Alma March 2018 Release Notes
This Alma release provides numerous new features and enhancements. Some of these enhancements are a result of Idea Exchange or NERS initiatives.
Download a PDF of the Release Notes – Note that the PDF includes the online help pages that describe the core functionality of the new features.Make the Most of This Release
| Action Items |
|---|
| Create Holdings During Import – The MD import process was enhanced to allow you to embed holdings information in your import file. |
| Using Overlap and Collection Analysis for Community Zone Comparisons – You can now run an overlap check of your electronic collections with Community Zone-managed collections. This is an addition to the previously supported option to analyze overlap between your own collections. |
| Dublin Core Application Profiles – Alma Digital now provides two out-of-the-box Dublin Core application profiles, enabling cataloging and indexing of up to 50 local fields. The application profiles provide a richer and more flexible cataloging system. |
| Managing Patron Records in the Network Zone – Institutions working with a Network Zone can now manage their users in a single user file that is centrally synchronized with a Network Zone-managed list, and no longer need to load users to all of the participating member institutions. |
What's New
The following sections present the new and changed features in this release of Alma.
New User Interface Survey
The Alma new UI was released several months ago. We would like to know your thoughts and opinions about it.
Starting with the March release, a floating tab appears in the UI. Click the tab to open the survey in a separate window.
We encourage every Alma user to complete the survey. Thank you.
Acquisitions
- Enhanced Display of Funds on Invoice Line and PO Line Pages– When there are multiple funds for an invoice, all of them now appear in the table on the Invoice Lines tab of the Invoice Details or Purchase Order Line Details pages.
NERS Enhancement (ID # 5271): Change PO Line Attributes After Ordering - Part II – PO line attributes can now be updated after an order is created and sent to the vendor.
Watch the Update PO Line Information After Creating video.- New Indexes for PO Line Searches – New fields were added to the advanced search and the persistent search for PO lines.
- Purchase Request Enhancements – The Create Purchase Request interface was changed.
- Trial Detail Enhancements – The Trial Details page was changed.
- Additional Acquisitions Enhancements
Resource Management
- Create Holdings During Import – Holdings records can now be enriched with information from your incoming records during the import process.
- Multilingual Preferred-Term Processing – Alma supports linking to multilingual authorities and preferred-term correction when there is no subfield 9 in the bibliographic record.
- Multilingual Authority Records with the Same or No Subfield 9 – Multilingual authority capabilities include handling multiple preferred terms when subfield 9 is the same or there is no subfield 9 specified.
- Call Number Duplication Validation – When you are working with bibliographic records in the MD Editor, Alma can check for duplicate call numbers.
- Merge and Combine Inventory Relations – Handling MMS-ID based related records was improved—specifically a record related to a secondary record, in a merge and combine inventory process.
Idea Exchange: Using Overlap and Collection Analysis for Community Zone Comparisons – The Overlap and Collection Analysis set comparison functionality added the capability to compare an institution's titles from a single electronic collection against the titles of one or more electronic collections in the Community Zone.- Cataloger Privileges in the MD Editor – If cataloging permission levels were enabled for your environment, new editing options are available for catalogers with a level lower than the level of the bibliographic record stored in the repository.
- ISO 20775 Holdings Support for SRU – Alma now supports the ISO 20775 holdings SRU schema for physical inventory.
- Suppressed Holdings Indication – Indications of suppressed holdings were expanded to include several different areas.
- MD Editor User Interface Consistency – In the MD Editor, the following areas were updated for consistency with the new Alma user interface: external search results, viewing inventory records, viewing record matches, viewing versions, viewing notes, viewing collections, viewing F3 (or binocular icon) Bibliographic Records tab results, viewing related bibliographic records, and relinking holdings results.
- Additional Resource Management Enhancements
Digital Resource Management
- Dublin Core Application Profiles – Alma now provides two customizable Dublin Core profiles to which you can add local fields.
- Handle PI Generation and Publishing – The new Export Handles job exports digital bibliographic records in a batch file with persistent identifiers that can be used by a Handle server to display the metadata record of the file, or to display the file in a viewer.
- Deliver Representations by MMS ID – Delivery URLs can now use the MMS ID of a bibliographic record to display a representation.
- Support Collection Thumbnails in MD Import – The Collection import profile now supports importing thumbnail images for the top-level and sub-collections.
- Additional Digital Resource Management Enhancements
Fulfillment
- Idea Exchange: Recent Options in Manage Patron Services and Placing Requests – The user's previous selections history now displays the list of previous selections only when you click the clock icon.
Resource Sharing
- Idea Exchange: Workflow Options for Rejected Resource Sharing Requests – You can choose whether a resource sharing request will remain in an active status even if it has been rejected by the resource sharing partner.
- Additional Resource Sharing Enhancements
Course Reserves
- Originating System ID for Citation Matching – You can now enter an originating system ID for citations and then use this ID to help Alma locate library resources when locating citations.
- Additional Course Reserves Enhancements
Collaborative Networks
- Member-Controlled Publishing to Primo of Institution Accessible Resources – For institutions working with a Network Zone, it is now possible to publish to Primo all records available for a member institution either from the Institution Zone or from the Network Zone. Contact Ex Libris to enable this capability for both the Network Zone and member institutions.
- Managing Patron Records in the Network Zone – External users may now be maintained in the Network Zone and distributed to all member institutions.
- Additional Collaborative Network Enhancements
Analytics
- Analytics Enhancements – Several enhancements were made to Analytics for the March release.
Administration and Infrastructure
- Copy Option When Selecting Text – A copy menu option appears when you select text on a page.
- Additional Administration and Infrastructure Enhancements
APIs
- Campus (Available for) information was added to the BIB API, SRU, and general publishing AVE and AVA fields.
- The AVA fields of the BIB API and SRU were enriched to generate the calculated summary holdings.
- License administrator information was added to the create, update, and retrieve license APIs. For details, see https://developers.exlibrisgroup.com/alma/apis/acq.
- The citation API now returns chapter_author and chapter_title for book chapters.
Content Operations
- The PUC (Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile) vocabulary was added to Alma Community Zone for this release.
- Library of Congress Authorities Community Zone Updates
- New Electronic Collections Added to the Alma CKB
- New External Search Resources
Known Issues
There are no known issues for the March release.
Next Release Sneak Preview
The April release sees a time when Alma development periodically needs to take a back seat. Maintenance, cloud infrastructure, and other important tasks need to be handled to ensure that Alma meets the highest standards of performance and high availability.
Stay tuned for a more detailed update next month.