[OPEN-ILS-GENERAL] discouraged

Fri Mar 16 16:55:01 EDT 2018

Diane,

I share your discouragement. We have identified more than 50 bugs in
cataloging. Very few cataloging bugs reported in launchpad have been fixed,
including https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/1715697 and others of
equal importance. This particular bug and the overall buginess of item
templates have prevented prevented PINES libraries from implementing
cataloging in the web client.

PINES libraries catalog at their headquarters. We have libraries with more
than 15 branches, so the inability to see libraries with no holdings in
holdings view makes it impractical for most of our libraries. A cataloger
has to click on add volumes, scroll down to the branch, then add volumes
again, scroll down to the branch, until they add all branches. If at any
point in the process they realize they didn't need to add one of the
branches, they can't delete the volume as they could in the XUL client (
https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/1739087), they have to close the
tab and start all over. Or, if they enter the volumes in any other order
than the list in the drop down menu and don't notice the order has
switched, they could attach the wrong barcode to an item (
https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/1744388 or
https://bugs.launchpad.net/evergreen/+bug/1744390).

They can also go along happily using their item templates when templates
suddenly stop working and save & exit doesn't save or exit. Or, suddenly
the template starts adding an invisible alert message or a value in the
deposit cost field. We haven't been able to determine what triggers either
of these have not reported them yet. I would like to have a rough idea of
what is occurring before I submit a launchpad bug report. If anyone else is
experiencing the same problems and has some ideas, I would love to hear
from you.

Those are just the major problems are experiencing. There are also a lot of
other problems that add up to a lot of frustration with the web client and
that negatively impact workflow for catalogers.

J. Elaine Hardy
PINES & Collaborative Projects Manager
Georgia Public Library Service/PINES
1800 Century Place, Ste. 150
Atlanta, GA 30045

404.235.7128 Office
404.548.4241 Cell
404.235.7201 FAX

On Fri, Mar 16, 2018 at 4:20 PM, Terran McCanna <
tmccanna at georgialibraries.org> wrote:

> >> Back in the Template Toolkit days, there was a tag we used in Launchpad
> that identified bugs we thought should be fixed before removing the old
> catalog from Evergreen. Maybe we could consider doing something similar for
> the web client. <<
>
> I like that idea. Although our circulation staff have moved over to the
> web client for the most part, there are still some major roadblocks that
> need to be overcome in cataloging before we are able to move everyone over
> completely.
>
> Terran McCanna
> PINES Program Manager
> Georgia Public Library Service
> 1800 Century Place, Suite 150
> <https://maps.google.com/?q=1800+Century+Place,+Suite+150++Atlanta,+GA+30345&entry=gmail&source=g>
> Atlanta, GA 30345
> <https://maps.google.com/?q=1800+Century+Place,+Suite+150++Atlanta,+GA+30345&entry=gmail&source=g>
> 404-235-7138 <(404)%20235-7138>
> tmccanna at georgialibraries.org
>
>
> On Fri, Mar 16, 2018 at 4:08 PM, Kathy Lussier <klussier at masslnc.org>
> wrote:
>
>> Hi Diane,
>>
>> I'm sorry to hear your frustration, but I can also empathize. While
>> working on a recent project to sponsor more bug fixes for the web client, I
>> also got discouraged as new bugs were reported, particularly when they were
>> ones that would have made our priority list if we had known about them at
>> the time we were selecting bugs to fix. To keep myself from getting
>> discouraged, I found it helped to keep some things in mind.
>>
>> - Despite the current open bugs, the web client has come a long way just
>> in the past year. Setting aside the addition of serials and offline, there
>> has been a lot of bug fixing  over the last months. In many cases, the
>> fixes have been for what I consider to be showstopper bugs. I continued to
>> see this work even today  as I was going through my bug mail. It might be
>> useful for the community to track statistics of how many web client bugs
>> are getting fixed on a monthly basis to help us see the progress that's
>> been done. Looking at the 3.0 point release notes is also a good way to see
>> how much work has been done.
>>
>> - There were many people, including myself, who spent a lot of time
>> testing the web client when the code was initially written, but, no matter
>> how much testing was done, we knew that there are just some bugs that just
>> won't be found until people start using it in production. This isn't unique
>> to Evergreen or open-source software, but is something I've seen when using
>> proprietary software as well. We tried to catch some of these bugs by
>> having 2.12 available for trial use in production, but I don't think most
>> sites really started using the web client heavily  until 3.0, which was
>> just released in October. I would say the flurry of bug reporting since
>> that time is an expected part of the process of eventually getting to a
>> more stable web client. This is also why we are keeping the xul client
>> around through the 3.1 release, because we knew it would take time to get
>> the web client to where it needs to be for all Evergreen users to move to
>> it.
>>
>> I still remember the early days of the Template Toolkit catalog. I was
>> equally discouraged about bugs and missing features, but as more sites
>> started using it, they made sure features important to them were fixed or
>> added, and we now have a stable and feature rich public catalog.
>>
>> - I'm worried about stating this the wrong way, but we also have to
>> remember the number of bugs we've learned to live with under the xul
>> client. I'm not saying we should just learn to live with the web client
>> bugs, but they certainly are more noticeable now because they are new.
>> There are also several xul client bugs we were able to close out because
>> they were fixed in the web client. The important thing is that the bugs are
>> open and known. Evergreen sites can see where the problems are and
>> ultimately choose to focus on addressing the ones most important to them.
>>
>> Having said all of this, I do think it's important that if there are
>> showstopper bugs in the web client (not annoyances, but things that really
>> prevent you from using the web client), we need to identify those to
>> increase the likelihood that they will be fixed ahead of other bugs. For
>> example, one of the groups I work with recently set the bug priority to
>> High for a handful of bugs they considered to be showstoppers. Back in the
>> Template Toolkit days, there was a tag we used in Launchpad that identified
>> bugs we thought should be fixed before removing the old catalog from
>> Evergreen. Maybe we could consider doing something similar for the web
>> client.
>>
>> Kathy
>>
>>
>>
>> On 03/16/2018 03:27 PM, Diane Disbro wrote:
>>
>> Good afternoon -
>>
>> I volunteered to keep track of Webby problems for the Missouri Evergreen
>> circulation committee. I am pretty discouraged. My library began using
>> Webby in December but there were so many frustrations that we stopped after
>> about a month. My spreadsheet of problems now has thirty-five issue on it.
>> Every time a new bug report is sent out my heart sinks.
>>  Diane Disbro
>> Branch Manager/Circulation Coordinator
>> Union Branch
>> Scenic Regional Library
>> 308 Hawthorne Drive
>> <https://maps.google.com/?q=308+Hawthorne+Drive+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++++++++++++Union,+MO+%C2%A0+%C2%A0+63084&entry=gmail&source=g>
>> Union, MO     63084
>> <https://maps.google.com/?q=308+Hawthorne+Drive+%0D%0A+++++++++++++++++++++++++Union,+MO+%C2%A0+%C2%A0+63084&entry=gmail&source=g>
>> (636) 583-3224
>>
>>
>> --
>> Kathy Lussier
>> Project Coordinator
>> Massachusetts Library Network Cooperative(508) 343-0128klussier at masslnc.org
>> Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/kmlussier
>>
>>
>
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