Map of/Excerpts from Jan. 18, 2017, Interview of Oren Beit-Arie (by Jerry Specht) (-- still under review as of 14-Feb-2017)
Link to complete unedited (3-hour) audio recording of interview
(Firefox and IE work better for me for moving around the recording; the Chrome bar for this is too small.)
In reviewing this recording, Oren and I have realized there were certain omissions:
· Luis Lacayo was a very early (the first!) Ex Libris U.S. employee. He played an important role in setting up hardware and systems software for Notre Dame and other early customers -- and in maintaining our own internal systems.
· Carl Grant, the first Ex Libris U.S. president, played a critical role in the creation/structure of the Ex Libris North America operation. (Plus, he provided all the photos of the first U.S. office seen at http://jspecht.org/exlibris_history/jerry.kickoff.2017.pdf .)
· Russell McDonald, the first Vice President of Sales & Marketing, was instrumental in signing certain key early Aleph customers.
Oren Beit-Arie Jerry Specht
Interview map/excerpts
h:mm:ss
0:00:00 Introduction
0:01:00 Yohanan; ALEPH before Oren (1978-87)
0:03:45 Yohanan’s pre-Oracle, indexed sequential database
Programming languages
0:04:30 COBOL, “C”
0:05:00 Oren hired (1988); improve sorting routine by at least 50%
0:07:30 COBOL
0:08:30 “C”; I/O layer / “I/O engine”
0:10:40 Parallels to Jim Aagaard/Assembler
0:11:40 COBOL, PL/1, “structured programming”
0:14:40 Advantages of COBOL
*Handle large data
*Compile same code for VAX/Unix; portability
* Structure
0:17:00 C++ for GUI
0:17:30 Keyword/Boolean
0:19:30 ALEPH z97/z98/z95
0:20:20 Proximity for DTV
0:21:40 z980 (“temporary” z98)
0:23:00 Google (no proximity; no truncation/wildcard)
0:23:45 Oren: ALEPH forced to be compliant
0:25:00 “incredibly challenging academic exercise that I doubt had any effect on scholarship”
0:26:20 Browsing; Northwestern University
0:27:50 “doubleword” for adjacency
0:28:30 “What got them to choose us was the architecture”
0:29:00 Oren/DTU (1989) ALEPH 300 … “That was my library school”
0:32:30 Jerry: “Library systems are interesting enough to attract really good programmers”
0:33:50 Oren: “… serving the mission of the library … the pleasure of working in this field is not just the challenges … also the people you work with; librarians are often times very smart …
It’s always helpful to work with people with passion”.
0:36:50 Fax / paper / telephone; no remote connection to sites; no Internet
0:39:20 Yohanan, traveled; “Yohanan worked really hard but he also had a really good time”
“A very intense year”
0:40:20 Oren’s father: Israel National Librarian “I certainly grew up in a house of books”
Per Udi: Oren expert in linguistics
1991-4 worked on Master’s degree in Theoretical Linguistics
Worked part-time for Ex Libris and ALEPH-Yissum
0:46:50 Consortia; mid–‘90’s
0:48:45 CDL
0:49:15 SUNY
“decoupling of discovery” in 2000’s
0:51:30 Ghent, Aleph 500
Herbert von de Sompel / SFX
0:53:30 Jenny Walker, Silverplatter
“first ideas about how to create linking”
0:54:30 Oren: programmer, analyst, and … “it was a time …
we didn’t know what product management was … we did everything”
0:56:00 mid-‘90’s high-level pilot work
0:56:45 Omri hired, took on GUI
0:57:20 “More time going places” Bibliotheque Nationale:
“much work … didn’t win the bid … just as well; they had so many requirements”
0:59:45 “We got a lot better at explaining our story”
1995: “Crucial decision to go with Oracle”; multi-tier architecture; beginning of Aleph 500
1:01:00 Parallels between Aleph and NOTIS (Northwestern On-line Total Integrated System)
1:02:00 Differences: Aleph/Yohanan openness to outside world
“Yohanan understood very well that writing a unique solution for the Hebrew University is unsustainable … In order for this to have a long shelf-life … it needs to have an audience and a market larger than just the Hebrew University … Very much aware of sales.”
1:05:20 Important to maintain one source code
1:06:00 Jerry: “Tensions in what would be developed?”
1:08:00 Big changes in those years
1:11”15 Client-side programs had to be created from scratch but many server programs could be converted from VAX VMS (COBOL) programs
1:12:30 Harvard/Taos (1998) “object-oriented” Harvard visited Jerusalem. Harvard/Wisconsin; Dale Flecker / Nolan Pope.
1:15:55 Why did Taos fail?
Jerry: “Developing a system from scratch which meets the needs of all of these kinds of libraries is a daunting task, to say the least”
1:17:10 Ex Libris has pretty much stuck with the academic library market
Differences between public and academic libraries. “Are the differences real?”
1:19:20 Oren: “I actually think both…
DRA/Taos: “Use of totally new, unproven object-oriented database technology…. They set themselves to an undoable task, I think.”
1:20:30 “With regard to public libraries, I think it’s a little of both: real differences, perceived differences.”
Possible “public library flavor” of Aleph
1:23:00 Debate within Ex Libris about whether to go after public libraries
*We didn’t want to get de-focused”
*Public library finances on downward trend … we didn’t see this as an attractive business”
1:26:00 Alternative paths of growth
* Parallel (other kinds of libraries)
* Vertical (associated functions within academic market)
“We definitely took the position of selling more things to the same buyer.”
1:28:10 Ex Libris North America
1998 Oren moves to Chicago
2001 Oren moves to Boston; SFX
1:30:30 Boston office
“Engagement with SUNY”, office closer to Albany
1:31:50 Harvard
1:33:30 North American staff
“Really good employees attract other really good employees”
James Steenbergen - “certainly a key player”
John Kolman (1)
1:40:30 Jerry - Fostered Support Knowledge Base
Oren: “Respect customers as peers”
Jerry: “There’s nothing more interesting you can do with computers than library/information systems”
1:48:40 Randy (Menakes) “You just don’t find people like Randy every day”
1:53:45 Marie Bradshaw; Laura Pierson; Maruta
1:54:20 John Kolman (2) “Just not good fit, I suppose”
Galen (Charlton) -- Generic fix routines (fix_doc_do_file_08)
2:00:30 “Aleph built in a very modular way”
2:01:30 X-Services
Make the system extensible; unique in having these tools so early?
edit_field / edit_paragraph / edit_doc
2:05:20 Use of source code by Support in solving problems
2:09:30 Notre Dame
2:10:05 McGill
2:10:40 “They felt Ex Libris had the will and the ability to do the development they were asking for.”
2:11:00 Oren: “… and think what’s at stake -- this is the operation of a major ARL library”
2:11:20 “I can’t overstate how fortunate we were to get their confidence in us, their trust”
2:12:20 Price (of Aleph)
2:13:20 Jerry: “Other vendors were offering more fully-developed solutions … but Aleph seemed more malleable”
2:13:40 Oren: “The uniqueness of this space, this sector [academic libraries]”
2:14:30 “These were people who were hired to do a library job, but they ended up, at least for a year, designing a system
2:15:20 ” … “the right partner is key”
2:16:05 Jerry: “That flowchart … did Pat Riva do that?”
2:17:50 Oren: “Our job wasn’t just to write code; our job was also to map their deep understanding of processes…”
2:18:30 Judy (Levi); Naomi (Leiser/Conforti); Tami (Trotter/Ezra)
2:19:00 Jerry: Aleph praised praised for its flexibility; criticized for its complexity … two sides of the same coin?
2:19:30 “arbitrary differences” … default values important
2:21:30 preconfiguration of the system for certain kinds of libraries?
2:23:00 “no debugging process for the setup”
2:24:00 “The only way to know if an option is really needed or not is to start from scratch” … Alma … “a little more conservative in terms of options”.
2:25:10 Jerry: “It made things interesting for Support.”
2:26:00 Jerry: “I’d like to give a shout-out to the Ex Libris Aleph programmers!”
2:27:20 “I think the Aleph programs are really good”
2:27:50 SFX/Metalib in year 2000 – expanded the market not just for Primo and Alma, but, even earlier, that for Aleph
2:29:10 “placed a foot in the door … positioned us as innovators”
2:29:45 Herbert van de Sompel; SFX as open standard; Herbert and team created “the framework and the product”
2:30:50 Jerry: “Were there competitors, other people who recognized the value?” …
SFX “summit” at Ghent
2:32:30 Jerry: “What if Ghent hadn’t bought Aleph and you had never gone to Ghent?”
2:34:00 “I think you underestimate your importance”
2:35:15 Importance of Knowledge Base
2:36:10 Non-Aleph development partners
2:36:20 Importance of name: “Open URL” vs. “SFX URL”
2:37:30 NISO … “think-tank”: EBSCO, Nature, CNRI
2:38:45 NISO Committee AX -- Eric van der Velde (Caltech)
2:39:00 Jerry: “I could see how with some companies this could have ended up some kind of proprietary thing … but I think this was a better strategy.”
Oren: “It wasn’t any easy pitch [to Ex Libris management] … they got it.”
2:40:00 In parallel to this, Metalib was created – Yohanan
2:40:45 SFX people: Vlad; Jenny Walker ;
2:41:40 Oren: “We had two challenges: sell it to customers plus convince information providers to support the standard (create open URLs)
Jenny Walker was instrumental
2:42:30 Nettie Lagace; Dana (Sharvit); Andres Monroy Hernandez; Vlad; Lieve Rottiers
2:45:40 Verde “practice” for Alma; “Verde, I think, was a really important stepping stone for us”
2:46:50 Code name: “the Green Box”. “The place where Verde ‘failed’ was the place where Alma excels: the unification …”
hard to create a standalone product … major components missing: Knowledge Base, bib records, Acquisitions
2:49:20 “Why couldn’t Verde do what Serials Solutions did?” – started from the ERM, added the link resolver to it
2:50:30 “Looking back at these years, 1988 to 2005, what things are you, personally, most proud of having done in connection with Aleph, SFX, Metalib -- and Ex Libris in general?”
“Probably, if I had to choose one … SFX…. But bringing Aleph to North America would be a close second.”
“A lot of people contributed a lot of good things.”