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  1. For some fragile items that we don't want to put in transit (e.g. telescopes, vinyl records), we want to be able to limit check-ins to the owning location. We can communicate these limits to patrons on our website and through signage or labels, but we'd like there to be an option within Sierra to generate a pop-up (with an option to override) so staff are alerted to tell the patron they have to bring the item back to another location.

    8 votes

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  2. Currently, authentication using the NCIP protocol does not update the CIRCACTIVE attribute in the patron account. We use this protocol to authenticate to a statewide ILL service and we'd like to know when cards are being used in this union catalog and not just our own.

    We use CIRCACTIVE to determine which cards are being used and which ones aren't. This is useful for statistical purposes, but is also linked to our patron database purge process.

    8 votes

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  3. Why is it important to link patrons?

    • Without linked patron functionality someone that is authorized to pick up a hold on another account is complicated. This is manually done by staff using patron notes, and the authorized patron signs out the book leaving the original hold on the other patron record.
    • Parents visiting the library with children would like to jump to the record of each child rather than using the child’s cards.

    Current privacy and circulation workflow issues:

    • Someone could link to the child record without authorization. If a patron is sharing their circulation details with someone, they should…
    8 votes

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  4. Our patrons are curious about their loan history. They would like to sort it by author or title in addition to the checkout date. We have told them to export it. But exporting the checkout history loses the checkout date! Could more sorting possibilities be added to the catalogue and checkout date added when exporting?

    8 votes

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  5. We've currently got 55 loan rules in Cincinnati. Not the most I've seen, but also not the least. At a certain point, it becomes difficult to remember, or better yet, know at a glance, their purpose & what loan rule governs what. The character limit to the name entry for loan rules limits how descriptive we can be.

    A number of Sierra releases back saw the addition of the tooltip rollover when searching patron records. I'd love to see something similar applied, so when I'm scrolling & rolling over loan rules, I can see a 2 or 3 sentence free…

    7 votes

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  6. Our library has deprecated the classic WebPAC in favor of a REST API-based custom discovery layer, but the Time to Holdshelf/Time to Reshelve temporary status message we've configured isn't included in the API response. It would reduce frustration for staff and patrons if we could implement a delay before items appear to be on the shelf when patrons check our website or mobile app.

    Please add the temporary status to the REST API response.

    7 votes

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  7. I'm blatantly copying this idea from a suggestion by Wes Osborn in the Polaris Idea Exchange (https://ideas.iii.com/forums/951742-ils-polaris/suggestions/46833076).

    While creating item records, generally while following prompts in an item template, it is easy for staff to scan a value such as a barcode or ISBN into the price field by mistake, resulting in items that can incur bills in the billions of dollars if the issues are not caught. Additionally, it's easy to miss entering a decimal point and still wind up with charges exponentially higher than intended.

    This could be mitigated by setting a maximum allow value for…

    7 votes

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  8. We'd like to be able to track how many times an item was checked out to our patrons vs patrons from other libraries.

    7 votes

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  9. A Sierra feature to allow scanning a Driver’s License to auto-populate customer information for a new account and/or to update an existing account. Automatically inserting a customer's name, date of birth, address, and DL number would result in less typos/mistakes, save considerable staff time when creating or updating an account, and additional staff time in reviewing and fixing errors.

    7 votes

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  10. Problem:

    Currently, the "Prioritize Paging Open Locations First" feature and the "Prioritize Hold Fulfillment at the Pickup Location" feature for Title Priority Paging are incompatible. When you have both turned on, pages will skip closed locations and page at an open location, but will not allow the hold to be filled because there is a copy available at the hold pickup location. However, the hold pickup location is not paged for that item since paging skipped that location, so they don't see that patrons are waiting. This causes staff confusion and also impacts how quickly a patron can receive their…

    7 votes

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  11. Idea: update the expected format requirements for the email variable-length field to account for modern, non-standard email domains.

    Relevance: The prevalence of non-standard email domains is growing. Currently, Sierra accepts some non-standard formats, like .me, but rejects others like .health. This prevents the saving of the patron record and requires that the patron provide another email or change their notice preference.

    7 votes

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  12. I recently learned that the fields included in the Expanded Display for patron records (when you rollover/click the i next to the record) are hard coded.

    I found this unfortunate, because what's shown in the Expanded Display differs depending on where you're viewing it, which in the case of patron records is either going to be in the Search/Find a Patron view or the Check Out mode view.

    Examples of where I see room for improvement here:

    1) When I search for a patron by name & come up with dozens of people with the same name, an identifier like…

    7 votes

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  13. Right now NCIP for Symphony, Voyager, Polaris, Koha and Evergreen all accept ISBNs, but Sierra's does not.

    7 votes

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  14. Ability for patron to add money to their Sierra patron account (via self-check) to pay for future fines, fees, and printing. We are looking to go mostly cashless, but some patrons aren't able to get credit cards (like our young patrons here after school). Our self-check machine takes cash, which would allow patrons to print and pay fees/fines with cash, even if the staff doesn't have a cash register.

    7 votes

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  15. When matching on an ISBN for record loading, it should be possible to limit the match to the first 13 (or 10) digits. There are often extraneous data in 020 subfield |a. There are now other subfields where that is supposed to go, but it frequently ends up in |a anyway, and then your record loading won't match.

    7 votes

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  16. We're currently dealing with a known issue in Sierra 6.2, where volume holds aren't being added to paging lists. Having discovered it on our end fairly recently, we've asked staff to continue running their paging lists for other items, but use the Manage Holds function to find & fill volume requests.

    The problem is that the current search retrieves such a high number of items. And while the search results display counts of the title number of holds, & the total number of bib, volume, & item level holds, you cannot currently limit them & make the Manage Holds report…

    7 votes

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  17. Currently, the ability to override a hold block is governed by permission 92.

    A hold might be blocked for a number of reasons. Staff might attempt to place more than the max number of holds allowed for a customer. They might place a hold for a customer on an item they already have checked out, etc.

    One scenario especially has been problematic for as long as I can remember:

    A patron finds an item on the shelf & takes it to a service point to check out. It turns out that this item can satisfy a hold placed by another…

    7 votes

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  18. Organizations with restrictive security policies may be unable to use FTP over port 1021 (or any other port) for file transfer to Sierra WebPAC, since FTP is an inherently insecure protocol. For the same reasons, FTP should ideally not be in use at all (even where permitted by the customer's organization) since it entails sending login credentials in cleartext which makes it subject to interception and abuse.[1]

    Without FTP, the only alternative is to use Web Master within Sierra Desktop App to upload files to make changes to Live or Staging WebPAC screens.

    If Innovative implements Secure File Transfer Protocol…

    7 votes

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  19. By default in the SDA, items are blocked from renewal if a hold is placed on the associated title or volume.

    If the Renew Title Holds feature is enabled, the system gives you the option to OVERRIDE the block on renewing held titles and volumes. The system does not consider frozen holds when blocking items from renewal.

    Staff will always select "yes" to a renewal if there is an available item. They do not want to continually select "override" when they are renewing multiple holds.

    Can there be an option to always renew if there is an available item (without…

    7 votes

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  20. The Sierra Patron Record is able to be communicated to Vega Discover in such a way that differentiates the following fields:

    Street Address Line 1
    Street Address Line 2
    City
    State
    Postal Code
    Country


    Discover does not parse Sierra addresses correctly.

    1) New Discover registrations do not parse correctly in Sierra.
    2) Existing registrations in Sierra do not parse correctly in Discover.

    This was the comment by Innovative Staff on this topic:
    Discover does have difficulty with parsing Sierra patron addresses, and this is not changing in the July release. For libraries who do allow patrons to edit their own…

    6 votes

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