[Koha] Koha 3.0 : item types or CCodes (again - sorry ..)

[Adrea Lund]

Our library would also really like icons to show up on the search results page in the OPAC - 1 icon for each bib record - it would drastically improve searchability of the catalog for our patrons.  Right now we have the XSLT stylesheet turned off on the OPAC results page and unless you read the "fine print" it is difficult to tell if you are looking at a book or a dvd or a book on cd.

We are not satisfied with the icons that the XSLT stylesheet currently pulls from the MARC record - it does not distinguish btw a juvenile book and an adult book, a dvd and a video, a book on cassette or a book on cd.   Regarding Joshua's comments about displaying icons based on MARC records (bib level icons) - we can not figure out a way to achieve the icons we want based on our MARC records (an icon pulled from the bib record would have to be based on format, audience and language - and I'm not even sure this would be enough to get the level of specificity that some libraries may want).  Our bib records currently have incomplete info for audience so these types of icons would not work for us without major work on our MARC records.

An added problem to assigning icons based on the format info in the 007 field from the MARC record, is that currently we are unable to edit this field in our KOHA installation (bug 3013).

It is also important to note that it would take quite a few other changes to get our library to want to use the current default stylesheet - the availability info is too brief and the other data displaying from the MARC record leader is unwanted.

 

So. given that assigning icons to bib records based on the MARC record seems very difficult for our library - we still want icons on our search results page.  We already have icons assigned to both item types and collection codes.

We would like to suggest a system preference that allows libraries to opt in or opt out of item type icons or cccode icons on the search results page. You could then choose icons based on ccodes, item types, or no icons at all.  I think flexibility is the key, since there seem to be many different types of ccode and item type setups in the KOHA community.



so with a new system preference....

Libraries migrating from version 2 who have icons set up for their ccodes would be happy.

Libraries using icons for item types would be happy - my library J

And libraries with multiple item types and collection codes for one bib record can turn off this feature

hmmm... maybe there could be a fourth option - if you want to base your icons on bib level data from your MARC records

 

Our other option would be to rework the XSLT stylesheet for our library, but that doesn't help any other libraries in the same situation and more importantly we don't have anyone at our library who can do this kind of work.

 

We are working with Liblime and getting ready to go live, and we really want to introduce this to our patrons with the icons on the search results page working, so any advice on how to proceed would be greatly appreciated.



Thank you,  (We really appreciate all the folks contributing to this discussion)

Adrea

 
Adrea Lund
Head of Adult Services
Grand County Public Library
257 E. Center St.
Moab, UT 84532
435-259-1111 ext11
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