Tag Archives: ex libris

Applying new lipstick on an old pig

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One of my work responsibilities is to maintain the Voyager integrated library system from Ex Libris. A new release (7.0) is now available and one of the features that is getting the most publicity is the new web interface to the catalog. It features dramatic architectural and feature improvements from its predecessor, as well as adding new features that weren’t possible before. The Voyager product manager and folks from Ex Libris customer support have posted several enthusiastic reports on new features to come on the Voyager discussion list (closed to customers only), and I think they are doing a fairly good job of trying to build excitement. Except that all that I’ve heard and seen so far leaves me cold.

Why? Well, although I definitely agree that there is much to like about the new interface, it’s not really that new. During my last stint at what was then Endeavor Information Systems three years ago, I participated in user studies at some existing Voyager customer sites that were based this same interface. The functionality and changes I see in the Voyager 7.0 web interface (a.k.a. WebVoyage) were all designed and finalized, as far as I can tell, three years ago. That’s light years in technology time.

Worse still, the things that are so “exciting” about this new interface (persistent URLs! WHoooHeee! — different “skins”! Oh my! — a truly simple, Google-like basic search! Isn’t that original!) are features that have been available and taken for granted in other systems for years. And they are ones that in some cases have been implemented better than what I have seen so far in Ex Libris’s Voyager offering.

Sorry, but this is just a new flavor of lipstick applied to an old pig. It would take a lot more than this to get me excited about this particular product again.

Usefulness of Meebo

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I’ve had a MeeboMe widget in place on the sidebar of this blog for a while without much traffic or contact from others. Recently however, some brave souls have begun to initiate contact in order to let me know what they think of FML. Usually I have no idea who they are, but I really appreciate these chats and enjoy the instant interaction that having this handy little widget provides. A more subtle form of interaction comes when I can see whether someone is actually visiting the site based upon the existence of a Meebo “guest” user. This information shows up as long as I am signed into Meebo at the same time as someone visits my site. It is rare to have more than one “guest” show up in my Meebo IM list — I think the all-time high for simultaneous “guests” was something like five or six, after I posted comments on the then-pending merger between Endeavor and Ex Libris.

Overall, Meebo is an excellent tool and I highly recommend it.

Merger fallout

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Last week about 45 employees from Endeavor lost their jobs as a result of the merger with Ex Libris. Among them are friends and former co-workers. I am not surprised that some were laid off; what surprises me is why some were laid off and others kept their jobs. Some who kept their jobs don’t deserve it, in my opinion.

What else is clear from the merger is that not much aside from Voyager will be retained in terms of products from the Endeavor side of the equation. It appears that for example, Meridian customers will be migrated to Verde; Discovery: Resolver customers will be migrated to SFX; and Discovery: Search customers will be migrated to MetaLib. At least that is my understanding at this stage. Oh, I forgot: There is one other Endeavor product that appears to have staying power: Journals Onsite. I suppose the installed user community for that product as well as for Voyager was just too strong to ignore or alienate.

It is a weird situation. I’m still getting used to saying ‘Ex Libris’ instead of ‘Endeavor.’ I wonder how many customer libraries will actually migrate to new products at a time when many are already overstretched in terms of time and resources devoted to complex information management systems. I wonder about those employees from Endeavor who remain and how they will manage the transition and uncertainty, and the same thing from the Ex Libris side. Time will tell.

Selfishly I am thankful I was able to leave Endeavor when I did, and I am thankful to have a job, period.

Fall of the axe

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I haven’t written much for a long time. I don’t feel the need to apologize or explain, really, but I do want to make it clear that I am not abandoning this blog!

The main thing I wanted to note down here is anxiety on my part for friends who are losing their jobs at Endeavor (now merged with Ex Libris). I know that today some of them are feeling the fall of the axe. This is what I thought would happen but hoped it wouldn’t come to pass. I don’t know much more than that — just that some were notified today that they no longer had a job as a result of the merger with Ex Libris.

Well, well, well

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I was surprised to see the announcement, published earlier this afternoon, that Endeavor and Ex Libris would merge under the ownership of Francisco Partners, a private equity fund with a focus on technology. In fact, I am still going through all of the ramifications of this news and haven’t quite figured out what it might mean. For a more cogent and unbiased view, be sure to read Andrew Pace’s writeup about the news at his Hectic Pace blog.

I can’t be unbiased about this news. Not only have I worked with and implemented most of Ex Libris’s product suite, I have worked as an employee of Endeavor, most recently from September 2005 through April 2006 (and for about three years in an earlier stint with the company). I have friends in both organizations.

The news caught me off guard. Upon reflection, though, it shouldn’t have. My personal opinion is that no matter what the language of the press release might use, this is not truly a merger of two separate companies. Instead it is a de facto acknowledgement of defeat by Elsevier, Endeavor’s parent company, in the longstanding battle for the high-end, large academic research libraries market. Ex Libris has certainly won the war, with mostly better products, better technology, and better support. My sense is that Elsevier has not received a satisfactory return on its investment in Endeavor; that its strategy, at least as I could see, to utilize Endeavor’s technology to boost its capability to deliver its content, has not been successful.

Of course there is almost a complete overlap of products between the two companies and so the speculation will center on which products will survive. Andrew Pace makes some predictions and I think he is probably correct. We could both be wrong but I agree with Andrew, that Endeavor’s Meridian and Discovery products will soon be history. What is less certain of course is the fate of Endeavor’s Voyager product vs. Ex Libris’s Aleph 500. Each system has its strengths but overall I believe that the Voyager product has a slight edge in terms of ease of implementation and use. We’ll see what unfolds in the coming months. (I have absolutely no “inside” knowledge about any of this. I am just as much in “guess mode” as anyone else.)

More personally, I wonder what will happen to many friends and acquaintences who work for Endeavor. As one would expect, the press release does not go into detail on this aspect of the deal except to say that Ex Libris’s existing Chicago office will be moved into the office space currently used by Endeavor. That office space is right next to O’Hare airport and is ideally situated for easy access for customers. I seriously doubt that everyone’s jobs will be retained as a result of this merger. I especially doubt that the development staff at Endeavor will remain intact. This is the area where I used to work.

It has been clear to me for some time that something big needed to happen at Endeavor if it was to survive. Now I know what that “something” is!