New Design of Open Source Evergreen Online Catalog

King County Library System, WA

Innovation Leader: Denise Siers, Director of Public Services/Web Services Manager, dsiers@kcls.org

Problem Statement

In late 2010, KCLS launched a brand new Open Source Online Catalog, powered by the Evergreen ILS. The out of the box Evergreen catalog was not on par with KCLS staff or patron expectations for what an Online Catalog would look or function like. Due to tight constraints on time, and cost, the KCLS Web Services team created a skin that would address user needs with immediate and projected improvements for implementation at a later time. The Web Services team evaluated a tremendous amount of user feedback that was submitted in the process of launching the new catalog. The new system was fraught with issues of functionality and usability at large. Detailed reports of how and why were a strong catalyst to getting the improvements released to the users. The Web Services team worked tirelessly to spec out a slick and friendly graphical skin that would greatly improve the user experience of the new open source ILS.

Innovation

Based on extensive feedback provided from users- both staff and patrons; priorities were analyzed for achieving the most impact possible with the current resources available. FGI, the current KCLS vendor for graphical catalog customization, was charged with fully designing and implementing the highest priority improvements as the KCLS team had specked out, for the greatest impact to the new Open Source ILS:

Better navigation buttons
Improved search results records
Improved Advanced Search Screens
New Patron Account Dashboard for quick and easy account details
Tabbed Patron Account Summaries with Past Fines paid and the ability to print old receipts
Wider Screens with better looking graphics, slideshows and more
Ability to Pay Fines Online

Progress

KCLS technology teams have tested, and initiated extensive detailed improvements and changes to the Online Catalog in order to improve the new system. The goal is to provide patrons and staff with a highly functional, intuitive and user friendly system. The new and improved graphical interface has made great progress toward satisfying this goal. It has been very well received by the users. Improvements continue to be made to the foundation of the system in efforts to improve the overall function of the ILS on the whole.