Koha

Koha is a web based, fully featured, library management system. Originally developed by Katipo for the Horowhenua Library Trust in New Zealand, the first system went live in 2000. There are now many systems in operation in many languages on every continent.

The Koha Community (a global community of libraries of varying types and sizes, volunteers, and support companies) now develops Koha collectively and provides two major releases a year and maintenance releases every month.

There are 90 libraries using Koha in Ireland, across all types of libraries from schools to corporate and academic. Most Koha sites are hosted in Data Centres although Koha can also be implemented on-premises.

Easy to Use

Koha is a browser based system. There are no client licences to install on individual workstations, simplifying System Administration.

Koha supports the full suite of library functions: Cataloguing, Circulation,  OPAC, Acquisitions,  Serials, SIP etc. in a consistent and easy to use interface.

Koha is smart device friendly which means that the staff and user interface can be used on tablets and smartphones. Imagine your staff roaming through the library with the full Circulation module available on their tablet, helping users. They can issue and return items, register new borrowers, place requests, search the catalogue – all the functions of Koha available at their fingertips.

The Koha Opac is also fully smart device compliant so your users can access the Opac on their Smartphones and Tablets. All this from Koha straight out of the box, no extra fees for all this functionality.

With regular upgrades, system developments respond quickly to user needs.

Try Koha – Demonstration

Have a look at Koha in action here on our demo Koha site. Feel free to play around with all functions both staff and OPAC. The usernames needed for login are listed on the site.

Cost Effective

As an Open Source system, costs are lower than other systems as there are no expensive up-front licence costs – all you pay for are service costs.
Interleaf Technology offer a fully hosted service so that there are no ongoing costs to the library for hardware.

Similarly there are no system administration overheads for backups, server management etc., all covered for you by Interleaf Technology.

Community Driven

  • Users decide how the system develops
  • Hundreds of developers world-wide
  • The emphasis is on sharing expertise and information
  • Over 300 reports freely available
  • Growing user community in Ireland
  • Developer expertise in Ireland

Koha is developed internationally by the Koha Community where the emphasis is on collaboration and cooperation.

With a large pool of developers, the system develops rapidly. The nature of Koha is that libraries can easily commission customisations that would not be practical in other software environments.

Come and talk to Interleaf Technology about what Koha can do for your library