Catalyst is delighted to join the Koha community in celebrating the release of Koha 24.11. This release contains 10 new features, 184 enhancements, and 647 bug and security fixes.
Every six months, the Koha community does a major release, such as Koha 24.11. Major releases are when most new features and enhancements are added to Koha and made available to libraries.
In this blog post, Alex Buckley, Catalyst Rōpū kohinga developer, has highlighted 16 enhancements available in Koha 24.11.
Check out the full Koha 24.11 release notes.
If you would like to try out the new version as you read along, head to the Catalyst Koha demo site.
16 new enhancements in Koha 24.11
Acquisitions
Automated MARC record ordering process - 34355
This new feature adds an alternative approach for automating your acquisition (purchasing) workflows! Some libraries use a process called EDIFACT to generate and upload order files to a vendor’s system. This is usually an order of resources for the library collection. When there is an invoice available, Koha will download and process it automatically.
With Koha 24.11 libraries can automatically create a new acquisition basket and multiple orderlines for a chosen set of records, driven by an uploaded MARC file.
How to use the automated MARC ordering process:
Step 1) Enable the new MarcOrderingAutomation system preference.
Step 2) Define mappings in the MarcFieldsToOrder and MarcItemFieldsToOrder sysprefs. These sysprefs both note example mappings which you copy/paste in and test with.
The purpose of the mappings is to tell Koha which MARC subfields (in the MARC file) it should automatically map to acquisition order values. For example, map the 975$p subfield to the orderline price in Koha.
Step 3) In the Administration module, click on the new ‘MARC order accounts’ link (highlighted yellow in the below screenshot) under ‘Acquisition parameters.'
Step 4) Create a new account.
- Choose which vendor and fund you want Koha to use to create the basket and orderlines for the uploaded MARC files.
- Define a ‘Download directory’ this tells the regular cronjob (an automated report) which folder on the Koha server it should search for MARC files to process. This would be the upload path used by the MARC staging tool: /var/lib/koha/<instancename>/tmp/koha_<instancename>_upload (you may need to get the instancename from your Koha support vendor if you don’t know it).
- The record matching settings on this new page are identical to the MARC file staging functionality already in Koha. You can read more about that in the Koha manual.
- Make sure you set ‘check for embedded item record data?’ to ‘yes’.
Step 5) Now we want to upload the MARC file. Navigate to the Cataloguing module > Stage records for import.
Step 6) Upload a file. You can download a MARC file to test this with on this bug report. Once you have uploaded the file, leave the rest of the page, you do not need to stage for import. The below screenshot highlights in yellow the only part of the page that you need to complete.
Step 7) Ask your Koha support vendor to configure the marc_ordering_process.pl cronjob to run on a regular basis.
Step 8) Once the marc_ordering_process.pl cronjob has run you will be able to see a new basket in the acquisitions module for the vendor that you defined in step #4 – the new basket is highlighted yellow in the below screenshot. It contains multiple bibliographic records and item records.
Step 9) Clicking on the basket name you will be able to see multiple order lines (showing in the Orders table), with prices populated from the MARC file using the mappings defined in step #2.
Step 10) If you click on a title link in the ‘Order’ column you can view the bibliographic record that Koha has created for you. Looking in the ‘Acquisitions details’ tab you’ll see it is populated with all the details of the basket and orderline that Koha has automatically made.
Cataloguing
OAI harvester - 35659
Koha can now harvest metadata from other the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata (OAI-PMH) repositories. Until 24.11 Koha was harvestable, but it was not possible to harvest into Koha from other systems. Now you can!
A scenario where this might be useful is, if your organisation had a DSpace installation, and you wanted to make the items available in Koha then you could use this enhancement for Koha to harvest from the DSpace OAI-PMH repository.
There's a new page in the Koha administration module - called OAI repositories - where libraries can define the details for the external OAI-PMH repositories to be harvested.
Then to make Koha actually harvest from the repositories that the library has defined you need to ask your Koha support vendor (or someone with server access) to schedule the new harvest_oai.pl cronjob (automated script) to run at a regular interval - for example nightly.
If you would like to be kept up-to-date about how the regular harvests are going then you can save your email address in the new OAI-PMH:HarvestEmailReport system preference to be emailed every time the harvest_oai.pl cronjob runs.
Amend MARC modification templates so control fields can be copied to subfields - 36515
This enhancement was sponsored by our partner library SCIS, Education Services Australia.
You can now:
- Make a MARC modification template work with control fields. Control fields are fields with a tag is less than 10. Learn more about control fields.
- Copy the content from a control field into a subfield. For example from the 001 control field to the 099$a subfield.
We envisage this enhancement will be very useful when importing MARC records from external systems into Koha. Why? Because some external systems store their internal ID in the 001 field, so having the ability to easily move that data into the 099$a subfield for future Koha reference would be very helpful.
Circulation
The booking feature, which was added to Koha 23.11 has had a lot of attention in Koha 24.11 with some great new enhancements to it!
Add bookable option on itemtypes - 35906
Up until now if you wanted to make item records bookable you had to individually enable that functionality for every item record. That is no longer the case in 24.11. Whilst you can continue to make individual item records bookable you can also make entire item types bookable as well!
There is now a new 'Bookable' checkbox visible on the edit item type page, where you can enable or disable the item type being bookable. In the below screenshot, we are making the 'Music' item type bookable.
Then on the Koha staff client when you navigate to any bibliographic record with at least one attached item record having the item type of 'music' then you will see a 'Bookings' tab visible automatically, as you can see in the below screenshot.
Add bookings to collect circulation report - 33736
It's now easier than ever to administer bookings in Koha. In 24.11 there is now a page that lists all the upcoming bookings, so librarians can check it for an upcoming date range and then know which items to fetch ready for the patrons to come and pick up their booked items.
You can find this new page linked as 'Bookings to collect' on the circulation home page of the Koha staff client - highlighted yellow in the below screenshot.
Add command-line utility to SFTP a file to a remote server - 36766 and add a reportID parameter to export_records.pl - 36770
Libraries in New Zealand, that want to share holdings information with Te Puna (the National Library union catalogue) need to have the ability to upload a MARC file to a different remote server. This feature exists to save time for libraries by automatically contributing MARC files.
Until this point that has been custom functionality. But now it is available to everyone in Koha 24.11. These two enhancements work hand in hand.
- A library can write a SQL report to generate a list of bibliographic numbers.
- This SQL report can then be run by the export_records.pl cronjob (automated job), which will be able to generate a MARC file for those bibliographic records.
- This MARC file can then be securely uploaded to a different remote server using the new sftp_file.pl cronjob.
These enhancements were co-sponsored by five Catalyst partner libraries: Horowhenua Libraries, Toi Ohomai Institute of Technology, Plant and Food Research Limited, Waitaki District Council, and South Taranaki District Council New Zealand. Learn more about the collaboration for these enhancements.
Add turn-around periods around bookings - 34440
Before 24.11 an item could have back-to-back bookings on it, without any time for transfers or maintenance in between.
It's now possible for libraries to add turn-around time either before or after a booking. This is done through the Circulation and fine rules.
A pre-processing window and a post-processing window can be set in two different ways:
- set a default for all bookings. In the below screenshot a pre-processing window of three days and a post-processing window of 3 days is defined in the 'Default checkout, hold and return policy' table.
2. set item type level processing windows. For example in the 'Default holds and bookings policies by item type' table highlighted below, the Books item type is configured to have a two-day pre-processing window and a three-day post-processing window.
Now when you go to place a booking on a 'Book' item type, the calendar pop-up for placing the booking indicates a red highlight on the calendar two days before the booking start date, and an orange highlight for the three days after the booking end date.
MARC bibliographic data support
Simplify MARC21 fast add framework - 36055
In Koha, a bibliographic framework is a template of MARC fields and subfields to simplify data entry.
Koha comes with a range of standard frameworks that can be found in Administration > MARC bibliographic framework.
The fast-Add Framework is designed to be a cut-down template of essential MARC fields that is quick for non-cataloguers to add bibliographic records to the Koha catalogue. However, over time unnecessary and obsolete MARC fields and subfields were added.
The Koha community has addressed this by making the default fast-add framework much shorter and tidier again. A range of unnecessary MARC subfields have been removed. If you use the default fast-add framework please test this before cataloguing, next time you upgrade,
Notices
We should notify an assignee when they are assigned a ticket - 36758
Catalogue concerns is a feature that enables staff and library users to report comments or concerns about catalogue records. Essentially, this is a way to track tasks about catalogue records that need updating. We're excited to see how people build up on this to meet other use cases.
A feature came in with Koha 24.05 adding basic ticket management system functionality to Koha.
One of the workflows in this feature enables someone to assign a catalogue concern to a library staff member to fix. Koha provided a page where the backlog of tasks was visible but did not yet have messaging functionality. In 24.11 Koha will send an email notice to the library staff member who is assigned a cataloguing concern to fix, and thankfully does not send an email if you assign tasks to yourself! This is implemented as a new standard notice for Koha TICKET_ASSIGNED.
As with all notices in Koha, you can customise the content of this email notice in the Tools module under 'Notices and slips.'
Add the option to 'Reset to default' in the notices editor - 36815
Standard Koha notices are often enhanced at Koha upgrade time. It's now possible for libraries to reset out-of-the-box Koha notices that they have customised, in order to benefit from the notice changes in the upgrade.
As long as a notice comes with Koha out-of-the-box, (if it's not a completely custom notice that you have created from scratch) then you will see a 'View default' button when viewing the content of the notice - highlighted yellow in the below screenshot.
Clicking on the 'View default' button pop-up loads showing you what the standard Koha notice content looks like - see the below screenshot.
If you click on the 'Copy to template' button then Koha will replace the custom notice content with the new standard content.
As the below screenshot shows, the highlighted yellow email content for the ODUE notice has now replaced our old, customised 'Test Koha 24.11 ODUE notice content', with what was in the pop-up.
OPAC
Add 'cite' option to detail page in OPAC - 14670
The Koha OPAC now provides a 'Cite' link in the grey tools box on the right-hand side of a biblio detail page - highlighted yellow in the below screenshot.
This link loads a pop-up window displaying a citation in 4 different formats: APA, Chicago, Harvard, and MLA.
Patrons
Add a preferred_name field to patrons - 28633
Do you have library patrons whose preferred name is different to their firstname? If so, this enhancement will come in handy. It introduces a new 'Preferred name' input field when adding or editing patron accounts.
If a preferred name is saved, then Koha will prioritise displaying that name throughout Koha, as you can see highlighted in the below screenshot. If you don't save a preferred name that's not a problem, Koha will just continue to display the patron's first name.
Force password change for new patrons entered by staff - 33462
This enhancement makes Koha more secure by enforcing password reset on the first login. A new system preference has been added to Koha called ForcePasswordResetWhenSetByStaff.
When this syspref is set to 'Force' the library patron will be forced to reset their password the first time they login. Currently this is only for user accounts that are manually created by staff.
It's important, if you want to use this syspref, that you also set the EnableExpiredPasswordReset syspref to 'Enable'. That enables your users to reset their own password.
So now, when a patron logs in for the first time they will see a message informing them they need to reset their password and a 'Reset your password' link where they can reset their password. This is shown in the screenshot below.
As with most things in Koha this feature is very customisable! If you want to exempt certain patron categories from having to reset their password on first login, that's possible too.
When editing a patron category you will now see a new 'Force new patron password reset' setting. You can use this dropdown setting to choose whether to make the patron category you are editing:
- 'Follow system preference ForcePasswordResetWhenSetByStaff' - so if you set the syspref to 'Force' then this patron category will automatically enforce that global rule.
- 'Force' - enforce all manually created patrons of this category must reset their password on the first login.
- 'Don't force' - don't enforce all manually created patrons of this category must reset their password on the first login.
Add guarantee to patron categories with category type 'Staff' - 36169
This was an enhancement sponsored by our partner library at Waitaki District Council.
You can now add child patron accounts (as guarantees) to your library staff accounts. This means your library staff can see their children's checkouts from their own staff account, rather than being forced to manage a second patron account, defined as an 'adult', for viewing their children's accounts. In other words, this enhancement means there are fewer things for the library staff to manage!
In 24.11, when editing a 'staff' patron account in Koha you will see a new 'Add guarantee' link in the toolbar (highlighted yellow in the below screenshot). Clicking on that will load a page where you can add the child guarantee account to Koha.
Rest API
Add public routes for lists - 28965
Over the last few years, the Koha community have added a number of API endpoints to Koha. API endpoints are just pieces of code that other applications can run to fetch data or affect a change in Koha.
API endpoints are particularly useful for discovery platforms, for example, VuFind, to fetch and display a wide range of Koha data in the discovery interface.
In 24.11 the community added a function for other systems to fetch all Koha public lists through a new public list endpoint. The below screenshot shows an example of the data that this endpoint retrieves, in this case, it is retrieving the name and ID of a 'Spring 2024' public list.
Searching
Add option to create a shareable link for item searches - 14322
When libraries use the Koha staff client item search this simple enhancement enables them to share the results of their search easily with their colleagues.
The user simply clicks 'copy shareable link' at the top of the item search result page (highlighted yellow in the below screenshot). When clicked it saves a URL to your clipboard which you can then paste into an email or message to someone else! Sometimes this kind of enhancement sounds small, but saves many clicks for those libraries that need the function often.
You can read more about the 10 new features, 184 enhancements and 647 bug and security fixes of the 24.11 release on the Koha Community website.
Catalyst Rōpū kohinga
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