Empowering Organizations to Take Control of Their Technology and Drive the Direction of Their Library Service Platform ByWater Solutions

In today’s world, a library plays an important role in our lives, promoting the progress of knowledge. There are many people who love reading but they can’t afford to buy books because the prices of books are very high. And that is when a library comes to the rescue.

But, have we ever thought that how tough it is to manage a library with thousands of books? Whether a library in your town or an online library, it is not a cake walk to manage a place where hundreds of people come to borrow books on a daily basis.

Founded in 2008 by Brendan Gallagher, ByWater Solutions empower libraries by giving them the technological flexibility and freedom they deserve through the use of open source software with comprehensive and honest support.

ByWater Solutions is Made up of a diverse group of librarians, book lovers, technology and data geeks, photographers, Tolkien fans, space nerds, genealogists, knitters, gamers, animal lovers (furry or hairless) and most importantly, open source fanatics who share the company culture to positively impact the clients and the community.

Today, ByWater supports over 1,500 individual library sites and has a proven track record offirst-rate implementation processes with library systems of all sizes. Its customers range from small special collections to large multi-type consortia ranging from 7 to 100 member groups.

ByWater Solutions Services

ByWater Solutions provides support for Koha, the Open Source ILS, Libki, the kiosk management system, CORAL, the Open Source ERM, and FOLIO, the library service platform.

Supported Hosting

ByWater Solutions plans and prepares for the worst by taking the following precautions and installing the following safeguards to protect your data. It performs a daily backup of all system data stored on the cloud. This information is saved both on-site and off-site and is comprised of all of the system data, and all other information found on the main server. In addition to the daily backups listed above, B yWater creates a mirrored image of the system data and code-base. If you so choose, the company can also set up an additional system backup onsite at your library’s location and populate that day for an additional fee.

• Free HTTPS security for all sites
• Fully managed hosting and security
• 9% uptime guarantee
• Triple redundancy nightly backups

Migration and Data Manipulation

ByWater understands how important your data is to you and your patrons. Accurate transfer of your data from your legacy ILS to Koha is the company’s mission in the Migrations Department. The first step in the migration process is data profiling in which it gains a thorough understanding of the data you have sent us. It analyzes your data to assess the quantity and quality. ByWater identifies any potential anomalies in the data and prepares a strategy for the migration process to move the data into Koha. The design of the migration process is unique to each library. No two data sets are ever the same! During the migration process, each of its new partners receives a migration test system where the migration process is fine-tuned, modified, and adjusted until the data in Koha suits your library’s needs. This migration server is also used in the hands-on training and for all testing, the library wishes to do during the migration process.

ByWater’s Koha migration and server setup services include, but not limited to:

• Creation of a migration Koha system to be used for training and testing
• Transfer of data from legacy ILS to Koha
• Koha installation and customization
• Administrative configuration
• OPAC customization
• Import of patron data
• Assistance with the import/configuration of authority records
• External device setups such as those using SIP2 and LDAP connections

Training & Education

ByWateris dedicated to expertise in educating its partners and community members. All training sessions are led by professional MLS librarians and accomplished library trainers. Its comprehensive training provides hands-on on-site or webinar personalized training. ByWater offers new libraries internally produced training manuals and tutorial videos, refresher webinars, and follow up training sessions. ByWater’s flexible training schedule will be adapted to meet the teaching styles of your library staff. Its Education Team provides the following:

• complimentary ongoing training
• live webinar and on-demand training for new releases
• workflow analysis
• new staff member training

Custom Development

ByWater Solutions fully embraces the ideas and practices of open source software. All custom development sponsored by its partners and developed internally is publicly available at ByWater’s GitHub repositories.

After a development has been tested and approved by the sponsor, it submits the changes to the community in the preferred format (most often a patch or a pull request).

ByWater believes transparency is a key to success. That is why it submits all the custom developments, plugins, tools,and documentation it creates. After all, sharing is caring! ByWater’s Development Team provides:

• Active leadership in the community
• Librarian driven enhancements
• 100% of code contributed to the community

Howdy Chief!

Brendan Gallagher, CEO, and Founder: Brendan founded ByWater Solutions in 2008 and is an expert on installation, data migration, and customization of many open source platforms. He graduated with an MLS from Southern Connecticut State University. He was a member of the first class of ALA Emerging Leaders where he focused on ways those in the library profession could re-brand themselves in the digital world. He was honored as Alumni of the Year for the Southern Connecticut State University in 2011. Brendan has worked in all types of libraries (Public, Academic, and Special libraries).

"In realizing that our clients’ satisfaction is the most meaningful measurement of our continued success, we pride ourselves in providing complete customer fulfillment in all we do.”