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Technical Services Report: May 2007

System news and work completed

  • Tested a new method of indexing on Lute. The results look good, and the method will be used to re-index the production database. All indexing will be done on Lute and then copied to Harp so the production database will only be down for approximately 8 hours instead of a week. Any changes that are made to the production database during the week of indexing on Lute will be captured and get indexed in the background after the updated database is copied from Lute.
  • Installed Wiki and Simple Machines Forum (SMF) software. Setting up systems for internal testing.

Work in progress

  • The production database will be re-indexed on Lute beginning on June 9th and should be completed by June 17th. Lute will be unavailable from June 8th to approximately June 15th. Harp will be unavailable for a few hours early Sunday morning June 17th. A reminder of the re-indexing will be posted to the list. The re-indexing will accomplish the following: fix the “see reference” problem, build the browse indexes for all logical bases, add the MITF recommendations to the SYS60 library, and turn on adjacency to fix phrase searching.
  • Ongoing system maintenance and upgrades.
  • Ongoing installation of service packs on Lute and Harp for version 17 and ILL.
  • Attending Indexing Task Force meetings.
  • Attending Reports Group meetings.
  • Continuing to work on PALS Support Center tickets.
  • Continuing to work with the UNIX system monitoring software.
  • Continuing to work on LibProxy.
  • Continuing to perform weekly updates to the Authorities database on Harp.
  • Continuing to report ILL and Aleph version 17 software problems to Ex Libris.
  • Continuing to monitor memory and performance issues on Harp. The problem is still surfacing, and we are working with Sun and Ex Libris to diagnose it.
  • Met with SUN and Collier sales reps to discuss new hardware options. Waiting to get a pricing proposal back from them.
  • Preparing to apply the latest Oracle security patches.
  • Preparing to upgrade to Solaris 10 and ORACLE 10G for version 18.
  • Working on SQL reports and services recommended by the Reports Group. Two new reports were placed on Harp for Acquisitions/Serials called, Titles per Budget Spent (mnpals-28), and Titles with Claims (mnpals-30).
  • Set up an ftp site on Lute for testing patron data registration.
  • Contacted Yankee Book Peddler to begin set up for EDI. Metro State University (MTR) will be used for testing.
  • Attended another Discovery Tool Task Force meeting St. Benedict’s College.
  • Resumed loading the Marcive records. All subscribers agreed to accept the product as is and requested to resume loading their records. Loaded the marcive records for BSU. Will be working on loading records for SCS, SBJ, and GAC.
  • Will be loading a set of NetLibrary records for Riverland Austin (RAU).
  • Started work on implementing version 17 new inventory functionality.
  • Will be installing a test version of EZProxy as an option to replace LibProxy.
  • Waiting for p_manage_18_p (record loader using parallel processes), p_file_99 (Marcive), and “golem” fixes from Ex Libris.
  • Waiting to hear from Ex Libris about problems with discounts and funds when using Blackwell’s Book Services Collection Manager to create order records in Aleph.
  • Waiting to hear from Ex Libris about the retrieval function problem with OWN codes that were added to the direct indexes.
  • Work on the file transfer from the business office and reformatting it for input to Aleph remains to be done.

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