Friday 28 October 2011

LMS Announcement

At the Local Government Association (LGA) AGM this morning LGA President, Mayor Kym McHugh announced that Sirsi Dynix had been chosen as the supplier for the Library Management System for the SA public libraries consortium.  Mayor McHugh paid tribute to the strong partnership between the LGA, the Libraries Board and the State Government who have worked together to ensure that this transformational project will proceed.  He also noted the active involvement of over 80 staff from public libraries who participated in the evaluation process.

While the accompanying media release does focus on the money side of things - i.e. savings, it did include a great quote from Minister Hill who said "I urge anyone with an image of dusty bookshelves in their minds to visit their local library - they will discover vibrant centres with online access and services for all ages." 

The consortium will deploy the Symphony LMS and the Enterprise discovery solution, along with "enriched content" and reporting tools Web Reporter & Director's Station.  The Symphony Facebook App will also be available for libraries.  One of the strengths of the chosen solution is the proven ability of the product to support a consortium approach which allows for high levels of local flexibility for consortium members.

A contract with Sirsi Dynix is in the final stages of negotiation.  Once this has been completed we (the Libraries Board and the Local Government Corporate Services) will be in direct contact with councils and libraries to put formal offers to councils regarding participation in the consortium.

The Libraries Board is looking forward to supporting the State's public libraries in implementing a new system which will provide increased access and new services for the public of South Australia.  To quote Jenny McDonald of the National Library of New Zealand at yesterday's Libraries Australia forum, "We lower the barriers to access for customers and just watch the usage grow."

2 comments:

  1. Exciting times ahead with learning Symphony and implementing the LMS. Which libraries currently use Symphony?

    ReplyDelete
  2. The only public library ins SA that operates Symphony is Alexandrina. However they do not have the discovery layer Enterprise.

    ReplyDelete