Background: This presentation explores some of the challenges encountered while managing records in Alma to make library resources more accessible. The Distributed eLibrary of Weill Cornell Medicine - Qatar (WCM-Q) recently migrated to Alma and Primo VE to manage its library resources. Primo is the centralized search engine that provides easy access to library resources for the WCM-Q community. Alma is the interface used by librarians to manage library resources. Managing electronic resources requires constant updating of library collections to grant patrons seamless access to library collections.
Description: Since the implementation of Alma, a common challenge has been that older Sierra electronic records display as physical items due to some records having multiple locations and item materials. This causes mismatched resource types in Alma. Correcting these mismatched records has been problematic as the use of batch processing to make the corrections has proved abortive. The only option is to correct over 11,000 mismatched records one by one. There are 641 pages of 20 records per page that need the right material types for the corresponding records to be under the correct resource type. One of the methods being used is creating sets of queries to minimize the number of pages to flip at a time. The process involved changing the form of item in field 008 to online to make these titles show correctly as electronic.
Conclusion: Alma has improved the way we manage library resources and enhanced the library’s collections. Library resources have become more easily accessible to users because they have more options to choose from and Primo has more enhanced functionality for patrons. There has been a substantial increase in the collection counts of the library resources with Alma compared to Sierra, the previous library management system. Making sure that the material types and resource types of all resources fall into the correct category is the core of this project. The goal of this project is to bring these mismatched records down by forty percent by the end of the year. Thus far, more than sixty percent of the mismatched titles have been corrected and are now under the right resource type.
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