LINKcat News

News Summary (5/1/2022-5/31/2022)

News (in case you missed it!)

• 5/31/2022 The ILS Report for May 2022 is available online.
• 5/25/2022 The minutes from the May 18 DIS Meeting are available online.
• 5/25/2022 The minutes from the May 11 CMS Meeting are available online.
• 5/25/2022 The minutes from the May 10 CSS Meeting are available online.
• 5/25/2022 20,201 items and 2,507 bibliographic records (with only withdrawn items attached) were deleted in the monthly batch deletion of withdrawn items.
• 5/20/2022 The GetIt Acquisitions Setup: Vendors on-demand webinar is now available. Click here for the video.
• 5/18/2022 If you experience response time problems in Bibliovation, please report them to the Help Desk. For more details on reporting response time problems, see this LINKcat News blog post.
• 5/17/2022 See the LINKcat News blog post for information about the moratorium on changes to existing bibliographic records, which starts Saturday, May 28.
• 5/16/2022 There is a new Workflow for re-queuing holds at Check in or from the Hold Shelf.  See the LINKcat News blog post for more details.
• 5/6/22 The Bibliovation staff URL will be changing on May 31, 2022. A redirect from the old URL will be in place through September 1, 2022. See the LINKcat News blog post for more details.
• 5/4/2022 The monthly LINKcat.info and LINKcat Mobile reports for April are posted.
• 5/3/2022  The monthly Bibliovation reports for April 2022 can be found online

Reporting Bibliovation Response Time Problems

SCLS staff are working with LibLime to determine areas of Bibliovation where intermittent and short-term slowdowns are a problem and we are looking for your help. If you experience response time problems with Bibliovation, please open a ticket using the SCLS Help Desk Portal or send an email to [email protected].

In order to provide the most specific information possible to LibLime about response time, please report any problems at the time that they occur, and with as many details as possible. For example, if there is a problem when checking out to a patron, please provide the patron’s barcode number, as well as information about whether the patron has a large number of items already checked out or is checking out a large number of items. If there is a problem when viewing a bibliographic and/or item record, please provide the bibliographic number and/or item barcode number and the specifics of the problem. It’s also important to provide the date and approximate time when the problem occurred.

If Bibliovation is unusable or seems to be having major problems, please contact the Help Desk immediately (use the After Hours Support Number during evenings and weekends).

Moratorium on changes to existing bib records May 28 through around June 6

SCLS and the Madison catalogers are currently planning an authority control update project that will update all of the existing OCLC bibliographic records in our database with up-to-date author, subject, genre, and uniform title (series) headings. During this time, Madison cataloging staff cannot overlay or edit existing OCLC bibliographic records. 

What this means for you right now

Starting next Saturday, May 28, if you submit changes to Madison on the following ILS Work Request forms:

Request to Add ISBNs or UPCs to Bibs

Report Problems with Bib Records

Report Duplicate Bib Records

those changes will be held by Madison until the first full week of June. The changes will be done after the project is completed the next week. Unfortunately, we don't have an exact end date at this time, but it should be done by the end of the first full week of June.

 During this time, you can continue to:

1. Create BSEs and link items
2. "Send to catalog" from GetIt for both bib records and item records
3. Create, edit, withdraw, and delete item records for items owned by your library
4. Create LOCAL, PERM, or GEN records

What this means for you during the next week

Around June 4 or 5, there may be a day (or possibly two days) where we will ask you to refrain from creating BSEs and using "Send to Catalog" from GetIt to create new bib records while the updated bibliographic records are loaded into Bibliovation by LibLime. We will send an email out about this as soon as we have solid information. Unfortunately, we don't know exactly how long it will take for all of the updates to be made to the bib records and how long it will take LibLime to load the changed bibs back into Bibliovation.

NEW WORKFLOW for re-queuing a patron's hold at Checkin or from the hold shelf.

In order to re-queue a patron's hold for the following situations,

• Item in Transit to fill hold
• Staff pulls an item out of a delivery bin that is in poor shape or is missing a part and cannot fill the patron's hold.
• Item Waiting on hold shelf.
• Staff and patron can't find item on hold shelf or item is discovered to be defective before checkout.
• Item on hold shelf, patron requests a different pickup location
• Patron has an Unexpired hold on your hold shelf that they would like to be sent to a different pickup location.

the same, initial step is to CHECK IN THE ITEM AND CLICK THE IGNORE BUTTON.  Doing this will disengage the patron's hold from the item and re-place their hold at the top of the Holds list.

More information and detailed instructions for each situation are located in the Circulation Manual, Section VIII Problem Statuses and Workflows, Part K How to Re-queue a Patron's Hold and in Section IX Placing and Managing Holds, Part G Other Holds Procedures.

The Problem Item form has been updated to reflect this change in the workflow.  See this page for both the full and half-sheet forms

Bibliovation Staff URL Change May 31, 2022

The Bibliovation staff URL will be changing from scls.kohalibrary.com to scls.bibliovation.com during the day on May 31, 2022. LibLime will be doing a redirect from the old URL to the new URL until September 1, 2022. Because of the redirect, the change will happen behind the scenes and should not impact existing URLs right away. However, any links to the “old” URL will need to be updated to the “new” URL sometime between June 1, 2022 and September 1, 2022. Unfortunately, this is not something that can be done automatically by SCLS staff. No URL updates should be done prior to June 1, 2022.

Where are the staff URLs saved?
Please take some time between now and June 1 to think about where your library may have saved URLs to Bibliovation. Some places where URLs might be stored are:

• Bookmarks in browsers on staff computers
• Shortcuts on staff computers
• Internal library websites that are only used by library staff
• Documentation and instructions that your library created for staff
• Receipt printer shortcuts on staff PCs
• Spine label shortcuts on staff PCs

How do I update the URLs?
For browser bookmarks and shortcuts, you can edit the existing bookmark/shortcut and replace the old URL with the new URL. You can also delete the existing bookmark/shortcut and create a new bookmark/shortcut with the new URL. For internal documentation or websites, you can do a find and replace to update the URLs.

How do I update the URL in the receipt and/or spine label printer Firefox profile shortcuts?
There are special procedures for updating the receipt and spine label printer shortcuts. Instructions are posted on the ILS Support Manuals page.

Can I use my library's unique Bibliovation URL?
Yes! In Bibliovation, each library can use a unique URL for staff as well as for patrons. Your library's unique URL is <agency code>.scls.bibliovation.com. (For example, the URL for SCA will be sca.scls.bibliovation.com.) If you use your library's unique URL, then your library's items will display first on the "Detail" screen of the bib record, the "Edit items" screen of the bib record, and on the "Item status" screen of the bib record.

What about the LINKcat URL?
The generic URL for LINKcat is www.linkcat.info. The www.linkcat.info URL is not changing. Each library also has a unique LINKcat URL, which can be used for patrons. Your library's unique LINKcat URL is <agency code>.linkcat.info. (For example, the unique URL for SCLS is sca.linkcat.info.) Always use <agency code>.linkcat.info for any patron-facing information. Please do not use the scls.bibliovation.com URL for any patron materials or websites. If you are copying and pasting URLs into websites or other patron materials, be sure that you are using <agency code>.linkcat.info instead of scls.bibliovation.com.

What does this mean for patrons?
Patrons should not notice a change. Patrons will still be able to use www.linkcat.info to access LINKcat. Patron PCs in the library will continue to take patrons into the library's custom-branded LINKcat instance.

I need more help with this
If you need help with updating bookmarks, shortcuts, or anything else, you can contact the Help Desk. See the Get Help page for information on contacting the Help Desk.

Special note about GetIt Acquisitions
Libraries who are using GetIt Acquisitions must continue to use their library's unique URL in order to use GetIt. The library's unique URL is <agency code>.scls.bibliovation.com.