[OPEN-ILS-DEV] Question about Evergreen database

[Karen Collier]

Whether knowingly or not, you guys have hit on a pretty controversial topic in librarianship - whether or not to store data on what books patrons have checked out in the past... controversial at least in the US since the USA Patriot Act.

On one hand you've got the argument that you want to be able to give a patron a list of books they've checked out in the past when they ask for it, and they do ask.

On the other hand, some librarians oppose the USA Patriot Act on constitutional grounds related to patron privacy and for this reason, prefer to not retain this information, in case they are ordered to provide it.

With this in mind, it might make sense to have a configurable option where a branch/system/consortium could elect to save this type of information, erase it when a book is returned or when it has been checked out to another patron (as my library's current software does), or to let patrons opt in or out.

That much flexibility might overly complicate matters in development, but I doubt it would go unappreciated.

I am delighted to learn that information on when books were checked out is retained.  Our current ILS tosses that information out along with the patron specific information.  It would be very useful to be able to create a graph of circulations over time for an item or group of items, to see changes in popularity when you're deciding whether to weed an item from the collection or thinking about what types of books to add to the collection.

Just some thoughts,
Karen

----- Original Message -----
From: "Brandon W. Uhlman" <brandon.uhlman at bclibrary.ca>
To: open-ils-dev at list.georgialibraries.org, "Scott McKellar" <mck9 at swbell.net>
Sent: Thursday, November 22, 2007 4:33:28 PM (GMT-0500) America/New_York
Subject: Re: [OPEN-ILS-DEV] Question about Evergreen database

Hi, Scott.

I am not a EG developer yet, but as a humble sysadmin, I can take a  
stab at your questions.

The short answer to all of them is 'yes'. When a book is circulated, a  
record (or tuple, if you prefer) is created in the action.circulation  
table of the Postgres data. The tuple includes:

- the borrower (actor.usr)
- the item (asset.copy)
- the time the item circulated
- the staff person who circulated it
- the location where it was circulated

The item type is determined from the circ_modifier in asset.copy, the  
duration of the loan is determined in circ_item_config.js (in  
/Open-ILS/src/javascript/backend/circ in the source, and in  
$EG_HOME/var/circ in the compiled install) using with data in  
config.rule_circ_duration, and the result is also stored as the due  
date.

When the item is returned, the return location (actor.org_unit),  
return staff person, and return time are all stored in the tuple as  
well.

The database does retain this information for historical use. The  
staff client does have some already-included functionality for viewing  
this data, particularly for the scenario you mention in [2]. The  
reporting interface would let (staff) answer the questions in both [1]  
and [2].

It's worth noting, though, that some jurisdictions prohibit storing  
this information under privacy legislation without the borrower's  
consent, or, in some cases, at all. British Columbia, where our  
installation is, is one of the former, so over time, we'll be  
developing processes to vacuum this information from our database to  
comply.

Happy Turkey Day.

~B

Quoting Scott McKellar <mck9 at swbell.net>:

> Not being a librarian, and knowing little about how libraries work,
> I haven't paid a lot of attention to the OILS-specific parts of the
> code base.  However I do have a question.
>
> Suppose I check out a book, and return it a week later.  Does
> Evergreen remember that I checked it out at one time?  Or does it
> just note that the book is back in circulation, available to be lent
> to another patron?
>
> To address the issue a different way: is it possible (either through
> existing tools or through customized ad hoc queries) to answer
> questions such as the following:
>
> 1. Who checked out Moby Dick over the last year?
>
> 2. What books, or other items, did Suzie Grimshaw check out in March
> of 2007?
>
> I am not asking so much about the existing tools, but about whether
> the database retains this kind of patron-level usage history in the
> first place.
>
> Scott McKellar
> http://home.swbell.net/mck9/ct/
>
>



======================================
Brandon W. Uhlman, Systems Consultant
Public Library Services Branch
Ministry of Education
Government of British Columbia
605 Robson Street, 5th Floor
Vancouver, BC  V6B 5J3

Phone: (604) 660-2972
E-mail: brandon.uhlman at gov.bc.ca
         brandon.uhlman at bclibrary.ca