update collections job
Allow Information Update for Electronic Collections. Sometimes, we need to add a public note to all of the collections that are tied to a specific interface, due to scheduled maintenance, or unexpected downtime. It would be great if we could add/remove these notes with a job. Some large providers, like Ebsco, Proquest, or Wiley can have over 15 collections we have to manually edit, which is a big time drain
Alma December release includes an enhancment to cloud app application by the name of e collection quick update which provides an easy way to update of supported fields in a set of e-collections.
(you can read more about here:
https://github.com/ExLibrisGroup/alma-e-collection-quick-update/wiki/Help)
Now the cloudAPP includes additional fields:
1. Public description
2. "Activate new portfolios associated with service automatically? "
3. Service temporarily unavailable message
4. Service unavailability reason
5. Service unavailable message as of date
6. Internal description
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AN - UNSW commented
I will have to agree with the sentiment expressed below - whereas the app is at least a step forward on what was available before it does not really cover everything that you should be able to do. The functionality needs to be in Alma to make sure everything is covered and there are no unexpected issues
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Stacey van Groll commented
We object to this being considered as Already Supported when it is by Cloud App rather than in-built Alma functionality. The Terms agreement specifically says "…Cloud Apps are additional optional applications…". We are unable to agree to the TOU for Cloud Apps, with serious concerns around security of our data and the terms also advising no support via Ex Libris. How can this be considered 'Already Supported' when there is explicitly no support?
The outcome is that our site misses out forever on product development improvements because Ex Libris absolves themselves of any responsibility for exposing our data to third parties, and offers no help when using the apps potentially cause extensive damage.https://developers.exlibrisgroup.com/about/terms/
"The Developer Code & Apps may not be suitable for production use, may contain bugs and errors and may be incompatible with Ex Libris programs and/or services."
"Any use of Developer Code & Apps is at your own risk."
"You acknowledge that testing, installation and/or enablement of Developer Code & Apps for use with Ex Libris’ programs and services may result in the transmission of your Data outside of Ex Libris’ programs and services during normal use."
"Furthermore, the providers of the Developer Code & Apps may be able to obtain access to your Data through an application programming interface, which may result in the disclosure, modification or deletion of your Data by those providers or third parties."
"Further, such providers and their agents and partners may collect and use Data pertaining to your configuration and use of the Developer Code & Apps."
"Ex Libris is not responsible for any such use, transmission, disclosure, modification or deletion of your Data by or through Developer Code & Apps."
"Ex Libris has no obligation to provide support services for Developer Code & Apps or to update any Developer Code & Apps to support the latest products and/or services of Ex Libris." -
Erin Montagu commented
Further to Elizabeth York's comments, the new app features don't allow you to update databases at all. For example, we wanted to add an Internal Description across multiple collections, including databases, but the app kept failing (without reporting why). It took quite a lot of time to ascertain that the app won't update databases, even though they have an Internal Description field.
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Elizabeth York commented
I see the new fields have been added to the app, but these are not sufficient for our use case. We need to be able to add Collection level public notes and authentication notes. Currently, there is only the option to add service level public notes. We need collection level notes so we can 1) update notes for collections of type Database (which have no service) 2) In cases where an aggregator package and its portfolios are unavailable, we want to add a note to the Electronic Collection so both the Electronic Collection and its portfolios in Primo display the note. Currently, we can only add the note to the portfolios (because the notes are at the service level).
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Sion Romaine commented
The Cloud App looks like it will be a great tool! We look forward to seeing the Collection Record & Service Level Public Notes and Authentication Notes added as well. Thank you Ex Libris!
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Helen Garner commented
This is a good suggestion and could be quite a timesaver. We have the CDI enabled and need to make a change to all ebook collections to turn off a setting to avoid duplication in Primo. It is a shame that there isn't a job that came make the same update to a large volume of collections at once.
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Elizabeth York commented
This would be extremely helpful. Currently, I would like to add a public note to all 150 of our Springer ebook collections in Alma because ebook PDFs are not downloadable in Chrome. Adding this note manually one by one to each collection is simply not feasible.
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Anonymous commented
We've encountered this same issue, and it is a big time drain when a platform like Ebsco goes down! Please provide an update collections job. Specifically we'd like to be able to run a job that will toggle the 'Service temporarily unavailable' radio button (from yes to no, and back again when access is restored) and to also allow us to globally add a 'Service unavailability reason' to multiple collections from the same interface. Thanks!
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Anonymous commented
We recently have decided we need to standardize the language in some of the electronic collection note fields. We have over 900 collections, and it would be great to have a batch find and replace function for electronic collection fields.
Any data elements in Alma should be accessible to search, and to batch updating and to batch deleting and to batch adding. Period. If it is data, we need to manipulate it, and in the most efficient way possible.