CCS News
MAY 15, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Upgrade to Symphony – Memorial Day. We thank you for your nice messages and kind words of support about the schedule change for this upgrade. Stay tuned to the s-help list for all information regarding the upgrade. We plan to begin the upgrade when all libraries close on Sunday of Memorial Day weekend (May 24). We plan to have the systems operational by the time you come in the following Tuesday. Be sure you know how to use your offline procedures, just in case they are needed.
CCS MEETINGS NEXT WEEK:
Wed., 5/20, 9:30, CCS: SCRAP
Wed., 5/20, 9:30, Schaumburg: ILUUG
Thur., 5/21, 9:30, NSLS: PAS
Thursday, May 7, 2009
CCS News
MAY 8, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Upgrade to Symphony 3.2.1 – We have changed the date of the upgrade to occur beginning the evening of Sunday, May 24. We will be processing the upgrade while libraries are closed for Memorial Day,
New machine – We will be getting a replacement to our 890 Production Server in the coming weeks. We will keep you posted on the schedule for this project. At the moment the computer room is being prepared for the new electrical requirements.
Tipping Point – We will be adding a network appliance called Tipping Point to further fortify the network from unwanted traffic. When we implement the appliance, the network will be interrupted very briefly. This will occur either early in the morning before 8 A.M. or after library closing at night. We will keep you posted on the date and time when the network will be interrupted. We expect to do this sometime after our upgrade to 3.2.1.
Epay – As soon as the upgrade is in place, we will make ePay/Sirsi integration available. A memo will appear shortly.
SUBJECT HEADING NEWS:
For those interested in Buddhist art, use “Buddhist art” now as a subject heading, instead of “Art, Buddhist”. The same type of change also occurred Wednesday night with the subject headings of “Zen art”, “Zen arts”, and “Buddhist arts” .
Also congratulations go to Niles and Des Plaines, for submitting 3 subject heading proposals that were approved by LC this week. “Cumulative songs”, “Cumulative tales”, and “Guitar Hero (Game))” are now newly approved subject headings.
Virginia R. Seward
CCS Authorities Librarian
CCS MEETINGS NEXT WEEK:
Mon., 5/11, 1:30, Park Ridge: OPAC Review Task Force
Wed., 5/13, 2 P.M., CCS: Executive Committee
MAY 8, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Upgrade to Symphony 3.2.1 – We have changed the date of the upgrade to occur beginning the evening of Sunday, May 24. We will be processing the upgrade while libraries are closed for Memorial Day,
New machine – We will be getting a replacement to our 890 Production Server in the coming weeks. We will keep you posted on the schedule for this project. At the moment the computer room is being prepared for the new electrical requirements.
Tipping Point – We will be adding a network appliance called Tipping Point to further fortify the network from unwanted traffic. When we implement the appliance, the network will be interrupted very briefly. This will occur either early in the morning before 8 A.M. or after library closing at night. We will keep you posted on the date and time when the network will be interrupted. We expect to do this sometime after our upgrade to 3.2.1.
Epay – As soon as the upgrade is in place, we will make ePay/Sirsi integration available. A memo will appear shortly.
SUBJECT HEADING NEWS:
For those interested in Buddhist art, use “Buddhist art” now as a subject heading, instead of “Art, Buddhist”. The same type of change also occurred Wednesday night with the subject headings of “Zen art”, “Zen arts”, and “Buddhist arts” .
Also congratulations go to Niles and Des Plaines, for submitting 3 subject heading proposals that were approved by LC this week. “Cumulative songs”, “Cumulative tales”, and “Guitar Hero (Game))” are now newly approved subject headings.
Virginia R. Seward
CCS Authorities Librarian
CCS MEETINGS NEXT WEEK:
Mon., 5/11, 1:30, Park Ridge: OPAC Review Task Force
Wed., 5/13, 2 P.M., CCS: Executive Committee
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
CCS News
MAY 1, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Upgrade to Symphony – the upgrade to Release 3.2.1, also known as Symphony, is still being planned for the evening of May 12. We will work on it through the night so that we are up on the new release the morning of May 13. Please stay tuned for more instructions which will be published via the s-help list in the coming days and weeks.
Offline – it is a good idea to review your Offline procedures. You may find the procedures on the Sirsi Resource page of the old CCS web site
http://www.ccs.nslsilus.org
under Documentation, titled “Offline Users Guide.”
PATCH CLUSTER 4:
We are looking at installing Release 3.2.1 Patch Cluster 4 next week so we can test it before we do the upgrade on the Production Server. The Patch Cluster is small, but does address a couple irritants, and since it involves a Java Client upgrade, we’d like to minimize the inconvenience by bundling it with the May 12 server upgrade. If/when we do that, it may mean turning off the optional features we’ve turned on for testing, at least temporarily. We’ll provide further word before we proceed.
CCS MEETINGS NEXT WEEK:
Wed., 5/6, 9:30, NSLS: Catalogers (workshop)
Fri., 5/8, 9:30, NSLS: Circulation
MAY 1, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Upgrade to Symphony – the upgrade to Release 3.2.1, also known as Symphony, is still being planned for the evening of May 12. We will work on it through the night so that we are up on the new release the morning of May 13. Please stay tuned for more instructions which will be published via the s-help list in the coming days and weeks.
Offline – it is a good idea to review your Offline procedures. You may find the procedures on the Sirsi Resource page of the old CCS web site
http://www.ccs.nslsilus.org
under Documentation, titled “Offline Users Guide.”
PATCH CLUSTER 4:
We are looking at installing Release 3.2.1 Patch Cluster 4 next week so we can test it before we do the upgrade on the Production Server. The Patch Cluster is small, but does address a couple irritants, and since it involves a Java Client upgrade, we’d like to minimize the inconvenience by bundling it with the May 12 server upgrade. If/when we do that, it may mean turning off the optional features we’ve turned on for testing, at least temporarily. We’ll provide further word before we proceed.
CCS MEETINGS NEXT WEEK:
Wed., 5/6, 9:30, NSLS: Catalogers (workshop)
Fri., 5/8, 9:30, NSLS: Circulation
Thursday, April 23, 2009
CCS News
APRIL 24, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
HELP DESK – Except in the case of a system emergency requiring immediate attention – please log all requests via the help desk(WonderDesk). This is the only way that we can really keep tabs on your questions and the many projects we work on daily. In a time when the number of projects is growing, it is very important that we track progress well so that we can get it all done!
THANKS TO TESTERS – Many have returned the test scripts and so far we see no “show stoppers” for our upgrade. All test results should be to CCS by April 27. As of this writing we still need to test at least one Self Check..
THANKS TO TBS – In answer to my email, Tom at TBS very kindly ran a PCRES test system against our test server to prove that PCRES will work with the new release. Please thank Tom if you are a TBS customer.
DATE FOR UPGRADE – At the rate of progress we are now experiencing, we are tentatively planning for the upgrade to occur starting the evening of Tuesday, May 12. We will give you exact timing and details and will keep you posted. We always plan a second tentative date in case this one does not go well. Our fallback date would be one week later.
INACTIVE HOLDS PURGE PROCESS – We will be finished next week and will keep only 6 months worth of inactive holds data from May 3 forward.
TIPPING POINT – we will be installing a new network appliance to assist in our battle against security breaches. This will involve interruption of service the morning of Thursday May 7. The network will be disconnected for just a moment between 7:45 and 8:30 am.
NEW WEB SITE – remember to give us feedback on the new website at www.ccslib.org. We are aware that technical groups would like older minutes to be added and we will work on that request.
AUTHORITIES UPDATE:
CCS sent 5816 bibliographic records to Marcive on Wednesday, April 22nd for Overnight Authorities Processing. The records have been processed and were reloaded into our system. Of the 5816 bibliographic records, Marcive returned 2131 updated bibliographic records. Marcive also sent us 3000 new authority records.
Last week, Marcive sent 1850 updated authority records and 429 new authority records that they knew we needed.
Marcive’s speedy service insures that the CCS database is kept up to date as much as possible with current headings and references.
-- Virginia R. Seward
CCS Authorities Librarian
CCS MEETING NEXT WEEK:
None!
APRIL 24, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
HELP DESK – Except in the case of a system emergency requiring immediate attention – please log all requests via the help desk(WonderDesk). This is the only way that we can really keep tabs on your questions and the many projects we work on daily. In a time when the number of projects is growing, it is very important that we track progress well so that we can get it all done!
THANKS TO TESTERS – Many have returned the test scripts and so far we see no “show stoppers” for our upgrade. All test results should be to CCS by April 27. As of this writing we still need to test at least one Self Check..
THANKS TO TBS – In answer to my email, Tom at TBS very kindly ran a PCRES test system against our test server to prove that PCRES will work with the new release. Please thank Tom if you are a TBS customer.
DATE FOR UPGRADE – At the rate of progress we are now experiencing, we are tentatively planning for the upgrade to occur starting the evening of Tuesday, May 12. We will give you exact timing and details and will keep you posted. We always plan a second tentative date in case this one does not go well. Our fallback date would be one week later.
INACTIVE HOLDS PURGE PROCESS – We will be finished next week and will keep only 6 months worth of inactive holds data from May 3 forward.
TIPPING POINT – we will be installing a new network appliance to assist in our battle against security breaches. This will involve interruption of service the morning of Thursday May 7. The network will be disconnected for just a moment between 7:45 and 8:30 am.
NEW WEB SITE – remember to give us feedback on the new website at www.ccslib.org. We are aware that technical groups would like older minutes to be added and we will work on that request.
AUTHORITIES UPDATE:
CCS sent 5816 bibliographic records to Marcive on Wednesday, April 22nd for Overnight Authorities Processing. The records have been processed and were reloaded into our system. Of the 5816 bibliographic records, Marcive returned 2131 updated bibliographic records. Marcive also sent us 3000 new authority records.
Last week, Marcive sent 1850 updated authority records and 429 new authority records that they knew we needed.
Marcive’s speedy service insures that the CCS database is kept up to date as much as possible with current headings and references.
-- Virginia R. Seward
CCS Authorities Librarian
CCS MEETING NEXT WEEK:
None!
Thursday, April 16, 2009
CCS News
APRIL 17, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Inactive holds purge process - Our purge process still runs at least five hours each night. We are now up to September, 2006, with five million purged and two million to go, working forward chronologically. We will be doing this though the month of April.
Results of test – Thanks to those reporting results when we tested the purge during daylight hours. Our results were inconclusive. We know that capture of holds slowed down, and we know that technical services slowed down. We know that the system statistics slowed but were still well within acceptable range. One library reported being kicked out of Circulation.
3.2.1 testing - Scripts and comments are being received. Thanks to those of you testing the new release.
Upgrade date – we cannot schedule an exact date until the purge is complete. However, we are targeting the first three weeks of May and hope to start the upgrade on a Tuesday night and finish on a Wednesday morning. Naturally we always strive to minimize downtime when the library is open. However, this is a BIG upgrade. Libraries should be familiar with offline operations at their site. It is a good time to review the procedures.
ROGER’S RETURN (WE HOPE):
The optimistic projection for Roger Anderson’s return after gall bladder removal is Tuesday, April 21. Here’s hoping!
CCS MEETINGS NEXT WEEK:
Mon, 4/20, 1:30, Winnetka-Northfield: OPAC Review Task Force
APRIL 17, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Inactive holds purge process - Our purge process still runs at least five hours each night. We are now up to September, 2006, with five million purged and two million to go, working forward chronologically. We will be doing this though the month of April.
Results of test – Thanks to those reporting results when we tested the purge during daylight hours. Our results were inconclusive. We know that capture of holds slowed down, and we know that technical services slowed down. We know that the system statistics slowed but were still well within acceptable range. One library reported being kicked out of Circulation.
3.2.1 testing - Scripts and comments are being received. Thanks to those of you testing the new release.
Upgrade date – we cannot schedule an exact date until the purge is complete. However, we are targeting the first three weeks of May and hope to start the upgrade on a Tuesday night and finish on a Wednesday morning. Naturally we always strive to minimize downtime when the library is open. However, this is a BIG upgrade. Libraries should be familiar with offline operations at their site. It is a good time to review the procedures.
ROGER’S RETURN (WE HOPE):
The optimistic projection for Roger Anderson’s return after gall bladder removal is Tuesday, April 21. Here’s hoping!
CCS MEETINGS NEXT WEEK:
Mon, 4/20, 1:30, Winnetka-Northfield: OPAC Review Task Force
Thursday, April 9, 2009
CCS News
APRIL 10, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Easter Sunday. All the libraries are closed Easter Sunday, April 12. The Computer Room will be closed as well. As is our usual practice, we will rebuild the bibliographic indexes on Easter Sunday. Workflows and iBistro will be down from 6pm Saturday night and will come up again shortly after midnight on Monday morning. (We have a notification on iBistro and will have the “the catalog is down” page in place.) If the indexing finishes earlier, we will bring up the catalog earlier. Notices and reports that we normally run on Sunday night and early Monday morning will run, however, some could be possibly be delayed until late on Monday morning.
Inactive Holds Purge Test April 14 (Tuesday). We are continuing the long and laborious purge process. We will be conducting a short test Tuesday, April 14 from 8:30 to 9:00 in the morning. The objective of this test is to see if purging inactive holds has a noticeable effect on response time when the production system is up. We really do not know until we test. If the purge process has little effect on response time, then we can schedule some additional purges in the mornings before the libraries open as well as in the night between other reports. Completion of the purge process is a requirement of the 3.2.1 upgrade.
ROGER ANDERSON UPDATE:
Roger had his gall bladder removed last Sunday. He is recovering at home and hopes to be back by the end of next week, but won’t know more till he’s seen his Doctor Monday.
SERIES CHANGES IN THE CCS DATABASE:
Last year, LC & the PCC decided to implement the MARBI’s proposal which made the 440 field obsolete. Series would continue to be traced, but in a slightly different fashion. Since 440’s are now considered obsolete and since CCS usually re-indexes on Easter because all the libraries are closed, we thought it would be a good time to change these series.
After Sunday’s re-indexing, all series should be tagged with a 490 / 8XX combination. For a title series, use the 490 1/830 combination, and for author/title type series, use the 490 1/800 combination.
Enough of this cataloging jargon. What does all this mean for the average database searcher? Things really haven’t changed much. Searching for series within the CCS database remains the same. But for those searchers, who do keyword searches using MARC tags, then you would have to remember to use an {830} instead of a {440} (for example, “ Childhood of famous Americans {830}”).
Virginia R. Seward
CCS Authorities Librarian
[Editor’s note: There will be an essay test on this item Monday AM.]
CCS MEETING NEXT WEEK:
Mon., 4/13, noon, Jameson’s: Technical Group Chairs/Continuing Education Steering Committee Joint Working Lunch
Wed., 4/15, 9:30, Prospect Heights: SCRAP
Wed., 4/15, 10:00, CCS: Executive Committee
Thur., 4/16, 9:30, Dundee: ILL
APRIL 10, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Easter Sunday. All the libraries are closed Easter Sunday, April 12. The Computer Room will be closed as well. As is our usual practice, we will rebuild the bibliographic indexes on Easter Sunday. Workflows and iBistro will be down from 6pm Saturday night and will come up again shortly after midnight on Monday morning. (We have a notification on iBistro and will have the “the catalog is down” page in place.) If the indexing finishes earlier, we will bring up the catalog earlier. Notices and reports that we normally run on Sunday night and early Monday morning will run, however, some could be possibly be delayed until late on Monday morning.
Inactive Holds Purge Test April 14 (Tuesday). We are continuing the long and laborious purge process. We will be conducting a short test Tuesday, April 14 from 8:30 to 9:00 in the morning. The objective of this test is to see if purging inactive holds has a noticeable effect on response time when the production system is up. We really do not know until we test. If the purge process has little effect on response time, then we can schedule some additional purges in the mornings before the libraries open as well as in the night between other reports. Completion of the purge process is a requirement of the 3.2.1 upgrade.
ROGER ANDERSON UPDATE:
Roger had his gall bladder removed last Sunday. He is recovering at home and hopes to be back by the end of next week, but won’t know more till he’s seen his Doctor Monday.
SERIES CHANGES IN THE CCS DATABASE:
Last year, LC & the PCC decided to implement the MARBI’s proposal which made the 440 field obsolete. Series would continue to be traced, but in a slightly different fashion. Since 440’s are now considered obsolete and since CCS usually re-indexes on Easter because all the libraries are closed, we thought it would be a good time to change these series.
After Sunday’s re-indexing, all series should be tagged with a 490 / 8XX combination. For a title series, use the 490 1/830 combination, and for author/title type series, use the 490 1/800 combination.
Enough of this cataloging jargon. What does all this mean for the average database searcher? Things really haven’t changed much. Searching for series within the CCS database remains the same. But for those searchers, who do keyword searches using MARC tags, then you would have to remember to use an {830} instead of a {440} (for example, “ Childhood of famous Americans {830}”).
Virginia R. Seward
CCS Authorities Librarian
[Editor’s note: There will be an essay test on this item Monday AM.]
CCS MEETING NEXT WEEK:
Mon., 4/13, noon, Jameson’s: Technical Group Chairs/Continuing Education Steering Committee Joint Working Lunch
Wed., 4/15, 9:30, Prospect Heights: SCRAP
Wed., 4/15, 10:00, CCS: Executive Committee
Thur., 4/16, 9:30, Dundee: ILL
Thursday, April 2, 2009
CCS News
APRIL 3, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Inactive Holds purging – This process is continuing and we are 1/3 finished. The holds purge is now a little more challenging as it is taking at least 4 hours to remove 300,000 inactive holds. This is the reason why the halt and run was needed on Monday morning. This doubles our previous time and so we will be purging less each day. Why does this happen? Sirsi did not quite know, but it seems to be related to the fact that more recent holds still have items attached. Older inactive holds may be for items that have been withdrawn and thus are purged from the database faster.
Testing – thank you for testing with us. It is very important that you test the normal functions as well as new features. We want to be sure the daily routine works well.
Options – the following options have been turned on in the TEST server:
Workflows – checkout/renew for full loan period if card is expiring sooner
Trap hold with first available copy
iBistro - there is a renew button in review my account. You can see the number of “unseen renewals” in iBistro
Family Card – This option is turned on for the system. But there is some configuration that needs to be done to turn this on for any individual library. If you are interested in testing this option, please let us know. We can also test this after our go live date.
Hold Wrapper printing – this is a new feature. It was available as soon as we installed the new release. You need to configure this much the same as configuring receipt printers. We are still trying to get the printers working at some libraries and at CCS with this feature.
Test Server Software Upgrade – Patch Cluster 3 has been installed on both the Test Unicorn Database server and the Test iBistro server.
April 12 – Easter Weekend – the computer room is closed and the libraries are closed. We are planning to reindex the database from closing on Saturday night through Sunday evening.
LIBRARY CLOSING:
Winnetka-Northfield will be closed until 1:00 PM on Friday, April 3, 2009 for a staff meeting. The library will open at 1:00 PM and remain open until 5:00 PM.
STAFF ABSENCES NEXT WEEK:
Roger Anderson, Bob Barth, Richard Shurman and Linda Zaleski will be in Dallas next Sunday through Wednesday for the Sirsidynix users conference.
CCS MEETINGS NEXT WEEK:
None! (Executive Committee will meet 4/15 and ILL 4/16, a week later than usual in both cases.)
APRIL 3, 2009
FROM THE COMPUTER ROOM:
Inactive Holds purging – This process is continuing and we are 1/3 finished. The holds purge is now a little more challenging as it is taking at least 4 hours to remove 300,000 inactive holds. This is the reason why the halt and run was needed on Monday morning. This doubles our previous time and so we will be purging less each day. Why does this happen? Sirsi did not quite know, but it seems to be related to the fact that more recent holds still have items attached. Older inactive holds may be for items that have been withdrawn and thus are purged from the database faster.
Testing – thank you for testing with us. It is very important that you test the normal functions as well as new features. We want to be sure the daily routine works well.
Options – the following options have been turned on in the TEST server:
Workflows – checkout/renew for full loan period if card is expiring sooner
Trap hold with first available copy
iBistro - there is a renew button in review my account. You can see the number of “unseen renewals” in iBistro
Family Card – This option is turned on for the system. But there is some configuration that needs to be done to turn this on for any individual library. If you are interested in testing this option, please let us know. We can also test this after our go live date.
Hold Wrapper printing – this is a new feature. It was available as soon as we installed the new release. You need to configure this much the same as configuring receipt printers. We are still trying to get the printers working at some libraries and at CCS with this feature.
Test Server Software Upgrade – Patch Cluster 3 has been installed on both the Test Unicorn Database server and the Test iBistro server.
April 12 – Easter Weekend – the computer room is closed and the libraries are closed. We are planning to reindex the database from closing on Saturday night through Sunday evening.
LIBRARY CLOSING:
Winnetka-Northfield will be closed until 1:00 PM on Friday, April 3, 2009 for a staff meeting. The library will open at 1:00 PM and remain open until 5:00 PM.
STAFF ABSENCES NEXT WEEK:
Roger Anderson, Bob Barth, Richard Shurman and Linda Zaleski will be in Dallas next Sunday through Wednesday for the Sirsidynix users conference.
CCS MEETINGS NEXT WEEK:
None! (Executive Committee will meet 4/15 and ILL 4/16, a week later than usual in both cases.)
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