[Evergreen-catalogers] Angular catalog

Jennifer Pringle jennifer.pringle at bc.libraries.coop
Thu Jan 27 17:17:39 EST 2022 

We moved to the angular catalogue in 3.7.0 last May after giving  
libraries the option of trying out the experimental version in 3.5 the  
year before.

(We ran into a bug in 3.7.0 where placing holds in the traditional  
catalogue always used the staff member's contact details instead of  
the patron's so we haven't supported use of the traditional catalogue  
in our consortium since May 2021.)

The big issues our libraries reported after we moved to 3.7.0 were  
about the Search Results page, the Patron View, and the shortcodes  
being used in the search library selector.

When we upgrade this year we'll get the fixes for search results (more  
details button, URI displaying, etc.) which should resolve most of the  
issues we've had reported around search results.  There's still an  
issue with how information for preferred library displays in the  
search results in 3.8 -  
https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/1959052

I also really like John Amundsen's Summary tab suggestion. We've  
started looking at the Patron View button in 3.8 and it doesn't  
currently scope which will be an issue in our consortium (bug report  
to come).

The org unit selector using the shortcode instead of the library's  
full name is an issue for us in more places than just the staff  
catalogue - https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/1771636   
Relatedly, if you just type the shortcode into the angular catalogue  
and don't select it from the drop down your search scope won't change  
(though it will look like it did) -  
https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/1930483

We solved the issue of the formats list including the hidden formats  
by deleting the hidden formats from Evergreen (they weren't being used  
by anyone in our consortium which is why we'd hidden them).  The fact  
that the list is alphabetized based on the value instead of the search  
label is still an issue for us though -  
https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/1912559

Anecdotally we've heard from libraries that they find the angular  
catalogue to be faster than the old catalogue which is positive.

My personal favourite feature of the angular catalogue is that you can  
right click on a title in the search results and open it in a new tab.  
  I don't miss having to do the same search in multiple tabs anytime I  
needed to compare records.

Jennifer








Quoting "Thomsen, Elizabeth via Evergreen-catalogers"  
<evergreen-catalogers at list.evergreen-ils.org>:

> We introduced the Angular staff catalog in Release 3.6, and staff have
> really had a lot of issues with it.  One was having quite different
> interfaces for the public and staff catalogs -- staff liked having catalogs
> that were nearly identical.  This was especially true of public service
> staff, who have to be comfortable in both as they use the staff catalog all
> day and also assist patrons using the public catalog.   Our biggest issue
> is the loss of the OPAC View tab as default tab, like it was in the
> traditional staff catalog.  Whether you're a cataloger trying to identify
> whether or not to attach an item to a bibliographic record, or a public
> service person finding a book for a patron, placing holds, finding titles
> to add to a bucket, carousel or booklist, etc., you need more information
> than appears at the top of the screen, and you need to be able to move
> around from record to record -- what are this author's other books?  What
> are other books on this subject? etc.  There's a button to the Patron View,
> which provides the kind of useful, linky information we need, but we want
> that view (or something like it) to be a default tab, not a button to click
> every time, and following links in the that view take you out of the
> Angular catalog.
>
> Here's a Launchpad bug from John Amundsen of CW MARS on this issue that
> could use some heat: Angular Catalog should include "Summary" Tab
> <https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/1959010>
>
> We recently upgraded to Release 3.7.2, which improved some other Angular
> staff catalog issues --it added the More Details button, improved the
> open/closed state of the search box at the top of search results and record
> pages, and restored the option to jump directly to the record if a search
> had only one hit.  A big one for catalogers was restoring the counts for
> both the consortium and the preferred library for searches scoped to the
> consortium level.
>
> We still have some issues with the Angular catalog search form:
>
>    - Formats List includes all formats, including hidden ones
>    - Sort List doesn't default to our standard sort (Popularity Adjusted
>    Relevance)
>    - List of scopes includes codes not names, and useless choices for
>    single-site libraries WAKEFIELD and WAK) and includes libraries  
> who are not
>    currently members of NOBLE.  This is more of a problem now than it might
>    have been in more stable times -- we have so many new staff at all levels
>    that are still learning which libraries are in NOBLE, which have branches,
>    etc.)
>    - Search doesn't automatically re-execute when you add limiters, you
>    have to click on Search -- this may just a matter of getting used to the
>    change
>
> There are nice features that are only found in the Angular catalog,
> including search templates, and two features that are great for working
> with buckets: the ability to save items to a shared bucket, and the option
> to save all search results (up to 1000) to a basket with one click (see
> screenshots) and we really want staff to make the move, but we're not quite
> there yet.
>
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 18, 2022 at 12:28 PM Kate Coleman via Evergreen-catalogers <
> evergreen-catalogers at list.evergreen-ils.org> wrote:
>
>> Our switch was long ago, but I remember it being a relatively small
>> adjustment period. Things work a little differently, but most anything that
>> we could do before we could still do, just a little differently. All this
>> time later, there's nothing that comes to mind that I think all the time,
>> "Man this was better in the old interface." I really do think it's nicer to
>> look at and flows pretty well. Favorite things for me are the tabbed search
>> box (keyword, numeric, etc.), and 100 results per page. YES!
>>
>>
>> Kate Coleman, MLIS
>> Technical Services Manager, Jefferson County Library
>> Missouri Evergreen Consortium
>> 5678 State Rd. PP
>> High Ridge, MO 63049
>> 636-677-8689
>> Fax: 636--677-1769
>> kcoleman at jeffcolib.org
>>
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>>
>> On Fri, Jan 14, 2022 at 8:30 AM Mary Llewellyn via Evergreen-catalogers <
>> evergreen-catalogers at list.evergreen-ils.org> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi all,
>>>
>>> We upgraded to 3.6 last weekend, and our librarians are finally using the
>>> angular catalog interface.
>>>
>>> For those of you who have gotten there before us, would you mind sharing
>>> what the reaction was from your librarians? Was there a difference in the
>>> reaction of the catalogers vs public service staff?
>>>
>>> Thank you,
>>>
>>> Mary
>>>
>>> --
>>> Mary Llewellyn
>>> Database Manager
>>> Bibliomation, Inc.
>>> 24 Wooster Ave.
>>> Waterbury, CT 06708
>>> mllewell at biblio.org
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Evergreen-catalogers mailing list
>>> Evergreen-catalogers at list.evergreen-ils.org
>>>
>>> http://list.evergreen-ils.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/evergreen-catalogers
>>>
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>>
>
>
> --
> Elizabeth B. Thomsen
> Member Services Manager
> NOBLE: North of Boston Library Exchange
> Danvers, Mass.
> www.noblenet.org


-- 
Jennifer Pringle (she/her)
Co-op Support - Training Lead
BC Libraries Cooperative
Toll-free: 1-888-848-9250
Email:jennifer.pringle at bc.libraries.coop
Website: http://bc.libraries.coop

Gratefully acknowledging that I live and work in the unceded  
Traditional Territory of the St'at'yemc Nations.

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