NewGenLib, which stands for New Generation Library, is an integrated library system (ILS) that some of you, especially those in India, Syria, Sudan, or Cambodia, will already know. It is the product of a 4-year collaboration between the Kesavan Institute of Information and Knowledge Management (KIIKM) and Verus Solutions Pvt. Limited (VSPL), both based in Hyderabad, India. Toward the end of 2007 a business decision was taken to release NewGenLib under the GNU General Public License (GPL). And thus NewGenLib was reborn as a free and open source software (FOSS) ILS.

The code - should you immediately want to begin investigating NewGenLib's functionality - is available from SourceForge, the repository of more than 170,000 FOSS projects: NewGenLib on SourceForge. Since NewGenLib is Java-based, it deploys straightforwardly on Linux or Windows platforms. Just follow the installation notes for the platform on which you will be deploying.

NewGenLib was already a complete ILS prior to going open source. It boasts modules for

• Acquisitions
• Cataloguing
• Serials Management
• Circulation
• Administration
• OPAC, and
  
• Reports.

The current release is version 2.1, but version 3.0 is under development with a targeted release date of April 2008.

The biggest challenge, of course, is whether NewGenLib will be able to transition itself to a FOSS development model. Releasing code under a FOSS licence is easy compared to building and sustaining a FOSS community of users and developers. Will NewGenLib make the leap?

One positive sign is the set of discussion forums that NewGenLib has set up on its SourceForge site. I don't find forums as easy to negotiate as an email discussion list, but clearly many people like them and these seem to be busy. (The downside to that is that multiple forums mean more work for people within the project that need to respond to queries in various fora.) By contrast, the mailing lists for NewGenLib on SourceForge show very little use.

Deciding to release the code under the GPL also means a significant shift in business model. Or does it? The licence fee-based model under which NewGenLib previously operated was essentially tied to service support contracts. Under a FOSS licence, support contracts continue to work in exactly the same way. The developers, however, have moved to clarify matters by setting up a separate IT services company - Verus IT Services Pvt. Ltd. - in order to take on the servicing of the open source deployments, as well as existing commercial licensees. The most significant change for the business model is that, as FOSS code, nothing prevents other companies form also offering support contracts for NewGenLib. But if hundreds more libraries take up NewGenLib on account of its FOSS credentials, then there will be plenty of room for multiple support companies in different countries. Even better if those competing support companies are able to contribute code to the further development of NewGenLib.

Changing a licence does not, in itself, change the software. So, at the moment NewGenLib is about the same product as it has always been. But joining the world of FOSS does make a difference. It makes a difference to the future, to the future of NewGenLib and possibly the future of the FOSS ILS. It's great to see another FOSS ILS joining the ranks of Koha and Evergreen. And it bodes well for libraries in developing and transition countries that so much choice is now available.

I will be following NewGenLib's management of its fledgeling FOSS community closely, and with good will. I really hope it makes a great show of it.

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