[OPEN-ILS-GENERAL] Life lessons

[Lori Bowen Ayre]

Great advice!

Lori

On Tue, Aug 7, 2012 at 2:50 PM, George Tuttle <gtuttle at prlib.org> wrote:

>  When Evergreen was developed in 2006, time was of the essence and staff
> in the various Georgia PINES libraries were not always clear on how
> features should work. I know because I was part of the original testing of
> Evergreen.  Testing was done on a piecemeal basis and many features didn’t
> get fully tested. Time was the problem. Because of the lack of time and the
> lack of testing, there were definitely some surprises when Evergreen went
> live. I remember when we first realized that canceled hold shelf items were
> going to “Available” without being transited back to their owning library.
> Another example, how it is possible for an item to go from “In Transit” to
> “Available” without it reaching its destination.****
>
> ** **
>
> This second problem occurred because we asked for it. We knew we needed
> the ability to abort an item in  transit. What we failed to mention to
> developers was the circumstances when an item could or could not be
> aborted. We wanted the feature to work the same way it worked in Sirsi
> Unicorn, Dynix, and the popular ILSs of that time, but saying that isn’t
> the same as providing a detailed flowchart on how a feature should
> function. ****
>
> ** **
>
> In Dynix, you can’t convert an item from “In Transit” to “Available”
> without checking it in at its destination.  Also in Dynix, the main
> instance where an “In Transit” item is aborted is in Check Out and that is
> the only instance available to frontline staff. Dynix also allows for an
> operations manager to conversion old “In Transit” items to “Missing” or
> some sort of pre-delete status.****
>
> ** **
>
> Now, I not writing this e-mail to sing the praises of Dynix. With any ILS,
> there are certain features you like and certain features you don’t like.
>  In Georgia, there is a saying: “Evergreen isn’t the software we wanted.
> It’s the software we asked for.”  I am not saying this to be critical of
> Evergreen, I am just saying when you ask for something that it is smart to
> include a flowchart. Don’t assume the developers can read your mind.****
>
> ** **
>
> Life lesson: When asking for something, it is smart to include a
> flowchart.  Just saying.****
>
> ** **
>
> George Tuttle****
>
> Computer Services Librarian****
>
> Piedmont Regional Library System****
>
> 770-867-2762 x113****
>
> 770-891-0654 (cell)****
>
> 770-867-7483 (fax)****
>
> gtuttle at prlib.org****
>
> ** **
>
> *[image: littleone]*****
>
> ** **
>
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