Illiad International Conference Report by Brenda Wright

On March 19-21, 2013, Brenda Wright attended the ILLiad International Conference in Virginia Beach, VA. The following is her report on the conference and the various ILLiad function topics covered:

PRECONFERENCE             March 19

I attended two three-hour workshops during the preconference:

Super Easy Customizations for ILLiad Print and Email Templates

Print and email templates are used for sending email notifications of various types, as well as pull slips and other printed items.  They are customizable and I was particularly pleased to participate in this workshop as this is something I’ve wanted to do. 

The first part of the workshop dealt with print templates, how they are processed and how to edit them.  The second part dealt mainly with email templates.

ILLiad Top ten since 8

Since the issuance of ILLiad v. 8, numerous improvements have been added in subsequent upgrades.  This workshop covered the ten most popular – and/or controversial – additions to ILLiad.

1.        Modified data export and new templates for printing. 

Basically, the major improvement was made by changing the data sources from .dbf files to .xls.  This makes it easier to identify content of a particular field.

2.       PDF support in Odyssey lending.

PDF articles can be sent electronically without having to convert them to .tif for sending in Odyssey.

3.        Lending updates from the request form.

“Mark found” and “mark found scan now” available on the lending form, which eliminates extra steps in sending articles.

4.       Article Exchange workflow.

This enables direct delivery of articles or scanned documents to non-Odyssey libraries using OCLC’s Article Exchange add-on.  We do not currently use Article Exchange but I am now convinced we should.

5.       User defined fields.

This option gives us the ability to add fields to capture local data as necessary.

6.       Unicode compliance.

Imports non-Roman characters into ILLiad request forms.

7.       Improved overdue processing.

Email overdue notices are now generated automatically, according to a pre-determined schedule each day.  This has been controversial with some folks, but I personally like it.  The one possible flaw for me is that it does not take into account that an item’s status may be “returned”; that is, already on the way back.  However, it does notify the borrower that the item has not been received, which may indicate a shipping problem which needs to be looked into.

8.       Email templates housed in Customization Manager.

This is an option.  Email templates are presently housed on the C drive of each workstation, meaning that editing has to be done on each workstation.  I have not yet started to convert the templates, but plan to as a summer project. 

9.       Server addons

These are locally customized editing and querying features.  I have no current plans to use this option, but it is available when I do.

10.   Mobile styles for web forms

A full set of web pages is available for use on mobile devices.

CONFERENCE                     MARCH 20

Keynote speaker

"Strategies for Sustainability: Resource Sharing in the Digital World"

Liz Bishoff

Get It Now - Pay for it with OCLC's ILL Fee Management

This workshop introduced “Get it now”, an unmediated article delivery service, which is almost instantaneous for the patron.  It is not, however, free.   Costs – ranging from $5-50 per article - are billed through IFM, which is the money management system built into ILLiad.  It is something we may want to consider in the future, but probably would not need right now. 

E-books; who wants what and how to ILL them?

This presentation discussed patrons’ expressed need for E-books and their deliverability through ILL. ILL patron preferences for E-books were gathered using the ILLiad ItemInfo field. The first half of this presentation shares findings from data, accumulated for one semester, that include e-book preference by patron status, subject area, year of publication, etc. The second half of the presentation shares an analysis of those titles that patrons expressed an interest in seeing in E-book form. The availability of E-book version, the possibility of ILL, and strengths and weaknesses of the current procedure are discussed. The presentation concludes by proposing a possible E-book ILL model which may satisfy both ILL practitioners and patrons.  I found this interesting but it failed to address the major roadblock to ebook lending – licensing restrictions.

Atlas Update

Atlas Systems is the parent company for our ILLiad software.  This presentation introduced the newest update for ILLiad 8.4, which will be available in mid-May.  These include:

·         Support for 15 lenders in the lending string.

·         Lending fees (if any) to show in Policy Directory.

·         Overdue Processing will have added flexibility over version 8.3.

·         “Get it Now” addon will be available.

·         Article Exchange upload and download via web services.

·         More flexibility re overdue notices.

ILLiad 8.4 is scheduled to be available on May 21, 2013.  As of July 1, 2013, ILLiad 8.1 and 8.2 will no longer be supported.  We are presently on 8.3 and I plan to upgrade to 8.4 over the summer.

Best Practices for Overdue Processing

The latest update from ILLiad includes the above-mentioned automatic overdue notices which have generated so much controversy.  This presentation discussed the pro and cons of the new system and offered suggestions for dealing with it.

CONFERENCE MARCH 21

OCLC Update

Get it Now

•Provides just-in-time fulfillment of journal content

•Augments an ILL operation

•Developed in cooperation with the California State University System and the IDS Project

•Over 9,000 journals and growing

•Adopted by over 160 campuses

•Fee per article only; no additional fees

•Mediated and unmediated versions

New IFM Report

Note: we currently do not use IFM, as we try to obtain our items for free, and seldom have to pay for anything.

Article Exchange

Article Exchange is simply a way to send articles via the Web without attaching the article to an email.  It saves several steps and I am interested in implementing it this summer.  The State Library of Florida uses this system and I am hoping to get a demonstration.

ILLiad Web Reports

·         Differences between ILLiad web reports and OCLC Statistics

·         How to export data from your web reports to Microsoft Excel

·         Tips for using Custom Search instead of web reports when needed

Update without Fear

ILLiad updates seem to come more frequently and are usually full of surprises.  This session covered best practices for dealing with updates, including the following:

·         Release schedule and how to plan around them.

·         End-of-life dates for ILLiad versions.

·         Preparing staff for updating.

As always, ILLiad International Conference gave me much to think about in terms of what we can do to enhance services for our students, faculty, and staff, as well as the lenders we interact with world-wide.  And, as usual, I appreciate the opportunity afforded me by the university to take advantage of this very helpful conference.