Open Philosophy

At the heart of the Cooperative’s operations, strategies and philosophy lies the principle of openness. In part, we choose open approaches when possible simply because the choice is pragmatic for an organization of our size. More importantly, as an actor and leader in the Canadian knowledge sector, we believe open approaches ensure continual vibrancy. We develop, co-create, enhance, discover and improve within our team, with our members and with our partners and communities of practice.

Open Data

We release open data, including:

• Sitka Collection and Usage Statistics
  Data available for:  2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013
  These spreadsheets include system-wide active users, total circulation, monthly circulation counts, top circulation days for the calendar year, average circulation per open day, top 100 circulating titles for the year, and collection statistics based on item types.
• Measuring Informal Learning in BC’s Public Libraries
  Reports: PDF Summary and CSV source data.
  In September 2014, BC’s K-12 schools were closed during what would customarily be the first two weeks of school. During the closure, we tested the hypothesis that people would visit public libraries for informal learning opportunities. We compared year-over-year statistics of 82% of BC’s public libraries using Sitka.
• Sitka Bibliographic Records in MARC format
  Data available: Sitka MARC Export

Other examples of open data in BC include the BC Data Catalogue, Vancouver Public Library Open Data Catalogue, and the City of Vancouver’s Open Data Catalogue. The OpenDataBC Society aims to provide easier access to information so that citizens may better understand their province.

Open Tools

• We use and contribute to numerous open source software projects and communities, including: the Evergreen® ILS, Drupal, WordPress, Request Tracker, Nagios, etc.
• We share data visualization and open data tools & resources libraries can really use.
• Our documentation is licensed under Creative Commons Licenses.
• Using open tools, we built NNELS to promote accessible collections and resources in libraries. The NNELS repository is built on open infrastructure and we produce books for that repository using open recording software (such as Audacity) and production tools (such as Calibre).

Open Events

We sponsor, partner, facilitate and participate in open community events.

Check out our upcoming events. Past events are all based on principles of openness in some way:

• We supported the first BC datacamps for libraries.
• We participate in open communities, including LODLAM and Code4LibBC
• We co-hosted an Open Data Learning Summit in September, 2012, and several Camps in the years since, focusing on exploring opportunities for open data learning and leadership in libraries.

Other Open Projects

• Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) Contribution Fund: every year, the Co-op makes a number of small donations to open source projects from which we benefit, as a way of giving back to the larger ecosystem.
  • In 2015/16, we supported Smallpdf, Calibre, Horde, Drupal, and the Apache Foundation.
  • In 2016/17, we supported Calibre, CiviCRM, and Piwik.
  • In 2017/18 we supported Thunderbird and Let’s Encrypt
• BC Libraries Cooperative Technical Guide: Recommended Best Practices for your Library, prepared by Kevin Stranack, June 2013. This technology guide is an adaptation of TechSoup for Libraries “Planning for Success Cookbook” made available under a Creative Commons Share Alike license. This license allowed us to remix it for our own local needs, and our version is also available under the same Creative Commons Share Alike license.