Patron Defaults

Barcode

• Next Barcode. New patrons are assigned the next available barcode number, unless you assign them a number manually. You should set this field when you first configure Alexandria so that new patrons are assigned barcodes that coincide with your numbering strategy.

Policy

• Default Policy. Select the default patron policy to use for new patrons. If a user-created patron policy is selected and later removed from your Policies, this preference will revert back to Standard Patron. Review the Policy page for more information about implementing policies for patrons and items.

Security

• Default Security Group. Select the security group you want applied to new patrons by default; ordinarily, this should always be set to Patron or Patron Limited. Review the Security section in Tools for more information about assigning (and removing) access levels for patrons and operators.

Patron Rules 

History

Keep history for all patrons. When checked, a complete transaction history will be kept for all the patrons who are added to your library system.

Library Accounts

Disable account expiration dates. Ignores the calendar date when patron accounts expire, and disables the Account Expiration field in Patrons Management and the Days Patron's Account is Active field in Policies.

Patron Pictures

You can apply generic Male, Female, or Unspecified images to patrons if they don't have an individual profile picture attached to their record on the Personal tab of Patrons Management; pictures are assigned based on the gender value selected for each patron.

You can affix nearly any image supported by your browser (commonly accepted formats are JPEG, GIF, PNG, or BMP) into one of the three gender-based patron picture fields. If you don't have individual patron portraits assigned on the Personal tab of Patrons Management, these pictures will be used instead. Optimal image size for patron pictures is 155 pixels wide by 200 high. 

Grade Table Preferences

Individually enter each grade level relevant to your union in the order they should be sorted and incremented. The first entry in the Grade Table will be your first grade level, the second will be the next grade level, etc. The Grade and Description entries in the table are fully customizable, allowing you to use whatever terminology you desire. Grades must be advanced manually at the end of each school year by using the Advance all grades now button or the Advance Patron Level utility. Using one of these utilities, you can advance your patrons to the next grade level until they reach the Last Grade level (e.g. Graduated); patrons will never advance past the Last Grade level.

Last Grade

This user-defined field defines your patron's highest (and final) level of advancement. This level will be assigned to patrons who go beyond the levels defined in the Grade Table. Patrons will not be advanced out of this level when grades are advanced. Default is Graduated and the field must contain a value—it cannot be left blank.

Advance After

This non-editable field shows when the latest Advance All Grades operation was performed; the date is updated after the utility has completed.

Advance all grades now

Each time this is clicked, you add one grade level to each of your patrons until they reach the Last Grade level (described above). To elucidate, each patron in your database that has been applied a level that you defined in your Grade Table will have their level transitioned to the next grade in the table. For example, a patron with the grade level of 6 will advance to 7. COMPanion recommends that you perform an Archive before using the Advance All Grades button. Patrons whose grade/level is either not found or not defined in the Grade Table will not have their grade level advanced.

Add a New Grade Level

1. Click Add to add a new level to the grade table. In the dialog, enter the following information:
   
   1. Sort. Enter the sort order for the grade.
      
      • The sort value you provide changes where the grade appears in the Grade Table and how grades are advanced.
      • For example, if the earliest grade level you support is kindergarten, then “1” should be your Kindergarten Sort value. If, at a future date, you incorporate a new preschool level and that becomes your new “1”, then your Kindergarten Sort value will be automatically bumped to “2”.
   2. Grade. Enter a simple grade name.
      
      • This title will be added to the Grade drop-down menu in Patrons Management, Patron Details, Patron Reports, etc.
   3. Description. This is a more common or explanatory version of the grade name.
      
      • For example, your description for grade “7” could be “7th Grade”.
2. Click Save to close the dialog.
3. Finally, click Save to keep your new grade level or Revert to discard it.

Patron Lexile Preferences

Lexile values are used to track your patron's reading progress as they move from kindergarten through high school. For more information on the importance and increasing performance of lexile scoring, please review Learn more about patron Lexiles.

Settings

• Reading to Learn Lexile. The lexile value at which a patron has moved from Learning to Read to Reading to Learn. The transition from Learning to Read to Reading to Learn usually occurs between the third and fourth grade; therefore, the default Reading to Learn Lexile value is commonly set somewhere between 345 and 460.