LINK 2.0 Koha

Plan for 4.12 Upgrade

The 4.12 Upgrade will be done on the evening of Wednesday, May 30 and will be in place for the morning of Thursday, May 31. On that morning Talking Tech calls will be delayed so that we may conduct some preliminary tests. 

Read complete details about the included features and bugs in the 4.12 Release Notes.

The following features will be included:

• Ability to limit by Adult and Book from the Advanced Search Screen
• Ability to limit by foreign language from the Advanced Search Screen
• Format limit drop down on the Main search screen
• Talking Tech Koha will now check to see if a hold is filled before the call list is sent to the Talking Tech Server
• Barcode validation

We will not turn on the barcode validation feature until Monday, June 4 in order to give library staff time to adjust to some of the other changes with this release.

We encourage staff to look at the new features in the Koha sandbox.

 

Update on 4.12 Upgrade

If all goes well, we are planning on doing the upgrade to LibLime Koha 4.12 the week of May 28.  It will most likely occur on the evening of May 29 due to the Memorial Day holiday.  Testing is underway and so far we have identified one bug that will need to be fixed prior to the upgrade.  We are working on the Release Notes and will make them available next week so that you can prepare for the fixes and new features that will be included.  At this time we do not expect substantial workflow changes.

We do expect that there will be a fix to Talking Tech (Harriet) so that patrons are not called for holds they have picked up (SCLS Support Ticket 40862). There is really no way for us to test this ahead of time, so we may want to be prepared for some tweaking to occur to this process on the day of the upgrade.

Hold notices via text-messaging - bookmarks and workflow.

Bookmarks are being printed and sent out so that libraries can advertise this new hold notification option.  Each library will receive a packet of 50 bookmarks; we will supply more when requested.

Text hold notices take the place of telephone hold notices in Koha.  It provides an option for patrons who prefer to receive texts rather than a phone call. 

• If a patron activates text hold messages, they will not receive any kind of email notices. 
•  If a patron activates text hold messages, they will receive print overdues and no pre-overdue notices. 
• Patrons can receive text messages on phones with a non-Wisconsin area code.  Text messages are sent via the internet, not telephone lines.
• Any normal text messaging charges apply.
• Patrons will receive one text message for all holds trapped per day (digest format).  The message will be sent around 9am the day after the holds are trapped.

WORKFLOW - How to edit a patron record to receive hold notices via text messages:

• Access the patron record in the Koha staff client.
• Make sure that under "Patron messaging preferences", the Hold filled/email checkbox is checked.
• Remove any email address from the Email (Home) field. (You can store it in the Email (Work) field.)
• Modify the phone number in the Phone (Home) field as follows:
  • Phone number should start with a T, followed by a 1, followed by the area code, followed by the phone number.  Ex.: T1-608-xxx-xxxx
• Save the changes.

Change to Refund Charges screen

This morning the system preference RefundLostReturnedAmount was turned ON.   This preference provides separate Refund buttons for each refund amount a patron may have on their Refund Charges screen, rather than only allowing the Balance to be refunded. Please see patron Darlene Dynix as an example of how multiple Refunds will now be displayed.

Staff are now able to refund individual amounts on a patron's record, refunding only the amount(s) for their Lost/Paid/Returned item(s), instead of being forced to refund the entire balance.  Staff will be also be able to "refund" the amount just to clear it, if the returned item is not eligible for a refund.

If the patron also has other debit amounts on their record, this will affect how the refunds or the last refund will be available.  If there is only one Refund amount on the record AND a debit amount, Staff will only be able to refund the Balance of the two amounts.

New Check Out receipt option

A  new checkout receipt template has been added to each library's set up.  The new receipt lists:

• Item(s) checked out today (section header in italics)
  • Date due in boldface
• Item(s) previously checked out (section header in italics)
  • Renewed item have Date due in boldface and Number of renewals = 1 or more
  • Overdue items have Date due in boldface and Number of renewals = blank

We are not able to compartmentalize the items previously checked out into separate sections for overdue and renewed items.  Having the due date in boldface should help patrons identify overdue items.  If we wish to separate the overdue items and/or renewals on the receipts, we will have to pay for additional development.

Here is an example using this new template : 1027receipt.

If you are interested in using this template when you select the "Print Slip" option, fill out a Circulation Work Request Form  requesting that the "All Check Outs" receipt be assigned to your Print Slip option.  If you have had additional changes made to your current check out receipt that you want included in this new receipt, you must include those changes in this request as well. 

No changes have been made to the Quick Slip template, which still prints only "Item(s) checked out today".

Koha Reports Update

Custom Item and Patron Report Form Now Available

We are pleased to announce that there is a new Custom Report Form available for you to request item and patron reports.  The form is available on the Reports page as well as the Forms page. When filling out this form, be sure to provide a detailed explanation of the type of information you are looking for in addition to completing the selection boxes. Please continue to use the Weeding Form for all weeding report requests.

Purchase Alert Report Almost Complete

Cindy Weber has been working with LibLime to develop the purchase alert report for Koha. The work on this report is almost done and we are just fine-tuning it now.  Look for it to be available very, very soon.

Year End Reports

It is the time of year when we begin thinking about year-end reports--while everyone else is thinking about the holidays!  This year you will have two sets of reports.  We have already generated the annual reports from Dynix (many of which we are holding).  We are now focusing on creating annual reports on Koha.  The good news is that many of the reports are just an annual version of the monthly reports. We will be sure to provide a detailed memo and we will conduct workshops to assist with compiling your statistics for the state annual report.

Newspaper indexes available to public

The link to the public Newspaper index database has been posted in LINKcat. The Newspaper index database provides access to indexes of local newspapers and magazines. It is maintained by staff at several libraries:

• Baraboo Public Library
• Madison Public Library
• Mount Horeb Public Library
• Portage Public Library
• Reedsburg Public Library

See the Newspapers help page for more information on newspapers indexed and coverage.

Not for loan status and checkin/checkout

Good news! LibLime has made some changes in the way items with a Not for loan status (In Processing, On Order, etc.) are handled at the time of checkout/checkin. Since we migrated to Koha, you have had to manually clear the Not for loan status and then check in new items to trap holds. However, effective immediately you can simply check in your new items to clear the status and trap holds all in one step. The Not for loan status is automatically cleared when items are checked in.

If you attempt to check out items with a Not for loan status, you will still get a message alerting you that the item is Not for loan. If you override and proceed with the checkout, the status will automatically clear. If you do not override, the status will remain on the item.

We did not know this change was coming in the last upgrade, and it took a little while to realize that a change had been made. We have confirmed with LibLime that the change was made when they added clarity to the difference between items that are "not for loan" vs. items that are "not for hold" (this was done in response to problems with items incorrectly appearing on the Holds Queue report).

New Don't Miss Lists posted online

The Don't Miss Lists page has been updated with new titles for August 2011 and the NY Times and Publisher's Weekly best seller lists. The new titles lists are still a work in progress and will continue to be refined in the coming months. Also, there are some lists that we had in Dynix (such as new Overdrive titles) that are not available yet but we will add those lists when they are available.

In addition, we now have the ability to offer archived lists of new titles. We were not able to do this in Dynix but we have developed a process for generating and publishing the lists that allows us to store old lists. We will be adding archived lists back to April 2011 soon (starting with new titles added after the Koha migration). When the archived lists are available we will make an announcement.

Weeding Report Form Available

We are pleased to announce that you are now able to submit requests for weeding reports.  The form is available on the ILS Support/Forms page, but here is a link to it: http://www.scls.info/ils/forms/weeding-report.html

You may notice that we do not include average use or date status set which were fields that we were able to provide in Dynix.  Those were highly customized fields using our reporting software on Dynix. We may be able to develop these in the future, but for now we are able to generate reports with all of the other fields that you are used to getting.  One other issue is that you can only ask for either Total LINK copies or Total LINK holds, but not both as we have problems with printing both fields.

We expect to receive a lot of report requests and will do our best to meet the demand.  Please be patient as we cannot guarantee a turn-around-time just yet.