The Koha Community and ByWater Add Tools to Help with COVID 19 Disruptions

by Nathan Curulla on Mar 31, 2020

The Koha Community, one of the world's largest and most active Open Source communities, has come together to fast track a feature to allow libraries to bulk update due dates within the system. Previous to this, libraries and vendors would need to complete this action within the database which was more difficult and required vendor intervention if not self-hosted/supported.

The speed at which this feature was written, quality assurance tested, and rolled out was much faster than a typical timeline and illustrates how quickly an Open Source community can react to the needs of their libraries, especially during times of crisis.

Some of the immediate feedback we received from our libraries included

Wow! You guys are amazing. Thanks for all you do to keep our libraries going.

This is absolutely awesome!

Brilliant! Thank you!

Additionally, ByWater Solutions has green lit and is in the process of fast tracking further API integrations for Koha with e-content providers such as Hoopla so as to make it even easier for patrons to find all of the resources libraries provide within one interface. This in addition to Koha's already existing APIs for Overdrive, Recorded Books, and Cloud Library makes for a full featured multi-format interface which is perfect for the social distancing required during this time.

Using the Tool

This tutorial will show you how to use the tool within Koha. Monday Minutes: Bulk edit due dates.

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, HTML5, 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

ByWater Solutions is a full service, high quality Open Source support and implementation company dedicated to providing libraries with a lower cost, more advanced level of support for their systems than a traditional proprietary solution can offer. ByWater Solutions has a proven track record in first rate implementation and support services with library systems of all sizes for the Koha ILS, Aspen Discovery, Folio LSP, Coral ERM, and Libki PC Management.

Our highly ranked, comprehensive support is what sets our company apart from any other vendor in the industry. Partnering with ByWater Solutions not only lowers the cost of implementation and maintenance of OSS, but more importantly empowers libraries by giving them the flexibility and freedom they deserve. For more information please visit: https://bywatersolutions.com.