Atlanta, Ga., February 15, 2024: Equinox Open Library Initiative, a trusted leader in open source technology development and support for libraries, is pleased to announce that the Pennsylvania Integrated Library System (PaILS) has selected Equinox as their support provider for Evergreen ILS.
“PaILS is happy to continue our 11 year relationship with Equinox Open Library Initiative,” said Katie Greenleaf Martin, Executive Director at PaILS. “We value the quick response time and wide range of services offered by Equinox and look forward to many future projects. We enjoy working with Equinox staff to collaborate with us in creating solutions for our libraries.”
PaILS was founded in June 2011 as a non-profit organization to provide an open source integrated library system for Pennsylvania libraries. It oversees SPARK, the Evergreen ILS managed by PaILS on behalf of its member libraries across Pennsylvania. Equinox and PaILS have worked together to support SPARK since 2013.
“We are excited to extend our relationship with PaILS as the consortium continues to grow and to provide excellent service to the libraries of Pennsylvania,” said Lisa Carlucci, Executive Director at Equinox. “The PaILS consortium is actively involved with the Evergreen community and their leadership and contributions help ensure that Evergreen continues to evolve and meet the emerging needs of their libraries.”
Over the last eleven years, PaILS and Equinox have worked together to migrate 118 branch libraries to SPARK and added more than 2.6 million bibliographic records. This work directly benefited more than 848,000 patrons of SPARK libraries.
PaILS and Equinox have also partnered to complete significant development work for Evergreen ILS. Notable projects include the Emergency Closing Handler, which added the ability to create and immediately process an “emergency closing” that pushes back due dates and voids fines in the event of an unexpected closure. Library Groups (or Lassos) allows libraries to create independent, non-hierarchical groups for searching the OPAC and display them selectively (i.e. only at specific libraries). Development work on Carousels for PaILS replaced the existing functionality with one that was fully featured and database supported providing greater flexibility in creating, maintaining, and displaying Carousels.
In 2020, PaILS provided funding for the development of Curbside Pickup, a project designed by Equinox which helped libraries maintain services during pandemic-related closures. Most recently, Equinox and PaILS developed the Custom Penalties feature which creates a group of library settings allowing libraries to provide more granular penalty thresholds and rules.
“We are really proud of the development we’ve accomplished in partnership with PaILS,” said Andrea Buntz Neiman, Project Manager for Software Development. “Our collaboration has benefited both Pennsylvania Libraries and the Evergreen community over the years and demonstrates how one consortium can positively impact an open source community for the better. We are looking forward to continuing our work with PaILS on innovative development for Evergreen.”
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For more information:
Laura Barry
Communications Coordinator
Equinox Open Library Initiative, Inc.
EquinoxOLI.org
877.OPEN.ILS (877.673.6457)
About Equinox Open Library Initiative
Equinox Open Library Initiative is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization and is the successor to Equinox Software, Inc. Equinox’s mission as a nonprofit is to promote and support a thriving ecosystem for open source library communities in order to provide libraries worldwide with innovative, affordable, and sustainable open source solutions. We are devoted to reducing barriers to library technology and services, expanding library access to open source software, and providing high quality technology, consulting, and support services.To learn more, please visit https://www.equinoxOLI.org.
About Evergreen
Evergreen Integrated Library System is an award winning and trusted library solution used by more than 1,800 libraries worldwide. Evergreen ILS is a web-based and mobile-friendly system which provides attractive, easy to use interfaces for library acquisitions, administration, cataloging, circulation, OPAC, reports, course reserves, and serials functionality.
Evergreen ILS is an enterprise level system designed to manage a scalable catalog shared across libraries, including large public and academic library consortia. While designed for large collections, Evergreen is suitable for libraries of any size and type from government libraries to museum and special library collections. Its flexibility enables libraries to configure policies and settings that work best for their communities and to maintain ownership of their library and systems data.
For more information about Evergreen: https://www.equinoxoli.org/products/evergreen/.