Sixteen ByWater Partner Libraries Bring Features to Koha 3.14

by Press Releases on Jun 16, 2014

6/16/2014
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Sixteen ByWater Partner Libraries Bring Features to Koha 3.14

ByWater Solutions, an open source community contributor and America’s forefront provider of Koha support, has upgraded their partner library systems to Koha 3.14. Koha 3.14 introduced 13 completely new features, 161 enhancements to existing features and 471 fixes. Sixteen of ByWater’s Koha partner libraries sponsored developments in this release.

ByWater and the Koha community thank the following libraries for their contributions to Koha 3.14:

• A new course reserves module sponsored by Brooklyn Law School Library
• The ability to create lists of patrons sponsored by MassCat
• The ability to choose if the system forgives fines on returned lost items sponsored by Corpus Christi Public Libraries
• The ability to overlay item records during batch imports for preprocessed item records sponsored by Los Gatos Public Library
• The ability to automatically remove a patron restriction that resulted from an overdue item sponsored by NEKLS, Los Gatos Public Library, VOKAL, Athens County Libraries, North Central Regional Library System, and Arcadia Public Library
• The ability to sort lists and carts sponsored by Marlboro College Library
• A new tool to allow for batch renewals by barcode sponsored by the Northeast Kansas Library System
• Direct integration with OverDrive to show search results and real time availability in the public catalog sponsored by Roseville Public Library, Wiggin Memorial Library, Lopez Island Library, Los Gatos Public Library, Arcadia Public Library, Chinook Library Network, Texas Library Consortium and Waterford Township Public Library

In addition to the partner sponsored developments, Koha 3.14 includes:

• A new default theme, “Bootstrap‚Äù, for the public catalog interface. The Bootstrap theme provides a responsive design that works well both for desktop web browsers and mobile devices.
• A new offline circulation module that is entirely browser-based.
• A revamp of the serials predication system which allows for significantly more flexibility in managing patterns.
• The ability to search for items to check out by keyword rather than barcode.
• The ability to define rules (called MARC modification templates) for batch-modifying MARC records during import.
• Numerous acquisitions workflow improvements, including the ability to move orders from one vendor to another, search acquisitions history, merge duplicate invoices, and get warnings if a new order would over-commit a fund.
• Cataloging improvements including the ability to import authority record via Z39.50, the ability to merge authority records, and the ability to save and continue editing bib records.
• Support for schema.org microdata in the OPAC to increase the visibility of your catalog to search engines.

About Koha:

Koha is the first open-source Integrated Library System (ILS). In use worldwide, its development is steered by a growing community of libraries collaborating to achieve their technology goals. Koha’s impressive feature set continues to evolve and expand to meet the needs of its user base. It includes modules for circulation, cataloging, acquisitions, serials, reserves, patron management, branch relationships, and more.

Koha’s OPAC, circulation, management and self-checkout interfaces are all based on standards-compliant World Wide Web technologies,XHTML, CSS and Javascript,making Koha a truly platform-independent solution. Koha is distributed under the open-source General Public License (GPL). For more information about Koha, please visit: http://koha-community.org

About ByWater Solutions:

With over 10 years of experience, ByWater Solutions offers customized hosting, data migration, configuration, installation, training, support options and development of the enterprise class open source library system, Koha. Offering a 24/7 technical helpline, ByWater Solutions’ clients have the support system they need to make their software work for them. ByWater Solutions pledges to share 100% of all developed code to the Koha community for the strengthening and advancement of the Koha ILS. For more information about ByWater Solutions, please visit: http://bywatersolutions.com