Adding schools as branches to a public library Koha install
We're checking into the idea of adding the school district to a Koha 3 install. We were thinking of adding each school as a branch. We let Koha assign our patron barcodes and use our own item barcodes. The schools buy their item barcodes and use student numbers. There shouldn't be any overlap in our numbering systems. I'm looking for any tips on settings, importing items and patrons, things to look out for or anything else that would be helpful in a situation like this. -- Tim McMahon Technical Services West Liberty Public Library 400 N. Spencer St. West Liberty, IA 52776 Phone: 319-627-2084 Fax: 319-627-2135 tmcmahon@wlpl.org http://www.wlpl.org
Tim McMahon a écrit :
We're checking into the idea of adding the school district to a Koha 3 install. We were thinking of adding each school as a branch. We let Koha assign our patron barcodes and use our own item barcodes. The schools buy their item barcodes and use student numbers. There shouldn't be any overlap in our numbering systems. I'm looking for any tips on settings, importing items and patrons, things to look out for or anything else that would be helpful in a situation like this.
you already have IndependantBranches=ON, haven't you ? Otherwise, you should investigate this option ;-) -- Paul POULAIN http://www.biblibre.com Expert en Logiciels Libres pour l'info-doc NOUVEAU TELEPHONE : 04 91 81 35 08
I was thinking about that. I had to turn that off a while back to get returns to work, but returns seem to be working with IndependantBranches=ON now. Thanks Paul POULAIN wrote:
Tim McMahon a écrit :
We're checking into the idea of adding the school district to a Koha 3 install. We were thinking of adding each school as a branch. We let Koha assign our patron barcodes and use our own item barcodes. The schools buy their item barcodes and use student numbers. There shouldn't be any overlap in our numbering systems. I'm looking for any tips on settings, importing items and patrons, things to look out for or anything else that would be helpful in a situation like this.
you already have IndependantBranches=ON, haven't you ? Otherwise, you should investigate this option ;-)
-- Tim McMahon Technical Services West Liberty Public Library
From a school perspective our whole purpose in a shared catalog was to borrow and see each others materials. So we turned independant branches OFF. I'm looking forward to the granularity of security options to lock users out of
the MARC record! You may need to add some attributes for schools - homerooms, grade etc. to run overdues. If they use student ID's you can probably load them right into the cardnumber field or create another attribute for barcode. We're going through the migration process with 67 schools to go live in January! Should be interesting! David Schuster Tim McMahon - West Liberty Public Library wrote:
I was thinking about that. I had to turn that off a while back to get returns to work, but returns seem to be working with IndependantBranches=ON now. Thanks
Paul POULAIN wrote:
Tim McMahon a écrit :
We're checking into the idea of adding the school district to a Koha 3 install. We were thinking of adding each school as a branch. We let Koha assign our patron barcodes and use our own item barcodes. The schools buy their item barcodes and use student numbers. There shouldn't be any overlap in our numbering systems. I'm looking for any tips on settings, importing items and patrons, things to look out for or anything else that would be helpful in a situation like this.
you already have IndependantBranches=ON, haven't you ? Otherwise, you should investigate this option ;-)
-- Tim McMahon Technical Services West Liberty Public Library _______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha
-- View this message in context: http://www.nabble.com/Adding-schools-as-branches-to-a-public-library-Koha-in... Sent from the Koha - Discuss mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
My .02 (using Koha 2.2.9 on Win32...) -- I agree with the shared catalog....that way students can borrow books from any school in the district. --if they are a school of any size....they probably already have a directory (LDAP/Active Directory/eDirectory)....might be easier to connect to their existing student directory rather that deal with the bother of importing/updating etc etc ect.... I made an initial mistake and imported students in to the Koha database...shouldn't have done that.....over this next summer, I will be removing them and setting up Koha to authenticate users via Novell's eDirectory (LDAP). --We add the home room teacher, and grade level to the student data (we are a small district so it's all we really need) using the sort1 and sort2 entries. -- For custom reports (overdue report that shows home room teacher and grade ) , I added PHP to the server, and use a PHP class to query the MySQL database and present XML formated output, I then use stylesheets to output the XML in browser readable PHP. This pretty much allows me to generate any report imaginable. David Schuster wrote:
From a school perspective our whole purpose in a shared catalog was to borrow and see each others materials. So we turned independant branches OFF. I'm looking forward to the granularity of security options to lock users out of the MARC record!
You may need to add some attributes for schools - homerooms, grade etc. to run overdues. If they use student ID's you can probably load them right into the cardnumber field or create another attribute for barcode.
We're going through the migration process with 67 schools to go live in January! Should be interesting!
David Schuster
Tim McMahon - West Liberty Public Library wrote:
I was thinking about that. I had to turn that off a while back to get returns to work, but returns seem to be working with IndependantBranches=ON now. Thanks
Paul POULAIN wrote:
Tim McMahon a écrit :
We're checking into the idea of adding the school district to a Koha 3 install. We were thinking of adding each school as a branch. We let Koha assign our patron barcodes and use our own item barcodes. The schools buy their item barcodes and use student numbers. There shouldn't be any overlap in our numbering systems. I'm looking for any tips on settings, importing items and patrons, things to look out for or anything else that would be helpful in a situation like this.
you already have IndependantBranches=ON, haven't you ? Otherwise, you should investigate this option ;-)
-- Tim McMahon Technical Services West Liberty Public Library _______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha
With 3.0 we are able to add attributes as needed. So we are actually loading the entire student schedule into the borrower record so the librarians at Secondary can choose what class they want to send overdues to or period etc... I'm still fuzzy on how LDAP is going to control borrower records. When you type in the student ID at CKO wouldn't it have to pull data in order to track it? LDAP doesn't have any homeroom/class information or even Grade in our district so it is pretty much just an authentication piece. Let me know how your edirectory goes as we also use Novell and I'm not ready to go down that path right now. So we are loading ll 54,000 students. I hope to setup an automated process of loading borrowers say weekly. Scott Owen wrote:
My .02 (using Koha 2.2.9 on Win32...)
-- I agree with the shared catalog....that way students can borrow books from any school in the district.
--if they are a school of any size....they probably already have a directory (LDAP/Active Directory/eDirectory)....might be easier to connect to their existing student directory rather that deal with the bother of importing/updating etc etc ect.... I made an initial mistake and imported students in to the Koha database...shouldn't have done that.....over this next summer, I will be removing them and setting up Koha to authenticate users via Novell's eDirectory (LDAP).
--We add the home room teacher, and grade level to the student data (we are a small district so it's all we really need) using the sort1 and sort2 entries.
-- For custom reports (overdue report that shows home room teacher and grade ) , I added PHP to the server, and use a PHP class to query the MySQL database and present XML formated output, I then use stylesheets to output the XML in browser readable PHP. This pretty much allows me to generate any report imaginable.
David Schuster wrote:
From a school perspective our whole purpose in a shared catalog was to borrow and see each others materials. So we turned independant branches OFF. I'm looking forward to the granularity of security options to lock users out of the MARC record!
You may need to add some attributes for schools - homerooms, grade etc. to run overdues. If they use student ID's you can probably load them right into the cardnumber field or create another attribute for barcode.
We're going through the migration process with 67 schools to go live in January! Should be interesting!
David Schuster
Tim McMahon - West Liberty Public Library wrote:
I was thinking about that. I had to turn that off a while back to get returns to work, but returns seem to be working with IndependantBranches=ON now. Thanks
Paul POULAIN wrote:
Tim McMahon a écrit :
We're checking into the idea of adding the school district to a Koha 3 install. We were thinking of adding each school as a branch. We let Koha assign our patron barcodes and use our own item barcodes. The schools buy their item barcodes and use student numbers. There shouldn't be any overlap in our numbering systems. I'm looking for any tips on settings, importing items and patrons, things to look out for or anything else that would be helpful in a situation like this.
you already have IndependantBranches=ON, haven't you ? Otherwise, you should investigate this option ;-)
-- Tim McMahon Technical Services West Liberty Public Library _______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha
_______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha
-- View this message in context: http://www.nabble.com/Adding-schools-as-branches-to-a-public-library-Koha-in... Sent from the Koha - Discuss mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
Please note: this is all "As I understand it"........(in ver 2.2.29 win32)....... After getting Koha to use LDAP as an authentication mechanism, (this requires some editing of the Auth.pm in 2.2.9...I am unsure about 3.0), when a user logs into the Koha front end (Opac), their LDAP specific information is pulled from the source (in my case eDirectory) and used to populate fields in the Koha database. This should be a 1 way (read only) transaction, and you should not be able to update any LDAP/eDirectory info from the Koha interface.....however, every time a user logs into Koha, it should cause an update of their information. So if information is changed in LDAP, it should pull over and update the Koha user information on the users next login. At the end of the modifications required in the auth.pm you will find a section like this: my %borrower; $borrower{cardnumber} = $userid; $borrower{firstname} = $memberhash{cn}; # MANDATORY FIELD $borrower{surname} = $memberhash{sn}; # MANDATORY FIELD $borrower{initials} = substr($borrower{firstname},0,1).substr($borrower{surname},0,1)." "; # MANDATORY FIELD $borrower{streetaddress} = $memberhash{postalAddress}." "; # MANDATORY FIELD $borrower{city} = $memberhash{l}." "; # MANDATORY FIELD $borrower{phone} = $memberhash{telephoneNumber}." "; # MANDATORY FIELD $borrower{branchcode} = "PINE"; # MANDATORY FIELD #$borrower{emailaddress} = $memberhash{mail}; #$borrower{categorycode} = $memberhash{employeeType}; on the left of the = is the Koha specific database field, on the right, your LDAP attribute. These mappings can also be hard coded (as I did on the branchcode line). To add attributes to NDS accounts (homeroom, class1, class2, teacher, etc....) and map those attributes to LDAP requires a fair amount of knowledge regarding NDS/LDAP and could require some time on the Novell developer web site....with that said.......... in a nutshell: 1. Create NDS Attributes, assign them to the correct classes. 2. Create LDAP Attributes. 3. Map those two attributes together. 4. Add data. 5. Bulk modify the attributes for your users (from your SIS?) 6. Add the appropriate lines to the auth.pm (as shown above) to pull the data into the correct Koha fields. Steps 1 and 2 are the hard part......if someone knows of an easy way to do those....I'd love to hear it.... Because of my relatively small size (2,500 student) I should be able to get away with entering the homeroom, teacher, etc.. data into existing unused NDS and LDAP attributes...ie: "Fax Number" (not to many of my students have fax numbers....) and then just rename the output fields for reporting and such. Good luck. -S David Schuster wrote:
With 3.0 we are able to add attributes as needed. So we are actually loading the entire student schedule into the borrower record so the librarians at Secondary can choose what class they want to send overdues to or period etc...
I'm still fuzzy on how LDAP is going to control borrower records. When you type in the student ID at CKO wouldn't it have to pull data in order to track it? LDAP doesn't have any homeroom/class information or even Grade in our district so it is pretty much just an authentication piece.
Let me know how your edirectory goes as we also use Novell and I'm not ready to go down that path right now. So we are loading ll 54,000 students. I hope to setup an automated process of loading borrowers say weekly.
Scott Owen wrote:
My .02 (using Koha 2.2.9 on Win32...)
-- I agree with the shared catalog....that way students can borrow books from any school in the district.
--if they are a school of any size....they probably already have a directory (LDAP/Active Directory/eDirectory)....might be easier to connect to their existing student directory rather that deal with the bother of importing/updating etc etc ect.... I made an initial mistake and imported students in to the Koha database...shouldn't have done that.....over this next summer, I will be removing them and setting up Koha to authenticate users via Novell's eDirectory (LDAP).
--We add the home room teacher, and grade level to the student data (we are a small district so it's all we really need) using the sort1 and sort2 entries.
-- For custom reports (overdue report that shows home room teacher and grade ) , I added PHP to the server, and use a PHP class to query the MySQL database and present XML formated output, I then use stylesheets to output the XML in browser readable PHP. This pretty much allows me to generate any report imaginable.
David Schuster wrote:
From a school perspective our whole purpose in a shared catalog was to borrow and see each others materials. So we turned independant branches OFF. I'm looking forward to the granularity of security options to lock users out of the MARC record!
You may need to add some attributes for schools - homerooms, grade etc. to run overdues. If they use student ID's you can probably load them right into the cardnumber field or create another attribute for barcode.
We're going through the migration process with 67 schools to go live in January! Should be interesting!
David Schuster
Tim McMahon - West Liberty Public Library wrote:
I was thinking about that. I had to turn that off a while back to get returns to work, but returns seem to be working with IndependantBranches=ON now. Thanks
Paul POULAIN wrote:
Tim McMahon a écrit :
We're checking into the idea of adding the school district to a Koha 3 install. We were thinking of adding each school as a branch. We let Koha assign our patron barcodes and use our own item barcodes. The schools buy their item barcodes and use student numbers. There shouldn't be any overlap in our numbering systems. I'm looking for any tips on settings, importing items and patrons, things to look out for or anything else that would be helpful in a situation like this.
you already have IndependantBranches=ON, haven't you ? Otherwise, you should investigate this option ;-)
-- Tim McMahon Technical Services West Liberty Public Library _______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha
_______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha
On Fri, Nov 14, 2008 at 1:00 PM, Scott Owen <sowen@edzone.net> wrote:
After getting Koha to use LDAP as an authentication mechanism, (this requires some editing of the Auth.pm in 2.2.9...I am unsure about 3.0),
No editing of C4 modules should be required in 3.x. Instead edit the <ldapserver> section of your KOHA_CONF file. --Joe
Our installation is set to OFF because we share materials (interlibrary loan) though everything else does apply. We have not "gone live" yet. When 'IndependentBranches' is ON, Koha... -prohibits staff users from logging into another location from within the staff client, unless they have superlibrarian privileges. -filters out patrons from patron searches that do not belong at the login location. (If a patron is registered at 'C' Branch, a search at 'A' Branch won't bring up that patron.) -limits the location and sublocation choices to the login location, when adding or modifying an item record. -prevents users from other library locations from checking out or placing holds on material held at a different library location. -prevents staff from editing item records that do not belong to the login location. Rachel Hollis, librarian Stevens-Henager College, Boise Idaho Campus This message is for the designated recipient only and may contain privileged, proprietary, or otherwise private information. If you have received it in error, please notify the sender immediately and delete the original. Any other use of the email by you is prohibited.
Hi Tim, Rachel There are two new options for you, one of which is largely available now, and the other not yet, but will be available in bleeding-edge Koha shortly: (1) System groups: this is a new functionality that allows inheritance of system preferences and other system settings between Koha branches. Through this functionality, a school system can be entered into Koha with child branches, inheriting the properties of the parent organization. This is an extension of the Independent Branches functionality. See the RFC: http://wiki.koha.org/doku.php?id=en:development:rfcs3.2:rfc32_system_groups The core functionality of the System Groups development is available in the latest git snapshots, and is in use in production systems today. (2) The other recent development of interest is detailed in this RFC: http://wiki.koha.org/doku.php?id=en:development:rfcs3.2:rfc32_barcode_prefix... This may be of interest if there is a chance of overlap of patron and/or item barcodes. This patch set allows you to specify a barcode prefix for a given location. It is system-wide, so adopting its use would require modifying all your existing barcodes to use a location-specific prefix. If there is a possibility of overlap, that may force your hand to alter your existing data to include a location prefix. Using this functionality would allow new libraries using your system to buy barcodes within a specific range, and would alter the auto-generation capacity to obey those ranges. Lastly, I'll mention one other recent development available in Koha 3 that may be relevant. That is Patron Attributes. This is especially useful for schools and other organizations that may assign their own unique identifiers to borrowers. This functionality will help with importing new borrowers and also with updating their records each year, allowing you to use the school-supplied unique identifier rather than Koha's barcode or borrowernumber. Hope that helps, Ryan On Mon, Nov 10, 2008 at 2:02 PM, Rachel Hollis < Rachel.Hollis@stevenshenager.edu> wrote:
Our installation is set to OFF because we share materials (interlibrary loan) though everything else does apply. We have not "gone live" yet.
When 'IndependentBranches' is ON, Koha... -prohibits staff users from logging into another location from within the staff client, unless they have superlibrarian privileges. -filters out patrons from patron searches that do not belong at the login location. (If a patron is registered at 'C' Branch, a search at 'A' Branch won't bring up that patron.) -limits the location and sublocation choices to the login location, when adding or modifying an item record. -prevents users from other library locations from checking out or placing holds on material held at a different library location. -prevents staff from editing item records that do not belong to the login location.
Rachel Hollis, librarian Stevens-Henager College, Boise Idaho Campus
This message is for the designated recipient only and may contain privileged, proprietary, or otherwise private information. If you have received it in error, please notify the sender immediately and delete the original. Any other use of the email by you is prohibited. _______________________________________________ Koha mailing list Koha@lists.katipo.co.nz http://lists.katipo.co.nz/mailman/listinfo/koha
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participants (7)
-
David Schuster -
Joe Atzberger -
Paul POULAIN -
Rachel Hollis -
Ryan Higgins -
Scott Owen -
Tim McMahon