Owen Leonard wrote:

Graham Seaman wrote:

...

Is it possible to set the Koha Z39.50 server to return Opac format, or return holdings data in any other way?

Z39.50 cannot return availability information for items. That's one of the reasons why projects like FulfILLment (http://fulfillment-ill.org/) exist. ILSes need some kind of separate layer between them to exchange that kind of data.

I don't think that's exactly true. Z39.50 servers generally give you a choice of MARC 21, SUTRS, XML or OPAC format, where OPAC format includes holdings/circulation data appended to the bibliographic record. Several proprietary ILS systems (eg ExLibris Aleph or Sirsi-Dynix Horizon) support this format. Other proprietary systems such as Sirsi-Dynix Unicorn use custom Marc fields (Unicorn uses 926 $a, $b etc,). copac.ac.uk use custom fields in MODS instead of Marc, and this is carried in the XML Z39.50 output format. So there are several ways this can be done, and I wondered if Koha supported any of them (or if anyone was working towards supporting one of them). Graham PS sorry if the formatting of this mail is a mess, fighting with Outlook OWA.

-- Owen

-- Web Developer Athens County Public Libraries http://www.myacpl.org

MJ RAy wrote:

As you know, holdings data is not necessarily availability data.

I would prefer availability, but if holdings is all that's practical, that's fine too.

Happily, Koha will return holdings data in the 952 tag described on http://wiki.koha-community.org/wiki/Holdings_data_fields_(9xx) ncluding the due date in the q subfield if it's on loan. I checked and this still seems to be visible in a Zebra z39.50 connected to a recent master version.

The site I'm querying is not returning anything in the 952 tag. There is a note on the wiki page you pointed to which reads "As of 3.4.x, holdings data is no longer stored in a 952 field and that information is introduced in the items table only." I guess that means this site may be using 3.4.x. But that statement seems to conflict with yours above that 952 is still populated in a recent version. The only 900 fields I am seeing populated are 942, 962 and 999.

However, it's only useful if you know you're talking to Koha. In general, what Owen said is correct and we don't get availability.

I'm working on a cross-library Z39.50 search where I know what each LMS is. At the moment the only ones I can't get any holdings or availability data from are Capita Alto and Koha (I only have one Koha library in my list, the IDS library in Brighton). If there is nothing simple I can ask the Systems person for the Koha library to turn on to give me holdings in a Marc field, another possibility would be to query both holdings and availability through a web interface, if Koha has one? Thanks for the helpful information Graham