Aspen Discovery Announces 20.13.00 Release and Notes

by Jessie Zairo on Sep 29, 2020

Aspen Discovery announced this week that the 20.13 release is available. This major release includes 1 new feature, 31 improvements, and 4 minor changes.

Mark Noble, Aspen Discovery Developer, recently commented on the release:

We are thrilled to continue our partnership with Baker and Taylor to include support for Axis 360 titles within Aspen Discovery. These new changes will help provide libraries with additional options for including eContent within their catalog and will make it easier for patrons to discover the wealth of content their library owns.

Axis 360 integration updates

• Uses new API calls for loading titles and availability while indexing content and handles additional fields provided by the new methods for enhanced content.
• Added the ability for patrons to place holds, view existing holds, freeze and thaw holds, and cancel holds for Axis 360 titles within Aspen Discovery.
• Added the ability for patrons to checkout available titles, view titles that have been checked out, and return checked out titles for Axis 360 titles within Aspen Discovery.
• Added the ability to show the account summary for Axis360.
• Add logging of statistics for Axis 360 usage and add a dashboard to show the statistics.

Cataloging updates

• Provide a list of all alternate titles that have been provided within Aspen Discovery.

Documentation updates

• Allow anyone to view release notes and help manual.

EBSCO EDS integration updates

• Automatically default to Full Text in Limit Your Results.
• Automatically expand source type facet within results if applicable.
• Do not look for research starters if a search term has not been provided.

Indexing Updates

• Add a new option to the Indexing Profile to control how Aspen builds the detailed location. If turned off, Aspen will not include the location in the detailed location. This is only recommended for libraries that have a single branch and are not part of a consortium.
  
• Improve memory cleanup in indexers.

Koha integration updates

• Automatically detect if a user has opted into reading history within Koha the first time Aspen loads them from the database.
• Properly load default checkout date, default author, and format for reading history from Koha.
• Respect the AllowPurchaseSuggestionBranchChoice system setting when using the Koha purchase suggestion system to prevent users from selecting a branch when submitting a new suggestion.
• Provide a blank automaticCancellation field in the UserAPI when retrieving holds from Koha.

Menu improvements

• Add new options to control if menus options show in the horizontal menu when viewing Aspen Discovery on large screens.
  
• Menu items can now have a Font Awesome Icon defined for them. Menu items with icons can be always shown in the horizontal menu.
• Menus within the horizontal menu can include dropdown menus.
• Menu items can optionally be marked as unpublished and there is a new permission to allow specific people to view unpublished content.

OverDrive integration updates

• Update extraction of OverDrive availability to test each collection independently to better handle sharing between advantage collections.

Patron Account updates

• Add a new administration option within library settings to allow control over whether or not patrons can update their phone number (not used for Koha).

Report updates

• Add holds report to display a list of holds for a given location with the ability to print hold slips. (CARL.X only)
• Add overdue/checked out report to display a list of all books that are checked out materials for students based on their homeroom. (CARL.X only)
• Coding for these reports done by James Staub, Nashville Public Library.

Search updates

• Update the searchbox to only show the advanced search button for searches that include an advanced search option (currently catalog only).

Sideloading updates

• Process sideload files in the order they were last updated.
• Track which files have been indexed previously so Aspen can more accurately determine which files have been deleted.
• Allow individual sideloads to be processed from the command line by running the sideload processing jar with no parameters specified.
• Show last index time for changed records and all records as timestamps.

Symphony integration updates

• Updates and code cleanup for updating and resetting PINs.
• Updates and code cleanup for updating patron contact information.
• Do not force an item level hold if call numbers vary.
• Correct placing holds when the patron has selected the "remember pickup location" option.

System reporting updates

• Add a new report to track usage of Aspen by IP Address. The report will show total number of requests, blocked requests, blocked API requests, and the date of the last request.

Reading History updates

• Improve the performance of loading reading history

Other fixes

• Correct display of pagination links on the Reading History page.
• When a record does not exist in Aspen, differentiate if there is not a grouped work or if the record does not exist in the eContent collection or ILS.
• Don't show the sidebar menu when viewing the events calendar.
• Update Usage By IP report to sort by last request time with the latest request first.