software Coop" Koha the way that LibLime has chosen to do.

the big difference is that Biblibre, software-coop, (and all other Koha support companies) do *not* make their own Koha releases, 
unlike PTFS/Liblime

BL and SW-COOP understand that having many company-releases of many Koha-forks is harmful to the reputation of the Koha project, so they respectfully choose not to do that... (a subtle point that only PTFS/Liblime fail to understand)

... instead they continue to invest their energy submitting their enhancements and bug-fixes into the Koha codebase


PTFS/Liblime is the *only* company that continues to release its own 'Koha', and the only company to renege on it commitment to integrate its enhancements back to the Koha codebase

PTFS/Liblime seem to have missed the fundamental point of participating in the Koha project.


> The frequency with which we hear the phrase "New Zealand Koha" at conventions suggests the confusion may be deeper and more widespread than you have led yourself to believe.

Clay, i think that confusion exists only around conversations with PTFS/Liblime staff, at those conventions ;)


Mason