February 2020 Release - Harvard Highlights

Ex Libris Documentation

Harvard Alma Working Groups have summarized key changes below. A full list of changes for the release can be found in the official Ex Libris Release Notes:

General Enhancements

A reminder that the Alma sandbox will be refreshed with production data on February 9th. If you are currently testing in sandbox, please record information about your test scenarios locally so you can recreate them post-refresh.
For simple and advanced titles searches, the following search indexes have been added: OCLC Control Number (019), OCLC Control Number (035a), OCLC Control Number (035a+z), and OCLC Control Number (035z). With these new indexes, you can now locate specific OCLC numbers for improved search results and improved Excel exports.

Analytics & Reporting

Enhancements

The new Fund Rules dimension was added to the Fund Expenditure subject area. It includes the following fields:
- - Expenditures prior to fiscal period (days)
  - Fiscal period end encumbrance grace period (days)
  - Encumbrances prior to fiscal period (days)
  - Fiscal period end expenditure grace period (days)
  - Overencumbrance allowed
  - Overencumbrance limit percent
  - Overencumbrance warning percent
  - Overexpenditure allowed
  - Overexpenditure limit sum
  - Overexpenditure warning sum
  - Override Rules Information (Yes/No)
  - Transfers prior to fiscal period (days)
Preparing for Alma Analytics OBI 12
- Alma Analytics will be upgraded to version 12 of OBI (Oracle Business Intelligence) on March 1, 2020. This upgrade includes a new OBI tool called Data Visualization (DV). Learn more about what to expect in OBI 12 and DV by visiting the Analytics and Reporting wiki for introductory documentation, videos and "how to" presentations.
- Freeze on creation of new Analytics between 2/22 and 2/29- Reports will be migrated from version 11 to version 12 starting Saturday, February 22 and continuing through Sunday, February 29. During that period, new analytics can not be created. Any analytics creating during that period will not be upgraded to version 12, and will not be available when OBI 12 is introduced on Monday, March 1.
The following fields were added to Titles > Title Measures:
- - Number of Titles with Physical Items (Active)
  - Number of Titles with Physical Items or Holdings Records (Active)
  - Number of Titles with Holdings Records and No Items (Active)
  - Number of Titles with Electronic Portfolios (Active)
  - Number of Titles with Electronic Collections (Active)
  - Number of Titles with Digital Representations (Active)
The Return After Lost field was added to to Fulfillment > Loan. It indicates the number of items returned with the Lost process status.

Resolved

When creating a report in the E-Inventory subject area with fields from the Bibliographic Details dimension, if the the Originating System field is added, some of the results where Originating System is expected to be "Unknown" did not appear in the report.
Transaction Type Pie chart on the Acquisitions dashboard could not be edited to display the remaining allocation regardless of status.

Acquisitions/Finance

Enhancements

Entering PO line number in Item Editor: When entering the PO line number in the Item Editor page, the number is now validated, even when typing the number instead of selecting it from the pick list.

Resolved

In the In Process Items page, the Modified By column displayed the first operator that modified the record instead of the last operator. This was fixed.
When changing the price in the invoice line page the Redistribute line did not happen automatically and required the user to click it. This was fixed and now redistribute lines will happen automatically when changing the price.
Typo was corrected in the message displayed to user when adding a fund to a PO Line or Invoice line and there was an encumbered warning.

Course Reserves/Leganto

Resolved

Analytics data does not include owners added using the set_instructors_as_owners flag. This was fixed.

E-Resources

Enhancements

Local Extensions for Community Zone Bibliographic Records: All institutions can now create and maintain local extensions to Community Zone bibliographic records in order to record their own proprietary information. With this capability, institutions can enter and maintain local information in the MARC 21 77X/78X, 09X, 59X, 69X, and 9XX fields. This can be done with the MD Editor for one record at a time, or for multiple records by running a job with a normalization process that updates local extension fields. Local extension data can be searched, exported, published (general publishing and to Primo) and handled using APIs. When linked bibliographic records are synchronized during Community Zone updates, the local extension content is not overridden. See Working with Local Extension Fields for more information.
Additional DARA Recommendations:
- Based on ISSN / ISBN matching, DARA now recommends local standalone portfolios for linking to the Community Zone. Linking to the Community Zone enables you to receive updates automatically without the need to update the portfolio manually.
- Based on the electronic collection name, DARA now recommends local electronic collections for linking to the Community Zone. Linking to the Community Zone enables you to receive updates automatically without the need to update manually.

Resolved

When selecting Acquisitions > Import > Load Usage data it took more than seven seconds for the page to load. This was fixed.
Two portfolios connected to two different bibliographic records with the same ISBN / ISSN did not link properly to the Community Zone. This was fixed. The recommended workflow is to avoid creating bibliographic records with the same ISBN / ISSN.
E activation link from advanced search did not work. This was fixed and works as expected now from both searches (simple & advanced).
When selecting Acquisitions > Import > Load Usage data it took more than seven seconds for the page to load. This was fixed.

Fulfillment

Enhancements

Quick Printing Option for Multiple Records: When printing call slips for multiple items, you can select several items and print slips for all of them in one action with the Quick Print functionality. The quick print functionality aggregates all the slips into a single PDF (within a popup window) and allows the operator to either send these to a designated printer or save the created PDF to a file. See Pickup at Shelf.

Resolved

Export Users job sometimes failed to upload XML file due to invalid characters. This was fixed, the invalid characters are removed before retrying to upload the file.
If an item's barcode was changed while the item was in a work order, the item was sometimes not found when searching for it by the new barcode on the Manage in Process Items page. This was fixed.
Placing a request on a title with multiple items that belong to remote storage failed under a specific configuration. This was fixed.
Previously, if a library was removed from a lost loan profile, the locations list still remained saved on the profile, even though it was not displayed in the UI. Additionally, if a library and locations were selected, removing the location(s) from the profile did not work. Both issues are fixed.
Previously, in some circumstances, when a user requested a title from primo with two holdings or more, a pickup location appeared in the drop-down list that was not applicable. This was fixed.

Resource Management

Resolved

In the items list, the filters did not include all the values across pages, that was fixed.
After selecting an item to edit through the 'Browse Shelf Listing' feature and then returning back to the MD Editor by selecting Cancel, Save or the Back arrow, the user is not directed back to the Browse Shelf Listing with the previous parameters settings. This was fixed.