News

PressReader has shared with their community of library subscribers that their recent network outage caused by a malware attack. PressReader's Updates for users recounts the situation. PressReader said "At his stage, we do not see any evidence that customer data has been compromised..." Was my patron's data breached? No - SWAN patrons authenticate through OpenAthens to PressReader. OpenAthens only shares the patron barcode and confirmation of a pin match (not the pin data itself). No personal identifiable information is shared with resources connected via OpenAthens. OpenAthens is SWAN's...

The 22.03 release of Aspen Discovery is now live. This release includes the following improvements to searching: Searches are now case-insensitive, meaning you'll get the same results if you capitalize or don't capitalize your keywords Better handling of possessive searches that include apostrophes (e.g. devil's food cake) Better handling of stop words The focus for the next few releases will be on enhancements to search, facets, and record grouping. View the 22.03 release notes.

---------------Update at 7:00 a.m. on 4/18--------------- Despite some report delays, the rebuild has concluded successfully. Please resume work online, but be aware that we will experience report delays throughout this morning. Please let us know if you encounter any record issues. ---------------Original Posting--------------- SWAN is planning a Symphony database rebuild on Sunday, April 17th 2022 to accommodate our annual system maintenance. The database rebuild will begin the evening of Saturday, April 16th at 9:00 p.m., and will extend throughout the day on Sunday, April 17th. During the...

SirsiDynix will be performing scheduled maintenance to their global data center network infrastructure on March 9 starting at 10 PM CST. Maintenance is expected to last approximately one hour. During this time the following services will be impacted: BLUEcloud Analytics BLUEcloud Central BLUEcloud Mobile Enterprise/Portfolio During this outage fines payment via Enterprise will also be affected, but it will not affect Aspen services. BLUEcloud scheduled tasks including BCA reports will not complete during the maintenance window; they will kick off at the next scheduled day and time.

In case you missed the announcement in our February monthly newsletter, we wanted to share ByWater's February 2022 Librarian of the Month. Yes, it is our own Tara Wood, Manager of User Experience! As shared by the ByWater team - Tara has done an amazing job doing Usability Studies, Accessibility Reviews, and coordinating SWAN Member libraries as they implement Aspen Discovery. The Usability Studies she does with her libraries help to inform Aspen's development and the Accessibility Review she performed has helped to ensure that Aspen is available to more library patrons. First and foremost...

SWAN has negotiated a group discount for Comics Plus from Library Pass. Comics Plus is a database of new and backlist comics and graphic novels from about 125 publishers with unlimited access and simultaneous use. Patrons can read comics and graphic novels on the Library Pass platform on smartphones, tablets, or within a web browser. This discount is available for public libraries. The details and pricing are available on the SWAN Discounts page. A Comics Plus Live Demo will be held on April 13, 2022, at 11:00 AM.

We've had a few questions from members about what is happening on the March 8th soft launch for Aspen. Here is a recap of the steps that SWAN will take that date, and what your library should do between now and April 26th, when Enterprise is no longer available. SWAN updates March 8th Enterprise banner SWAN will post the following banner to all Enterprise catalogs for all libraries, directing patrons to your Aspen catalog and informing them that they can use both catalogs until April 26th. List copying in Enterprise SWAN will add the ability to copy lists to the Cohort 2 Enterprise catalogs...

Due to weather, we expect several closures today. As we hear about closures, we will attempt to update libraries on this news post. If you library is closed, please notify: RAILS Delivery Submit SWAN help ticket to notify us of closure No policy changes in the system will be made for temporary weather related closures. We recommend posting information on your library website regarding this closure. For libraries live on our Aspen catalog, you can update your catalog banners to alert your patrons. Libraries closed 2/17/2022 Beecher Bellwood Blue Island - closing early Bridgeview Evergreen Park...

SWAN is happy to announce plans to move forward with the BLUEcloud Cataloging pilot project slated for late Spring 2022. We expect the pilot will last about 3 months. BLUEcloud Cataloging offers robust and intuitive templates that will help to streamline the manual input of pre-cats. We are currently developing training materials but want to put the word out, so you have time to think if your library wants to participate in this project. Things to consider: Staff who participates in this project is expected to know how to create pre-cats in WorkFlows. This is not a cataloging training, and you...

The Aspen Discovery 22.02 release is live. The highlights of this release include: Improved handling of On Order statuses for Overdrive titles. Improved handling of search terms that end with a question mark, i.e. "do androids dream of electric sheep?" Allow better tracking of holds placed in Aspen, by patrons and by staff through masquerade mode, for statistics analysis. The focus for the next few releases will be on enhancements to search, facets, and record grouping. You can view the full 22.02 release notes.

The pricing for the SWAN group-purchase of EBSCO subscription database package was presented at the Committee of the Whole membership meeting last week on February 1st. That pricing is included in the meeting packet, and I have pulled out that pricing which is linked directly to the PDF below. /system/files/Public/documents/legacy/EBSCO/EBSCO%20FY23%202022-02-01.pdf This group purchase is going into its 3rd year renewal, which starts July 1, 2022. If you would like to learn more about this subscription database package, you can read about it on the SWAN Support page: https://support...

SirsiDynix has announced the next release of BLUEcloud Central (22.02.00) for 9:00 p.m. on Wed., Feb 9, 2022. This release includes added functionality for BLUEcloud Circulation. We will update this news post as soon as the release has been verified and we can provide details. A Member's Update session has been scheduled for Fri., Feb. 11th from 1:00 - 2:00 p.m. Register to attend on L2. A recording will be posted.

We have completed the processing of the 2021 NCOA address verification. In mid December, 2021, 970,826 patron records were sent for processing through the National Change of Address (NCOA). This process returned 107,427 or 11% with a changed address. Please review your next steps in reviewing these records on our National Change of Address (NCOA) support page. We ask libraries to review these records and complete one of the following: Verify and update these patron records (remove NCOA 2021 note) if the new address is in your service area Reach out to a colleague if the patron has moved to...

Dear Libraries, I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season! Please submit topics for the upcoming year! DVD BOXSETS When patrons place holds on boxsets (especially TV series) they expect to receive the entire season, not disc 1 or any single disc. So, it’s worth the reminder that DVD Boxsets circulate with one barcode. This policy saves an enormous amount of time for everyone and ensures happy patrons and staff. If you know that your library still has some boxsets that were split into individual discs, make this a resolution for the year, and combine the discs to circulate together. For...

You may have recently received a message about an offer from OCLC to update WorldCat holdings using an export of MARC bibliographic data. This message may have come from OCLC or been forwarded from the Illinois State Library. We ask that you do not accept this offer. SWAN has a system in place to update holdings on behalf of our membership, and we are unsure how this process will mingle with our existing work. We will be examining this offer closely along with the other Illinois consortia who are using the same system for OCLC holdings maintenance. We hope to determine whether it can be...

The January 2022 (October- December) Quarterly Billing is complete, and the invoices and checks will be mailed shortly. Documentation is available to help guide member library staff through the Billing Summary sheet as well as the detail statement reports folder accessible in BlueCloud Analytics Shared Reports. Library Directors have been provided with BCA login credentials. If you are a Director and do not have access to the BCA reports, please open a ticket at help@swanlibraries.net. Below you will find a statistical evaluation of the billing quarter to help contextualize the data. It...

Thanks to everyone who attended the PayPal & Aspen Fines Payment Information Session today. As a reminder please complete the configuration form so we can set up your online fines payment in Aspen. SWAN will start configuring PayPal in Aspen on a rolling basis beginning February 1st. The session recording is also available for you to review. If you have any questions, please email help@swanlibraries.net.

The Aspen 22.01 release is live. This release includes the following SWAN member requests: Use 590 field a fallback to assign formats Improved color contrast validation Improvements to search results for search terms ending in a "?" Tomorrow (1/13), after the overnight processes run, you will see format facet improvements for library-of-things records. View the 22.01 release notes.

On Friday, January 7, 2022 we got news that the National Endowment for the Arts American Rescue Plan Act grant SWAN submitted was not selected. This grant would have provided SWAN libraries an opportunity to use a fully licensed Beanstack reading challenge software platform. Currently more than 48 of our public libraries are using Beanstack. We will be including a shared license to Beanstack for libraries that would like to use a SWAN instance, as part of the next budget for approval. If you would like to pursue an individual Beanstack license for your library, branded and managed by your...

All libraries that are not yet live on Aspen should complete the Aspen Configuration form by January 31st. Complete form Kickoff meeting recording and slides If you were unable to attend the Aspen Cohort 2 Kickoff Meeting, you can view the recording and slides, which include more information about the configuration options available to you. In addition, they cover a helpful "to do" list for your library to help you prepare for the switch to a new catalog. Trainings If you have not yet registered for the Aspen Administration trainings, you can find those on L2 and register now. The first Aspen...