Alma January 2025 Release Notes
Upcoming Issues to Note
Elevating Your Experience with Our Service Excellence Program
We are committed to enhancing your experience through our Service Excellence Program, driven by your valuable feedback and support needs.
Key initiatives for the upcoming year include:
- Improved visibility into cases requiring development support.
- Estimated timelines for issue resolutions.
- Consistent updates: Regular status updates on cases at set intervals.
To achieve these goals, we are launching the Defect Backlog Resolution Project for Alma and PrimoVE in collaboration with the ELUNA and IGELU Steering Committees.Resolved issues will be documented in the release notes.
We will keep you informed of our progress and appreciate your ongoing feedback. We look forward to continually enhancing your experience.
Features
Resolved Known Issues for the New Manage Patron Service UI
January 2025Fulfillment and Resource Sharing (Updated - December 17, 2024)
A number of known issues in the new Manage Patron Service UI were resolved. For more information see Managing Patron Services.
New Physical Books Titles Network View Dashboard Now Available
January 2025 Analytics and InsightsURM-227817
The new out-of-the-box Physical Books Titles Network View data visualization dashboard is now available under the Alma > Consortia > Data Visualization folder. It is designed to provide the main office of a Network Zone with an overview of its single copies of physical items across the network to facilitate retention and deselection processes.
Physical Books Titles Network View
It displays information about the physical books in your consortia and contains the following tabs:
- Overview – an overview of physical book titles, which presents useful information regarding unique titles in your consortia
- Unique Titles Details – information on physical book titles that are held by only one institution in the network, which can be useful when preparing retention plans
- Limited Titles Details – information on physical book titles that are held by up to 3 institutions in the network, which can be useful when preparing retention plans
- Multiple Titles Details – information on physical book titles that are held by more than 3 institutions in the network, which can be useful for deselection processes
Due to the large amount of data processed by this dashboard, we highly recommend filtering the dashboard to limit the data within the analysis.
Additional Enhancements
- January 2025 Analytics and InsightsURM-229360 The PO Approval Date and Time field was added to the following locations. It displays the date and time that the PO was approved.
- E-Inventory > Portfolio PO Line
- E-Inventory > Electronic Collection PO Line
- E-Inventory > Cost Usage > Cost Usage POL
- Funds Expenditure > PO Line
- Physical Items > PO Line
- Purchase Requests > PO Line
- January 2025 Analytics and InsightsURM-227062 The Event Library Unit dimension was added to the System Events subject area. It contains fields about the library in which the event occurred. Previously, it was only possible to report on the institution in which the event occurred. For more information, see Event Library Unit.
- January 2025 Analytics and InsightsURM-225324 The following enhancements were implemented for fields in Analytics Usage Tracking > Query Details:
- The Query Type Group field was renamed to Query Type and its possible values were enhanced to include the following:
- Classic Report
- Classic Dashboard
- Data Visualization Workbook
- SOAP API Calls
- None (includes support queries such as report prompts and dashboard prompts)
Reports including the original field are not affected, unless the field was saved as a filter with one of the original values. In this case, the filter needs to be updated.
- For the Object Type field, if the analysis is not linked to an object, the value is now No object assigned instead of None.
- For the Dashboard / Workbook Path field, the values where updated to be consistent and now all begin with shared/.
- The Query Type Group field was renamed to Query Type and its possible values were enhanced to include the following:
Resolved Issues
| SF number | Area | Description |
|---|---|---|
| 07710086 URM-234944 | Acquisitions | PO Lines would sometimes return errors when adding funds due to an invalid fund in the Recently Used list. This was fixed. |
| 07147595 (Added - December 17, 2024) URM-223708 | Acquisitions | The issue with long holdings records, where summary holdings (866/7/8) were not created during the enhancement process using the 'MARC21 Expand Holding By 866/7/8 Task', has been resolved. The fix ensures that holdings are now enhanced as expected, with all 866/7/8 fields being generated correctly. Please note that for this fix to work, the customer parameter 'send_summary_holdings_request_to_aleph_in_chunks' must be enabled (it is set to 'false' by default). This parameter is only enabled by Ex Libris Support. |
| 07748750 URM-234776 | Analytics and Insights | The Analytics Shared with Me page did not open for a customer. This was fixed. |
| 07690543 URM-234523 | Analytics and Insights | In several cases, the Is Blocked field (Users > User Details) did not display the correct value. This was fixed. |
| 07023561 URM-217027 | Analytics and Insights | An incorrect currency symbol was displayed in the Rialto data visualization dashboards. This was fixed and the symbol was removed. |
| 07271536 URM-230481 | APIs | When sending multiple Update Open Hours API calls while the Apply Calendar Changes job (initiated from the first API update) was still running, later APIs were not processed correctly. This was fixed. In addition, the Update API response now also includes the "APPLY CALENDAR CHANGES" job ID, which can be used to verify the status of the previous job. |
| 06732443 06767091 06814972 URM-198122 | APIs | In some cases, orders that received an invoice were incorrectly marked as "waiting for an invoice". This was fixed. |
| 07763400 URM-235054 | Digital Resource Management | The "webm" extension was missing from the Extension drop-down list in the Digital File Advanced Search. It was added. |
| 07746273 URM-234726 | Digital Resource Management | The DC Import could not handle records with very long descriptions. This was fixed by truncating the records at the maximum character limit. |
| 07684307 07681003 URM-234357 | Electronic Resource Management | The Community Zone Updates Task List Extended Export produced an empty Excel file. This was fixed. The exception was handled, so the export does not fail. |
| 07185047 07693390 URM-231451 | Electronic Resource Management | Upload electronic holdings jobs (Project Muse, T&F, Ovid, Wiley) randomly failed. This was fixed and all holdings jobs execute without failure. |
| 07750108 URM-234792 | Electronic Resource Management | Collections deleted via API left orphaned sub-collections behind. This was fixed. Users can no longer delete collections with sub-collections, regardless if the sub-collection is being suppressed or not. |
| 06929261 URM-231166 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | When selecting “Submit Request” from the Manage Patron Services page, searching in the Network Zone scope did not work correctly. For the moment, this was fixed by disabling the search title by Network Zone scope. |
| 07241116 URM-230425 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | On the patron requests tab, the "Item information" section showed the "External Name" (the Primo name of the location) of a physical location. This was fixed and it now shows the internal name. |
| 06960247 URM-227696 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | The recalculate requests job may cancel a TRANSIT_FOR_RESHELVING request if the item that is in transit is deleted. However, the job would send a redundant notice to the operator that put the item in transit. This was fixed and the notification is no longer sent. |
| 07106533 URM-222050 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | The "Requests" count on the "Pick From Shelf" list was incorrect in some scenarios. This was fixed. For example, if there are 3 booking requests and 1 hold request for a title, the initial count shows 4 requests. When filtering by "Booking Requests" the count shows 3 + start/end time of the earliest booking request. When filtering by 'Patron Physical Item Request', the count shows 1. |
| 06721704 URM-201599 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | The Workflow Step Status facet showed the name for institution work orders and the code for library work orders. This was fixed, and now the library-level workflow step status also shows the name. |
| 07194749 URM-225401 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | The manual skip location did not work as expected for booking requests. This was fixed. |
| 06944947 URM-233140 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | In some cases, a completed pick-from-shelf request related to a lending request remained active. This was fixed. |
| 06881733 URM-230982 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | In some cases, when a borrowing request was completed, the related MMS and its entire hierarchy were deleted. This was fixed, and now the system runs pre-deletion validations before deleting the temporary bib record associated with a borrowing request. |
| 07123486 07216689 URM-227401 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | Trying to ship SLNP requests that shared the external ID with closed requests resulted in an error. This was fixed. |
| 07176920 URM-226884 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | Some records caused the manual locate job process to fail. This was fixed. |
| 07178516 URM-226568 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | For lending requests, an error occurred for the Ship item physically option. This was fixed. |
| 07704188 07139149 07716549 URM-222832 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | An error occurred when using the download function for a lending request. This was fixed. |
| 07050330 07042126 URM-218769 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | Re-adding partner records after rejecting them resulted in an error. This was fixed. |
| 06969090 07132284 URM-218623 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | In some cases, an institution could not open files sent from their PSB instances for digital lending requests. This was fixed. |
| 07022437 URM-215265 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | Sometimes, requests failed to be sent to a lender because the note sent from the borrower to the lender was too long. This was fixed. |
| 07199085 URM-234572 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | In some cases, the NCIP message sent to an existing borrowing request did not trigger the sending of an "On hold shelf" letter to the patron. This was fixed. |
| 06646209 07180331 URM-160884 | Fulfillment and Resource Sharing | Previously, when the View It label c.uresolver.request.ill.patron_has_duplicate_request (Configuration > Discovery > Display Configuration > Labels) was customized, the customized message was not displayed. This was fixed. |
| 07713617 URM-234529 | Metadata Management | Running an advanced search did not work correctly when "Is Empty" and "Is Not Empty" were used in the local call number fields. This was fixed. |
| 07259719 07259713 07221796 URM-230910 | Metadata Management | Running an All Titles search with Resource Type equal to “Music Component Part” did not work correctly. This was fixed. |
| 07805523 URM-237359 | Metadata Management | Exporting itemized sets to Excel sometimes failed when the new titles search UX was enabled. This was fixed. |
| 07804433 07805797 07805799 07797699 URM-237336 | Metadata Management | Electronic collections of type "Database" did not appear in the new titles search UX. This was fixed. |
| 06891329 07002225 07034433 URM-214864 | Metadata Management | In a record, selecting an authority using F3 added a duplicate subfield if this was a subfield to preserve. This was fixed. Now, if the subfield code and value are already in the field, it will no longer be added again. |
| 06850301 07027010 URM-185266 | Metadata Management | Synchronize changes from the Community Zone jobs failed frequently due to an internal error. This was fixed. |
| 06444141 06869239 06531921 07143473 URM-184524 | Metadata Management | Occasionally, import jobs that ran in a member institution and used the Network Zone repository, detected “Records duplicated in Job” incorrectly. This was fixed. |
| 07743331 URM-234739 | Metadata Management | When importing NACSIS records into Alma, the previous handling was that author names in CJK script (imported into MARC fields 100 and 700) did not have a comma between $a and $d. This was fixed. Now, per the customer's request, names will always have a comma between $a and $d, regardless of the script. |
| 07116770 URM-221255 | Metadata Management | When importing a NACSIS serial bibliographic record into Alma, the NACSIS NDLPN field was crosswalked to MARC field 024 instead of MARC field 016. This was fixed. |
| 07079201 URM-218089 | Metadata Management | Customer requested that the crosswalk of MARC field 007 to NACSIS GMD/SMD fields take into account the value in MARC field 300 subfield b (to determine, if possible, if the sound recording is analog or digital). This was added. |
| 07154703 URM-226315 | User Experience, Accessibility & Infrastructure | Previously, when the "allow_activity_on_transferred_finesfees" parameter was set to true, there were errors when waiving fines/fees in the "Transferred" status. This was fixed. |
| 07145438 07015407 06567575 URM-217328 | User Experience, Accessibility & Infrastructure | The "Update/Notify Users" job did not toggle the account type of some user accounts from "Internal" to "External". This was fixed. |
| 07498158 URM-233689 | User Experience, Accessibility & Infrastructure | The SAML metadata file contained a misleading code: "nameid-format:transient", specifically for ADFS (EntraID). This was fixed. |
| 06923130 URM-204138 | User Experience, Accessibility & Infrastructure | For widgets, the remove button still appeared even after being selected a second time. This was fixed. |
| 07175611 URM-231484 | User Experience, Accessibility & Infrastructure | The modification of a note owner placed on an account via API USERS, sometimes did not work correctly. This was fixed. |
| 07086209 URM-231194 | User Experience, Accessibility & Infrastructure | In some cases of the synchronize action, where users were loaded without a user_name, the generated user_name was not unique, which caused a failure. This was fixed. |
| 07194479 URM-229262 | User Experience, Accessibility & Infrastructure | Users could not be found when searching by Job Category. This was fixed. |
| 07250614 URM-235500 | User Experience, Accessibility & Infrastructure | For deposit forms, the mandatory Checkbox field was not working correctly when the default value was false. This was fixed. |
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