USMAI Resource Sharing Task Group

September 25, 2006

Present: Beverly Gresehover, Jean Phillips, Robin Moskal, Jamie Bush, Tanner Wray, Sharon Payne, Stephen Miller, Paula Langley, Carol A. Vaeth and guest Sharon Epps

Agenda rearranged.

August 7 Minutes Approved with changes. Under Marina information p. 2 change wording to ESTIMATES; bursar extracts p.4 add ‘working on this for Towson.’

Single Record Proposal

Discussion included:

• OCLC is not working with ExLibris to merge e-serials
• why display e-holdings when we don’t display our paper holdings (TU and FS do have holdings displays)
• Concerns about licensing for ILL permission
• HSHSL has a cheat sheet for vendors’ licensing info
• E-serials holdings service is available for merges, just as an fyi

ACTION: Robin will invite Marlene Vikor, Joyce Tenney and/or Laura Wrubel to talk to us about licensing and e-issn issues.

OCT or NOV agenda:

• discuss getting paper and e-journal holdings in OCLC
• discuss making licensing content viewable for ILL staff (no timeline available for Verde)

Circulation Subcommittee Update

• Hans completed the first round of Patron Purges. Over 244,000 records purged which is 30% of the patron database. Circulation Managers need to look over the remaining records and decide what can be purged in Phase II.
• Many campuses have completed the in-transit overdue report and others still working on it.

ACTION: Paula will send a follow-up message asking campuses to complete checking their shelves against the in-transit overdue report and delete their items from the list.

Common due date and loan period

The subcommittee started with faculty/staff as they have a long lending period, and examined loan periods in current usage. Most common is two due dates a year or one due date a year.

• set two fixed due dates of APRIL 1 and OCTOBER 1 or MAY 1 and DECEMBER 1. Those that use only one due date will be asked if they would set their one date on either of those chosen fixed dates. The recommendation will be voluntary system-wide.

Discussion:

• Bev thought the dates were not at a good time, right before the semester end, and other fixed dates were suggested. The early dates were chosen because faculty is usually not available at semester end or during breaks
• Tanner suggested looking at peer institutions
• Carol suggested lining up the due dates and working with an extended grace period, but that might further confuse patrons
• Robin and Tanner thought we might consider automatic renewals for faculty/staff with an accompanying note to return the book if it is no longer needed

ACTION: Paula will ask a Circ subcommittee member (Everly?) to query CircPlus re: consortium due dates. Also, the Circ Fines Chart needs to be distributed again.

Circ charge:

Privacy Purge, Off-Line functionality in Aleph, and Single Due Dates were discussed. Jamie said that when the electricity goes off or Aleph goes down, Aleph keeps a log and when it comes back up, circ departments have to update the files into each system. Consensus is that this needs to be tested.

ILLiad Implementation Update

MFS and CES are both implemented.

• MFS has been having Odyssey problems and has turned it off until they can get together with their campus computer department, as we think this is a local problem
• CES has been having processing problems. Robin and Carol are planning another site visit.
• Jamie has been working with St. Mary’s on their borrow type and status.
• Web reports are up. We need to educate on how to get reports, since this is a shared file.
• Disavowed/Blocked users function does not work. This will be looked at later.
• Robin has a full implementation on a computer at UMBC; Carol will have one soon. This will allow them to access the satellites and help with troubleshooting.
• We hope to finish with the implementation in Nov-Dec.
• Coppin is the next implementation, set for October.

ACTION: Jamie will speak to Dr. Bradbury re: Bowie implementation and contacts

ACTION: Robin and Carol will schedule another site visit with CES CLD said that travel and hotel costs can be passed on to USMAI, but not food costs.

ITD

WORK PLAN Draft

ITD will present the draft Work Plan at the Campus Contacts Meeting on Thursday. The plan is now set up as a web page.

• links for the topic areas that contain background information and status on each area
• links are functional but not all of the data has been input.
• RSTG suggested changing the heading for Circulation to Resource Sharing, or Circ/ILL; something that is more self-explanatory.
• priority process and procedures to have issues considered are not yet established.

ACTION: Jamie will send out the URL (password is the usual)

Aleph Version 18

• October, a discussion of the issues begins.
• December, task groups will begin work with hardware considerations in January.
• May, expert testers will begin work and later, functional testing.
• End of June, it is expected to go LIVE at the end of June

Some issues are the off-line functionality, PPH to PDQ (patron direct queue) and privileges that combine usage (x-functionality).

Elimination of the use of SSN

• SSN issue is still a priority, but at this time, it is still needed for patron load and bursar fines because of the merged patron file
• is the Ex Libris architecture able to hide the SSN?
• Will they develop it and what would it cost?
• Can it be tied to a permission? (too many staff share permission passwords)
• Can it be stored encrypted in the Circ files; ITD might have to develop this and ask Aleph to implement it
• Create an SSN table outside of Aleph for loads
• Other issues are ILLiad and Research Port, encrypting staff log-ins, server security and circ history

ACTION: All RSTG members are to read the University System of Maryland Records Retention Standards, Revised April 28, 1997 before the next meeting. Do we need to investigate the State Law?

Circulation Meeting

The USMAI Circulation Staff Meeting is set for Thursday [November 16] from 9:00-2:00 (DATE CHANGE To Dec 4 at Bowie) Each campus can send up to 2 representatives.

AGENDA: ACTIONS

1. RSTG Highlights- one year update, Bev and Stephen will work out details
2. Circ Subcommittee Update- Paula, Patron purge, in-transit clean-up, off-line functionality
3. ITD Work Plan- Jamie on Aleph 18, PDQ, outage procedures
4. COI Resource Sharing- Jamie, reminder on how to send RX or contact COI and when it is appropriate
5. Round Robin
6. Communication- Jamie will address the issue of when to contact COI and when to submit an Rx report (develop a cheat sheet?)

When invitation is sent out, staff will be asked to look at the priorities, bring ideas and concerns. Specifically, What Worked Well, What Would You Like to see Happen, and What Could Work Better.

ACTION: Paula will talk to Dr. Bradbury re: parking, contact person to handle details. Bev will ask about funding for breakfast.

E-news

Add:

• Circ & ILL meetings
Patron purge CES Implementation Off-line Circ

Information Retrieval Process

Stephen presented a model that he is working on that identifies the process by which people search and retrieve information on the internet as a conceptual framework for Resource Sharing. As a work in progress, it is set up as a work flow chart beginning with identifying the information needed, working through the sources, discerning the availability, and options available to obtain the information.

Information Technology Division College Park, MD 20742-7011
Please send comments and suggestions to ITD's Webmaster.
Content questions should be directed to Resource Sharing Task Group.