Re: [VuFind-Tech] [VuFind-General] New books lists in VuFind

[Jon G. <jon...@gm...>]

On Fri, Oct 16, 2009 at 1:53 PM, Demian Katz <dem...@vi...> wrote:
>> I agree, adding create_date will make it simpler. As for populating
>> the field, here at York, we have a cron job to load new records every
>> night, it wouldn't be hard to set the date whenever we load the new
>> records.
>
> One problem I could see with this approach is distinguishing a new record from an updated record.  In Villanova's setup, at least, the nightly update consists of new and modified records.  I don't think we want a ten-year-old record that had a typo fixed to show up as if it were brand new...  but I'm not
sure how we could easily tell the difference.

Not to make matters more complicated, but also just because an item
record has been created doesn't mean it's viewable, complete, or the
object is ready for use by the patron.  There's a lot of workflows
where a record is created at acquisition time, later enhanced or
replace by catalogers, and in our case can wait even longer while
being assigned a call number, possibly heading to bindery, then
finally to the shelf of a library.

Sorry to complicate things even more.  Most places probably don't have
this level complexity.  A few will however.  If people are fine with
books appearing before they're available, then it might not be a huge
deal.  Otherwise people probably don't want to see a new book till
they can get it or at least request that it go into some sort of "fast
processing".  (Of course, to do the latter you have to be able to tell
where the book is in in the process).

Jon Gorman