Most Circulation commands and operations are designed to modify individual pieces of data one entry at a time; utilities, however, can change large amounts of information in your database at once. The Utilities window allows you to create your own set of essential utilities; we provide the general templates that help you build utilities that modify, transfer, remove, update, or verify the information you require. Once you've created custom utilities, there won't be a need to adjust the particulars very often.

Take some time to explore the categories and subcategories and set up some Saved utilities for which you'll be able to easily access and run in the future.

Back to Top

The Utilities window

The Utilities interface may look complicated at first glance, but it was designed with simplicity in mind—placing everything in an easily navigable window that allows you to quickly find, modify, and run utilities. Additionally, the Utilities interface allows you to create utilities that only modify, clear, or clean required information: records of interest, title/copy policies, patron histories, and all types of circulation transactions. In order to become a utility wizard, there are only three essential things you need to understand: utility categories, utility templates, and creating custom utilities.

The Utilities interface uses the familiar three-panel layout found in most Alexandria management interfaces.

• The left-hand side of the window is home to the Categories pane, containing a list of all existing utility categories (e.g. Titles) and subcategories (e.g. General). Selections from this pane act as filters, allowing you to narrow your focus and display only relevant utilities.

• The upper-right section of the window contains the Quick and Saved tabs and the Utility Selection pane, which allow you to select the specific utility you would like to view, modify, or run. If you haven't yet selected a utility from this pane, you will be presented with a larger list; the Selected Utility pane for Quick/Saved utilities only appears after a utility is selected from this list.

• The Selected Utility pane—the bottom-right area of the window—contains settings and options for the selected utility, housed in the following tabs: Overview, Selections, Options, Notification, and Schedule.
  
  

Back to Top