Collaborative Networks - June 2016 Enhancements

Contribute Vendors to the Network Zone

Alma already provides a means for administrators of the Network Zone to push global information of a list of vendors to member institutions in the collaborative network. Members of a collaborative network can now share or edit global information about vendors managed in the Network Zone.

When a vendor manager at a member institution pushes new vendor information, or changed information about a shared vendor, to the Network Zone, that information is pushed to all member institutions the next time the Distribute Network Acquisition Changes to Members job is run on the Network Zone.

A vendor is uniquely identified by its code. When a vendor manager pushes vendor information to the Network Zone, or when the Network Zone pushes information to its member institutions, Alma creates a new vendor if a vendor with that code doesn't already exist. Otherwise, the new information overwrites the existing information in that vendor.

A vendor's code cannot be changed.

Each member institution continues to define local information for vendors, such as vendor accounts, EDI information, access providers, and vendor interfaces.

For information about contributing global information from a member institution to the Network Zone, see the marked sections in Sharing Vendor Information in a Network Zone.

For more information see the Shared Vendors - Ability to Contribute to NZ video.