Meeting Minutes January 9, 2009

Roll Call
Troy Brown (IL), Tom Ceresini (PALINET), Steve Gregory (CO), Darci Hanning (OR), Christine Kreger (CO), Tom Metzger (INCOLSA), Bev Obert (IL), Michael Sauers (NEBASE), Justine Shaffner (Collaborative Coordinator)

Approve 12/12 Joint Project Coordinators/Tech Group Meeting Minutes
Gregory moved to approve and Hanning seconded.  There were no objections so the 12/12/08 minutes are approved.

Status of SOW for work on Plinkit 2.0
Hanning said the SOW was sent on 12/23/08 to twelve Plone contractors.  Shaffner said that ten contractors will definitely be responding and we’re hoping for Sharkbyte too.  Hanning said the Europeans may not respond because of the weak dollar which makes them more expensive, though Jarn (Norway) will still respond.  Obert asked if Hanning had any idea what this will cost.  Hanning didn’t, but said we’ll know 2/2/09 when the quotes are due.  Shaffner mentioned it looks like the teleconference will probably be 1/21/09.  Shaffner will email the list serv the date and time and how to connect to the teleconference in case anyone on the PC/Tech Group Committee wants to sit in.  Brown said he is interested in attending it.

Hanning said we’ll post the proposals on the website so during the first two weeks in February we all need to be sure to review them as they’ll be the main item on the agenda of our February meeting and hopefully we can decide on the top three then.  Hanning mentioned we’ll be using an evaluation form.  Shaffner will develop this, so be sure to give input on that when it’s sent to the list serv.  Hanning also said that the last week of February we’ll present the top two vendors to the Steering Committee (perhaps at a special meeting) so they can decide on the winner by 3/2/09.

Update the Suggested Project Timeline - see http://www.plinkit.org/resources/projects/suggested-project-timeline.html/
See updates in red. 

Gregory asked whether it is appropriate to update the timeline now when we have no idea how long the contractor's work is going to take.

Re convening the Advisory Group, Bev reminded everyone except Colorado to send Shaffner names of people they suggest for the group.  Hanning asked what the time commitment would be and Obert said it should be a one and a half hour conference call in March 2009 to give input and then another one and a half hour call in September/October 2009 to see how the changes are working for them and to get further input. 

We decided to change the date for Obert to start discussions about “Plinkit training modules online - tutorials for libraries” to October as that item will be informed by the  feedback from the September/October 2009 Advisory Group meeting and can’t be done until we have the new version of Plinkit running.

We changed the date for Obert to start discussions about “Plinkit marketing materials for Plinkit libraries” to February as Obert has a brochure that is 95% done which she will send to this listserv by the end of January for input, and to start group discussions re what additional marketing materials we should develop.

Hanning asked if anyone wanted to work on the SOW for skins which can begin now.  She mentioned that there are two pieces to the skins work.   One piece is part of the SOW that just went out.  The other piece is to either have people design new skins from scratch (which would require graphic design work that is separate from the technical implementation) or we could take another more efficient approach where we look at three to five Plone themes that are available free at Plone.org and have them implemented and cleaned up in two to three colors each.  The latter approach means we won’t have to pay a graphic designer.  Hanning will send the url that shows us the themes available for Plone 3.0.  We should all look at them and decide on three we like and discuss our favorites via the list serv, then make our decision at the February meeting.  Bev pointed out we’ll need to get permission from the Steering Committee (SC) to spend the money. 

Shaffner will get SC approval for the changes to the Timeline and then repost it at the website.

a.    Additional developments needed?
Hanning will take the lead on updating the Administrator’s Manual.  Someone else will need to see if the Training Manual is okay, or if it needs to be updated or complete rewritten.

Update on potential new members
Shaffner said that MA and PA will contact us if they want to pursue it further.  Ceresini said he’ll be contacting PA.  Duncan will be contacting IA and will contact MI after checking that the Library of Virginia doesn’t object to MI only paying $5000 for a half year fee.  Piper is waiting to hear back after contacting IN at the end of December.  Shaffner has a call in to WA, but Hanning said WA has lots of regional systems that are well funded and so would not have many libraries in need of Plinkit.

Status reports from each state
IL – Obert said things are the same as last time and Brown said that not much was going on due to the holiday.

CO - Kreger said they hope to launch Red Feather Lakes and Trinidad by the end of the month and they have a lot more libraries to contact after that.

OR – Hanning did three Plinkit trainings so those libraries will be live at the end of the month and she’s doing a few more trainings next week that will also go live soon, but after that she doesn’t have much in the way of new sites.  Her main tasks now are getting the Collaborative website and the OR Plinkit website upgraded to Plone 3.1 as well as doing skins work for OR libraries.  She’ll also post the Plinkit Libraries location map at the Collaborative site after she finishes the upgrade.

TX - No attendees, so no report.

NEBASE - Sauers hopes to log in for the first time next week.  They are finishing three major projects, so he didn’t have time to log in yet.

PALINET – Ceresini also hopes to login for the first time next week and will soon get some instances set up and will also be showing a smaller state in the region the demo.

INCOLSA - Metzger said Humphrey said they are working on the template and he greatly appreciates the Administrator’s Manual.  Libraries are contacting them to volunteer as pilot sites and two especially are very interested.  Looking at the IL Plinkit sites made their libraries very excited about Plinkit.  Friends of Indiana Libraries (FOIL) is also interested.

Library of Virginia - No attendees, so no report.

Innovative things done by states – add to website
Nothing to report as the holidays quashed the innovative streak in us.

Colorado report on contribution to website for the month
Gregory put up the blog entry “What is your library worth to you?” on the ROI calculator.  There was some discussion re is “ROI” the correct term and we decided it was.  Shaffner said for the technology behind how to add the calculator to a Plinkit site, log in to see “Related Links” for this post.

To Do list status
Gregory would like more comments on “something new for the home page.”  He’ll resend what he has and give a deadline of one week, and will then post it.  Obert reminded all to look at website and see what should be made clearer and suggested since some of us are so familiar with this that the new members should make a concerted effort to look at it since if it makes sense to them it’s okay.  Shaffner will change that item to be the responsibility of new members only.  Re “Look at your state sites…” please try to look at this – hopefully by March.  Hanning hopes to get the RSS feed done today or tomorrow.  Shaffner will eliminate the “Done” items from the To Do list. 

Other Business
Brown asked Hanning if she’ll make design changes when she upgrades the Collaborative site to Plone 3.1.  Hanning thought she wouldn’t, but the skin may change as the current one may not be compatible any more.  It’ll be a boring green skin, so if you have suggestions or feedback on it, tell the list serv.

a. Website Discussion
i.    Are contributions giving the right info to prospective customers?
The consensus of the group was that this will be taken care of when the newest members look at the web site to make sure all the information is clear.

ii.    Are Tech Group/PCs sharing information there? 
Obert said we’re getting better at this and it helps that this is on the agenda as a reminder each month.  Brown wondered if the Tech Group should have a meeting every other month for more technical talk.  Hanning suggested we compress the business part of the meeting into 45 minutes and then the Technical Group can spend a half hour at the end of the meeting in tech talk.  Obert thought that maybe after reviewing the SOW responses in February we should start having separate meetings again.  Brown thought that just one meeting is fine, but liked the idea of compressing it.  Shaffner will start adding the Tech Talk section to the end of each agenda.  Hanning said Shaffner doesn’t need to stick around to take minutes during the tech talk.  Gregory said he thinks we really could have a separate Technical Group meeting once a month or every other month.  Brown said let’s try tagging it on to the February and March meetings and if after two meetings we find that’s not enough, we can add  a separate meeting.  The Tech Group was okay with that.  Obert mentioned sometimes the Project Coordinators may need to meet separately too, but we can always add special meetings as issues come up. 

Ceresini wondered if anyone will be at ALA midwinter and if so do they want to meet informally?  Obert and Shaffner will be there too and Obert mentioned the SC might meet at Midwinter too.  Obert will decide after the 1/16/09 SC meeting if we should meet at ALA. 

Obert asked if there are any other comments.  No one had any, so Obert adjourned the meeting.


Next Meeting
February 13, 2009 Friday - noon Eastern Time, 11 am Central Time, 10 am Mountain Time and 9 am Pacific Time


Plinkit Updated To Do list

Who                        What
All                            Pick two to three people that could be in a conference call in January where we could make some decisions about what the Users Advisory Council should do.  Shaffner has CO’s people only.

Gregory                   Write something new for the home page – whatever you like, but especially about who our intended audience is. 12/12 proposed text sent to list serv and comments made by Obert and Shaffner.  1/9 Gregory will resend with a one week due date.

INC/VA/NE/PAL     Look over the website and make suggestions about what needs to be made clearer and what needs to updated.

OR/TX/IL/CO         Look at your state sites and see if there is anything there that might be helpful at the collaborative site and send a list of those topics to Shaffner.

Shaffner                  Compile a list of helpful topics from the above item and send it to the list serv asking if they agree that all these things should be added to the collaborative site (as long as one person would like it at Plinkit.org, then it should be posted there). 

Hanning                   See if you can find information on how to fix the RSS feed for Plone 2.1 and let the list serv know about it one way or another.

Shaffner                   Email the list serv the date and time and how to connect to the Plone contractor teleconference in case anyone on the committee wants to sit in.

Obert                        Send marketing brochure to this listserv by the end of January for input, and to start group discussions re what additional marketing materials we should develop.

Hanning                     Post the Plinkit Libraries location map at the Collaborative site after it’s upgraded to Plone 3.1.

All                              Look at the themes available for Plone 3.0 and decide on three you like and discuss on the list serv.  We can then make our final decision on which two to three themes to clean up and implement in two to three colors each at the February meeting, and decide who’ll write the SOW for this work.

All                              When Shaffner sends the suggested SOW evaluation form, be sure to give her your feedback.

All                               After the quotes for the SOW are posted at the web site, be sure to complete the evaluation form by February 13 so you can discuss them at that meeting.