Making the Most of Your ILS by Lynn E. Gates

Author:Lynn E. Gates
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: ABC-CLIO

Functional and Operational Field Values

Acquisitions and Cataloging

Before a library can circulate library materials, it needs to buy them and catalog them. The whole process generally starts with loading a bibliographic record. Libraries using their ILSs acquisitions modules create and attach order records to the bibliographic record. The order record also has field values that connect order record to vendor and fund records. Depending on your ILS, they may also have fields that allow it to connect to purchase orders (POs) and invoices. When an order arrives in the library, items are received and the order record is updated to show the date received. Many of the modern ILSs now make it possible to send POs to and receive invoices from vendors electronically. Throughout the ordering process, fund records will keep track of how much money is encumbered (money set aside for an item that has been ordered but not received), how much has been paid out (the item has been received and the vendor paid), and how much is left to spend. Some ILSs will show you both the free balance and the cash balance. The free balance is the starting amount of money assigned to the fund minus any money paid out and encumbered, whereas the cash balance is just the starting money minus any that has been paid out.

Once the item has been through the ordering process and has been received, an item record is added to the bibliographic record. The fields in the item record are assigned various values that will be used by circulation and other ILS functions to correctly manage how the item is used. During cataloging, libraries that use authority control will also load any new authority records that may be needed by a bibliographic record—the authority records will also attach themselves to any fields in a bibliographic record that fall under authority control. Here you can see that field values can be both descriptive and functional.

Some serials and most periodicals often go through an alternative purchasing process, where an order record may be for a year or another subscription period. In this case, one order may have many issues arriving throughout the year. Instead of creating an order record for each individual issue, there is generally one for the entire order, and then check-in or holdings records are attached to the bibliographic record to track the individual issues. The exact method used by different ILSs may vary, but generally a library is able to set up a pattern of when to expect issues and how many issues to expect. As issues arrive, they are received on the check-in or holdings record. Then because the pattern has been set, if an issue that is expected doesn’t arrive, the ILS marks this and the library can send a claim to the vendor.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.