LINKcat News

Non-fiction multi-part TV series, mini-series, documentaries can circulate together as a set

Effective immediately, you can now circulate non-fiction multi-part DVD TV series, mini-series, and documentaries together as a set, in the same way that we have been circulating fiction multi-part DVD sets. This change to the Videorecordings Searching and Matching Policy was approved at the April 5 ILS Committee meeting. 

 

Please note that instructional and travel sets would still circulate separately if each part can stand alone. Travel sets can be large, and cover different states or countries on separate discs, so that is why travel sets would continue to be split. For instructional sets, there are some sets that are circulated together, such as the Great Courses, because they come with a booklet that is used with all discs and these would continue to circulate together. However, if each part of an instructional set can stand alone, then it would be circulated separately.

 

Moving forward, you can treat non-fiction multi-part TV series, mini-series, and documentaries in the same way that you have been treating fiction sets. Any new non-fiction sets can be added to Bibliovation as a full set. The Linking Manual and Linking Training materials have been updated. These are all linked from the Cataloging page (under the Multi-part DVDs Project header): https://www.scls.info/ils/cataloging. The FAQ for Multi-Part DVD Packaging has also been updated.

New Collection Code, Shelving Location, and Item Type limits available in Advanced Search for staff only

New limits for Collection Codes, Shelving Locations, and Item Types are now available in the Bibliovation Advanced Search for staff only. These limits are not available to patrons. To see the new limits, log into Bibliovation using a staff login, and click Search in the top toolbar to access Advanced Search. If you don't see the new limits, please clear your browser cache and verify that you are logged into Bibliovation using a staff login.

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

Change in procedure - no longer need to add "T1-" prefix to phone numbers for Hold Filled text messages.

Staff are no longer required to enter the "T1-" prefix in the patron's Phone (primary) field so that Bibliovation will deliver Hold Filled messages as text.  Since the Patron Messaging Preferences are now so granular, the system extracts phone numbers for messages  based on the PMP setting and not prefixes or extra characters in the phone number field(s).

 

Based on information provided by LibLime and testing done in our Production database, the script extracting phone numbers to deliver Hold Filled messages to the Talking Tech server, both phone and text, is extracting the phone number from the Phone (primary) phone field in the patron record and is not requiring the T1- prefix for text messages.

 

Please share this information with any staff that create and modify patron records so that they no longer add the "T1-" prefix to any phone number field in a patron's record. 

 

We are updating documentation and forms with this change.  We have also submitted a data clean-up ticket to LibLime to strip out the "T1-" prefix from all phone fields in our database, as well as the "*" asterisk used to prevent patrons from getting Telecirc phone messages (in Dynix and Koha).

Change of practice - Entering more than one email address in the Primary email field

Past practice for entering more than one email addresses in the Primary email field was to place a comma or a semicolon between the addresses.  This has been a very useful tool for parents/guardians to (also) receive email notices that their children/guarantees receive, as well as other types of situations where more than one email address is provided for a patron record.

 

Oregon Library discovered that if a semicolon is used to separate addresses, the address after a semicolon will not receive the email notices.

This was confirmed and reported to LibLime, who stated that we should ONLY be using commas to separate email addresses.

 

Please inform all of your staff that create/edit patron records that if they are asked to place multiple email addresses in a Primary email field, to ONLY use a comma to separate the addresses.

 

There were 71 patron records in our database that were using the semicolon, LibLime has replaced all of those semicolons with commas.

Reduced Transportation Holds setting change - effective 11/22/2021.

On 11/22/2021 the Reduced Transportation Holds setting, "FillRequestsAtPickupLibraryAge", will be changed back to 60 days.  This was approved by the ILS Committee at their 10/06/2021 meeting. 

There is a bug affecting this setting in Bibliovation version 6.2 (Production).  The algorithm for this setting is incorrectly calculating from the item’s Checkin date rather than the Hold (Placed) Date.  That means that some materials checked in, which should stay at your library to fill a patron’s hold, will leave your library to fill the oldest active hold in the Holds Queue. 

The fix for this bug has been tested and confirmed fixed in the 7.0 version of Bibliovation, currently in our Sandbox.  We hope to upgrade Production to that version in December. 

For more information about the Reduced Transportation Holds settings, please read the Circulation Manual, Section IX Placing and Managing Holds, Part I Reduced Transportation Holds (aka RTH). 

New Requirements for entering data in a patron's phone number field(s)

As of October 2021, the FCC is mandating Wisconsin phone companies to require customers to enter a 10-digit phone number to make calls.  This means that all phone numbers entered in the Bibliovation database should be entered with the area code and correct formatting.  

 

Both of the Talking Tech services, phone hold notices and text hold notices, will require the area code and correct formatting to successfully deliver notices.

 

Format for data placed in the phone number field(s):

• For "regular" phone numbers, the format is xxx-xxx-xxxx.  Use hyphens, not parentheses.
• For text message phone numbers, the format is T1-xxx-xxx-xxxx
• Please do not enter 000-000-0000 or a Note to indicate that a patron has not provided a phone number.  Leave the field(s) blank if that is the case.

Enrollment period of Limited Use and Limited Use-Juvenile patron categories changed to 12 months.

At their September 14, 2021 meeting, the Circulation Services Subcommittee recommended that the enrollment period for the Limited Use [LU] and the Limited Use-Juvenile [LUJ] be changed to 12 months.  The ILS Committee approved the recommendation at their October 6, 2021 meeting.

All new patron records created with these patron categories will have this enrollment period set automatically. Patron records with these categories that are renewed will have a new, 12 month expiration date based on the date of renewal.  Libraries that would prefer a shorter enrollment period can set the expiration date manually to comply with their local library policies.

Optical scanner required to read digital patron barcodes

With the advent of the new LINKcat Mobile App, patrons are able to store their library cardnumber (patron barcode) in their app.  However, the laser barcode readers, Metrologic and Honeywell, will not read these digital barcodes.

If you are accepting digital library cards at your library, you may wish to purchase an Optical Barcode scanner to read these barcodes at your Check Out station(s).  Bibliotheca and Envisionware Self check units have optical scanners, though one Bibliotheca library reported that their older model Bibliotheca unit had a laser scanner for patron barcodes.

Craig investigated optical scanners a few years back and his purchase recommendation is located on the Peripherals Order Form.

NEW: Requirements for entering data in a patron's phone number field(s)

As of October 2021, the FCC will be mandating Wisconsin phone companies to require customers to enter a 10-digit phone number to make calls.  This means that all phone numbers entered in the Bibliovation database should be entered with the area code and correct formatting.  

 

Both Talking Tech services, phone hold notices and text hold notices, will require the area code and correct formatting to successfully deliver notices.

 

Format for data entered in the phone number field(s):

• For "regular" phone numbers, the format is xxx-xxx-xxxx.  Use hyphens, not parentheses.
• For text message phone numbers, the format is T1-xxx-xxx-xxxx
• Please do not enter 000-000-0000 or a Note to indicate that a patron has not provided a phone number.  Leave the field(s) blank if that is the case.

Reports will be sent to libraries for clean-up.  Please make sure that all of your staff are aware of this change.