New facet, other changes for ILL program Tue 11/10

The NHAIS ILL System will be offline briefly starting at 10 o'clock tonight (Tuesday, Nov. 10) to update software.

-As part of ongoing efforts to enhance request processing, tonight's update includes speed improvements for the Search by Request Number and Barcode Processing functions, helping requests load and process more efficiently.

-Speaking of Barcode Processing, do you scan the shipping label barcodes to change the status of requests? Be aware of this change: the ILL program will now confirm your role as Borrower or Lender before updating a request. Because some statuses, such as Received, are available for the Borrower in their Borrower Action Items queue and for the Lender in their Awaiting Borrower Action queue, until now staff could inadvertently select the wrong Received queue for barcode processing and update requests to the wrong status. 

-The conditions under which the Owned by My Library message will display have been modestly expanded. While it will still be true that the message only appears when you're looking at a record on which your library (the location you're logged in as) has a holding, its display no longer depends on whether a collection code for a Z-target is mapped as lendable.

-A new facet will be added to the list of options for narrowing search results. Owning Library joins Format, Author, Date, and other options found on the left side of the search result screen and will function similarly. A count of records in the result set will appear next to the library name. The library name can be selected to limit the displayed results to records with holdings from that location. You may need to click the down arrow to expand the Owning Library list and click on Show More to see your library's name. 

This feature was developed to benefit catalogers at libraries that maintain holdings in the NHU-PAC to make it easier for them to find records with their holdings in the union catalog. Libraries without an automated catalog can use this as an online surrogate, giving them an option to see what books they have on certain subjects or by certain authors, assuming their NHU-PAC holdings are up to date. Before launching a search, limiting search resources to the NHU-PAC (click on the "stack-o'-pancakes" icon) can further help narrow results.

Others are welcome to use the Owning Libraries facet but ILL librarians are reminded that your Preferred Lender List works with the lender list build process to determine where your request is routed. For ILL purposes, find a record that matches what you're looking for, create your request, and let our ILL program do the rest of the work. Don't waste time fussing over who has what--it won't affect your lender list.

Questions? Contact the NHAIS Help Desk via e-mail or call 603-271-2141. 

No vans Wed 11/11

The NH State Library is closed tomorrow [Wednesday, Nov. 11] to honor Veterans’ Day, and therefore there will be no Wednesday ILL van deliveries.

Thank you for understanding.

Sincerely,
Jennifer M. Finch (she/her)
Supervisor, Reference & Information Services and State Data Coordinator
New Hampshire State Library

 

CD van postponed to Tue 11/10

The Capital District (CD) route for ILL van deliveries is postponed until TUESDAY, 11/10.

Affected libraries are in the list below. If you prefer to come pick up your bin from the NHSL, please give us a call at 603.271.2616.

Boscawen
Canterbury
Loudon
Chichester
Epsom
Pembroke
Allenstown
Hooksett
Bow
Dunbarton
Talking Books
NHTI

Thank you for your understanding.

Sincerely,
Jennifer M. Finch (she/her)
Supervisor, Reference & Information Services and State Data Coordinator
New Hampshire State Library

No SE-B van Mon 11/9

Today’s SE-B ILL van route [Monday, Nov. 9] is cancelled. The affected libraries are as follows:

Salem
Derry
Nashua
Milford
Amherst
Merrimack
Bedford
Manchester

Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Sincerely,
Jennifer M. Finch (she/her)
Supervisor, Reference & Information Services and State Data Coordinator
New Hampshire State Library

SW Combination Route Fri 11/6

Hello, everyone,
 
I’m sorry for the delayed notification.  Due to van driver illness, we are combining and shortening today’s Southwest (SW) route and tomorrow’s SW-A route into one Friday route. 
 
The libraries on these routes who WILL RECEIVE deliveries tomorrow, Friday, November 6, are as follows:
 
New London 
Newport  
Washington  
Charlestown  
Keene  
Marlborough  
Dublin  
Mont Vernon  
Weare
 
We won’t be able to add additional stops.  Thank you for your understanding. 
 
Sincerely,
Jennifer M. Finch (she/her)
Reference Librarian and State Data Coordinator
New Hampshire State Library
N.H. Department of Natural & Cultural Resources

No CD van Mon 11/2

The Capital District (CD) route is cancelled today [Monday, Nov. 2] due to illness. Here is the list of libraries affected:

Boscawen
Canterbury
Loudon
Chichester
Epsom
Pembroke
Allenstown
Hooksett
Bow
Dunbarton
Talking Books
NHTI

Your patience and understanding are appreciated.

Thank you,
Jennifer M. Finch (she/her)
Supervisor, Reference & Information Services and State Data Coordinator
New Hampshire State Library

Lender list build process

The lender list build process in the NHAIS ILL System determines where your request will be routed. You don't really need to know the details below but understanding how the process works will answer questions like "Why didn't my request go that library when I know they hold the title?"

The lender list build process happens behind the scenes right after you submit an individual request. The request is usually in Awaiting Lenders status less than a minute before it becomes Pending at the first potential lender. With a multi-copy request, the lender list is built before you submit the request--the program first has to establish that there are enough copies held at libraries around the state.

The lender list build process takes the information in the record you chose to create your request (the "source record") and searches the catalogs in the NHAIS ILL System for matching records. The program also checks lending policies before adding a library to the lender list. Once all potential lenders are determined for the list, the locations are sorted according to the Preferred Lender List assigned to each borrower.

Matching criteria are tweaked from time to time to minimize the false positives and false negatives that come up when trying a establish matches across millions of MARC records from hundreds of sources. As of this writing, matching occurs as detailed below. All gathered targets are searched for the first match point available from the ILL request information, then any remaining libraries that were not successfully matched are used to search the next match point, and so on.

ISBN and ISSN
-Searches up to first 3 numbers in record..
-If match is found, no additional validation occurs.
-If no match, moves to next match point.

OCLC Number, LCCN, and UPC (Other Standard Identifier)
-Searches first number.
-If match is found, validation includes:
a. Title
b. Format, if lending policy is used
-If no match, moves to next match point.

Publisher Number
-Searches first number.
-If match is found, validation includes:
a. Publisher Source or Title
b. Format, if lending policy is used
-If no match, moves to next match point.

Title/Author
-Both Title and Author must be present in the ILL request data to perform this search.
-If match is found, validation includes:
a. Publisher date and publisher name
b. Format, if lending policy is used

In the absence of standard numbers or an author in the source record, the program will resort to the following:

Title
- Requires an exact match on normalized titles.
Normalization information:
-Everything before the bracket (245 $a $b $n $p) is used
-Strips symbols and double spaces, lower all cases, changes “&” to “and”
-If match is found, validation includes:
a. Publisher information
b. Format, if lending policy is used
-If no match on the final match point, the lender is not added.

Even if a location makes it onto a lender list, that doesn't guarantee the library will ever see the request. Once a request is Shipped by a lender, none of the libraries below it on the lender list will see the request. Also, when it's time to send the request to a particular lender on the list, the program runs some checks again and others for the first time to ensure the most up-to-date availability. A "no" to any of these questions will lead SHAREit to skip over a potential lender in the list:
-Does the lender still own the item?
-Does the lender still lend the format?
-Is the library currently accepting requests?
-Is the item showing an "available" shelf status (for Z-targets that provide that information)?
 

Brief ILL outage Tue 10/27 10pm

The NHAIS ILL System will be offline briefly tonight (Tuesday, Oct. 27) starting at 10 o'clock for software updates. Only behind-the-scenes functions are affected so you won't notice anything different Wednesday morning.

In case anyone is wondering - how to quickly see which libraries around the state serve a similar population size

With thanks to my colleague here at the NHSL, Jen Finch, head of reference and go-to for all things library statistical 🙂

Someone asked me how to quickly see which libraries serve a similarly sized population. Here are the steps:

1. Go here: Library Statistics | NH State Library

2. Scroll down below the photo

3. Download 2025 Complete Library Statistics (or just take this link, but I wanted you to know where to find it on the NHLS website for future reference)  https://www.nhsl.dncr.nh.gov/sites/g/files/ehbemt726/files/documents/2025-complete-library-stats.xlsx

4. Choose the first tab, "Outlet Data"

5. Sort Column J "Population of the Legal Service Area"

       6. Find your library in the sorted list and you'll see which others serve close to the same population size.

Deb Baker
Adult & Youth Services Consultant
New Hampshire State Library