Transcript Benefits of NCIP in VDX John Bodfish Senior Technical Designer VUGANZ September 18, 2006

Benefits of NCIP in VDX
John Bodfish
Senior Technical Designer
VUGANZ
September 18, 2006
NCIP Review
•
•
•
NCIP is the NISO Circulation Interchange Protocol,
issued in 2002.
Designed to support Circulation/Interlibrary Loan
interaction (amongst other areas).
Consists of two parts:
1. Protocol that specifies data structures, services and
messages
2. Implementation Profile 1 which specifies XML for message
encoding, UNICODE for character encoding, etc.
•
The standard looks to Application Profiles (such as the
Circ/ILL profiles implemented in VDX) to specify what
services and options are used by a specific
application.
Current workflow
Req
Created
Item
Marked
Returned
Item
Received
Borrower
ILS
Borrower
VDX
Loan Request Life Cycle Manual
Bib Record Created
Lender
VDX
Item
Delivered to
Pickup Loc
Picklist
Printed
Answer
Will Supply
Patron
Checks Out
Item
Patron Notified
Item Checked In
Patron
Returns
Item
Item
Shipped
Item Marked
Checked In
Item Checked out to
Borrower
Item Checked In
Lender
ILS
Item
Retrieved
From Shelf
Hold Placed
Incoming Request
ILL-Request message
Requesting
Library
Supplying Library
NCIP Request Item message
to place a hold
ILL Answer message
If an item is on the shelf a hold is placed on it and a “Will
Supply” response is sent to the requesting library.
If an item will be available before the expiry date a hold is placed
on it and a ‘Hold-placed’ response is sent.
If none of the matching items will be available before the expiry
date a ‘Retry Request’ response is sent.
If no matching items exist an ‘Unavailable’ reply is sent.
Circulation
System
Pick List
Automation Benefits
• VDX locates available copies
automatically.
• VDX notifies the requester that you will or
won’t be supplying the item
– Your peers benefit from faster response times.
• Round-the-clock operation unattended by
staff.
The Role of DocFind Responder
• VDX attempts to locate a matching title in
the local catalog using Z39.50.
• Searches are done using standard
numbers such as ISBN, UPC, ANBN, BN,
LCCN, OCLC and other system control
numbers.
• Therefore it’s worthwhile to have those fields
indexed and searchable by your Z39.50
server.
Ship
Requesting
Library
Supplying Library
Shipped message
with due date
NCIP Check Out Item
message
Circulation
System
Available items are retrieved from the shelf and routed to the ILL
desk (because the pick list has that as the destination).
On-loan items are routed to the ILL desk by the circ system when
returned by borrowers.
Automation Benefits
• VDX lets your circulation system calculate:
– loan periods, which may vary by:
• item type, e.g. printed versus audio-visual
materials, or
• requesting library.
– due dates, automatically accounting for:
• holidays, semester calendar, etc.
• reserves placed on specific items.
Receive
Received message
NCIP Accept Item
message
Pickup
Notice
Requesting
Library
Supplying Library
Circulation
System
You can use the lender’s barcode, assign a temporary one, or the circ system can create one
automatically, depending on the capabilities of your circulation system.
Your circulation system will be given a due date derived from the lender’s due date.
Automation Benefits
• Temporary bibliographic record is created
with whatever data is in the request.
• Temporary item record is created with the
item’s medium type (e.g. book, audio tape,
etc.)
• The item is put on hold for the user so that
the user will be notified in whatever
fashion is usual for local holds.
Return
Requesting
Library
NCIP Check In Item
message
Circulation
System
Supplying Library
Returned message
Automation Benefits
• Assurance that items are discharged from
local user’s account.
Check In
Requesting
Library
Supplying Library
Checked In message
NCIP Check In Item
message
Circulation
System
Automation Benefits
• Elimination of duplicate work
– Staff don’t have to check items in to both VDX
and your circulation system.
Renew
Renew message
Requesting
Library
Supplying Library
Renew Answer message
Renewal
Notice
NCIP Renew Item
message
Circulation
System
NCIP Renew Item
message
Circulation
System
The requesting library’s VDX uses the supplier’s new due
date as the basis for the due date given the circ system,
which it adjusts exactly as it did when the item was first
received.
Automation Benefits
• Supplier’s circulation system can:
– determine renewability based on current
requirements, e.g. local holds and
reservations, and
– determine loan period and renewal due date
as before during the Ship action.
• Round-the-clock operation unattended by
staff.
Cancel
Cancel message
Requesting
Library
Supplying Library
Cancel Reply – Yes
message
NCIP Cancel Request Item
message
Circulation
System
Automation Benefits
• Round-the-clock operation unattended by
staff.
Request Status
NCIP Lookup Item
message
Requesting
Library
ZPortal
Circulation
System
ZPortal invokes the Lookup Item service for transactions
where the item has been received but not yet returned.
Such items will now indiciate they are “Available for Pickup” if
the user has not yet picked them up from the hold shelf.
Automation Benefits
• “Truer” information for the user because
ZPortal now “knows” whether the user has
checked the item out or not yet picked it
up.
• Round-the-clock operation unattended by
staff.
NCIP Automation: Requesting
Libraries
• When receiving:
– Creates temporary bibliographic & item records.
– Puts the item on hold for the patron.
• When patron checks their requests:
– Checks local circ status to distinguish items on the
hold shelf from items they’ve checked out.
• When patron requests a renewal:
– Automatically updates circ with new due date if lender
agrees to the renewal request.
• When returning:
– Ensures the item is discharged.
NCIP Automation: Supplying
Libraries
• When requests arrive:
– Locates available copies and places holds on them,
so the circ system’s pick list includes these items.
• When shipping:
– Checks items out; due date assigned by circ system.
• When renewal requests arrive:
– Tries the renewal in the circ system, so local circ rules
control whether the renewal is granted, and if so what
the new due date is.
• When requests are cancelled:
– Cancels the hold in the local circ system.
Note: These Are Benefits of VDX
• Your library must be using VDX for you to
benefit from these NCIP features.
– VDX is invoking NCIP services directly with
your library’s circulation system.
– VDX does not invoke NCIP services for you at
the peer library.
– Therefore it doesn’t matter whether the peer
library – that’s requesting from you or lending
to you – is using VDX; you still get the
benefits even if they don’t. 
VDX is the Initiator
• All NCIP messaging is initiated by VDX
rather than by the circulation system
because at this time all NCIP circulation
implementations are being built to respond
to NCIP messages rather than initiate
them.
And It’s Simple
• Screen changes
– Added item barcode on Ship & Receive screens
• Configuration
– Create a one or more Naming Authorities and add IDs
for your VDX locations.
– Define the NCIP Responder (e.g. network address)
and link its into the locations it serves.
– Select which set of services to use.
– Enter pseudo-user barcodes for your peer libraries.
NCIP Authentication
• Patron authentication against local library
systems.
• Similar to existing authentication methods
such as 3M SIP.
• At the moment no circ vendors appear to
be adding this capability.
Testing and Rollout
• Phase 1 tests messages independent of the full
request cycle
– This can be done in an hour, but so far it has always
taken longer.
• Phase 2 tests the full request cycle
– Including Z39.50 search, printing of picklists, check
out to users, etc.
• Both phases are completed by staff at OCLC
PICA and the circ vendor.
• Successful completion of these 2 phases allows
us to proceed to beta testing with libraries in the
field.
How to Talk to a (Circ) Vendor
• Ask them if they support the Circ/ILL or the DCB-3 NCIP
Application Area Profiles.
– More specificly than “NCIP support”, they must support the 7
services we use, and the optional fields within them that we
require.
• If they say yes, ask them what libraries are using it.
Contact those libraries to confirm this and pass us that
information.
– This will help us understand the context in which they have
implemented NCIP.
• If they say no tell them how important it is to you and
give them a copy of our Circ/ILL Application Profile from
the customer website.
– This Application Profile tells them all they need to know to
ensure their application will interoperate with VDX.