VUGM 2001 Toast to Endeavor

by Alan Manifold

20 April 2001

"Who let the frogs out?" I would like to know
I seem to find them everywhere I go
No matter if I'm in the U.S.A.
In New York, Madison, Hilo, L.A.,
Chicago, Birmingham, Fort Hood, Eau Claire,
West Lafayette, Bethesda, Delaware,
Woods Hole, Yakima, Tucson, Evanston,
Manoa, Richmond, Slippery Rock, Boston,
Or Barstow, College Station, Salem, Rome,
El Paso, Winston-Salem, Mountain Home.
Or if I'm in Auckland or Wellington,
Or Adelaide, Canberra or Clayton,
Or if I am in Melbourne or Sydney,
In Paris, London, Stockholm, Helsinki,
Or Aberystwyth, Cardiff, Lampeter,
Or Swansea, Cambridge, Hatfield, and yes, sir,
In Edinburgh, Glasgow, Örebro,
In Kalmar, Canterbury or Växjö,
Caracas or Geneva, Port of Spain.
Or crossing the Canadian domain--
Victoria or Windsor, Edmonton,
Regina, Calgary, Guelph or Kingston,
And hundreds more I don't have time to say;
The list is growing almost every day.

The frogs came from Endeavor, yes, but why?
Why didn't we all go with Triple-I,
Or with Ex Libris, Sirsi, DRA,
Or that damned Epix-thing no one can say?
I think the explanation is quite plain
It lies within three "P"s; let me explain.

The first "P" is the products, with an "s",
They are both cause and outcome of success.
From Voyager, the LMS, the core,
Up to Citation Server and lots more:
3M Self-Check and Universal Cat-
alog and Borrowing on top of that.
And Booking, ILL and ARS,
And ImageServer, UNICODE, and, yes,
ENCompass, soon to take the world by storm,
As Libraries continue to transform.

The second "P" stands for philosophy
The hardest to encompass of the three.
With innovation, vision and hard work,
And guided by the wisdom of Jane Burke,
Endeavor aims to lead the industry
And their success in that is plain to see.
The competition tries to stay apace,
I think they know they're in a losing race.

The third and final "P" is personnel,
The people who make EIS excel.
There's Verne and Cindy, Jim and Tom and Don
Doug, Alex, Donna, Gail, Cathy and John,
There's Keeley, Shelley, Kay and Mark and Matt,
And Carol, Sara and on top of that
There's Laurie, Marjorie and Harry, too,
And lots of others, veterans and new,
Victoria, Irinia, Carla, Chris,
And Kathryn, Cheryl, Meredith, Melis-
sa, Mary, Beverly, Marci and Scott,
Vadim, Napolean, Ann--that's a lot!
But also Kevin, Kristen, Dolph and Russ
Michele, Dave, Eli, Henry, Sandy, plus
There's Jenny, Gretchen, Ericka and Chad,
And Jana, Karen, Daniel, and, egad!
There's Penny, Mike and Jean and also there
Are Stephen, Ray and Sarah, Joe and Claire,
Jorge, Amy and Ross can't be forgot
And Sharon, Geri, Eric, now I'm hot!
Stan, Ora, Reeta, Leslie, Daryl, then
Paul, Mary Sue, Patricia, Magdalene
Quinn, Charles, Debbie, Iris, Dale and Jack
And Linda, and before I get off track
There's Lloyd, who isn't personnel per se,
But I think naming him should be okay.
Along with Jane, the Prez and CEO
And many more whose names I do not know.

But that's just one half of the people "P";
Without the customers, where would they be?
At all the sites where Voyager is found
Librarians who use the thing abound.
And helping them are techies by the score
Who load and tune and test and train and more.
The users play a part in the success
Of Voyager and thus of EIS.
And the Enhancement Teams who give their time
To shape the product; it would be a crime
To overlook them, or the beta sites
Whose staff endure the ugliest of plights
So we don't have to, and last on my list:
The User Board, whose reason to exist
Is to speak for the users as one voice.
These people ALL are reasons to rejoice.

Three solid reasons why the frogs are out
Products, philosophy, people, no doubt
There's more that could be said, but I will quit
And let the partiers get on with it.
So, let us raise a glass in solemn toast
To the Endeavor we admire the most!