[Koha-bugs] [Bug 4245] New: Bestseller's Club and email notifications

[bugzilla-daemon at kohaorg.ec2.liblime.com]

http://bugs.koha.org/cgi-bin/bugzilla3/show_bug.cgi?id=4245

           Summary: Bestseller's Club and email notifications
           Product: Koha
           Version: rel_3_0
          Platform: PC
        OS/Version: Windows 2000
            Status: ASSIGNED
          Severity: enhancement
          Priority: P5
         Component: Cataloging
        AssignedTo: kohaprogrammers at ptfs.com
        ReportedBy: jwagner at ptfs.com
                CC: jwagner at ptfs.com
   Estimated Hours: 0.0
 Change sponsored?: Sponsored


Created an attachment (id=1667)
 --> (http://bugs.koha.org/cgi-bin/bugzilla3/attachment.cgi?id=1667)
Screen shot of club archetype setup

Sponsored by Middletown Township Public Library, Middletown, NJ, USA.

The library wanted a way for patrons to join a bestseller's club and have holds
automatically placed on any matching new title.  They also (separately) wanted
emails to go to patrons when new titles matching certain criteria were added to
the collection.  Kyle Hall revised and expanded his earlier Bestseller's Club
function to allow creation of both clubs and services (email notification). 
Patrons can join them through the OPAC (or staff can enroll patrons).  If a
title and item matching a club setup is added, everyone in the club gets an
automatic hold placed on the item (the priority order is randomized each time).
 Patrons who've joined an email list get a regular (probably weekly) email of
any new titles matching the list.

Instructions:

The feature is under Tools, Clubs and Services.  There must first be at least
one archetype for each (club and service).  Multiple clubs can be created based
on the archetype.

Create a new club, and fill out the data required. You can set the club by
Title and/or Author; probably most of the time it will be author. The author
field here has to match the author field of the items exactly. For example, to
make a Larry Niven bestseller's club, fill in the author field with 'Niven,
Larry.' (Don't enter the quote marks, but note the period after the name). 
After that, a batch hold is placed on any newly catalogued item where the
author field is 'Niven, Larry.'.  (NOTE:  Only applies to new titles, not to
new items added to existing titles.) You can use % for truncation, like
Personal memoir% (for anything starting with that string).  Under Clubs &
Services Home, you can enroll new users, or click details to see current list
and remove users.  You can also add/delete users from the patron record in
staff or OPAC.  If the list is created to allow public enrollment, patrons can
join through their OPAC account.

You can restrict the clubs to certain item type codes, so that for example a
hold would only be triggered on a book, not a DVD of the same title/author. 
However, because a title can be added without items attached, the underlying
club software must rely on the biblioitems.itemtype field, not the actual item
record's setting.  When a record is imported, Koha sets this field from the
first item type in the list on your system, which may not be appropriate.  To
be sure the title will be included or excluded from a club, before saving the
title edit the 942 subfield c to the appropriate item type.  This is the field
the club software uses; it does not look at the 952 subfield y.

The mailing lists are based on two criteria, the itemtype and the callnumber.
For example, if you want a list for new science fiction novels, and your sf
books all begin with the call number 'SF author', then you would fill in the
callnumber field with 'SF %'.  (Don't use the actual quote marks in any of
these examples -- they're here for clarity and to show the spacing.) To limit
to only the book itemtype, put 'BK' in the itemtype field (assuming that is
what you set the book itemtypes code to). To make it work for all itemtypes,
just put '%' in the itemtype field. For an inverse example, such as a new DVD
list, just fill in the itemtype with 'DVD', and the author field with '%'.  
For email notifications, the mailinglist.pl script will send out a weekly
e-mail based on a New Items Email List archetype (name needs to be exactly
that). The e-mail is based on the template file found in the
misc/cronjobs/mailinglist directory; this template can be customized for each
library.  The script is also found in misc/cronjobs/mailinglist and should be
cronned to run weekly.  The script looks for items created less than seven days
ago matching the other parameters.  NOTE:  the delivered template file uses the
syspref OPACBaseURL to create a direct link to the title record.  Make sure
that syspref has the correct setting.


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