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Ex Libris Knowledge Center

Glossary

Term
Definition
Action
What can be done or applied to a request. Available actions may be limited due to request status.
For more information, see Borrowing Request Actions and Lending Request Actions.
Activate
An action that completes the creation of a lending partner. 
Alma Glossary
For more information, see Alma Glossary.
Analytics
Analytics are used for measuring various aspects of resource sharing. Out-of-the-box reports are available at all libraries for assessment purposes. Other reports for borrowing or lending can be created using the variables in analytics.
API
A means for systems to communicate.
Assign to
Use this action to assign the request to a staff user.
Automatic Renewal
A new due date is automatically rewarded. Indicates if automatic renewals are allowed for borrowing requests.
Borrowing Due Date
Once the resource is shipped and the shipping message is sent to the borrower, the borrowing due is the same as the Lending Due Date.
Borrowing policies
Used to order the pods. Determine the order of pods based on the priority of use. 
Cancel
The borrowing request cannot be canceled after shipment, but the fulfillment request can (either from the patron My Account or from the staff Manage Patron Services page). If a fulfillment request is cancelled after shipment, upon receiving the item in the borrowing library, the item is immediately marked to be sent back to the lender.
Cancel partner
This action sends a cancellation notice to the lender and the borrowing request is kept active so that Rapido then looks for the next possible lender.
Use this action when you do not want to use the current partner, for example, a non-responding partner.
This action is accessible from the full view of the request and will soon be added as an action in the actions menu.

Central Discovery Index (CDI)

The Central Discovery Index (CDI) is a searchable database of citations collected from scholarly e-resources including journal articles, e-books, legal documents and more. They are harvested from thousands of primary and secondary commercial publishers and aggregators, and from open-access repositories.
Check Out to Patron
Marks that the patron received a physical non-returnable item and completes the request.
Cloud app
Cloud apps are cloud hosted add ons. They are free and perform a variety of additional functions. They can be built by the Ex Libris team or built by the community. For more information, see Ex Libris App Center.
Conditional Reply

This action enables the lender to send the borrower a condition for the request. When selecting this action, you have the option to select a Conditional Reason, Date for reply, and a Note. Select Yes or No in response to the condition specified by the lender. If the response is Yes, the request status changes to Sent and the Date for Reply field is cleared. If the response is No, the status changes to Rejected by Partner and continues to the next partner in the rota.

Copyright declaration
Copyright statement that can be configured for viewing by a library user at the point of request. For more information, see Copyright Declaration.
Copyright (mediation) rules
Configuration for copyright management for the borrower. For more information, see Copyright Management.
Copyright Payment
Define if the borrower or the lender is responsible for the copyright payment. Borrower is selected by default.
Damaged
Send an email to the lender to report that damage occurred and set the status to Damaged communicated. Only displays when Damaged communicated is enabled in the borrowing workflow profile. For more information, see Adding Workflow Profiles.
Data Sharing
Configuration to enable library holdings to be discoverable by the resource sharing system. 
Digital fulfillment workflows
The practice of lending an electronic copy in place of a physically owned copy while maintaining the "owned-to-loaned" ratio. 
Directory Member
Libraries that have completed the steps for becoming a part of the resource sharing directory. For more information, see Contributing to the Resource Sharing Directory.
Duplicate
Create a new request based on the existing one. You can then modify the request as required on the Resource Sharing Borrowing Request page.
When duplicating a Resource Sharing Borrowing request, the values in the following fields are copied to the new request:
  • Title
  • ISSN, ISBN (Metadata fields)
  • Author
  • Requester
  • Owner
  • Request Status
  • Requested Format
  • Delivery Location
  • Request Note
Enable Direct Charge Functionality
An indicator that enables the option to see and update all relevant direct charge fields.
Escape label
Within a mediation rule, identify an escape label to override a rule after appropriate actions are applied to meet the requirements of an existing rule. For the parameters, using the if not in list statement with the escape label supports the use of the label acting as an escape label. 
Expand Results
An available action that includes Rapido results within the discovery scope.
Expired
Request expired for the lender. If there are no other predefined lenders, the request moves to the next lender. Otherwise, it remains at this status.
Expired is a final state. When a request expires, the request is cancelled and a letter is sent to the patron. The request remains active enabling a librarian to reactivate the request if the librarian chooses to look for another lender.
Expiry
 The number of days until the request expires and moves to the next lender in rota.
External Identifier
A unique identifier that can be used by both lending and borrowing institutions in referencing the request. 
Facets
Facets are used in search results lists to filter the results
Used for document delivery for materials owned by an institution through Rapido. 
For circumstances where none of your partners can fill your request, the Find Partners opens the Potential Lenders list of lenders who have the requested resource and can possibly fill the request.
General Message
Send a general message with a borrowing request to a lender (for ISO/Mail partners) This does not include requests processed by Rapid.
Global Title Index (GTI)
Index of records from institutions that are Rapido members. When selecting the global index, you are actually searching in the Discovery Rapido Global Title Index + CDI.
History
Shows past partners and relevant request statuses for that partner
ISO
Communication standard for Resource Sharing. Often used for peer-to-peer requests.
Institution Level/ IZ
The area of the Metadata Management System comprises local institutional data such as locally managed bibliographic records, locally activated electronic portfolios, and local physical holdings. See Introduction to Alma Inventory.
Interlibrary loan
The sharing of library materials between library institutions used interchangeably with resource sharing.
Internal Identifier
A number assigned to the request that is limited to internal uses such as searching. 
Invoice Number
The invoice number that contains this request charge information.
Invoice Printed
An indication if an invoice was already created for this request.
Invoice Sent Date
The date the invoice was sent to the partner.
Knowledge Center
Ex Libris website that contains documentation on training, workflows, configurations, etc. See Knowledge Center.
Labels
Application of labels can be done either manually or automatically to support workflows and analytics. 
Last Resort
The use and integration of a secondary ILS system utilized to process resource sharing requests after an attempt with a primary ILS system.
Lending Due Date

The lending due date calculation includes the delivery shipping time to the borrower, the loan period, and the return shipping time to the lender.

For example, if the shipping time is five days and the loan period is 14 days, and the current date is May 1, 2021, then the Lending Due Date = May 25, 2021 (May 1st + 5 (shipping to the borrower) + 14 (loan period) + 5 (shipping to the lender)).

Letters
Alma letters have a variety of uses that include contact with patrons, contact with other libraries, and slips. For more information, see Rapido Letters.
Library Card
The patron view of the patron account. 
Loan Period
Duration of a loan circulation.
The loan period is the Borrowing Due Date minus the return shipping period.
Locate Resource
A non-Rapido request manually activates the Borrowing Locate process. This action only appears if the request has an assigned partner or rota. See Borrowing Locate Process.
Lost
Sends an email to the lender and sets the status to Lost communicated. Appears only for Rapido emails or ISO partners.
When the request is received by the library (and not as Physical non-returnable) and has not yet been returned to the partner when Lost communicated is enabled in the borrowing workflow profile. For more information, see Adding Workflow Profiles.
Maximum Request Cost
As defined on the self registration form.
Member Attributes
Configure the Member attributes tab from Configuration > Resource Sharing > Members. The Member attributes tab is configured for setting up the participating resource sharing library. For more information, see Consortia Resource Sharing.
Mediation rules
Used to establish rules for when requests should not automatically be filled and require staff mediation to advance the request to the next stage.
NCIP
A communication standard for Resource Sharing. Often used with external systems, such as ILLiad.
Note to patron
A note to customer contact.
Output parameters
The label to apply to requests.
Override Local Holding
Relevant for Document Delivery. Rapid prevents you from placing requests that you already have a holding for such as digital requests for resources that your institution owns. Use this action to override this and enable the request to be sent to Rapid.
Participating items
Participating items are sets of physical items used for fulfilling resource sharing requests. Participating items must be defined for every member.
Patron Account
The patron interface known as the library card.
Permission
User roles that are often shown to identify which user roles are needed to be able to perform a configuration, workflow, or action. 
Physical Items Lending Policies
For more information, see Participating Items.
Pick from shelf
Referencing items that need to be pulled or searched for in physical book stacks or collections. 
Pod
A grouping of libraries. Rapido pods are structured such that libraries in each pod abide by agreed upon terms such as loan period, cost, delivery time, renewal details, and expiry. For more information, see Rapido Pods.
Pod Allow Automatic Renewals
Yes or No value.
Pod Allow Renewal
Yes or No value. Whether renewals are allowed in this  pod. Pod terms determine if a renewal option is visible on requests.
Pod Cost
Numerical value. The charges per request.
Pod Delivery Time
Numerical Value (Days). Expected delivery time of physical items filled by partners in this pod.
Pod Expiry Time (Days)
Numerical value. The number of days a request will be with a lending library prior to automatically expiring from this partner and moving to the next potential lender.
Pod Loan Period
Duration of a loan circulation (Days). The loan period is the Borrowing Due Date minus the return shipping period.
Pod Maximum Renewals Allowed
Numerical value. The maximum number of times a renewal is allowed by pod terms.
Pod priority
Lending terms, including the renewal policy and loan period, assigned to a group of participating items.
Pods
A group of resource-sharing libraries that share resources under the same terms and conditions.
Primo VE
A patron-facing discovery interface.
Purchase Request
For Fulfillment Services Operators / Managers with the privilege Submit Purchase Request RS enabled, you can create a purchase request with the information in the borrowing request.
RapidILL
The doc del component of Rapido that provides access to the collections of nearly 600 libraries in over 20 countries. Members commit to a 24-hour lending turnaround time, with a system average of less than 10 hours. The borrowing fulfillment rate is over 95%. For non-Rapido users, RapidILL integrates with most major ILL management systems and can also be used as a standalone platform.
Rapido Holdings Index Record
The index that contains all Rapido libraries holdings. For more information, see Rapido Holdings Index Record.
Rapido Number of Renewals 
The number of times the borrowing request was renewed.
Rapido offers
The discovery differentiation of an item held by a Rapido library or with known terms versus the item discovered at an institution with terms of use that are unknown to the system
Reactivate
Appears only when Reactivated is enabled in the borrowing workflow profile. See Adding Workflow Profiles. Select this option to reactivate resource sharing request.
The assessment of available partners based on current availability determined appropriate for the partner to send the item to. See Recalculate partner. 
Receive
resource sharing
The sharingof library materials between library institutions, used interchangibly with interlibrary loan
Reject
Use Reject when the lender rejected the request but for some reason, the request in the borrower's system was not updated automatically. This is primarily used for partners who work with email. If the patron is no longer interested in the request, use the cancel option as cancel enables you to choose whether to send the patron a cancellation notice or not.
Mark a request rejected by the lending institution as Rejected. Reject is only visible if the workflow option Reject is enabled.
See Reject in the Lending Workflow Actions.
Also see Reject in the Borrowing Workflow Actions.
Release assign
Enables you to unassign an assigned request from a user.
Release Notes
Documentation regarding the monthly system updates. See Rapido Release Notes.
Renew
This option to renew a resource sharing borrowing request.
This option is only available for Rapido requests if the pod’s terms allow renewal.
Resource Sharing Agreement
Refers to the configuration of toggling data sharing to Yes. For more information, see Data Sharing Profile.
Resource Sharing Directory or Directory
A catalog of libraries. 
Resource Sharing Library
The library configured to perform resource sharing.
Resubmit
Send the request to Rapid again.
Resupply Request
For Rapid document deliveries, after a request is completed, Rapido enables you to request a new copy of the original request in case the original request was not properly received. This action reopens the request on the borrower's side for RapidILL requests if the request is complete. This action can only be used once.
Return

Displays when the request is received by the library (and not as 'Physical non-returnable') and has not yet been returned to the partner. If the borrowing Workflow Profile for the partner includes the Lender check in option, the request status changes to Returned item to partner (see Configuring Workflow Profiles).

The Resource Sharing Return Slip Letter is printed when returning a borrowing item to the lender. For more information, see Configuring Alma Letters.

Rota
Rota is the terminology used for the creation of a list of partners (similar to an OCLC lending string).
A rota is a list of partners that are queried in real-time to see if they can fill a particular resource sharing borrowing request. A rota can be ordered, where the partners are queried in a specific order, or random. You can have multiple rotas, each defined by a rota template.
Rota Assignment Rule
Automatic rules that determine the list of potential lenders that are assigned to a borrower resource sharing request.
Rota list
A list of potential lending partners that are searched to fulfill the sharing request. For more information, see Resource Sharing Partners and Rotas.
Rota Template
Groups of potential lenders for fulfilling a borrower resource sharing request. Rota templates are assigned automatically to borrower resource sharing requests by rota assignment rules.
Sandbox
A test environment for exploring configurations and functionalities. 
Scanning
Beyond the physical act of digitizing materials on a scanner, there is the action of scanning in a barcode into various fields in the interface. Not limited to but including scanning in a barcode for shipping and receiving physical or digital materials. 
Scope
A term used to describe the breadth and container of discovery results. 
Self owned
Items requested by patrons and owned by that library can be labeled as self owned, and filled from either the lending or borrowing request of the library. 
Send Query to Patron
Ability to communicate with the patron using the send the Query to Patron letter. For more information, see Configuring Patron Query Types.
Sets
A group of requests that share criteria. For more information, see Rapido Sets.
Show File
Applies to digital requests. Selecting this option downloads the file.
Status Query
Request a status update from the lending institution. This is only applicable to Rapido and ISO partners.
Statuses
The value that describes a request's current state in the workflow. Unless mediated, or requiring actions, requests move automatically between statuses. Statuses are available under facets for filtering results. Some statuses are available for analytics.  For a list of statuses, see Statuses.
Supplier
Lending partners or vendors providing materials may be considered suppliers. 
Upload file
Ability to upload a file for digital requests or for any requests the library permits to be shared electronically.
For this feature, your browser settings must be configured to allow viewing of PDF files.
Use Consolidated Billing
A setting that indicates if the lender will consolidate billing with this partner.
View
Action option for viewing requested information.
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