LINC Pac Enhancements Committee

Committee Members:

Chair - Karen Hackman (Central H.S.), Lynn Schmidt (Mahomet PL), Lou Graham (Hoopeston PL), Tim Schreiber (Lake Land College), Melissa Records (Champaign PL), John Dunkelberger (Urbana PL), Donna Schaal (LTLS), Pat Boze (LTLS)

Our Charge

To discuss enhancements to LINC Pac and make recommendations to LINC Policy Council who will then consider these recommendations.

Our Approach

1.    Examined other implementations of HIP 3.0.4 (iPac)

2.    Discussed issues that were problematic

3.    Came up with suggestions for changes and enhancements

4.    Prepared a test version of the catalog

 5.    Made additional suggestions based upon this test version

Our Philosophy

We looked at several factors: differing patron and staff needs; the functionality of HIP 3.0.4; the potential costs of customized programming; and staff time needed for updates of customized changes.  Generally we ended up following the most common practices/implementations for search selection mechanisms and wording.  We also tried to develop more consistency, greater functionality, and to provide more instructions.  We didnπt worry a whole lot about looks.

Types of Changes We Suggested

1.    Changed search selection mechanism on some of the menus

2.    Rearranged some of the menus/options

3.    Changed some of the wording

4.    Added some enhancements

5.    Fixed a few bugs

6.    Inquired with Dynix about some desired functionality

The Test Catalog - http://209.174.169.34:8080/ipac20/ipac.jsp?profile=ltn-test

1.    Changed search selection mechanism on some of the menus

Search boxes rather than pull-down menus (Basic, Media, Numeric menus)

2.    Rearranged some of the menus/options

Added a Media menu for format searching

Moved the My Account menu tab closer to the Catalog menu tab, since this is the second most commonly used menu in LINC Pac

Rearranged the search selection lists so that most common searches are at the top of the lists (e.g., Any Word, Title, Author) OR similar searches are grouped (e.g., all audiobook searches are grouped together in the Media menu)

Rearranged Media Limits in the Advanced menu so that most common formats are listed first (e.g., Text, Videos, etc.)

3.    Changed some of the wording

Changed the name of menus (e.g., Power menu became Advanced)

Changed the wording for search selections (e.g, Title Alphabetical became Title starts with)

Changed the wording for My Account options (e.g., Fines/Blocks became Fines/Notices)

Changed the wording for Chapter-A-Day to Online Book Clubs

Changed the wording for Hold/Request suspensions from Change Status to Suspend Request

4.    Added some enhancements

Added format icons to detailed results lists to distinguish different types of formats

Added Horizon Bib Number (Dynix #) searching to Numeric menu

Added ≤feedback≤ mechanism to catalog with link to www.mylibrarian.info

5.    Fixed a few bugs

Removed User Defined Limits from Advanced menu (didnπt work)

Fixed My Book List so that you can add more than 10 items to the list

6.    Inquired with Dynix about some desired functionality

Clustering title alphabetical and subject alphabetical search results

Add some instructions to the My List page