I almost decided to go to the MetaLib/SFX session instead of this, as our Aleph installation is now pretty mature, and I’m having difficulty getting excited by small increments in Aleph functionality.
However, in his opening talk Matti mentioned a couple of things that would be covered to whet my appetite, so while Damyanti is hearing about MetaLib and SFX, I’m in the Aleph session, hoping that it keeps my interest…
Perhaps the most interesting development for us are:
Staff permissions
The first phase of enhancing staff permissions in in v18, this includes extra information about library staff – e.g. expiry dates. This should make the management of staff accounts earlier.
There are further development to come in v19 which look at workflows and processes to grant permissions, rather than very detailed individual bits of functionality.
Staff Interface for Aleph Configuration
This is starting in v18, and continuing in v19. Ex Libris are trying to integrate configuration within the Aleph GUI. This is not just to have the config tables edited via the GUI (which can already be done), but to simplify the process of configuration, with Function/Task oriented workflows, and a more intuitive and graphic UI. All this, of course, appropriately permissioned.
This latter development is something that was tried a few years ago, but didn’t really succeed, as they focussed on just giving a GUI to the text based tables – which didn’t really simplify anything.
In this case they are committed to actually using the interface to help the system administratror – ensuring that information in one table is cross checked with any dependent tables, and that any codes are ‘decoded’ in the GUI (so use descriptions rather than numbers in the the GUI)
As a demonstration of what they are going to do, they have done this for ‘Opening Hours’ (tab17 I think?) in v18. This allows non-systems staff to edit the opening hours.
In v19, they are starting with this new configuration GUI in the Circulation module – it is probably the most complex configuration.
In v19 they are also focussing on the ‘Task Manager’ – to make it easier to use, and view outcomes from the Batch logs. They want to improve the scheduler (job_list) to increase flexibility and also introduce a ‘Log Analyzer’ to analyse log files in search of errors, and to send alerts to operators under certain circumstances.
Integration of functionality into GUI
Ex Libris have been working on integrating the ILL functionality into the GUI client over the last couple of years. At the moment the ILL GUI lags behind the rest of the clients in terms of look and feel. However, the development of the ILL GUI has been tied up with the development of ISO ILL functionality.
The other functionality they are planning to bring into the GUI is the ‘Course Reading’. This really has been the poor relation module in the past, with a web interface, that doesn’t seem to have been developed at all.
However, Ex Libris are now working with a Course Reading working group to look at outstanding underlying issues and to implement the functionality into the GUI.
This sounds like a great step forward, but I hope they take it further than this, as the current Course Reading functionality falls well short of what we require for our course reading functionality.
ALEPH Publishing
This is the publication of records in MARC XML format. This is to support the implementation of Primo at least, but raises some possibilities of integration with other search engines – e.g. Google Enterprise search etc. It includes expand routines, and includes availability information.
They are also introducing a HTML publication format which could then be indexed by Google or other search engine – with a link back to Aleph. This sounds great (although not sure what Google will make of this?)
This publication process will be based on the OAI publication routines already present.
RFID
Integration of staff user client with RFID hardware.
This will allow the circulation client to directly access the RFID hardware. So far done with Bibliotheca, but they will need to do an integration with each hardware vendor, so it will be necessary to engage with Ex Libris and any hardware vendors you use to see this integration.
So far they can support check-out and check-in actions, and can update information on the RFID tags. This is done via SOAP.
Although this is a modest start, I think this is really exciting. I’m convinced that RFID provides a way of making libraries more efficient in their handling of stock – not just at the circulation end, but also in terms of acquisitions. However, for this to be realised, we need systems to be able to deal with information from RFID tags – to be able to deal with batch processing of items, and to even write information back to the tags – e.g. to say that a book has been processed/invoiced/received etc.
SMS
In v19, Ex Libris are introducing SMS Server Connectivity, with some additional infrastructure in the patron address file …
SRU
In v19 Aleph will support SRU to connect to other databases, currently with the following functions:
searchRetrieve
scan
explain
Not that interesting to us, but good that Ex L are keeping up with this new search protocol.
X-Services
Staff Authentication – to allow libraries to protect web pages with Aleph staff IDs. Generally I wouldn’t think this would be interesting – but the poster session on using php to report from Aleph yesterday used Aleph staff authentication (via the Aleph Staff interface), so I guess it will be of interest to others.
Really interested in the idea of RFID for other aspects of library work such as Acquisitions. At the moment we’re only writing barcode info to tags but can see the potential. Other crucial area of join-up is with the main book suppliers. Do I sense another special interest group developing here?