June AspenCat Users’ Group Meeting Overview

Koha upgrades, exciting cooperative purchases, Discovery Layer updates, and more! Look below to see our meeting agenda and notes. You can also listen to the meeting here.

Koha upgrade
  • Will be upgrading to 21.11 August 1st. No big changes this time!
  • Currently have this release on our sandbox, if you want to do some testing: https://staff-clictest.bywatersolutions.com/cgi-bin/koha/mainpage.pl
  • Item Search will now be on Koha home page, under Advanced Search. This is useful for specific searching and getting specific lists.
  • Patron from Logged in Library Display. This will show which home library the patron is associated with; this is more helpful for our libraries that have multiple branches.
  • Main Contact Method -you can check with your patron to see which main contact method they want (i/e. Primary phone or secondary email). We can also add this preference to hold notices.
  • You will be able to resolve Claims Returned upon check-in of the item.
  • We will be able to send out Hold Reminder notices if the item on hold has not yet been picked up. We are going to initially set this at 4 days (holds expire after 7); let us know if you think this should be set at a different time, though it is a global setting. Like most of our notices, these can be customized, so please send in a ticket after the upgrade with your preferred wording.
  • You will be able to click on details of a particular transaction in Accounting, which makes things much clearer.
  • You will be able to filter in advance by Item Type, Collection Code, and Shelving Location (it’s still able to be sorted after running, just like before).
  • Shows Transfer Library on Check-in Screen – will show which library it is being transferred to upon check-in
New cooperative purchases with Kira
  • Library Speakers Consortium -Authors (bestselling authors!) will do a book event and will send out to your library. They will set up a micro-site with your library information on them, and you have unlimited access to those recordings. Find out more on the website and you can watch the CLiC info session here. Prices are by your library’s budget…so fairly low for most AspenCat libraries! Kira has negotiated with the vendor to extend 50% off to the end of this week!
  • Stack Maps will map out where your item is physically located in your library, so patrons can click on the item in the Discovery Layer and see where the item is in your library. These prices are low here, too!
    • Let Kira know if you are interested in either product (coophelp@clichelp@clicweb.org) and if you have other ideas for new cooperative purchases!

Q: Does CLiC have a cooperative purchase for LibCal?

A: Yes! Please contact Kira if you are interested in this      Note: we are looking at developing the Discovery Layer to incorporate a calendar in there. If you do have Libcal, we can integrate that into the Discovery Layer now!

Vendor loads
  • We can do vendor loads much easier now. Please send in a ticket if you want us to help you with that!
Fast Adds
  • You can use Report 3325 to find your library’s Fast Add records. The “issues” column will tell you how many checkouts they have had. If it’s been checked out multiple times, it would make sense to delete the item and/or record and start from scratch using our Cataloging Workflow (if there are other libraries’ items on there, let us know and we can get everything on a good record
Prospector Update
  • Training July 28th / Go Live August 2nd . If you are participating, you will be getting more information soon. Schools might be able to participate through a public library – contact Marisa if you are interested: swift-support@coloradovirtuallibrary.org
Discovery Layer updates
  • We can do a lot of fun things with Web Builder now, including a “children’s catalog”, adding your Summer Reading link, and creating registration forms for programs. Check out our test catalog and send in a ticket if you’re interested!
  • Diversity Placard and Browse Categories – we now have a Children’s Award Winners – Diversity Emphasis Browse Category and Placard. The placard is currently showing for everyone when someone searches using our set trigger words (let us know if you have search word suggestions for that!).