The most important of NekoSakana Software's current projects, Librarian's Assistant is intended to be far more than merely an educational exercise for it's author.

My mother is School Librarian for Thornden Secondary School in Chandler's Ford, Eastleigh (UK). Currently she uses a program called MicroLibrarian on an Acorn computer for all book records and issues to students. Although this program performs the majority of the functions she requires of it the time has come to update the system to a PC with Windows 95 (or 98) in order to network with the other computers in the school.

This brings a problem. The only system she is aware of to replace MicroLibrarian will cost almost 2000 pounds to install and update the book and reader records, excluding the cost of buying the new PC for it to go on. I thought I could probably do it for cheaper than that!

Although I realise I will have problems to face which I currently do not know how to tackle (the integration of a bar code reader into the system for example) I am fully confident in my ability to produce a stable, easy to learn program that will deal with all the situations required of it.

If all goes well and the program is well accepted by Thornden I may well decide to try marketing this product to other schools. If you are in some way connected to a school library and you have some comment about this project please feel free to e-mail me. Any comments about any special requirements for the system you feel will be beneficial will be gratefully received.