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Handouts, resources and display documents for the class

Handout – Items and Holdings Intro Handout - 1 pager.docx (word doc)

Display – Items Holdings practice exercises_Intro Class.docx

Links to any pre-reading and reference documents

• Items - Material types for reference
• Item Policies for reference
  

Outline for the class and links to related documentation

Script for the class

Introduction

Welcome to the Items & Holdings Intro class. In this class, we will look at viewing and editing items and holdings for physical materials across functional areas (acquisition, cataloging, circulation). This class will include time for hands-on practice.  

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• I want to share some logistics information: 
  
  • The nearest bathrooms are...
  • The nearest water fountain/supply is...
  • Please log in to your computers using the following username and password: (Whatever it is for those computers - if possible, put it into a Word document and project it on the screen)

• Quick recap of essential training elements:
  • This is Phase 1 of Training. We are trying to make sure people are prepared to do 80% of their job on day 1
  • We are training on the tool of Alma, not on specific workflows or local procedures
  • We will show you one verified way to do tasks – there are almost certainly several other ways to do the same thing, and possibly better ways – you can go back, practice and find out.
  • Please use fidgets – they can be helpful for focusing, relaxing, staying awake...and if you are feeling tired at any point, feel free to stand up in your area, stand along the wall, etc.
    
    
• Please ask questions when they come up; I will also pause between sections for questions and to make sure things are clear
  
  
• Let's start by introducing ourselves.

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• Please log into your computer and navigate and login to Alma at this time.
  
  

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Items

Let's begin our work by looking at items.  Items records cross over into most functional areas – from ordering, to cataloging, to inventory maintenance, to de-acessioning.  For that reason, they are part of this class for staff across functional areas.

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• Remember in the Sandbox, to be able to edit materials and see the full range of options for an item, we need to use the locations we have access to.
  • We'll want to focus our work on items from Lamont, Widener or Schlesinger during this training period, so we have the full range of editing possibilities.

General Information about Items

Here is some basic information about Items in Alma, which in some cases may be different from Aleph.

• Holdings and items together are called "inventory" in Alma. 

  • To help understand how Alma Inventory is structured, Ex Libris has created these diagrams – you may remember seeing this structure of Alma inventory in your Intro or Search & Sets class.  

    • Trainer can show images on this page / draw something similar on the board, as needed: Items & Holdings

• In Alma, anything with a holding is referred to as a Physical Title or Physical Inventory.  
  • Most holdings and items represent physical pieces in our collection. 
  • A difference from Aleph is that most electronic resources will not be represented by holdings, instead they will be represented by Electronic collection and portfolio information. 
• In Alma, all items are attached to holdings. This is a core difference from Aleph, where creating a holdings was not required. 
  • Alma will not allow you to create an item without a holding. 
  • When creating an item, Alma will also create a holding if one does not already exist for that library/location.
  • You may be wondering – what about the things in Aleph that didn't have holdings?
    • Aleph items that were not attached to holdings were attached to holdings in Alma during data migration.
      • During migration, Alma either attached the item to an existing holding (when the library/location were the same) or, if they were not, Alma created a new holding.
• In Alma, a holding may or may not have an item.  
  • Examples of a bib that has a holding without items: are an analyzed monographic series, a multipart work, or an older serial.  (Trainer, 3 examples below if you want to show one, two or all)
    
    • • a monographic series: Conduct an "All Titles" search for MMS ID 990091802930203941 (Archaeological studies Leiden University) 
      • a mulipart work: Conduct an "All Titles" search for MMS ID 990074312040203941 (Oxford history of art) 
      • older serial tiles do not have items : Conduct an "All Titles" search for MMS ID 990051690120203941 (Quarterly digest of statistics (Accra, Ghana : 1959) 

• Alma allows setting of Temporary locations values, which can be helpful for some materials, such as Reserves and Serials.
  • When temporarily moving items from one location to another, staff have the option of inputting an end date for the temporary location in Alma. 
    • On this date an automated job will warn staff to return these items to their regular location.

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• • • • Please note that because not all physical items held have item records, these summary statements may not reflect actual holdings. 
        • If you are interested in an example: Ghana living standards survey (MMS ID 990027316770203941). We also hold v. 1-4, but they do not have item records.)
          
          
          

• I want to highlight 2 changes in vocabulary in Alma related to Items.
  

  • In Aleph, the field called "Item Status" was used to define terms of use, or loan policy, for an item.  
    • (This data migrated to a field called "Item Policy" in Alma, which is used along with Location to determine terms of use for an item.)  

  • The Item status that displays in Alma  is determined automatically by the system and is one of two values (Trainer: do an All Titles search for Theodore Rex, click on the Items hyperlink, to show on the screen during this explanation):

    • Item in place (item is not checked out, in transit, or in process)

    • Item not in place (item is in process, transit, or checked out)

      • Any time something is not in place the "availability" status will be "unavailable." (Appropriate request links will still be present in the public catalog).

        
        

  • Item Process type is also different than Aleph Item Processing Status.  
    • In Alma, Item Process type is used when an item is undergoing some kind of library processing or circulation activity. 
      • It will be one of two kinds of statuses:  a Work Order status (which is what is replacing pseudopatrons; something like Tech Services Shelf Prep, or Preservation Review); or a Circ-related status (like On Loan, Missing, On Hold, Lost, etc).
    • Process types are defined centrally for Harvard. 
      • In many cases, Aleph IPS migrated to Alma Item Internal Notes. If you have question about migrated data points for items, please refer to the item data mapping guide.

Creating Items Using "Add Physical Item"

Item creation occurs at various times based on workflow and type of material.  

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Practice time (show instructions on screen): We are now going to try this Quick Cataloging Add Physical Item process. 

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Viewing and editing items

Next we are going to look at the process for both viewing and editing existing items.

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Practice time (show instructions on screen): Now let's try searching for an item, viewing an item, making edits to the item, and saving your edits.

Additional documents about Items

Before we move on to holdings records, I want to show you some reference documents on the LTS wiki regarding items:

• Items - Material types for reference
• Item Policies for reference
• Item Statuses, Process Types, and Fields – has migration info, and a link to a full list of all item fields, with descriptions, on the Ex Libris documentation site.

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Holdings

We will now turn our focus to holdings records.  In this portion of the class, we will walk through viewing, and editing holdings records, like we just did with items.

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• You may have seen already how if you open a bib or holdings record in the Metadata Editor, it will be locked to you for editing for 7 days unless you "release" it.  
  • This is the opposite of what we encountered in Aleph.  In Aleph, if you had an Item record open on your screen, other staff would get a pop up about the record being "locked by another user".
  • Item records will never be locked in Alma – but both holdings and bibs will be "locked" from editing if another staff member has one open or hasn't released it yet.
• So in the case of holdings, it's important to note whether you want to just **view** a holdings (which won't open it in the MDE or lock it to you), or if you need to **edit** a holdings.
  • If you accidentally land in the MDE, clicking the back arrow to get out of the screen will not release the record.
    • You need to regular click on the folder in the left column, and the option to Release All Records will appear.  Click on this, both for the bib and holdings folders.
      • (Trainer: demo doing this)

Viewing holdings

I will use a different example than the title I created earlier, so you can see both an item with multiple holdings, and a holdings record that has fuller content that the brief one that was generated for my earlier title.

• First, note that there is no "Physical Holdings" search in our drop down.  There is no way to directly search for holdings.
• If I perform a physical items search for the title I created I can only view the holdings by choosing "Holdings" from the ellipsis menu. But if I click on the hyperlink for the title, I now have the option of choosing "Edit" at the top of the screen, which will open the holdings in the MDE and allow you to make any necessary changes.
  

  • (Trainer, demo this with the title from earlier in the class.)

• Performing a Physical Titles search offers a more options for editing the holdings. For this demonstration I will use a title that has multiple holdings attached and that has fuller content than the record I created earlier.
  
  • (Trainer: search Bossypants)
  • You can see that several different libraries have holdings of this title.
  • If you click on the hyperlinked text in the Location column (Trainer click on the LAM FARNS holdings), you will get the MARC view of the holdings record.
    • I easily can move to editing by clicking "Edit" at the top.  
  • But before I click on that, let's go back a screen.
    • I can also click on the hyperlinked text "holdings" in the expanded view below or in the ellipsis menu
    • Because there is more than one holdings,this will take me to a list of all holdings associated with this bib.
      • Having lots of holdings also means I get lots of options here: 
        • I can click on the hyperlinked holdings record number for the MARC view, 
        • (Trainer use the LAM FARNS holdings and click on the ellipsis)
        • Going back one screen to the List of Holdings, I can use the ellipsis menu to View, Edit or several other options
        • I also have options at the top like:Delete Holdings and Add New Holdings
• If I click on edit, the Metadata Editor will open.  I land in the same place as I would have if I clicked Edit earlier. 
  • Note that there are even more ways to open a holdings and those will be covered in more detail in the Cataloging classes.

Editing holdings

• The MDE will keep keep track of holdings that you are working on. 
  • These will display on the left hand pane. You can click on any holdings in your left pane to display and edit that holdings.
    • When you open things to edit (bibs or holdings) they become locked to you.  Make sure to release them when you are done.  Otherwise they are locked for editing (view-only) for 7 days after your last edit. 
    • More information about using the MD Editor can be found in the MD Editor Overview documentation.
• You can add or delete fields using the Edit menu.
• You can open fixed fields like the 008, LDR and 852 using Ctl + F. Click the Escape key on your keyboard to close a form that you have opened.
• To save your changes you will need to choose a save option under the File dropdown menu or click the blue Save icon at the top of the record.
  
  • Trainer demonstrate adding and editing fields as appropriate
    • Isabel please improve this section, I am not very fluent at holdings stuff
• Got to Tools: Save and Release (rather than the Save icon) when your edits are done, or click Ctl+Alt+R. 

Practice time (show instructions on screen): Now let's try searching for a holdings, viewing a holdings, making edits to a holdings, and saving your edits.

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Additional topics

Some other topics that are important with regard to holdings and items are:

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These will be covered in the Advanced Holdings and Items class.

Closing

In the next day or two, you'll receive an email that includes an evaluation for this class. Please take a few moments to fill it out - your feedback will help us improve this class and will help me improve my training skills. 

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