> Are any currently existing open source ILSs  flexible enough to support this
> model?

I kind of doubt it.  What are you are doing sounds neat, but is not typical library workflow. Tell me if I'm re-describing what you're talking about correctly:  Every book in the library essentially belongs to one of the patrons. Patrons can both borrow books, and loan books to other patrons. The "library" is basically just a facilitator of patron-to-patron lending.  So you need to know what books are out that are "owned" by a certain patron, as well as what books are being borrowed by a certain patron. You need to know what books are over-due that are owned by a certain patron, etc. 

Creating a "location", "branch" or "collection" code for each patron is going to be un-manageable with more than a few dozen patrons. 

I don't think most existing ILS systems -- open source or not -- are going to be set up to handle that system. On the other hand, many existing ILS systems are going to have all sorts of stuff you _don't_ need, like acquisitions, and serials tracking, and such. 

I wonder if you are better served looking for software that is NOT library software to handle the actual "circulation".  Maybe there is some non-library software that is designed for "a network of people lending stuff to each other"?   And then you could always put a Solr-based discovery system on top of that for actual _finding_ of books available to be borrowed, perhaps using VuFind or Blacklight or rolling your own.  But the underlying tracking of "circulation" is actually the tricky part -- perhaps write your own custom software for that, if nothing open source can be found, but then export all items to a seperate Solr-based component for the actual search engine. 

Jonathan



... wrote:
> Reading my original post, perhaps I should have made the important point
> more clear.
>
> My question is about an ILS suitable for a library that does not own its
> books, but is borrowing those books from patrons.   The books all have lease
> end dates associated with them.  Book lenders are very similar to book
> borrowers, and they require end of day processing to see if any of the
> library's books are due back to them, in the same way borrower's books are
> due back to the library.
>
> So, in the last two posts which mentioned "simple borrowing", that is what I
> am wanting, but for the library to be simply borrowing the books AND for
> patron to simply borrow those same books out of the library.
>
> Book lenders and book borrowers are essentially the same, except lenders
> first check a book in, and the due date is when the book leaves the library,
> and book borrowers check books out and then back in again.  Of course, many
> book borrowers are also lenders.
>
> Are any currently existing open source ILSs  flexible enough to support this
> model?
>
> Sorry for the confusion,
> Elliot
>
>