BTECH minutes - 6/5/02

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BERKELEY TECHNICAL SERVICES DISCUSSION GROUP
MEETING MINUTES
       
Wednesday, June 5, 2002 
9:00am to 11:00am 
303 Doe Library 
           
Announcements: 
                          
There will not be a July meeting. 

There was an error on the Mainly Stationary list from the
last meeting.  Two entries for double-sided tattle tapes were listed.
Stock number 20225001 are single-sided tattle tapes.

Agenda: 

CDL Melvyl-T update / Pam Daniel 
           
Pam distributed three information handouts concerning the
project: overview and background, timeline and feature comparisons.  
They have done 2 usability studies on Melvyl-T to test it out.  Exlibris
has been working on the changes to make the system work.  It takes a lot
of time to build a new catalog.  As problems appear their programmers are
trying to iron these out.  They are working on a prototype that will
hopefully be up next month. 

The differences between the current Melvyl and Melvyl-T are
numerous and profound. One noticeable change will be that the periodical
database will no longer be separate, it will be combined with the books.
It will be one catalog instead of two.  Some other great features of
Melvyl-T will include browsing by calling number or subject, and limiting
searches by location and format (government publication, series,
conferences, etc). 

Since this project is work in progress, CDL values comments
and feedback from Melvyl users.  They would like to incorporate all
reasonable and useful suggestions into Melvyl-T.  If you have any comments
or suggestions please contact Pam.  In addition, Pam is hoping that CDL
will schedule more town hall presentations in order to keep
staff and faculties updated on the progress of Melvyl-T and
answer any concerns or ideas they may have about the project.

Order Division update / Jody Bussell, Don Lee 
            

Jody announced the addition of two new hires to the
Payments Unit family, Megan Keane and Tom Long.  Thanks to their help,
they have been able to catch up on some backlogs.  In addition, Megan will
be taking over the SERPAY email account. 

Recent vendor update changes include the loss of Kamki and
the Swets merger with Blackwells.  For subscriptions formerly with 
Nijhoff that have been transferred to Swets, you will see a temporary
vendor code of MN.  Hold off on claims with this transition code.  Since
April, Swets has stopped taking claims for titles once belonging
to Nijhoff in order to allow the transition to take place. 
                
Technical Services Cataloging unit update/Sheila
Wekselbaum Sheila announced that Tonette Mendoza has been appointed
the Assistant Head of Monograph Processing.  Additionally, three new
employees have been hired to Technical Services.  Sheila also mentioned
various ongoing and future Technical Services projects.  Concurrent
projects include linkage of serial anals and upgrades of both serial and
MVM records.  Her primary future priority is the moving of over
56,000 backlog books out of Technical Services.  This will
effect main and foreign rapid cataloging.  Strategies of moving these
catalog backlogs are being looked into.  Sheila stressed the importance of
good public service. Thus, getting all materials out to the public in a
timely manner definitely applies.

BPM update/Jon Solomon 
            
The reformatting of the BPM is almost complete.  Finished
rewrites include checkin, binding, ordering and the Innopac manual.
Storage is being worked on.  Since Pam's departure, Jon has overtaken the
supervision of the update. He has reorganized it and is now working on
navigation improvements.  Jon is hoping to demonstrate the new
look and navigation interfaces at the next August meeting.

The meeting was adjourned at 10:50 am.