Monday Minutes: Marc Modification Templates for Items

by Kelly McElligott on Jan 31, 2022

In this week's Monday Minutes, Kelly and Jessie demonstrate how to add items to a file of marc records upon import.

Marc Modification Templates

The first thing a library would need to do is to create the Template that will in essence create the items when we import the file into Koha.

As we discussed during the video, there are three required fields for Koha to create an item, a library would need to create a 952$a, 952$b, and a 952$y. We should also create the bib level item type, which is stored in the 942$y.

A good reference for all the item-level fields can be found in the Koha Wiki.

Here is a sample of the template we created during the tutorial video that shows the Adding of the Koha required fields.

More Resources on Marc Modification Templates can be found here:

Monday Minutes: Marc Modification Templates

Uploading the File

Once the template is created, now the library can import a file of MARC records into Koha and at the same time apply the template which will make the items. We mentioned the Matching Profile feature which is relatively new to Koha, if you need more information about how this works, please see this tutorial blog post:

Create Matching Profiles When Importing Records

Under the Tools Module, Stage Marc Records for Import is the option we want to choose. During this, we will make sure the import tool has the appropriate settings such as Record Type, Character Encoding and Format.

Next, we will want to apply the Marc Modification Template we created to this import.

Looking for Matching Records - is the next section that will let Koha know if you would like it to search for duplicates, and base these duplicates on what criteria. Then, if Koha finds duplicates, what should it do.

Finally, Looking for Embedded Item Data is the last option. This does default to YES, so you should be good here, but always best to check to make sure Koha is set to look for the item data at this import process. We are creating items through the template, so we want Koha to recognize that is what it is seeing in the file.

For more information about this process, see this section in the Koha Manual.

Staged Marc Management

Finally, we will import these records into Koha and see the items have been created. When working with the Staged Marc Records, Koha will tell you how many records and items it found and give a list of the marc records. Once the library chooses to import these records, Koha will assign a bibliographic number and the magic has happened. Your library now has successfully imported a file of records and created items at the same time!