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Inkleaf Takes On Library Operations: An Interview With John Blyberg
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Posted On October 15, 2024
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For the January/February 2024 issue of Information Today, I sat down with Inkleaf founder and CEO John Blyberg to talk about the imminent release of the company’s all-in-one library experience platform, also called Inkleaf. At that point, John and the Inkleaf team members—which includes COO and all-around amazing human and librarian Cindi Blyberg—were getting ready to unveil all of their hard work to librarians at the upcoming spring/summer slate of library conferences.

Inkleaf team members: John Blyberg, Adrien Trainor, and Cindi Blyberg at a conference booth

Inkleaf founder and CEO John Blyberg, technical writer Adrien Trainor, and COO Cindi Blyberg

When I spoke with John at that time, I didn’t feel like I was speaking to the CEO of a technology company. Instead, I felt like I was talking to an artist or a musician on the cusp of finishing their latest work and who was about to head out to the stage to unveil their heart and soul to the world. Inkleaf didn’t feel like just another product for librarians to consider and commit a chunk of their budget to. Sure, Inkleaf looked and felt like a system for librarians, but John’s passion for the platform he built came out through his words: “I want library workers to know they are important and deserve good software.” To me, this doesn’t sound like a CEO hoping that their next big product will deliver big fiscal results (even though I know that big fiscal results are nice too). This sounds like a human being and a library lover opening up their heart and soul to create and then deliver something that will actually help librarians in their day-to-day lives.

I was intrigued.

Blyberg is no stranger to the world of library technology and user experience. He started in library land at the Ann Arbor District Library in Michigan, where his work in library technology led him to be named a Library Journal Mover & Shaker in 2006. After that, he moved to the Darien Library in Connecticut and became its assistant director for innovation and user experience. His work on the creation of an open source library catalog system based on the Drupal CMS won the LITA Brett Butler Entrepreneurship Award in 2009. On top of that, Blyberg’s leadership at that library helped set up the framework for the Darien Library’s new approach to customer service, community outreach, and technological innovation. If you were studying to be a librarian or working in a public library in the early 2010s, then you’re surely familiar with the Darien Library. If not, all you need to know is that when you’re hearing about customer service, community outreach, and technology these days, chances are that those discussions started with the work done by that library during that time.

Inkleaf feels like the culmination of Blyberg’s many contributions to the world of libraries and technology all in one product. From the moment you log in to Inkleaf, you know that what you’re dealing with has the potential to simplify your work life and help you keep the focus that you need.

Sleekly designed, easy to follow, and free from the clutter that bogs down a lot of technology, Inkleaf is one of those library tools that you shouldn’t overlook. Library leaders and managers who want to unlock the full potential of their staffers will find Inkleaf to be the technology that keeps the team together. Communication is always put at the top of the list when it comes to what makes an organization successful, and Inkleaf will ensure that the library team that you lead is working together and communicating effectively. Why? Well, everything you’ll need to know when it comes to your library, such as what events are happening and what the current policies and procedures are, are all live in Inkleaf. Having this information easily accessible, stored in one place (instead of wading through old Microsoft Word files on an old server just to find the latest version of a policy or procedure—an experience I know you, the reader, have had), and in the most up-to-date version will transform the way you and your library team operate.

All of that time spent searching for the right information or the date and time of a specific event? Gone. You can now spend your library time focusing on the things that brought you to working in the library in the first place: the community.

Over the past month, I’ve been lucky to have access to Inkleaf, and I’ve spent my time imagining that I was still working in a public library. How would I incorporate a new library system into my daily work life? What are some of the features of Inkleaf that are most helpful to the modern librarian? Fear not, dear readers, for those questions and others will be answered in this article.

THE KINDEST SOFTWARE OUT THERE

On the About page of Inkleaf’s website is one simple sentence that stood out to me before I had access to Inkleaf, and now that I’ve had a chance to experience it, this sentence is all I can think about: “Inkleaf creates kind software for libraries and library workers.” Kindness, a word that you’re most likely not used to seeing when it comes to any kind of software, let alone library software, is always present when using Inkleaf. From simply logging in to Inkleaf to using its many features, Inkleaf is always presenting itself as really quick, easy-to-use, and easy-to-navigate software. It’s this focus on kindness that will keep users coming back to Inkleaf to cover all of their library needs.

Inkleaf has four major categories that I’m going to focus on for this article: People, Topics, Knowledge Base, and Forms. People and Topics are the two that will look the most familiar to the user. They’re standard for any type of intranet, but with Inkleaf, you’ll find them to be easy to use, easy to follow, and reliable. I can’t tell you how often I’ve had to spend time searching Microsoft Outlook to find contact information for someone I needed to email. With Inkleaf’s People category, nothing feels hidden away.

Topics reminds me of the early days of the internet when message boards ruled the day, and this is something I very much welcome as a user. Inkleaf doesn’t give you all of the bells and whistles of a common social media network, and for that you’ll be thankful. Topics keep the conversations focused and easily accessible, and Inkleaf’s Reddit-style upvoting of comments made on Topics can help those ideas offered by others on the library team rise to the top and get the attention they deserve.

Where Inkleaf really shines are its Knowledge Base and Forms categories. These two sections are where I found myself spending most of my time while using Inkleaf. As I experienced the excellent design and layout of these sections, I imagined all of the time it would save for me to do all of the other community-focused library things I wanted to do. My heart leapt with joy as I dreamed my own shared library dream with Inkleaf.

I can’t tell you how much time in the past I’ve spent looking through folders, shared drives, intranets, and every other type of file system invented just to find the particular library document I needed. With Inkleaf, you can put away your scuba gear because no longer are you going to be taking long deep dives just to find those board meeting minutes that you need.

Inkleaf is made by librarians for librarians, and who would’ve guessed it: This type of arrangement works really well. Blyberg’s knowledge of how librarians catalog, store, and share information comes in super handy with Inkleaf’s Knowledge Base. He’s built the tool that you’ve been looking for all of these years. Goodbye to your secret library Google Drive folder where you store information that you need daily. Now you can safely store and share this information with your team and ditch any less-than-ideal workarounds that you’ve developed through the years.

Forms may seem like a simple feature on Inkleaf, but it’s essential for the modern librarian. First, I love how the Forms section has two separate tabs: one for staff forms and one for public forms. Once I saw those two tabs, I thought about how I could use Forms for both areas of my library work life. Public Forms can be used for event registration or feedback, ILL request forms, library card signups, and more. The information that someone inputs into each form easily stays in the responses to that form. Staff forms can record daily statistics and happenings in a simple way, including staff vacations and holidays.

Let me remind you again: Inkleaf is made by librarians for librarians. Inkleaf’s design really shines, presenting the user with an easy-to-read and easy-to-understand format. In a profession in which user experience is often at the forefront of the conversation, I’m always surprised at how little of the user experience discussion makes it into the software that librarians use. Inkleaf isn’t that—and trust me, you’re going to love it. By focusing on providing the librarian user with a simple yet elegantly designed product, Inkleaf has managed to take all of the tools that are needed for modern librarians, group them together, give them a structure and a shine that only librarians will understand, and offer the software that they need to go out there and be the best community-focused librarians they can be.

As I wrote this article, I kept thinking about how Inkleaf is a bit like the body’s central nervous system. Constantly receiving and processing information, Inkleaf is doing all of the background work to keep the information that your library generates accessible, organized, and understandable. It keeps the library running smoothly, just like your central nervous system keeps you going without you having to think about it.

CATCHING UP WITH THE CEO

Now that Inkleaf is fully ready for the public, I sat down with Blyberg again to catch up and learn more about Inkleaf. Here’s that mini interview (minterview?).

John Blyberg wearing 3D glasses while sitting at the Inkleaf boothJustin Hoenke: How were your first conferences with Inkleaf at center stage?

John Blyberg (photo at right): Our first two shows at PLA and ALA were really exciting because it was the first time we put the Inkleaf platform in front of so many people. I think our list of planned features doubled in response to the feedback we received at the booth. One of our challenges is that we’ve been calling ourselves an “intranet” because that’s a term people recognize. While that’s true, Inkleaf is also a productivity platform specifically designed to complement your library’s public service model. The two shows helped us refine how we talk about something that hasn’t existed in the library marketplace until now. Our goal for PLA and ALA this year was to introduce ourselves, make people aware that we exist, and find a few select partners who are excited about our vision and want to take this journey with us.

Hoenke: What have you heard from the people in library land you introduced Inkleaf to?

Blyberg: When we had the opportunity to demo Inkleaf to librarians and library workers, one of the most common responses was, “I wasn’t sure what to expect, but it wasn’t this.” Our Knowledge Base and Forms apps received the most buzz.

Knowledge Base garnered attention because the current options—SharePoint, wikis, WordPress, and, in many cases, Word documents and PDFs on a shared drive—leave a lot to be desired. The ability to easily manage notebooks and permissions and retrieve documents with a simple, super-fast search was very appealing. The fact that Inkleaf shapes itself to your organization, rather than the other way around, means library workers can spend less time adapting to new software and more time focused on their work.

The response to our Forms app was a bit of a surprise. It is our least mature product, but it resonated deeply with many people. Forms are a critical tool for libraries. As a company founded by people who worked in libraries for many years, we are keenly familiar with the need to collect information from both the public and staff. We also know that this information needs to be handled differently, with varying levels of access. Appropriately managing how and where that inflow of information goes, and who has access to it, has been such a long-standing pain point that we felt it was high time to address it. When we demo Forms, and people see how easily they can set permissions on form responses, segregate staff forms from public forms, and create and modify forms, a common refrain is, “I really wish we had this!”

Hoenke: What has been going on with Inkleaf as a company now that you’ve made your public debut?

Blyberg: Following our debuts at PLA and ALA, we took a well-deserved breather. After months of intense software sprints and the excitement of product launches, we needed some time to recharge—because, after all, we’re human too! It was important for us to step back, reflect on the feedback we received, and allow ourselves a moment to reset.

We reconvened as a team to map out our priorities for the fall. Armed with the insights gained from our experiences at the conferences and the valuable feedback from our demos, we were ready to dive back into refining the platform and tackling the next phase of development. Our focus was to ensure that the momentum we’d built carried forward into delivering even more powerful features and enhancements for Inkleaf.

Hoenke: Does Inkleaf have a soundtrack?

Blyberg: I’ll have to think about this one! I will say that I cannot listen to music with lyrics while coding—it’s just too distracting. I almost exclusively listen to Classic FM while I work, a delightful British classical music station that provides comfort and music that helps me focus.

Hoenke: What’s the most important thing that you discovered while you were building Inkleaf?

Blyberg: Inkleaf is by far the largest application I’ve worked on from the ground up, so it’s really important to me that its complexity remains scalable. From an engineering perspective, we take technical debt very seriously. For non-engineers, technical debt refers to the accumulation of hidden issues in an application’s source code. Sometimes, as developers, we make decisions that cause future developers to scratch their heads and wonder, “What were they thinking?” These decisions can stem from rushed deadlines, inexperience, good intentions gone awry, or even just a bad day.

Technical debt is inevitable in any codebase, but its impact is compounded when a company doesn’t prioritize ongoing refactoring and remediation. Many companies don’t, because development time is expensive, and the focus tends to be on shipping new features. However, continually kicking the can down the road leads to application instability, increased support burdens, and missed opportunities.

I’ve come to realize that building a major application like Inkleaf requires careful planning and patience to get it right. Fortunately, much of the early work we invested in the platform has paid off, providing us with a solid foundation on which Inkleaf can grow and evolve in any direction we choose.

Hoenke: What are some of the next steps that you want to take?

Blyberg: Right now, we are focused on continuing work on the existing platform and apps, while also developing a mobile experience that we hope will achieve feature parity with the desktop and web versions. Accessibility improvements are another major priority for us in the coming year. Additionally, we want to continue sharing our story and spreading the word about our product.

Hoenke: What is your favorite feature in Inkleaf that you think librarians will dig the most?

Blyberg: I think the most fun thing to work on as a software engineer will also be the feature our users come to appreciate the most. Users are always seeing live data on the screen. Someone updates their email address or phone number in the staff directory? It immediately shows the new information to all logged-in users. The same goes for updated Knowledge Base notes, blog posts, and comments. You can even watch form submissions in real time. At the same time, we’ve taken great care to make content easily addressable with clean, uncluttered URLs.

Hoenke: Can you talk about the different resources you are using to help build Inkleaf?

Blyberg: The Inkleaf platform is a collection of Node.js microservices written in TypeScript and running in a Kubernetes cluster in our New York City data center. The front end is a Vue.js application. Readers who follow web development closely may ask why we chose Vue over the more popular React, and to that, I would say that we like Vue for its simplicity and its single-file component (SFC) model. We use Postgres as our database back end, along with a number of other open source tools such as RabbitMQ, KeyDB (a Redis alternative), and Traefik for balancing inbound web traffic.

Throughout my career, I’ve made it a point to rely solely on open source software for any critical system in a tech stack—from my code editor all the way up to container orchestration. Not only is open source software free to use, but it is also inherently accountable by its very nature. The concept of open source is an example of the very best humanity has to offer, and of course, those are the tools we want to build our business on.


Photos courtesy of Inkleaf


Justin Hoenke is a library consultant who is interested in public libraries as community centers, supporting youth services staff to help them achieve their goals, and video game collection development. You can learn more about his work in libraries at justinthelibrarian.com. Hoenke previously worked in public libraries across the U.S. and New Zealand in leadership and youth services.

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