Alma-LoanTransfer

Bulk loans transfer from a user to another user with Alma Offline circulation

Create one or more .dat files to upload in Alma Offline Circulation tool [2]

• check if both users id exist in Alma
• check if user_from has loans
• create a .dat file for every loans libraries and circulation desks
• every .dat file perfom items returns from user_from and loans to user_to, at the same date and time of initial loan (plus one minute for return and two minutes for reloan)
• if loans are renewed a event error is possible trying to upload in offline circulation: since there is no possibility to obtain the last renew date the script can set the return/reloan date n days prior to due date
• date and time in UTC format are automatically adjusted to the local time

Usage

command:

python loantransfer.py [user_id_from] [user_id_to]
python loantransfer.py [user_id_from] [user_id_to] -d 30

In Alma Circulation tool upload the .dat file/s selecting previously the correct library/circulation desk.

Installation

No installation needed, simply download loantransfer.py in a rw directory. In the ini-section add your institution Alma user API key and API server baseurl [3].

Prerequisites

• Python 3.x with modules: requests, time, datetime, xml.etree, argparse
• Alma Ex Libris
• User API access and key

Authors

• Nazzareno Bedini - University of Pisa

References

• [1] Alma Bulk Loan Transfer Using Analytics and Offline Circ. The script is inspired by this Alma developers tech blog post.
• [2] Offline Circulation . Alma Offline Circulation Tool.
• [3] General info to start to works with Alma's APIs - HowTo obtain the API key for your environment.