Aspen Discovery 23.04.00 Release Notes

by Mark Noble on Apr 19, 2023

Aspen Discovery announced this week that the 23.04.00 release is now available.

See Release Summary Here

This release includes code contributions from:

• ByWater Solutions
• Equinox Open Library Initiative
• PTFS Europe
• Nashville Public Library

Thanks to all of our contributors!!

23.04.00 Release Notes

Administration Updates

Documentation

• Allow searching within administration/settings forms.
• Added searching option to admin side menu
• Added searching option to permissions admin page
• When viewing links between settings (i.e. libraries to themes), display links that the active user does not have access to edit in plain text rather than a dropdown.

Comprise Integration

• When sending Location ID to Comprise, use the Customer Name rather than the Username.

Content Sharing

Documentation (New Sharing page in the Help Center)

• Allow themes to be shared within the community

Cover Updates

• When loading covers that were uploaded within Koha, save them to the Aspen server based on the biblionumber rather than saving them to the grouped work.
• When loading grouped work covers, check related records for uploaded covers.

eCommerce Updates

Documentation

• Certified Payments By Deluxe is now a supported vendor.

Event Updates

Documentation (New Your Events page in the Help Center)
Documentation

• Added event integration with Communico
• Added event pages within aspen for all event integrations
• Added ability to save events to lists for all event integrations
• Added ability to save events to a "My Events" page where patrons can view upcoming and past events they have saved
• Link to Aspen event pages when viewing events in calendar view
• Fix an issue where event location was not displaying in search results

Evergreen Updates

• Add the ability email link to recover PIN/Password if the patron forgets their PIN.
  • Your administrator will need to edit the appropriate Evergreen email template so the password reset link goes to: https://*yourAspenSiteUrl*/MyAccount/PasswordRecovery/?uniqueKey=[% target.uuid %]. See https://docs.evergreen-ils.org/eg/docs/latest/admin/actiontriggers.html.
• Allow patrons to set a new PIN/Password.
• Suppress items and volumes that are not opac visible when updating bibs using the Evergreen APIs.
• Allow on shelf holds to be cancelled.

Evolve Updates

• Allow extracting more than 90 days of changes.

Hold Updates

• After successfully placing a hold make sure the On Hold For You button shows correctly and directs the patron to their holds shelf. Also make sure the functionality works within the list of editions.
• When a bib record has more than one format on it, use the selected format to determine the type of hold to be done. Rather than looking at all formats.
• When a bib record has more than one format on it, correctly limit items when a format allows Bib & Item holds or Item only holds.

Indexing Updates

Documentation

• Do not index 856 links where subfield 6 is set since those are part of Library Holdings.
• If an 856 field does not have a subfield z, use subfield y for the link text.
• Update loading indexing profiles and sideloads based on what is defined rather than what was previously indexed
• When determining format, if a title is both Journal and Book, make it Journal
• When determining format, if a title is both Serial and Book, make it Serial
• When checking the 300a field to determine if a title is paged, look for a word break after the page, p., volume, v. rather than looking for non-word characters.
• Check all 250 fields rather than just the first 250 field when determining format.
• When checking for bly-ray dvd combo allow separator between the blu-ray and dvd to be / \ or +
• If a title is determined to be Book+DVD make sure it is not identified as just Book or DVD
• If a title is determined to be Book+CD make sure it is not identified as just Book or CD
• If a title is determined to be Book+CD-ROM make sure it is not identified as just Book or CD-ROM

Koha Updates

• Allow renewal error message from Koha API to be translated
• Update volume functionality for Koha to use new item_group tables and APIs.

Materials Request Updates

• When sending the email when a new materials request has been created, send to the email for the patron's home library rather than the active library.

Record Display

• When showing Continues and Continued by links, just show the title (from subfield a and t) if subfield w does not link to another bib record or if it does not exist.
• When a variation has no related records, make sure to remove it when there is only one manifestation in a work.

Search Updates

• Correct sorting facet values to show owning library/location first for Owning Library, Owning Branch, and Available At Facets.
• Show the main branch of a library first in Owning Branch and Available At Facets unless the patron is at a specific library.
• When searching combined results, make sure to escape search terms for javascript so searches containing an apostrophe work properly.

Sierra Updates

• Add configuration of which order records to load from the database to Indexing Profiles rather than loading them from the config file.
• Add a new option to suppress order records if a bib has any physical items on it.
• Correct loading first name and last name from Sierra APIs.
• Allow linking to records if checkdigit and leading . is not included in the record id.
• Check for errors loading items from the API which happen when the bib itself has been deleted.

SSO Updates

• Updates when self registering with the ILS after successful SAML authentication to ensure Aspen/ILS fields are passed.
• Update self registering in Koha to ensure mapped fields are used during the self registration process.

Theme Updates

Documentation

• Allow multiple themes to be assigned to a library or location, a location can also use the themes defined for the library.
• Allow patrons to change their preferred theme both when logged in and logged out.
• Allow themes to be copied within the admin interface
• When inheriting themes, make sure logo, favicon, background image, footer image, and footer text are inherited if not supplied in the child theme.
• Added a new checkbox to indicate that a theme is intended for higher contrast which enables base CSS enhancements for increased contrast on images, larger font size, inverts modal colors, and always underline links.
• To simplify and enforce contrast ratios, modals will now use the theme's Body Background and Body Text Color.
• Add edit links between themes and libraries to quickly go between the two.

Translation Updates

Documentation

• Update translations so they are shared with the community and enable loading translated terms from the community.
• Move endpoints for translations from Greenhouse API to Community API.
• Add additional options for filtering the list of translation terms.
• Respect new filters when exporting terms for translation

User List Updates

• When saving lists mark them non-searchable if they are private.

VDX Updates

• When submitting ControlNumbers.icncontrolnumber, validate that the OCLC number starts with ocn, ocm, or on before submitting. Only the numeric portion is submitted.

Other Updates

• Fix pagination within the list of available Lists within MyAccount.
• If a record has more than one format, display the format for each item within the copies table for the record.
• Fix the My Preferences page layout to match other pages with the label above the input field.
• Create a new method of creating blank database.
• Fix Web Resources that require login to open properly.
• Make all tables lower case for improved cross-platform compatibility when installing clean via docker.
• Disable IP Address tracking by default for GDPR compliance. Can be enabled for diagnosing problematic traffic.
• Fix clearing the previously set default library when setting a library as default.
• Correct submitting the two-factor authentication form while logging in if the user presses enter rather than the verify button.
• Read only text areas no longer have editors displayed for them.
• Added getCopies to Item API which returns copy data from a given record id.
• For web builder custom forms the label field will now accept up to 255 characters.
• In the "Where Is It?" modal, items will no longer have a green text color and will instead have a checkmark to indicate if it's available.
• Hide the search bar and menu when printing Aspen pages.
• Automatically strip off -test from subdomains when checking for the active library.
• When importing backups, do not import mysql.* backup files

Aspen LiDA Updates

• Geolocation for Android users has returned for finding nearby libraries at login.
• Users will be prompted for a hold confirmation when placing a hold on an item that has a queue. Polaris only.
• Available volumes when placing a hold will display in the same order as Discovery.
• Gave context to users being prompted for Screen Brightness permissions on the Library Card screen.
• Fines on a user's account will display in the Account Drawer again.
• Searches without any results will again display something more useful and give the option to try a new search.
• Translations from Discovery are now supported in Aspen LiDA.
• Added support for placing holds with multiple item types.
• Users can now search through available facets when filtering search results.

Watch the 23.04.00 Aspen Updates in an Instant Recording

Watch a short highlight video of the some of the new features available in 23.04.00