Round Two Alma Enhancements

Resource management

Import Profiles: more mapping options (Material Type, Acq Method, E-Collection)

We need additional mapping options in Import Profiles. We need the ability to map to Electronic Collection, Material Type, and Acquisition method, based on field/subfield values in the input file. For example, we have several EOD profiles for Casalini, when we could have 1 if these values could be mapped. We have several because we load different material types (Books, DVDs, etc.) and have multiple Acq Methods, such as Approval, Purchase at Vendor System, etc. Similarly, for Import Profiles that load Portfolios, you cannot map to Collection. You have to have a separate profile for each Electronic Collection for which you want to load portfolios. These greatly increases the number of profiles we need to maintain. If we could map to Electronic Collection from a field/subfield value in the input file, we would need to maintain significantly fewer profiles.  

80

See attachment "6666-solution with images"

856 

Acquisitions

Editing items via Receiving, Save & Receive items

From the Receive Items List, add options to edit description, enum, and chron. Currently only the barcode is editable here. This will greatly improve productivity. Furthermore, when staff need to edit additional item fields during receiving, they need to be able to go to the Physical Item Editor and then Save & Receive. Currently they can only Save from the Physical Item Editor, meaning the Receipt of an Item and the Editing of an Item are two disparate workflows, even though staff need to do them at the same time. Without this feature, working with continuous items is time-consuming, awkward, and requires many extra keystrokes/mousing.  

30

We are now finalizing the redesign of the PO line task list, and, once complete, we plan to redesign the Receiving WB ("Receive Items List") and hopefully address the needs raised in the request above.

We would like this NERS solution to focus on the same direction which was voted for last year:

As a first step, until the refactor of the Receiving WB, we will focus on the addition of the "Save and Receive" action to the item editor page. Here is the suggested design which was presented last year, and I believe is still relevant this year, for your approval:

• A new “Save and Receive” button will be added to the item editing page

• The new button will not be visible if the item was already received (“Receiving Date” field is today or in the past)

• The new button will not be visible if there is no PO line associated with the item

• The new button will have the following behaviors when clicked:

o Alma will validate that the location the user is in supports receiving of the item
§             If not the user will get an error message that their location does not support receiving of this item (not a receiving department) - when coming from the receiving WB it is likely that the correct location will be selected

• Alma will close the item editor page and take the user back to the page they came from.  A full receiving process will run on the PO line (including populating the receiving date on the item and progressing the PO line in the workflow - mostly relevant for One-Time orders)

• The button will appear at all cases, whether accessing the item from the receiving WB or from any other workflow (as long as the item was not received e.g. the item does not have a "receiving date").

1033 

Resource management

Enable to upload controlled vocabulary lists in Excel format

Currently the only way to create a new controlled vocabulary list (to use in fields with per-defined values) in Alma is by adding the values manually, one by one. Usually the controlled vocabulary lists are added in implementation by the migration teams, but after Go Live, there is no way to do that neither by the institution nor by the support. 

30

No solution provided.

846 

Fulfillment

Run "Bulk change due date" process on an itemized set of users

Add to the "Bulk change due date" process the option to run on a predefined set of users. 

30

No solution provided.

1128 

Acquisitions

Revised title: Allow user to specify a number of years for which issues are predicted, and to select which issues are saved and which discarded (Original title: Allow User to Customize how many Issues are Predicted)

Revised description: Currently, Alma’s 853 Predictive Patterns, and the ‘Open Predicted Items’ function are only capable of predicting an entire year’s worth of serial issues at one time.
It will be possible to predict serial issues for multiple years at one time.
When saving/discard+I21ing the predicted issues as items in Alma, it will also be possible to select which of the items to save.
NERS 7721, submitted by Hong Kong Polytechnic University, was merged into this request. (Original description: Currently, Alma’s 853 Predictive Patterns, and the ‘Open Predicted Items’ function are only capable of predicting an entire year’s worth of serial issues at one time. NERS 7721, submitted by Hong Kong Polytechnic University, was merged into this request.)

80

Determining the number of items to be predicted would require a massive change of the prediction patterns infrastructure, but we can offer a conceptual solution where:

1. The operator will be able to specify the number of years for which they would like the system to generate predicted items in the next predicted item information.

2. When the generated items are displayed to save / discard - the operator will be able to specify which items will be saved, and which will be discarded.

This will give the operator more control on the predicted items created.

864 

Fulfillment

Enable viewing of Requests history in Alma

Currently, within a patron record in Alma, it's possible to view current and previous activity for Loans, Returns, and Fines and Fees. However, within Requests, it's only possible to view current requests. It would be incredibly useful for Alma users to be able to view historical requests as well, this to assist with any request queries. The ability to view request history in Alma Analytics has been very welcome and useful for reporting. However, for troubleshooting purposes, it would be much better to be able to use live Alma straight away, rather than having to wait until Alma data refreshes into Analytics.  

25

To be implemented only in the new UI (scheduled to be released next year): Similar to the existing list in the monitor, we will list the request history also in a requests history tab in the context of the user record in the patron services workbench. Note that  this will be possible only if requests are not anonymized.
The intention is to include full history, including cancelled ones.

1199 

Administration

Add Option to Toggle User Record Type

Add a simple toggle option for a user record to easily switch Record Types between Staff and Public. While there are more complicated ways to deal with it, if a user record is accidentally created and assigned the wrong Record Type there is no easy mechanism to change it, like we can when toggling an account between Internal and External. 

10

A solution may be to have a new button on the user edit form that will enable to change the record type from staff to 4 public and vice versa. When clicked a warning will pop up saying 'you are about to change the record type from X to Y. Are you sure'. If approved then the record type will change ang the form will be reloaded with the user information as is after the change.

1110 

Fulfillment

Display user's loan due date in borrowing request screen

When a user who has an interlibrary loan requests a renewal of the item, staff need to check both the due date that the partner library has set, and the current due date of the loan on the user's record. This is because we can sometimes extend the due date of the loan without requesting a renewal from the partner library, since the loan due date will still be within the due date that the partner has given us. To do this check, staff need to view the borrowing request (to see the partner library's due date) as well as the user's record to check the current due back date. To make this process quicker and simpler, we would like user's loan due date for the item attached to the borrowing request, to display in the borrowing request screen. 

10

The solution we would like to implement would be to add the loan due date to be visible in the second column of the request in List View (as is the request due date) as well as in the right-hand pane in Split View. The field will be called 'loan due date' or similar to differentiate it from the request due date, and it will not replace the request due date. 

1115 

Analytics

Add more local params for bibliographic records in Alma Analytics

Currently there is the option to add 10 Local Params in Bibliographic Details, by request to Ex Libris. Ex Libris has stated previously that they will not add more until they see that many sites use up the existing 10. This approach ignores that it is good practice to keep such configuration options in reserve for future use when really needed, given the out-of-the-box fields may not suit requirements. The option to change field mapping of Local Params over time is not acceptable as the varying field data remains in Analytics forever with Deleted records, causing a mess of different field mappings. This submission is to add another 10 Local Params to Bibliographic Details in Alma Analytics, across all subject area with this Shared Dimension, for a total of 20. 

10

Will add another 10 Local Params to Bibliographic Details in Alma Analytics, across all subject area with this Shared Dimension, for a total of 20.

817 

Administration

Ensure email is delivered with DKIM protocols

DKIM (Domain Keys Identified Mail) is an email authentication technique that allows the receiver to check that an email was indeed sent and authorized by the owner of that domain. Currently ExLibris does not issue DKIM keys to allow the implementation of this protocol. Increasingly, emails sent by Alma from institutions using their own domains are at risk of getting caught in spam filters and not being delivered. 

20

No solution provided.

2031 (merger of votes for NERS 8197 & 8377)

Acquisitions

PO Line: missing identifiers ISBN/ISSN/ISMN etc. 

Please list all identifiers in the PO Line. See the following examples: Data in the bibliographic record --> data in the PO Line XML file Example 1: 020 __ |a 9783702404727 024 2_ |a M008027376 --> PO Line - XML: only content of 020 <identifier>9783702404727</identifier> <identifier_type>ISBN</identifier_type> Example 2: 024 3_ |a 730099129329 028 52 |a 8.551293 --> PO Line - XML: empty identifier <identifier></identifier> <identifier_type></identifier_type> Example 3: 020 __ |a 0415462444 (pbk.) |c £24.99 020 __ |a 9780415462440 (pbk.) |c £24.99 020 __ |a 0415462436 (hbk.) |c £70.00 020 __ |a 9780415462433 (hbk.) |c £70.00 --> PO Line - XML: only content of first 020 <identifier>0415462444 (pbk.)</identifier> <identifier_type>ISBN</identifier_type> Status quo in Alma: (1) The bibliographic information in a PO Line includes only one ISBN (Marc21 field 020) or ISSN (Marc21 field 022). If a record includes more than one ISBN (or ISSN), this information is missing in the order letter. (2) In case of other materials than books and journals - without ISBN or ISSN - identifiers like ISMN and EAN (Marc21 024) or other publisher numbers (Marc21 field 028) are skipped --> the <identifier> field in the XML file is empty. To give our vendors the best bibliographic information when ordering items via Alma, it is important to have all these identifiers within the XML file: - please provide us all 020 / 022 entries, not only the first ISBN or ISSN - please include also 024 and 028 to the XML file (it is possible, that a record has both: 020 and 024 or 028, etc.) Thank you in advance! P.S.: See also idea|exchange: https://ideas.exlibrisgroup.com/forums/308173-alma/suggestions/46228312-po-line-missing-identifiers-isbn-issn-ismn-etc  

35

see attachment "8212-solution with images"

1175 

Interoperability & Integration

The link resolver should be able to calculate the availability of volume or issue in a book serial

What is the problem: At present, the LinkResolver cannot calculate the availability of print holdings to determine whether a particular issue is available in those holdings. The LinkResolver matches your local inventory based on the ISBN, so the resource sharing options are being hidden due to the matched inventory, even though this particular volume is not available in your physical holdings. For instance, if an institution has the ISBNs for non-held volumes cataloged in the 020 field, the link resolver will match CDI records or OpenURLs containing the ISBN for these volumes even if the library does not have holdings. These records are likely to be autoloaded from OCLC for the entire serial. What is expected: The link resolver can calculate the availability of print holdings to determine whether a particular issue is available in those holdings. For example, if the request is for an article in volume 6, the link resolver will check the availability of volume 6 in the decision-making of a match. 

35

See attachment "8335-solution"

844 

Fulfillment

Make an easy way for items to be removed from 'in transit' status

We continue to have items change to 'in transit' status and we don't know why and Ex Libris cases are at a dead end. We think it is a simple error of our students checking an item in or out of the wrong library but this is human error. We have changes our transit tables several times but the error continues to occur. Can we please get a feature to change an item out of 'in transit' status?  

10

The 'Change Physical items information' job will have an additional option for  'remove transit to reshelf status'. This selection will only affect items that are "in transit for reshelving" or "In Transit to Remote Storage" and will make the items be considered in place. This should delete the attached transit request as well.

946 

Fulfillment

Allow auto renewal to restart after blocks removed

Currently we receive reports of users that are to be blocked due to late payment of fees. Once the blocks are removed or made inactive auto renewal rules do not allow the automatic renewal process to restart 

20

When the 'Daily within range without repeating notification' option is selected for the 'Send Courtesy Notice' job it will be possible to configure another parameter for 'number of days after due date to attempt renewal'. If configured, the job will also look at loans that have passed the due date by the number of days in this parameter, and try to renew them. The maximum number of days to be configured will be 365. No courtesy notice will be sent for them.

1140 

Interoperability & Integration

Bursar integration: Additional fee statuses in Alma & Allow fee status change with job Import from Bursar

Revised description: Allow the bursar import to supply a comment that will be recorded on the transaction. The comment would be a free text, and viewable in the transactions list. It will also be reportable in Analytics. This way the bursar will be able to supply any additional information that is required for the library staff to view. Also - add the fine comment to Primo. A 'Add Comment' option will enable inserting new text to the comment but not editing existing ones. The newly added text will be automatically prefixed by the the date it was generated (Original description: Currently only the fee statuses “open”, “transferred” and “closed” exist in Alma. The status "transferred" means that the fee was exported to the external Bursar system. When the fee is imported back to Alma, it is automatically Closed. For staff it is not possible to tell if the closed fee was paid, waived, unpaid etc. without consulting the 3rd party Bursar system. To give librarians and end users more transparency about the (invoice) status of a fee, we would need more differentiated fee statuses. Also, we need to be able to set this status when importing the fees back to Alma using the job Import from Bursar. The optimal development would be: 1. Have the possibility to configure ourselves in Alma which fee statuses we want to use and to have the possibility to add additional fee statuses. 2. The Import from Bursar job must be able to set this status based on a field in the import XML file. If the #1 is not possible, it would be good to have the following additional fee statuses implemented: invoiced unpaid partial payment paid/closed storno write-off transferred to the debt collection e-mail not deliverable)

30

Allow the bursar import to supply a comment that will be recorded on the transaction. The comment will be free text, and viewable in the transactions list. It will also be reportable in Analytics. This way the bursar will be able to supply any additional information that is required for the library staff to view. Also - add the fine comment to Primo. An 'Add Comment' option will enable inserting new text to the comment but not editing existing ones. The newly added text will be automatically prefixed by the the date it was generated

730 

All

Ability to schedule manual jobs

Ability to schedule manual jobs -- Ideas Exchange: https://ideas.exlibrisgroup.com/forums/308173-alma/suggestions/32970643-ability-to-schedule-manual-jobs-on-a-regular-basis This would be very useful e.g. for scheduling a Suppress Bib Records job or a Normalization job on Sets of Bib records, or a Change Portfolio Information job (including deactivation for expiring licenses) on a Set of Portfolios. At present any such jobs have to be run manually and are therefore restricted to staff availability; it would be great to be able to schedule these in advance, whether they need to be run regularly (repeated) or just as a one-off job that can run outside normal working hours or when a staff member is on leave and cannot run it 'in-person'. 

30

The approach we are considering is to add special option of scheduling using new scheduling capability we have used in Analytics new layout.
This special capability needs to be added to each job separately.
In the initial requirement the following jobs were mentioned:

1. Suppress Bib Records job

2. Normalization job on Sets of Bib records,

3. Change Portfolio Information job (including deactivation for expiring licenses) on a Set of Portfolios.

1405 

Resource management

Add warning for active title-level-requests when relinking or deleting holding records or items 

When relinking holdings and items to new bib records or deleting holdings or items, requests can get lost. This is the case if they are on the titel level instead of on the item level. (Cf. https://knowledge.exlibrisgroup.com/Alma/Product_Documentation/010Alma_Online_Help_(English)/Physical_Resource_Management/015_Managing_Physical_Resources#Relinking_Items_to_Another_Bibliographic_Record ) See also Idea Exchange:  

15

Warnings will be added for the following Title Level requests:

• Relinking last item to another bib record

• Relinking holdings to another bib

756 

Resource management

Special characters option in Metadata Editor

We would like a special character option within the Metadata Editor, so as to be able to enter diacritics/special characters from there, like with Voyager. The other methods (copy and paste, pulling up operating system character maps, and downloading browser add-ons) are fussy.  

20

The solution will be:

1. Add a dialog box containing special characters, where the operator can select the special character.

2. Selecting the special character will insert it where the cursor indicator was when the dialog box was opened.

3. The dialog box will be opened using a menu option or a keyboard shortcut.

922 

Analytics

Add Physical Item Details for Course Reserves subject area in Analytics

It should be possible in Analytics to make a list of the physical items that are on reserve. Libraries need to be able to create reports that contain the name of the course and the instructor (and the name of the reading list), along with the item barcodes for the physical items on reserve for those courses. However, the Course Reserves analytics area does not currently contain the “Physical Item Details” subsection, and the “Citation Metadata Details” section’s barcode field is typically blank. Libraries would also like to gather usage statistics for on-reserve items. The Citation Number of Loans field already available in the Course Reserves analytics area counts all the uses for a given bibliographic record, even if one or more of the items is not on reserves. Teaching faculty who use reserves for their courses want accurate statistics of reserve item usage. See also Idea Exchange item:  

70

No solution provided.

1244 

Administration

User Purge should not delete users with active requests

The Alma User Purge job currently deletes users with active requests. When deleting linked user records in a fulfillment network, sometimes the only activity that a linked user record currently has is an active request (a request that is in the pick-from-shelf queue, in transit for hold, or on the active hold shelf); the requested item may be committed for the patron’s use, but not yet checked out to their account.  

10

The purge job currently does not delete users with active loans or fees, but DOES delete users with active requests. The suggestion is for the purge users job submission form to have a check box that allows staff to select whether or not patrons with active requests should be deleted. 'Active requests' are requests that are in an active workflow (pick from shelf/transit/hold shelf).

1100 

Administration

Allow institutions to export and import all configurations from Alma

Ex Libris has the policy of forcing a refresh of the sandbox for all customers on the premium sandbox twice a year. This presents a significant challenge for institutions that use the sandbox actively, because it means that before every refresh, we have to go through the largely manual process of exporting all configurations out of the sandbox so we can keep record of them. Then if we want to recreate the old configurations, we have to do this manually. Ex Libris offers no way to export or import these configurations in bulk. This policy change reduces the value of the premium sandbox for customers who were already using it with the old policy, when we could request refreshes when we wanted. We would like Ex Libris to make it possible to export all configurations in bulk, and then reimport these configurations after the refresh. Ideally these would be exportable in bulk, and then you could pick and choose which configurations to reimport. 

140

Using exist a CloudApp which provide specific ability to export and import configuration that contain elements which are mostly pointing to different environments which should be different in sandbox then production. Our offer is to extend it to the Import profiles.
A comprehensive solution is very complex and required to handle each one of the special configuration logic when uploading the saved configuration and might be still different between production and sandbox 

1264