Automatic holding sync

 Overview

This feature automatically syncs holdings for Wise titles in WorldCat without any staff intervention. The process reads triggers within Wise when an item and/or title change occurs, and will maintain a count for items that are not temporary items and are not in any of the following statuses: Missing, Discarded, On Order, or On Sale and chooses an appropriate holding action to be sent to WorldCat.

Holdings actions that can be sent to WorldCat include:

• Set holding - when the first item is available (available at branch, checked-in, or on transport)
• Unset holding - when the last item is marked Missing or Discarded

These holding actions for a title will be communicated to WorldCat via the Metadata Search API 2.0. The primary inputs to the API are OCN and holding action. Therefore, this process will be unsuccessful in syncing the holding for a title in WorldCat if its OCN field has a missing value in Wise. This means that it is critical that OCN fields for titles are always up-to-date in Wise.

An initial data export and sync pre-process will be used to update holding information before the automatic sync is enabled.

Pre-process

A one-time process, ColdStart, will be used to update holdings in WorldCat and to update the OCLC numbers (OCNs) from WorldCat into Wise for existing titles in Wise.

The process involves the following steps:

1. Titles MARC data export: At the kick-off of ColdStart, a MARC data export file for titles with holdings is extracted from Wise. This file is then exported to the WorldCat metadata team via a secure file transfer. Simultaneously, Wise intermediary database tables are updated with the OCN and corresponding item information for these titles.

2. Sync Holdings in WorldCat: The MARC file is processed within a data sync process which involves a full MARC data match with that in WorldCat. In WorldCat, for the library institution OCLC symbol, it will set holdings for matched title records and unset holdings for any remaining title records if they exist.

3. Data sync reports: The below reports are generated from the above process and are transferred to Wise server, via a secure file transfer:

• Holdings Processing report - contains matched Wise titles for which a holding was set, unset, or a holding was already set
• BibProcessing report - contains the matched Wise title number, Wise OCN and WorldCat OCN

4. Update data in Wise: The data from these reports is loaded in Wise and is processed to:

• add the OCN for a title, if it was missing in Wise
• update the OCN for a title, if there is a new OCN reported from WorldCat
• update Wise intermediary database tables to correctly track items of titles with updated or added OCN

5. Completion: At the end of ColdStart process, the automatic holding sync process is enabled for the library.

 Note: The ColdStart process will ensure that Wise intermediary tables are updated so that items in Wise are tracked for the added/updated OCN from WorldCat rather than for the old Wise OCN. It also accounts for all title and item changes that occurred in Wise after the kick-off of ColdStart process. These cumulative updates for items and their counts are maintained within Wise and are referred to in order to send an appropriate holding action via the on-going automatic sync holding process, once it is enabled.

A field called "Previous OCN" is available under the Title Screen in the Client. Current OCNs are stored in the OCN field and any previous OCNs are stored in the Previous OCN field. For more information, see Title changes screen.

Sync process

The automatic holdings sync process will sync holdings when the following occurs:

• an item is re-linked
• an item is relocated
• zebra for an item changes

The process will not sync holdings for titles with the following flags enabled:

• Public block (and/or)
• WorldCat Holding Sync Block (new)

 Note: Holding sync jobs will be scheduled to run every 5 minutes to appropriately calculate and send holding actions to WorldCat.