Jan/Feb 2020 ULMS Update

Project Management

• The ULMS Steering Committee met with Matt Baker and Shelley Hostetlier from Ex Libris regarding issues raised in the Satisfaction Survey from the fall. Ex Libris has proposed identifying 2-3 of those issues and forming ad hoc task forces around addressing each of them. The hope is that we can find a method that works for us both and then iterate through the issues as we can. 

Analytics

Working Group

• Alma now supports COUNTER5 with the January release. There are new separate analytics reports in the shared/Alma directory. The group is reviewing these and revising best practice recommendations. There will be a Tech Services Open Forum soon.

• The group discussed ExL's "New Developments in Alma Analytics" December presentation which covered enhancements over the last several months: handling of OCLC#'s has been substantially improved; a new dimension, "Title (complete)" includes all relevant subfields; reporting on non-transactional POLs (e.g., gifts, exchange, etc.) is now supported in the Funds Expenditure Subject Area along with new fund transaction measures; & a new calendar tool has been added to date measures in all SAs.

• The group is reviewing documentation for the move to OBIEE 12 in the March release.

• The inability to use the "Available for Group members" dimension in the NZ is still unresolved. However, it's possible to report on NZ inventory from the IZ using the 'Details for Consortia' measures.

• ACRL eResource counts - The group audited the 4xb 'official' queries after difficulties reported last month. Several campuses were unable to provide their numbers to Ying. Periodic performance issues with Analytics are expected to be addressed by a planned infrastructure upgrade over the next month.

  There may also have been confusion about which versions to run. The original 4xb reports intended to be run in the NZ will not work due to a persistent problem with the Available for Group members measure. "Alternate NZ reports" were included in the "Run in IZ" folder for the 40b, 42b & 43b queries. These utilize the "Portfolio Details for Consortia" measures which allow reporting on the NZ from the IZ.

  Although testing of the alternate reports revealed a few quirks, they appear sound. We are contacting campuses that had difficulty obtaining stats to resolve any issues.

• Customer satisfaction survey - Performance issues are expected to be addressed by the infrastructure upgrade next month (and possibly OBIEE12). A paucity of useful Course Reserve stats was the next most reported issue along with the underdevelopment of Primo Analytics. Working to identify what reports and measures would be most useful.

Resource Management

Working Group

• Alma item material types- Thanks to a request by RMFC committee member Carole Chapman (SLO), the addition of Alma item material types for Broadside, Poster, and Archival material will be part of the March 2020 release.

• ELUNA enhancement cycle- The committee plans to weigh in on Resource Management-related enhancement requests when first-round voting begins on March 29.

• Authority Control Task Force- The task force was reconvened (membership shared with Steering Committee in an earlier email). I attended their first meeting.

• Headings enrichment- This was enabled in mid-December, before the winter renorm. There was an oversight with the editing of the Primo norm rules, and variant headings were unintentionally published to the facets/topic section. The norm rules were corrected and records should be resolved during the next full renorm.

• ELUNA 2020- Luiz and Israel will be presenting on the CSU’s approach to addressing the LCSH Illegal aliens. Marcus Jun, formerly of the CSU, will join them to provide potential options for Primo VE folks.  Committee member Lia Ryland (SFSU) will present with SFSU colleague Ya Wang on ERM and Cataloging batch work using Analytics, Alma sets, and APIs.

• Radical Changemaker Awards- The ULMS Resource Management Functional Committee was awarded one of the Radical Changemakers awards by the Central Coast Coalition for Undocumented Student Success at the Change the Subject documentary screening at SLO on February 4. Committee member Carole Chapman was present to represent the committee.

Acquisitions & ERM

Chancellor’s Office

• Ex Libris showed me a demo of their Agreements tool in Alma NZ Licenses that would allow libraries to subscribe or renew centrally managed resources.  Sent screenshots to ERM and ACQ and asked for feedback about the tool. We are meeting with ExL next week to see the live demo and ask questions.

• Updated the NZ Licenses with the FY 19-20 renewals for January.  List of which licenses have been updated, see the ERM Weekly Update notes.

• Working with the ERM Working Group on the upcoming CDI migration.  

• Providing feedback to ProQuest and Ex Libris for the new tool in Alma, My Electronic Resources by Provider.  The tool will create a list of e-collections that you subscribe to from a specific vendor.  From this list, you can activate the correct e-collection in Alma or confirm you have the correct e-collection activated.  Currently, ProQuest is the only vendor available in the tool.

• Working on activating Films on Demand e-collections in the NZ.  Currently there are no portfolios activated in the NZ, just a record to order from.  Ex Libris now has full text e-collections available. I’m creating the different title lists to use to activate the correct portfolios for each subscribing library.

Working Groups

Acquisitions:

• Jessica Hartwigsen is setting up a meeting next week with Acq and ERM so see a live demo of that could replace the current CPO process.

•  Here are the Acq teams top customer satisfaction issues:

  • Ability to edit PO Line type

  • Ability to select a sort routine (currently done alphabetically not chronologically) for items attached to a record and have it "stick" in Alma and Primo

  • Too many clicks when ordering and invoicing- ability to have hot keys or short cuts to alleviate this issue

  • Having to override/add funds when posting an invoice.  You should be able to finish posting and add funds or override rules after invoice posting is finished.

ERM:

• Developed a plan for the CDI migration. We will be sharing this via the ULMS Tech Services listserv. We've signed up to present this plan next week at a Tech Services Open Forum. We've also reached out to the Discovery chair to discuss the possibility of a joint Open Forum once enablement has been completed after March 22. The ERM group still has several unanswered questions and we've requested that Ex Libris offer a webinar for our consortia. We are still waiting on response. 

• Provided feedback on a potential new module in Alma for centrally managed agreements. The ERM and Acquisitions groups will be attending a demo of this new module on Feb 18. This new module may cover both subscription memos and cpos. 

• Began adding/changing/editing the new ERM confluence page and will be moving ERM pages to this new space once they have been reviewed.

Resource Sharing

Chancellor’s Office

• The Rapido Development Partnership is up and running at full speed. All five CSU partners were set up with access to their Rapido test environments and attend weekly scheduled calls with the North America group + ExL to discuss release testing and design considerations. Topics covered to date include:

  • Creating test users

  • Configuring participating items, lending policies and pods

  • Placing test requests

  • Patron facing resource sharing request form format, content and placement

  • Workflows for printing slips and paging items to lend

  • Parameters required to re-route requests to a mediated queue

• Weekly Rapido office hours hosted by Mallory started in February.

• Both institutional sandboxes now have a library configured to mirror resource sharing in our production environments. All issues appear to have been resolved and requests are sent between sandboxes and processed as to reflect how we use CSU+. The RSFC is now creating users and submitting test requests to ensure all is well before the case is closed, wrapping up a project that started in November of 2017.

• Revisiting the Unity courier contract which designates Presidents Day as a holiday after checking campus calendars and observing that only one campus (Fresno) is closed on President’s Day. Working with CO contract manager to find out requirements to have holiday service for this day in 2021.

• Supporting one library through service point consolidation ensuring transit rules and pick from shelf configurations reflect desired workflows

• Figuring out why some campuses were continuing to receive resource sharing requests with no title or other identifying information in the request despite a fix being deployed in the Primo central package months ago. Hint: they don’t use the Central Package. Sent information about updates required to fix the issue to individuals who maintain Primo at affected campuses.

• Creating instructional materials to document how CSU+ works in Alma CSU+ to share with RSFC before Mallory’s contract ends in June

Working Group

• Alma Resource Sharing Conditionals release testing – Last year an Alma release contained functionality for Conditionals.   The RSFC did thorough testing and found that the functionality was unusable. We reported the problems to Ex Libris, who recently said they used our feedback to fix Conditionals functionality.  RSFC did another thorough testing session and found that the functionality is now usable. Publicity and recommended usage for CSU+ Conditionals occurred on the Feb 6^th installment of I-SPIE TV.

• CSU+ Expansion investigation – Members of the RSFC are working with Mallory and Brandon on the potential for expanding CSU+. Questions regarding technical feasibility were sent to Ex Libris. Their response was received and is currently being evaluated.

• CalState Walkins – The RSFC and Fulfillment groups agreed that we should break the initial document down into its 3 main components:  1.) A policy about basic CalState Walkin functionality and privileges as well as how to set up Alma patron data sharing correctly. 2.) Best Practice recommendations on dealing with CalState Walkins and CSU+.  3). Best Practices recommendations about providing CalState Walkins extended access to physical library spaces.

• Alma to ILLiad API release testing – CSU San Marcos has been testing Alma to ILLiad API functionality.  This is an easier way of making ILLiad lender of last resort. Functionality appears to be working as advertised, but some things still need massaging.  For example, San Marcos experienced an increase in duplicate requests since starting. When requests move from CSU+ to ILLiad the user is not notified, but their request disappears from their Primo account so people request again and again.  A possible solution is being explored.

• ILLIad transaction information displayed in Primo testing – RSFC was tipped off about a Primo customization that will display request information from ILLiad in a user’s Primo account.  This would be a significant user interface improvement. Humboldt State and CSU San Marcos plan to experiment and test the customization in Spring Semester.  

• Random Regional Rotas – Pilot study began at the beginning of February. 

• Delayed notification testing – CSU San Marcos set up delayed notifications to improve user experience with CSU+ and will report back findings.

• CSU+ Loan Period Project – Analytics queries have been developed to get the data we want.  However, running them on the Network Zone has been a problem. A SalesForce case was opened, they were able to replicate the problem but no news yet on if they can fix it.  Queries have been run in the IZ at a few campuses to give us some preliminary results. We are also considering recommending a longer hold shelf period in addition to renewals or extending loan period.

Fulfillment

Chancellor’s Office

• Testing visibility of different levels of record suppression (bib and holding) and how these affect discovery in various Primo scopes

Working Group

• The Fulfillment chair and vice chair got together with the chair of the RSFC to discuss the CalState Walk-in document and how to break it down between recommendations and policy. It was recognized that there might be campuses who don’t wish to toggle visiting patron accounts to internal to allow for unmediated CSU+ requests, so a compromise of splitting the document into configuration and best practice solutions would be optimal. It was also determined that a separate policy recommendation regarding extended services to physical library space, specifically during 24/7 periods, would be best as its own document. Another reason for splitting up the document was that testing conducted showed that there are certain blocks that are not carried over. This may have to do with individual configurations per campus and a discussion with the larger Fulfillment community will be needed.

• With the Course Reserves environmental scan finished, the group has created a document that describes the various policies and practices of all campuses. These practices will be shared in a paper as well as presentations in a future open forum. Work with the Analytics group might be beneficial in helping create certain lists that are difficult to run for CR. Will reach out to Brian for possible assistance.

Discovery

Working Group

• We're finalizing the date for our next open forum, and will be sending out announcements to the discovery listserv soon.

• San Jose and Fresno have been testing out the new, custom Get It Menu.  There’s still important testing that needs to be done before we can go live with this customization. If you have time to do the testing, please consider helping.