Alma July 2017 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 |
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| Advanced Search Options Expanded – This enhancement (NERS request 4057) provides new possibilities for querying your catalog and inventory, using an expanded set of search operators. |
| Linked 880 Fields in Bibliographic Records – With the new feature, Alternate Graphic Representation (880) fields can also be used as fully fledged access points for purposes of authority control. This enables greater flexibility and control in maintaining your multilingual bibliographic records. |
| Prevent Reading Room Loans at Regular Desks – Are you making use of reading rooms in Alma? You can now easily manage open shelf items for reading room use only. This way, you can leave items on the open shelf, but allow them to be loaned only in reading rooms. |
| New Linked Account Rules Options – Libraries that make use of fulfillment networks and linked accounts can now keep copied user account expiry and purge dates in sync with the original user account dates. Just use the new option to have every user account refresh also update the expiry and purge dates. |
| Digital Services in the Analytics Link Resolver Usage Subject Area – Do you want to measure the services used on digital objects in the Alma Link Resolver? You can now report on these services, allowing your institution to have a full picture of how all inventory is used. Two new fields, Number of Digital Services and Number of Digital Clicked Services, were added to the Link Resolver Usage subject area. For these fields to be populated with data, you must select the Include Representation services in link resolver statistics check box (Fulfillment > Fulfillment Configuration > Discovery Interface Display Logic > Other Settings). |
What's New
The following sections present the new and changed features in this release of Alma.
New Alma User Interface
- The new Alma user interface is now available on all institution sandboxes. For instructions on enabling the new UI for your institution's sandbox, see Enabling Alma's New UI for Your Institution. For general information on Alma's new user interface, see What's New in Alma's New User Interface.
- A "sneak peek" of the new Alma user interface is available from the classic Alma UI (on production environments). Click the New UI Preview button in the top-right corner of Alma to view selected pages of the new Alma UI.
- Note that as a result of preparations for the new Alma UI, some fields in the classic UI may have shifted position on the page. We will not report these cases for the classic UI.
Acquisitions
- Acquisitions Enhancements – Several enhancements were made to the Acquisitions functional area for the July release.
Resource Management
- Controlled Vocabulary Lists Filtered Dynamically – In the MD Editor, the controlled vocabulary lists that appear are now dynamically filtered beginning with the first character that you type in the subfield.
- MD Editor Usability – The usability of the MD Editor was enhanced with a number of new developments.
- Metadata Profile Updates – A number of bibliographic and authority changes were made to the metadata profiles.
Idea Exchange: Suppressed Record Identification Expanded – The identification of suppressed records in different areas of Alma was expanded.
NERS Enhancement (Request ID 4057): Advanced Search Options Expanded – Certain advanced search query options were expanded to include Not Contains Keywords, Not Contains Phrase, and Is Not Empty. - Linked 880 Fields in Bibliographic Records – Additional linked 880 field features, such as unlinking and changing the scripts, were implemented.
- 880 Field Implemented as an Access Point – The 880 field can now be used as an access point with all its related capabilities.
- Importing an EAD as a New Top-Level Collection – You can now use EAD files as an exchange format for importing into Alma to create top-level collections with their sub-collections.
- Additional Resource Management Enhancements
Fulfillment
- New Options in Fulfillment Configuration Utility – The Fulfillment Configuration Utility was expanded to include request- and booking-related parameters.
- Mark Work Order as Done When Using a Self-Check Machine – You can now receive an ordered item (from a vendor) using a self-check machine.
- Prevent Reading Room Loans at Regular Desks – An institution may now specify that an item that is for use only in a reading room may be loaned only at a desk that is defined as a reading room desk.
- Additional Fulfillment Enhancements
Since February 2016, it is possible to configure Alma to send a single overdue or lost item notification to a patron listing all of the patron's overdue or lost loans. If this option is configured (simply by setting the Fulfillment Other Settings configuration parameter switch_to_overdue_and_lost_loan_new_job to True), the patron receives a single notification, rather than multiple notifications, for each notification type. Note that if you have customized your previous notifications, you will need to customize the new notifications, Ful Overdue And Lost Loan Letter and Ful Overdue And Lost Loan Notification Letter. For instructions on customizing letters, see Configuring Alma Letters.
Although support for multiple notifications will continue and this functionality will not be deprecated, Ex Libris will develop new features only for the aggregated notification method going forward.
Collaborative Networks
- New Linked Account Rules Options – The Linked Account Rules page contains two new parameters in the Output Parameters section.
Analytics
- Assigned To Added to Borrowing and Lending Requests – The Assigned To dimension was added to the Borrowing Requests and Lending Requests subject areas.
- Support for COUNTER Type JR5 Added to Analytics – To support COUNTER type JR5, the Usage Data Details JR5 dimension was added to the Usage Data subject area.
- Portfolio Modification Date Added to E-Inventory – The Portfolio Modification Date dimension was added to the E-Inventory subject area.
- Additional Analytics Enhancements
APIs
Idea Exchange: A new API that allows you to create a user fine/fee is now available. For detailed information, see https://developers.exlibrisgroup.com/alma/apis/users.- The e-collections linked to bibliographic records can now be retrieved using the following syntax: GET /bibs/mms_id/e-collections
- The Get Users API now enables fetching copied user records (linked accounts in other institutions) based on the SOURCE_LINK_ID + SOURCE_INSTITUTION_ID fields. The syntax is: GET /almaws/v1/users/{user_id}?source_institution={institution_id}. It also allows fetching the source record based on the linking ID, using the syntax GET /users/x?user_id_type=linking_id. The linking ID information was added to the Get Users API. See https://developers.exlibrisgroup.com/alma/apis/users.
- A new API that allows you to update the due date of a loan is now available. For detailed information, see https://developers.exlibrisgroup.com/alma/apis/users.
- An input parameter to all web services (lang=XX, where XX is the two-letter language code, such as en for English or de for German) now enables selecting the language in which response texts are generated for all APIs. The API response is now created according to the requested language. For detailed information, see https://developers.exlibrisgroup.com/alma/api.
- The external_id field was added to the Get Jobs Instance API.
- The reading list citation API now returns the following additional fields. Visibility and sipx fields are Leganto-only.
- due_date
- license_type – SIPX, SELFDECLARED, CREATIVECOMMONS, or CLA
- visibility_start_date – Citation appears in Leganto
- visibility_end_date
- material_visibility_start_date – Citation material's (uploaded file or electronic article) accessible from Leganto
- material_visibility_end_date
- sipx_doc_id – SIPX-related information
- sipx_user_price
- sipx_list_price
- sipx_funded
- dcs_doc_id – DCS related information
- source1 ... source 10 – Taken from the values added in the last release on the Edit Reading List page
- The reading list section API now returns the following additional fields. This API is Leganto-only.
- start_date
- end_date
- visibility – true/false
- * tags - type – PUBLIC or LIBRARY
- * tags - description – Tag code
Content Operations
Known Issues
There are no known issues for the July release.
Next Release Sneak Preview
View a list of the features that are planned for the next Alma release.