[Evergreen-circ] Angular Circulation Testing during Feedback Fest

Mon Oct 7 17:11:27 EDT 2024

Hi Terran,

Thank you for sharing this info, Terran, and for sending the link to the
test server running this code!

What a big change to the circulation interfaces! Modernizing the
circulation interfaces is probably a project that is long overdue, and I'm
sure there are a lot of good UI improvements on top of the accessibility
improvements. I don't have specific feedback on the interface, but I have a
question and also a concern related to the process for introducing a major
UI change to Evergreen.

My question is whether this code is being considered for 3.14. From my
review, it clearly falls in the camp of new feature, and, with the beta
release already available, my understanding is that we should  no longer be
introducing new features into the release. Am I misunderstanding our
release policy?

Here is my concern. As a community, I think we need to do a better job of
communicating potential major changes to the software before coding
starts.. By giving the community the opportunity to provide feedback at an
early stage, we can better ensure that these changes are going to meet the
needs of the majority of libraries using our community software. I have
this expectation of my community partners primarily because, when I first
arrived in the Evergreen community and started asking questions about
development, other community members emphatically told me that I needed to
share my plans early on. I listened. When I share NOBLE's plans for a
development project via the general list, I do so precisely because I want
to find out if the development is likely to cause problems for others using
the software. This worked well for the last project NOBLE funded. We
thought the OPAC visible flag should also determine visibility in the staff
catalog. We asked the question. Other Evergreen libraries told us they have
use cases for seeing in the staff catalog an org unit that is not visible
in the public catalog. We updated our requirements to incorporate this
feedback. My hope is that everyone gets what they want when that code is
eventually merged into the software.

This update to circulation is a significant change to a place in the
software that is often used by part-time staff. Because they are part time,
training can be a challenge because there are specific issues they may only
encounter occasionally, and they need an intuitive way to help them address
it. Rolling out a major interface change will be tricky, and I would like
to know that our circ experts in this community have had enough time to
fully engage with this proposed interface and provide feedback before it
gets merged. I know it will not be forced upon people in the next release
because it's still in experimental mode, but once it gets merged, we've
essentially made the decision on behalf of the community that it is okay
for the circulation interface to make this shift.

When I first came on board at NOBLE a little over a year ago, we had not
performed an upgrade in over a year because of another major interface
change that lost some features our libraries depend upon. We have since
upgraded with the most critical of these features restored, but I know of
at least one other consortium that has still held off on upgrading. That's
what happens when we make major overhauls to an interface without adequate
community feedback in the development at all stages of the development
process. The new interface may meet the needs of a handful of
libraries/consortia, but other Evergreen libraries then need to make tough
decisions about upgrading despite a critical feature missing or staying on
an older release as it moves out of community support. Greater community
engagement won't fix all of these problems, but it goes a long way in
mitigating them.

I heard that the cataloging interest group recently had a meeting that
included a demo of the interface changes introduced to buckets. I think a
great next step for this project would be a similar presentation for those
heavily involved in circulation (I don't know if we have an active
circulation interest group.) Such a demo will ensure that more community
partners buy into the change to the interface and maybe even provide
suggestions for making it work better for those who work at their circ
desk, thereby benefiting everyone else in the community who may have a
similar concern.

Beyond this project, I would love to see a set of best practices for
communicating with the community when embarking on a development project,
particularly when that development makes a significant change to people's
current workflows. I volunteer to work on this and am willing to pull
something together by myself, but I'm also happy to work with others if
anyone else wants to incorporate their feedback into the best practices.
After all, we are a community, and I know incorporating everyone's feedback
into this best practices document will make it better for everyone.

Just my two cents for what it's worth.

Kathy

--
Kathy Lussier
she/her
Executive Director
NOBLE: North of Boston Library Exchange
Danvers, MA
978-777-8844 x201
www.noblenet.org

On Mon, Oct 7, 2024 at 4:07 PM Terran McCanna via Evergreen-circ <
evergreen-circ at list.evergreen-ils.org> wrote:

>
> Hello everyone -
>
> During Feedback Fest this week, please take a look at the updated
> (Angularized) circulation interfaces that are loaded onto
> https://butternut.evergreencatalog.com/eg/staff and available through the
> "Circulation (Experimental)" menu.
>
> Note that these elements are still missing from the new interface because
> they are not yet complete: Hold groups, refresh penalties, display alerts
> options.
>
> Also note that the old/current interfaces will still be the default in
> Evergreen 3.14, but the default will most likely change to these new
> interfaces in Evergreen 4.0
>
> Please add any issues you find with the new interfaces to the omnibus
> ticket here: https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/2065344
>
> Thank you!
>
>
> [image: logo with link to Georgia Public Library Service website]
> <https://georgialibraries.org/>
>
> Terran McCanna, PINES Program Manager
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Georgia Public Library Service
>
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