Two Environmental Scans (Cataloging and Resource Sharing) From an Illinois Library Organization

We’ve heard from many people over the years, including library/info science students, that they appreciate when infoDOCKET shares primary documents from various library organizations. We hope to do more of this moving forward.
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Both of the environmental scans linked to below were researched and written for RAILS (Reaching Across Illinois Library Systems) by outside consulting firms and then posted on the web.
RAILS offers a number of services and has more than 1,300 public, academic, and school library members.
Two Environmental Scans
1. Environmental Scan of OCLC Alternatives (Final Report)
From the RAILS Web Sites:

In January 2015, RAILS contracted with Joe Matthews of JRM Consulting, Inc. to do an environmental scan of OCLC alternatives.
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This report will inform RAILS’ work with OCLC, further exploration of cataloging alternatives and a possible pilot project, and work on the Overlay Project.

Direct to Full Text Scan (50 pages; PDF)
Direct to Slides From Presentation About Final Report By Author (7 pages; PDF)
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2. Rails Overlay Project: Environmental Survey (Final Report)
January 22, 2014
Submitted by Lori Bowen Ayre, The Galecia Group and Melissa Stockton, Quipu Group
From the Introduction:

In August, 2013, Reaching Across Illinois Library Systems (RAILS) issued a Request for Proposal for a consultant to assist with the selection of a resource sharing product as part of their Overlay Project. Specifically, the objective of the Overlay Project was to find a resource-sharing discovery and fulfillment system that builds on the existing technology environment, allowing libraries in consortia and libraries with standalone integrated library systems (ILS) to participate.
Although none of the RFP respondents’ proposals were accepted as presented, the Overlay Project decided to contract with Lori Bowen Ayre from The Galecia Group and Melissa Stockton from Quipu Group to provide an environmental scan of the resource sharing systems currently in production in the U.S. Working with the Overlay Project group, the Consultants identified six consortia that represent the universe of resource sharing products currently in production in the U.S. There are four such products including INN-Reach from Innovative Interfaces, RelaisD2D from Relais International, SHAREit from Auto-Graphics, and OCLC’s Navigator.

Direct to Full Text Scan (84 pages; PDF)
Learn More About the RAILS Overlay Project

Filed under: Academic Libraries, Associations and Organizations, Libraries, Public Libraries, Resources, School Libraries