NDE UI - Support for "May Also Be Held By"

February 2026 - Collaborative Networks  URM-237333

The NDE UI now supports the "May Also Be Held By" feature for collaborative networks. When this feature is activated, the Full Display of resources contains a "May also be held by" section whenever the resource's metadata includes links to other institutions, campuses, and libraries that may also provide services for the resource. The section lists the relevant locations, with links to those locations. You can use the customization package to add icons for each of the locations.

For additional information, see Configuring the "May Also Be Held By" Service in Primo VE; NDE UI Customization - Best Practices.

NDE UI - Option to Customize Background Images in Login and Dedicated Search Pages

February 2026 URM-253268

You can now use the customization package to customize the background images that surround the search box in dedicated search pages, such as the Journal Search or the Database Search, and the image that appears in the Login page.

To customize the background image of a dedicated search page, in the customization package, in the images/header folder, add a PNG image file for the type of search, with the file name <resource type>-search-header-img.png. For example, for the Database search page, add a file called database-search-header-img.png. Currently, the background images of the following types of search pages can be customized in this way: Journal search, Browse search, Database search, and Newspaper search.

NDE UI - Similar Image Browse for Digital Images

February 2026 URM-242755, URM-321296

For customers who have purchased Alma Specto, a new section has been added to the Full Display of digital images: Similar Image Browse. When enabled, this section presents a selection of images in the institution/network holdings that are deemed similar to the current image. This feature employs the Alma Specto API to find similar images. The images found are displayed in a carousel, in order of the degree of similarity between them and the current image. Selecting one of the images in the carousel opens the Full Display of that image.

NDE UI - Central Package for Consortia

February 2026 - Collaborative Networks   URM-233647
The NDE UI now supports central distribution and deployment of customization packages in consortia. This enables consortia to share common UI assets, such as headers and images, so that the members' UIs can have a similar look and feel.

As in the original UI, configuration of the Central Package in the NDE UI is performed in the Network Zone, in the Manage Customization Package page (Configuration Menu > Discovery > Display Configuration > Manage Customization Package). Configuration for NDE UI Central Packages is similar to that of the original UI, but it is configured separately, so that views based on the original UI are not affected by the configuration of the NDE UI, and vice versa.

Once the NDE Central Package has been uploaded to the Network Zone, it becomes available to member institutions. Each institution can then choose to implement the Central Package in any of their NDE views. They have two options for how to do this:

• Use the Central Package as a template for further customizations – Download the central package, modify it as required, and then upload it to the view. In the institution's UI, modifications made by the institution override the settings of the Central Package.
• Adopt the Central Package completely, without modifying it at all – Select the Inherit from Central Package option. When this option is selected, any updates that are implemented in the Network Zone in the future are also automatically implemented in the view.
  If Duplicate for NDE is used to create an NDE view from an existing non-NDE view, the Inherit from Central Package setting is not copied, and is not selected. If you want to use this option in the NDE view, you must select it again in its settings.

For additional information, see Central Management in Collaborative Networks.

Improvements to Natural Language Search

January 2026 URM-317408, URM-254501, URM-253493

In the Natural Language Search, we have improved the transformation of the original query into a structured format. Highlights of the improvements include:

• The identification of author names in search queries has been refined to better differentiate authors from subjects. This makes it possible to use them as author filters in query processing, which improves the accuracy of the search results.
  Identification of author names in queries relies on the Large Language Model (LLM). While author detection is generally very accurate, detection may not always be successful.
• We added a new mechanism to ensure that terms that are used as filters are not duplicated in the actual Boolean query.
• We enhanced the handling of non-English queries. When a query  is identified as being in a language other than English, the resulting Boolean query is generated with three permutations in the (non-English) query language and three permutations in English (because the CDI index is very rich in English content).
• Searches for photos now automatically include the more general resource-type images.

For additional information about Natural Language Search in Primo VE, see Natural Language Search in the NDE UI.

NDE UI - Linked Open Data - Discovery of Organization and Location Entities

January 2026 URM-253782

The NDE UI now supports the linked-data organization and location entities. This feature utilizes Linked Open Data (LOD) to enable users to discover additional information regarding an entity and to relate it to materials provided by your library. Currently supported entity types are person, organization, and location. The information about each entity is obtained from the Library of Congress and Wikidata.

The UI includes the following elements to enable discovery of entities:

• Autocomplete Entity – Suggestions of entities related to terms the user enters into a search query. When the user begins to enter a search term, the system identifies possible matches for the term among entities of each type for which LOD information is available, and ranks the suggestions for each type of entity. The top-ranked suggestions appear at the bottom of the autocomplete list; up to two suggestions may appear. When available, the first suggestion is a person, and the second suggestion is an organization. Locations only appear if neither persons nor organizations are found.

  

• Info Cards – Brief information about entities related to a record that is open in the Full Display. Info Cards appear on the Full Display page in the Related Entities section of the Recommendations panel. A card showing the same brief description that would appear in an autocomplete suggestion is displayed for each entity that is associated with the record. Selecting the entity's name in a card opens the Entity Page (see below) of that entity.

  Up to three entities can appear in the Related Entities section. If more than three entities are associated with the record, a More related entities option appears below the Info Cards. Selecting this option opens the full list of related entities in a sliding panel. Up to 40 entities can be included in the list in the sliding panel. Persons are prioritized for the first suggestion, organizations are prioritized for the second suggestion, and locations are prioritized for the third suggestion.

  

• Entity Page – More detailed information about an entity presented in a dedicated page. Entity pages open when an entity is selected in either an autocomplete list or an Info Card.

  

For additional information, see Linked Open Data in the NDE UI.

NDE UI - Related Links

January 2026 URM-216833

Contextual relationships – links to CDI records of resources related to a book – are now included in the Full Display of book records in the NDE UI. Unlike the original UI, the NDE UI includes sections in the Full Display page of a book record for each type of related links available for the book. The following types of related links are supported:

• Chapters of this book
• Reviews of this book
• Other chapters of this book (for book-chapter records)

Links in the general information section of the Full Display indicate how many related links exist. Selecting a link takes the user to the relevant section.

Initially, the first five available related items in the category are listed in the section. Selecting the Show more items link below the list adds the next five available related items, and so on, until all of the items are shown.

From the related-links section, users can select an item to view it. The Full Display of the related item then opens in a new tab.

For additional information, see Configuring Contextual Relationships for Primo VE.