Pretend It’s Magic: The Story of a Library Management System

by Tara Kunesh

I’m dancing in a club in Melbourne, Australia. It’s a dimly lit underground establishment not too far from St. Kilda beach where I have been sharing a small apartment with a friend I met sailing. Lights the color of a rich port wine are dotted unevenly upon the walls, and most of the patrons are grouped in corners or leaning over small tables conversing intently. It’s almost midnight on the final night of the 1990s. It’s the type of place that invokes intensity at the best of times and, tonight, the mood is impassioned bordering on overwrought with a side of inebriation. The group of women next to me on the dance floor are sobbing into their Manhattans. When I enquire about their wellbeing, they raise tear-streaked faces that sparkle strangely in the burgundy glow. They glance at their watches. In twenty minutes, they say, life, as we know it, is possibly over. A slightly less weepy woman stares deeply into my eyes. Our jobs, she says, may be no more. Nodding, I back away. I don’t have a job so there’s that. And, well, if the world is going to end, I’m going to take Prince’s advice and party like it’s 1999. Which it is. I turn to the bartender and order another pitcher of vodka and red bull.

Rewind time a little and switch locations. In the United States, the Georgia Public Library Service (GPLS) had been spending the last few years of the nineties thinking much more soberly about the dawn of the next millennium. To be precise, they were thinking about the date January 1st, 2000, technically a year earlier than the new millennium, but let’s not get too bogged down with details. One specific problem they were facing was the fact that many libraries across Georgia were operating with systems that might not be compliant with the potential computer errors that Y2K predicted. The librarians were scrambling for a solution. In 1998, a universal borrowing card for Georgia that would link local library regions into an ambitious state-wide network had been proposed and accepted.¹ As such an arrangement would not work unless there was a single integrated library system (ILS) put into place to connect all these disparate libraries, GPLS had also been busy building the Public Information Network for Electronic Services (PINES) to provide such unity and to combine all willing public libraries in Georgia into a resource-sharing consortium.² PINES rose judiciously from the ashes of anxiety in December 1999 and began life with ninety-eight libraries under its care.

It’s inspirational, and a little humiliating, to think about this work going on while I was drinking cocktails in an Antipodean bar. Seeing as Atlanta, Georgia is fourteen hours behind Melbourne, Australia, there’s even a good chance that the PINES team were hard at work while I danced the (sort-of) millennium away. I’d like to believe that was the case. You see, as I twirled in that infernal glow (averting my gaze from the now almost hysterical group of women), and the DJ counted down to midnight, the Fates were already plotting my circuitous route to Georgia.

I don’t think it will come as much of a spoiler if I say that the world woke up on January 1, 2000, not much worse for wear. There were issues with a few credit card companies, some wonky spreadsheet formulae and the like, but we certainly had not come to the “End of Times.” While Prince was correct to sing that we were all going to die one day, that day was, for many, still somewhere in the hazy future.

The new millennium did signal the end of my sojourn in Australia, however. I had been enjoying their hospitality courtesy of a yearlong visa, and I had almost overstayed my welcome. I took the time offered almost to the minute before dragging myself away from that gorgeous country. This is where Fate rubbed her hands together and got to work. I am not sure to this day why she took an interest and intervened, but it certainly seems that I spent the next year making some atypical decisions. You might think, for example, that I would fly home after being away from my family for approximately three hundred and sixty-seven days (give or take some truly heinous flight times). However, I felt uncommonly ready for a new adventure and decided to head in the opposite direction. Going home for me would have meant returning to England and, instead, I headed to the west coast of America. I fell asleep in a park in downtown San Francisco - waking to find a chattering squirrel perched on my shoulder - before recuperating from the flight in that foggy utopia. Closing my eyes and drawing a dot on the map later in the week determined that my next steps would be to head south to Hollywood.

Most journeys begin with the literal opening of a door. I had been an avid reader of Tolkien when I was around sixteen and remembered that, in both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, Gandalf the Wizard tries to warn both his heroes–Bilbo and Frodo–of the dangers that lurk beyond the safety of the hearth. While unlikely, there just might be dragons waiting outside. It is then arguable that you would only have yourself to blame for the inevitable fire-blowing, bone-crunching, death-inducing devastation that follows your tentative foray into the wide blue yonder. It’s equally possible, of course, that you might step outside to a scene of delightful tranquility. You might walk forwards in a gentle spill of afternoon sunlight, brushing your hands over an array of waving grasses underneath a baby blue sky. The point is that you don’t know what you will find when you open the door and take that first step. You might board a train at the edge of an ocean that will, eventually, take you somewhere you never planned or expected to be.

We’ll fast forward a little here. My life is really quite incidental to this story. It is enough, perhaps, to explain that, while staying in a hostel in the Hollywood Hills, I met an American man. It’s an immigration tale as old as time; it was far easier to get married in haste and, after twenty-five years, there’s no need to discuss whether I needed to repent at leisure. We tried on lives in England, then Florida, Wyoming, and Utah, before landing in Georgia in the summer of 2012. I still remember the feeling of wonder as I stepped off the plane and felt, for the very first time, the smothering, sweat-inducing blanket of humidity that Atlanta was wrapping cozily around me. I had grown up a little in the last twelve years, and my life was very different. I spent less time in bars and more time scrubbing dirt off my two daughters, throwing child-friendly pasta dishes in the oven, and picking bits of the same pasta dishes out of the carpet.

Meanwhile, back at the PINES ranch, business was booming, although the intervening period had not been without its challenges. At the time of the 1999 launch, PINES had, you may remember, ninety-eight libraries under its electronic wing. Within a year or so, this number had more than doubled. However, while PINES was cheerfully expanding–demonstrating the power of collaboration and sharing–the software behind PINES labored fruitlessly to keep up with such unprecedented growth. There is an infamous day, noted in the literature and remembered by PINES staff, when this software failed completely, resulting in a complete and inconvenient halt to the servers.³ Hearsay adds a layer of bitterness to this era. PINES staff, even now, do not like to mention this software company. If they say its name at all, it is in hushed, furtive whispers. The name has taken on the significance of that equally unmentionable Scottish play. Thankfully, by the time I arrived in Georgia, PINES had left that unhelpful software in the dust and were well into their journey with a new, attractive in-house developed alternative.⁴ But wait. That statement is a bit of a spoiler and doesn’t really do justice to the drama and boldness of their venture. We need to take a closer look.

Obviously, PINES desired expansion. They wanted more libraries across Georgia to join their consortium. But the fact of the matter was that there simply wasn’t any software on the market that met their needs. It was definitely a moment for PINES to consider whether or not to open that door. Even if there weren’t actual dragons outside, Frodo could have told them a thing or two about other dangers they might find on the road: giant, flesh-eating spiders, zombie horsemen, and whip-wielding demons for starters. PINES opened the door anyway, and in 2004, embarked upon a quest to create their own library management system.⁵ It seemed a tall order and certainly a leap of faith. I wish I had been around for those conversations. I can only imagine the inordinate level of calculated coaxing it must have taken to convince those in charge that this bold idea was viable. I’ve been adding a lot of analogies about heroic journeys, and you may scoff. But, truly, the creation of the PINES developed, open-source software called Evergreen had the high drama and magical elements befitting an epic quest. Thanks to their powers of persuasion, PINES were allocated two years: They would need to deliver a fully functioning library management system by 2006.⁶

PINES is—and I am sure was—a closeknit crew. As a cohesive unit, they traipsed around Georgia, inviting library staff to focus groups to discuss the potential software. It was hard, they explained, to get people to think outside the parameters of other systems and what they had seen before. “Pretend it’s magic,”⁷ the PINES staff urged, encouraging the focus group participants to imagine a library management system that soared above the rest. The PINES team didn’t want to be constrained by previous or known entities; they wanted to develop something extraordinary. “Pretend its magic” is such a lovely concept. What if we used this idea more in life? Do you want a different career? A different spouse? Do you want to move to a different country? Or do you want to own miniature goats? What would you change if you could reach into the fabric of the universe and manipulate its ineffable mystery?

It was on September 5th, 2006, the Tuesday following the Labor Day weekend, that Evergreen was launched into reality.⁸ Anyone out there familiar with library system migrations knows how exhausting, challenging, and demoralizing they can be. Let me make sure I drive this point home then. On launch day—after a purported sleep-deprived weekend for the PINES team—all two hundred and fifty-three libraries now in their care successfully went live with Evergreen.⁹

Library systems sat up and took note of this groundbreaking development and, today, there are more than two thousand libraries around the world that use the Evergreen library management system.¹⁰ Its users really care about their friendly, open-source software too. Evergreen, as befits the name, is a living, breathing community that vigorously responds to the careful and enthusiastic stewardship of its members who come together to write code, fix and report bugs, create documentation, test new versions of the software, and meet to share knowledge. Evergreen grows bigger and better every year.¹¹

I started working with the PINES team in 2024 when Evergreen was really quite grown up. While it took me a minute to realize the significance of its development, it did not take me long to comprehend the passion that the PINES team feels, to this day, for their creation. While the initial developers had, due to conflict-of-interest considerations, left PINES to create their own support company in the very early days, that change had been born from legal necessity rather than from personal choice. It’s a bit cheesy, but I think the PINES staff, both past and present, should be really proud of their monumental achievement. By pretending it was magic they just about made that magic real.

Recently, I attended Evergreen’s twentieth birthday celebration. The event—replete with not one but two cakes—was held during the annual Evergreen conference. It goes without saying that I ate a slice of both. One had a citrus flavor, reminiscent of key lime pie. The other was more subtle, pink butter cream with delicate floral notes. I was excited to be at the shindig and a little smug about my excellent timing. I got to meet one of the original developers, and it felt a little like meeting a celebrity. I found myself strangely moved knowing that I was now part of this shared history. I’ve very much enjoyed my job as an Evergreen cataloger since the beginning, but I would now consider myself an enthusiastic advocate for all that our software stands for as well. Okay, it’s been a long speech. So, without further ado, let us raise a toast: Happy birthday, Evergreen. May your feet always remain on the road, may your encounters with dragons be few, and may your magic always endure.

Notes

• 1. Molyneux, “Evergreen in Context,” 27-28.
• 2. Molyneux and Rylander, “State of Evergreen,” 667.
• 3. Molyneux, “Evergreen in Context,” 27.
• 4. Weber, “Evergreen: Your Homegrown ILS,” 38.
• 5. Molyneux and Rylander, “State of Evergreen,” 668.
• 6. Georgia Public Library Service. “White Paper PINES/Evergreen/Equinox August 2009.”
• 7. Boule, Michelle. “The Case Studies.” 10.
• 8. Molyneux and Rylander, “State of Evergreen,” 667.
• 9. Georgia Public Library Service, “White Paper PINES/Evergreen/Equinox August 2009.”
• 10. Evergreen, “Project Site.”
• 11. Albee and Chen, “Perceived Value and Satisfaction,” 393.

Bibliography

• Albee, Barbara and Hsin-liang Chen. “Public Library Staff's Perceived Value and Satisfaction of an Open Source Library System.” The Electronic Library 32, no. 3 (2014): 390-402. https://doi.org/10.1108/EL-03-2012-0024.
• Boule, Michelle. “The Case Studies.” Library Technology Reports 44, no. 1 (2008): 10-20. https://journals.ala.org/index.php/ltr/article/view/4417/5124.
• Evergreen. “Evergreen Project Site.” Accessed April 20, 2026. https://evergreen-ils.org/.
• Georgia Public Library Service. “White Paper PINES/Evergreen/Equinox August 2009.” Accessed April 18, 2026. https://pines.georgialibraries.org/files/WhitePaper-PINES-Evergreen-Equinox-8-09.pdf.
• Molyneux, Robert E. “Evergreen in Context.” Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science and Technology (Online) 35, no. 2 (2009): 26-30. https://asistdl.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/bult.2008.1720350208.
• Molyneux, Robert E. and Mike Rylander. “The State of Evergreen: Evergreen at Three.” Library Review 59, no. 9 (2010): 667-676. https://doi.org/10.1108/00242531011086999.
• Weber, Jonathan. “Evergreen: Your Homegrown ILS.” Library Journal 131, no. 20 (2006): 38-41. https://www.libraryjournal.com/story/evergreen-your-homegrown-ils.