Sometimes unexpected events occur throughout the year and library situations change. If your school or library is closing early or going online, here are some suggestions and resources for making this transition with your library easier.
If you are Self-Hosted and have Alexandria only accessible on your school network, you may want to open it up to outside access. Work with your Network Administrator or IT Specialist to set this up. They can see detailed instructions in our Web Settings and Controller Web Settings articles. If you are Cloud Hosted, Alexandria is already accessible to anyone anywhere who has the URL.
Anyone who needs to access Librarian can follow our instructions on Accessing Alexandria. They will need an operator username and password.
Patrons can access Researcher from home by simply typing your library's URL into an internet browser's search bar. They can log into their account to access Patron Status, which will give them an overview of their account. They'll also have access to links and resources on the main Researcher pane.
Holds
Patrons can place holds in Researcher to be picked up later. To allow them to view and edit their holds, go to Tools > Preferences > Security. Click on your patron security group and go to the Account tab. Make sure the Holds setting is Manage.
There are several things librarians and administrators may want to do to as you close your library and/or go remote.
Adding closure days to your calendars will automatically delay scheduled notices and prevent overdue fines. To do this, go to Tools > Preferences > Calendars. On the appropriate calendar, click once on the days you want to close, including past days the library has been closed. Click Save in the top right corner when you're done. After adjusting your calendar, you will need to run the Recompute Due Dates utility, which will change due dates so nothing is due during the closure period.
Updating your calendars should take care of most everything. However, here are some individual instructions on turning off notices and updating due dates just in case:
Check out our v6 instructions on updating your calendar, using the Fix Due Date utility afterwards, and turning off automatic emails. |
This would be a good time to run a backup for your Alexandria system. Only Self-Hosted libraries need to worry about doing this manually. COMPanion automatically performs backups for Cloud Hosted libraries.
After performing a backup, Self-Hosted libraries can stop their Data Station from running and log out any active operators by going to Tools > Administration. Click on the Actions menu in the top left corner and select Quit Alexandria.
There are several ways you can use Alexandria to distribute information and stay connected:
Check out our v6 instructions on managing bulletin boards and using Explore Builder. |
If your school is now taking advantage of more online resources, considering cataloging them so they're "bookmarked" for patrons. Once catalogued, they'll show up in Researcher and can be added to lists.