Circulation User Group Spring 2006 Minutes

1. Convener Lynne Weber/MSU-Mankato introduced herself and opened the meeting at 1:50pm.
   
   
2. Pam Sukalski/MWL announced as meeting recorder.
   
   
3. There were no additions or changes to the agenda.
   
   
4. Minutes from the Fall 2005 meeting (October 25, 2005) were approved by motion from Orrin Ausen and second by Bruce Willms. All votes in favor.
   
   
5. PALS Report by Susan Dueis. Susan highlighted her report on page 10 of the Support & Training Services Report. Good news was shared about the Patron List being accessible without delay as the p_cir_25 is no longer necessary to run on a daily basis. Susan talked about the PLIF change effective April 3 so that barcodes come through with updated ISRS data. Item Booking and Media Maintenance will be implemented with Aleph V17. Questions: Kathleen Ashe/SSU asked for clarification about whether or not new faculty will come in as faculty as they had been coming through as students. Al Rykhus/PALS states that now that barcodes are coming through, that shouldn't be a concern. Al noted if patrons aren't coming through from ISRS that we should let him know.
   
   
6. Regional Ex Libris meeting held March 7-8; Kathleen Ashe/SSU reported that there were representatives there from ND, SD, IA, UofM, some WI and MnSCU/PALS. Many programs were discussed (e.g., MetaLib, SFX) along with Aleph. MINITEX did an ILL presentation. Two sessions focused on sub-system level discussions. Kathleen attended the CIRC Subsystem meeting and stated it was a good idea to have that breakout, but it was only partially successful with that group as there were many questions/issues that weren't able to be addressed. There was a lack of specific information available to address the issues as one person was bringing forward questions from her staff, but didn't know the specifics behind them. Another group of similar type ALEPH setups (e.g., Shared Systems) talked about system issues and their experiences. It was nice to have a wider group of people to discuss ExLibris topics with and it was a worthwhile meeting.
   
   
7. Aleph patron scrubbing feature/Pam Werre(TRM). Pam wanted to know how many days different colleges have their patron scrubber set at; she passed around a sheet to have libraries give her an indication. Concerns have been raised by patrons about the length of time that information is retained and how long the Borrowing History on the OPAC is out there. It was 60 days on PALS and many libraries have retained that schedule. Other libraries that commented on different times included Leah Anderson/TRC who said they had students complain that it was gone too quickly, so they've extended it to the end of the semester so students could refer to their history when putting together bibliographies, etc. St.Ben's/St.John's have a very short timeframe (3-5 days?) and wanted it short due to privacy issues, but also said it has been a concern at times not being able to follow up on returned items (e.g., a CD case was missing and they couldn't track down who'd had it checked out). St Cloud indicated they have it set for 2 weeks. Mary Teske/DCTC said they have had students upset if they need the information for a paper. Lynne Weber/MSU asked the question if anyone believed the info shouldn't be scrubbed? No one responded. Susan Dueis/PALS wanted to point out that information tied to a bib does not get scrubbed if a person is fined; it may still show up unless the paid transactions were deleted.
   
   
8. Private Data/Lynne Weber(MSU). Lynne revisited the issue about whether or not birthdates can/should be in the ALEPH record. Indicated they had met with an attorney who said the ALEPH record isn't a public record and is not accessible to the public so thought it would be okay as long as not being used without permission (for an authority record, for example). Lynne indicated the birthdates are an easy way to distinguish among 4 Steve Johnson's in the system. Lynne asked PALS if birthdates could be restored on an institution by institution basis? Al/PALS said it would take development time to get it set up, but believes it's possible. Al indicated the code is still there, it's just not active. Angela Wortham/SCSU asked Lynne if the birth date was desired primarily for cataloging thesis? Lynne said it could be faculty publications, student thesis, or AP papers. Angela said it might be easier to get author's permission to establish the authority record with their name, birth date information during the thesis submission process. To clarify Angela stated it would be easier to get the birth date at the time of submission rather than having them sign off on it being used from the ALEPH system. Lynne said the attorney also mentioned using part of the birth date in the ALEPH record (month, day) as the discrimination issues usually come into play with the year information. Mark Ericksen/WSU stated that necessary thesis information could be gathered from ISRS. Lynne commented that from the cataloger point-of-view it would be easier to just be able to retrieve it from the patron record in ALEPH. Mark said their concern stemmed from an incident that happened a few years ago (on PALS) when a student worker was using name and birth date information for something bad (he wasn't sure what it was...fake Ids?) Mark asked if it would be possible to set it up so only certain people with special rights could access that type of information in the record? Many people responded that no, that functionality can't be separated out. Mark stated that a lot can be done with just a name and birth date. Susan Larson/MSL commented that as a victim of identify theft, and all it took was a birth date, she would like to see it excluded from the records. Lynne commented that the SSN is no longer in the record, but could use the Tech ID to verify. Lynne noted that this issue keeps coming up in her library. Mark asked Al if it is technically possible do just a month/day load? Lynne said having at least that much information would help identify at circulation and that the cataloger would need to get information from elsewhere, which shouldn't be too much of a problem as most times authors want to contribute their information so it is out there correctly.
   Lynne began listing off the options we had at this point:
   1. a) restore the entire birth date
   2. b) restore month/day
   3. c) do nothing
   4. d) library by library could make decision to have birthdates loaded (additional workload for PALS)
   Angela stated perhaps we should take the first vote on whether or not people want to take any action at this time or to leave it as it is (birthdates no longer being entered into ALEPH record), and then consider a vote on which action should be taken. Joni Myers/MSU moved to vote to add birthdates of some sort back into the ALEPH record. Sharon Evenson/UCC seconded the motion. With one vote per institution; four voted in favor, the rest were nays. The motion failed. No more discussion.
   
   
9. Circulation Holds in ALEPH/Leah Anderson(TRC). Leah wanted to know what institutions do about circulation holds. Their situation is that students cannot check out without an ID, but they have had the practice of putting a hold on the book for the student (for up to 5 days) so the student can retrieve his/her ID and return to pick up the books. Problem arises as the item shows as available in the catalog, though technically it is not available. Several suggestions were shared that required TRC to change policy and Leah didn't think that was likely. Susan/PALS indicated they could create a separate item process status in tab15 for those types of items. Lori Pesik/SMU asked if the concern was about OPAC display and commented that verbiage could be added to display in the OPAC (e.g. On Hold at Circ Desk). Leah said they know they need to do a better job of educating their patrons. Joni/MSU asked if happened that often? Suggested not doing anything in the system, but rather just set them aside for 24-hours.
   
   
10. Aleph Inventory - Leah Anderson (TRC). Becky Bell/PALS stated testing will start next week on this and noted that MSU-Mankato is working on a Percon process.
    
    
11. Aleph Reserves - Mark Eriksen(WSU). Interested in what colleges are doing if they have an e-reserve system. How are they integrating Aleph Course Reserves and the E-Reserves product? Are they recording them in Aleph or just in E-Reserve product? Leah Anderson/TRC asked if it was about availability for electronic? Mark said it was more of a process question. Deb Meissner/MSU-Mankato said they use Docutek to list everything on reserve. Lynne said Bonnie Kalla/SBU-SJU had good information on this topic at the Breakout session this morning.
    
    
12. Time lag between registration and library barcodes being activated - Lynne Weber(MSU). Lynne estimated 30% of new students are in the system, but not with barcode number; have to search by last name. Al/PALS said a correction was made after last fall and said the flag setup that was mentioned earlier should resolve this issue. He also commented to the Eta Group that they will see a lot more patrons from ISRS. (In PALS we had to API them to show in patron list, but in ALEPH they are all just there, with or without the college-assigned barcode.)
    
    
13. Global Status 10 - Susan Dueis (PALS). Does anyone assign Global Status 10 and if so, who? Stated this question came up during training. Pam Werre/TRM said she has some high school students in there. Susan stated it affects Tab 16 and how people are going to treat them at their library. Kathleen/SSU asked if global was necessary? Susan stated it is required to assign a global status, but could choose which one to assign. Jay Nordstrom/GAC said she has about 30 in the Global Status 10, but would rather move them to another; thinks they transferred over that way from PALS conversion. Rosie Mock/MSU-Mankato said perhaps it came out of the box that way to have Global Status 10, but could it be marked out or deleted? Becky Bell/PALS said when writing conversion scripts it was set up to be student -1, faculty/staff - 3, community - 5, other - 10, which corresponded to the patron record entry type in PALS, so they would have migrated that way.
    
    
14. General Questions
    1. Billing/Fines/Overdue - Janet vanOosten (Crown) asked how people get a notice to patrons and also send fines to the billing office at the end of the semester? Leah Anderson/TRC asked if wanting a similar to the PALS Patron Record with Fine Report? Angela Wortham/SCSU walked through how to get a Loan Report out of the Circulation Module (said she did this before they went dark so she had a record of everything that was currently checked out). After retrieving report, Angela said she converts it to XML, then moves it into Excel. Rosie Mock/MSU-Mankato stated PALS has documentation about how to do XML out on the website. Susan Dueis/PALS stated there is not much documentation for services yet (only the Help screens within the program) so if would be great if those who have documented procedures to share them on the PALS website. Al/PALS noted that the Help available is in html and can be adjusted. Janet still needed to know how to get information down to billing. Many commented that they are loaded by hand, either by authorized library staff or by the billing office, depending on campus policies/ISRS rights. Janet asked if the only way is entering them by hand? Yes, although Becky/PALS said there is a cash export/import process on the workplan, but it's not quite ready yet. Export seems to work okay, but the import has problems. Becky reiterated PALS' priorities: 1) operations/support 2) V17 conversion 3) others on Worklist, but stated they do understand this is important for many member libraries. St.Ben's/St.John's commented that they have another process, but also stated it is labor intensive.
    2. Email Notices - Mark Eriksen(WSU). Asked about how to handle if an email address is incorrect/way to know if the patron gets it or not. Rosie Mock/MSU-Mankato demonstrated how to go into Aleph ADM - Configuration - Application Configuration and under Common Headings there is a place to insert a return email address so messages could bounce back to that if they are undeliverable. MSU uses a shared Circ email address to monitor that. Susan Dueis/PALS commented that if the patron has blocked your address, it won't go through and it won't bounce back. LSC asked if there was a place to cc: yourself so you could see what had been sent out? Many commented that wouldn't be desirable (and didn't think it was possible) and noted that it was a courtesy, not a requirement, to send notices out at all.
    3. Expiry Dates - Leah Anderson (TRC) Wanted to know how people are addressing approaching Expiry dates. Susan Dueis/PALS said you can set it up so that expiry date won't affect the due date and noted that other institutions have asked about this as well. Many shared different situations at their library about policies for graduating students and their due dates as well as for faculty/staff who aren't on campus during the summer months.
    4. Export Process - Stuart Rosselet/BSU. Asked if at least the export process could be used since that part of the process is working okay. Al/PALS stated the other process is required to complete it so using Export only is not an option.
    5. Jay Nordstrom/GAC message to private schools: since some privates aren't tied into PLIF, the system brings in an ALEPH ID number, so be sure to search by patron last name. Lori Pesik/SMU commented that things are coming through okay. Al/PALS clarified that some private schools do send patron data in via a file that is loaded in the PLIF process, but those schools may or may not be sending the patron barcode. Some MnSCU schools do not send the barcode either. If the patron barcode is not loaded via PLIF, Aleph creates a barcode that matches the Aleph patron ID. This barcode then needs to be changed to reflect the actual barcode.
    6. Version Impact - Pam Werre(TRM) asked if there will always be down time and will it be about the same length of time as this one when moving to a new version? Commented on it's big impact on ILL. Al/PALS said for sure for version 17 there will be downtime as it is required to re-index for V17; he wasn't certain about V18.
       
       

1. 1:45 Opening Remarks - Lynne Weber, Convener (MSU)
   
   
2. Recorder -- Pam Sukalski
   • Please identify yourself when speaking at the meeting to ease the recorder's job.
   • As the recorder you may ask someone to repeat their comment or verify your notes.
     
     
3. Additions / Changes to Agenda
   
   
4. Approve Fall Minutes - October 25, 2005
   
   
5. 2:00 PALS Report Adobe Acrobat - Susan Dueis (PALS)
   
   
6. 2:15 Report from the Regional Ex Libris meeting held March 7-8, 2006.
   
   
7. 2:25 Aleph patron scrubbing feature - submitted by Pam Werre, (TRM)
   
   
8. 2:30 Private data (birthdates, gender) in Aleph records in patron records
   (a continuing discussion from fall, 2005, meeting) - submitted by Lynne Weber
   
   
9. 2:55 Circulation Holds in Aleph - submitted by Leah Anderson (TRC)
   
   
10. 3:00 Aleph Inventory - submitted by Leah Anderson (TRC)
    
    
11. 3:05 Aleph Reserves - submitted by Mark Eriksen (WSU)
    
    
12. 3:10 Time lag between registration and library barcodes being activated
    (a continuing discussion from fall, 2005, meeting) - submitted by Lynne Weber
    
    
13. 3:15 Global Statuses in Aleph - Susan Dueis (PALS)
    
    
14. 3:20 Breakout Group Panel will assemble to take questions
    Questions/problems/solutions regarding Aleph Circulation issues: opportunity for new Aleph users to ask questions of experienced Aleph users
    
    
15. 3:40 Other
    
    
16. 3:45 Adjourn
    
    

7. Aleph Patron Scrubbing Feature:
   Questions include:
   • What is the typical number of days Aleph Libraries have set their patron scrubber?
   • How frequently is this feature used?
   • Are Libraries concerned about suppression of the "Loan History" as a patron privacy issue?
   Information item.
   
   
8. Private data (birthdates, gender) in Aleph records in patron records.
   • Note from Fall Agenda: At the April, 2004 User Group, a concern was raised about the fact that birthdates are coming into the Aleph PLIF load and whether or not it would be possible/desirable to leave that information out. The group recommended that birthdates should be omitted from patron records. This change was made on September 30, 2005. This will affect new patron registration data, not existing patron records in Aleph.
   • Subsequently, birthdates have been removed from all Aleph patron records.
   • Legality of including birthdate and gender information.
   • Usefulness of birthdates.
   Action: As a result of discussion there needs to be a determination about whether birthdates and gender information should be included in the patron record.
   
   
9. Circulation Holds in Aleph:
   • Library practices
   Discussion Item.
   
   
10. Aleph Inventory:
    • Update from PALS
    • Testing the inventory feature
    • Mankato pilot project
    • When will Aleph Inventory be available?
    Information Item.
    
    
11. Aleph Reserves:
    • How are Aleph reserves integrated with electronic reserves?
    • Some libraries are using Docutek (for example) for managing electronic reserves-are they also using Aleph Course Reserves to create course reserve records in Aleph for electronic reserves?
    • Discussion on integrating other electronic reserve software with Aleph.
    Discussion Item.
    
    
12. Time lag between registration and library barcodes being activated.
    Notes from Fall meeting:

    Currently when a patron in the MnSCU system is assigned their barcode, a flag is set in the ISRS system denoting the fact that the patron barcode needs to be sent to us. When the evening run at ISRS is done, the ISRS system sees this flag and then knows that it needs to send the barcode. If the patron is registered for a class at their institution, the information is sent, including the barcode. If the patron is not registered for a class, nothing is sent.
    
    This is what causes the problem. The flag on the barcode change is cleared, but because the patron was not registered for a class, the barcode was not sent to us.
    
    If the patron now registers for a class a couple of days later, their information is sent to us. The barcode update flag is no longer set, it was cleared in the earlier run, so it is not included in the update.
    
    Mike has requested, and MnSCU has agreed to change the procedure. When the barcode flag is set, if the patron is not registered for a class, the flag will be reset. This way when the patron registers for a class the barcode flag will still be set and the barcode will be sent with the student information.
    
    Has the situation been corrected?

    Information item.
    
    
13. Global Statuses in Aleph.
    • How are people assigning Global Statuses in Aleph? For example, is anyone assigning Global Status "10" to users and if so, to whom?
    Discussion item.