[OPEN-ILS-GENERAL] Bookbags and record buckets: having my cake and eating it too?

[Jane Sandberg]

Hi all,

We have several bookbags that we use to keep track of books for a
particular assignment.  We particularly like being able to direct
students to a link that includes a nice HTML display of all the books
in that bookbag.

We typically add books to those bookbags at the point they are
cataloged.  However, the staff client doesn't make it easy for
catalogers to add to those bookbags at the point of cataloging.  Since
the btype column in the container.biblio_record_entry_bucket table =
'bookbag', catalogers can't go to the bib record, click "Other
Actions", and use "Add to Bucket".  Instead, they have to:
1) Note the TCN of the book they are cataloging
2) Look up the ID of the bookbag in a document and open it
3) Look up the book by TCN in the Record Bucket Query interface
4) Add the book to the bucket

It's really round-about!  If I change the btype to 'staff_client',
then the catalogers can suddenly use "Other Actions" > "Add to Bucket"
from the catalog record.  It's way easier, but it means that we can no
longer see the bookbags in our catalog at the URL
https://libcat.linnbenton.edu/eg/opac/results?bookbag=[bookbag_id_goes_here]

Does anybody have any suggestions about how we can have our cake (i.e.
get nice, public-facing HTML displays of bookbags) and eat it too
(i.e. a less onerous process for catalogers to add the books they are
cataloging to those bookbags)?  Is there any particular reason that
non-bookbag record buckets can't have that nice HTML display in the
OPAC too?

Thanks,

  -Jane


-- 
Jane Sandberg
Electronic Resources Librarian
Linn-Benton Community College
sandbej at linnbenton.edu / 541-917-4655
Pronouns: she/her/hers