Library Technology Guides

Selected Survey Findings

• Polaris offered by Polaris Library Systems toped the rankings in ILS satisfaction and completeness of functionality for medium to large public libraries.
• Apollo, developed by Biblionix topped the rankings in ILS satisfaction for small public libraries. The company earned top ratings for support across all libraries of all types (tied with OPALS). Apollo was rated by the libraries using it(exclusively small public libraries) as having the best customer support. Its functionality was rated as most complete in functionality. (again tied with OPALS)
• Sierra, developed by Innovative Interfaces, Inc. topped the rankings in ILS satisfaction for large to medium-size academic libraries. The company's Millennium ILS was the second highest rated system for large academics. Sierra also earned the highest marks for completeness of functionality as rated by large academic libraries, again followed by Millennium.
• OPALS, an open source ILS for school libraries and districts developed and supported by Media Flex earned top rankings in Company Satisfaction, Product Support, and Company Loyalty. School libraries using competing products, notably Destiny from Follett Software Company, did not respond to the survey in significant numbers, making it challenging to interpret the superlative performance of OPALS within its peer group.
• 634 libraries indicated that they are considering migrating to a new ILS. Ex Libris Alma (121) and Sierra from Innovative Interfaces (120) were mentioned most frequently by libraries systems under consideration, followed by WorldShare Management Services from OCLC (99), the open source Koha ILS (71) or Evergreen (65), Symphony from SirsiDynix (51), Intota from Serials Solutions (48), and Kuali OLE (21).
• Products that ranked highest in earlier years of the survey, including and Polaris from Polaris Library Systems, Library.Solution from The Library Corporation, AGent VERSO from Auto-Graphics, continue to receive satisfaction scores just as high as before, but fall below the superlative marks given by libraries involved with Apollo, OPALS, or Koha as supported independently or by ByWater Solutions.
• Companies and products serving large and complex library organizations and diverse library types receive a broader range of responses, and fall into a middle tier of rankings. Yet where they fall within this middle ground represents important differences. Sierra and Millennium from Innovative Interfaces, Library.Solution from The Library Corporation, and Evergreen from Equinox Software, and came out as very strong performers at the top of this middle tier.
• Except for the libraries already using one, the survey reflected fairly low levels of interest in migrating to an open source ILS, even when the company rates their satisfaction with their current proprietary ILS and its company as poor. Libraries using Koha, as supported by ByWater Solutions (8.21) or independently operated by the library (8.37), or OPALS (8.32) demonstrated highest interest in open source, followed by Evergreen as supported by Equinox Software (7.29). Libraries using LibLime Koha showed a softer interest in open source (6.73). Though the open source interest scores were low, a substantial portion of libraries that registered some interest in moving to a new ILS named open source products among the replacement candidates.