Way to go MassLNC & Georgia PINES! And thanks Kathy for your unabashed, 
shameless (& I hope, very effective) cookie bribery.
Cheers
Ben

Ben Hyman 
Executive Director | BC Libraries Cooperative
[email protected] | 1.855.383.5761 ext 1001 | cell: 250.889.2738
bc.libraries.coop | Twitter: @BCLibrariesCoop

On Jul 25, 2014, at 2:32 PM, Kathy Lussier <[email protected]> wrote:

> Hi all,
> 
> I'm pleased to announce that Georgia PINES has joined MassLNC to help to fund 
> the Enhancements to Evergreen Alerts and Message Center projects. Thank you 
> Georgia PINES!
> 
> We have also received some interest from Evergreen sites on the activity 
> metric project.
> 
> MassLNC would really love to see all three of these projects implemented in a 
> future release of Evergreen. If anyone is interested in the projects and can 
> contribute some funds, even if it's only a small amount of money, please feel 
> free to contact me at [email protected] with your questions.
> 
> What do you get out of being a partner on one of these development projects? 
> Putting funds to a development project is your opportunity to make a 
> contribution to the future direction of Evergreen. It's a great feeling to 
> see a new feature in Evergreen and to say to yourself "I helped to make that 
> new feature happen." Budgets are tight everywhere, but by pooling our funds 
> together, we can see some great new functionality at a lower cost for each 
> partner. The recent MVC/CRA project (aka icon project)  is a great example of 
> a development project where many small development contributions, combined 
> with a couple of contributions from some larger sites, resulted in some nice 
> improvements for the whole Evergreen community. Being a development partner 
> also ensures that  you will be part of spec discussions and testing, allowing 
> you to watch out for the needs of your users while the project is being 
> shaped.
> 
> But, wait, there's more! If you participate in a MassLNC development project, 
> your organization will be added to the MassLNC Wall of Fame where we 
> acknowledge and thank all of the sites that have worked with us on 
> development projects over the years - http://masslnc.cwmars.org/node/3067. 
> The large number of libraries and consortia listed there is a testament to 
> the great community we have and the fact that there are so many sites out 
> there that want to contribute what they can to help make Evergreen better for 
> everyone.
> 
> But that's not all! For a limited time only, if your organization decides to 
> help fund one of these projects, you will receive a batch of cookies made by 
> MassLNC coordinator Kathy Lussier (that's me). The cookies will be 
> hand-delivered to you at the next Evergreen conference (or, if we're both 
> there, at the next Evergreen hack-a-way).
> 
> Please take some time to look over these projects and let me know if you're 
> interested.
> 
> Have a nice weekend everyone!
> 
> Kathy
> 
> Kathy Lussier
> Project Coordinator
> Massachusetts Library Network Cooperative
> (508) 343-0128
> [email protected]
> Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/kmlussier
> 
> On 7/1/2014 2:45 PM, Kathy Lussier wrote:
>> 
>> Hi all,
>> 
>> Today marks the first day of the new fiscal year for MassLNC, and our 
>> development committee has identified a few new enhancements we are hoping to 
>> sponsor over the next year.
>> 
>> We have received proposals from Equinox for all three projects, but MassLNC 
>> needs help to fund these projects. I am sending out this e-mail to see if 
>> there are other Evergreen sites interested in helping us fund any of these 
>> projects. For more details, you can e-mail me directly at 
>> [email protected].
>> 
>> 
>> Also, if you are already working on a similar project or just want to 
>> provide some feedback for our proposed projects, please feel to share your 
>> feedback on the list.
>> 
>> These three projects are listed on the new Proposed Development Projects 
>> wiki page at:
>> http://wiki.evergreen-ils.org/doku.php?id=evergreen_features:proposed_development_projects
>>  
>> 
>> ACTIVITY METRIC FOR RELEVANCE RANKING
>> The goal of this project is for a title's activity (circulations, number of 
>> holds, etc.) to affect the relevance of that title when retrieving search 
>> results. Google and Amazon use popularity with much success when ranking 
>> search results. I think Evergreen would see similar success if it were to 
>> incorporate activity into its relevance algorithm.
>> 
>> As an example, if a user were conducting a keyword search on "abraham 
>> lincoln,"  there are many books, movies, etc. in most US libraries where the 
>> words "abraham lincoln" show up in the title. There would be no way to tease 
>> out the titles that are getting the most attention by readers. In fact, a 
>> title like "Team of Rivals" ranks very low in our search results even though 
>> there is a fairly high likelihood it is the title the patron is seeking.  By 
>> applying a metric based on activity, we might be able to see those 
>> more-recently popular titles floating higher in the search results list.
>> 
>> The current proposal is to make factors like circulation and hold activity, 
>> record and item age, and item ownership counts available as an activity 
>> metric. Each factor will embody a "popularity badge" that a bib record can 
>> earn, and each badge will have a five-point scale, where more points 
>> indicate a more popular record.
>> 
>> The average of the badge points earned by each record will constitute a 
>> "popularity star rating". The number and types of badges will break ties for 
>> average popularity.
>> 
>> A new sort axis of popularity will be created to sort first on the 
>> cumulative popularity of each record, followed by the query-specific 
>> relevance available today.
>> 
>> ENHANCEMENTS TO EVERGREEN ALERTS
>> I mentioned this project in the recent thread on problems with items not 
>> checking in properly - http://markmail.org/message/rnm5s7wdxjgy3tym.
>> 
>> This project would give Evergreen sites more control over which alerts 
>> appear during check-in and check-out. The project has three components:
>> 
>> - Separate checkin and checkout copy alerts
>> - The ability to add temporary copy alerts from the checkin, checkout, and 
>> item status screen
>> - A library setting that allows sites to determine if some system alerts 
>> should appear at checkin and checkout.
>> 
>> MassLNC's full project requirements are available at 
>> http://masslnc.cwmars.org/node/2764.
>> 
>> This project is not slated to begin until Fall 2014 after sprint 1 of the 
>> web client project is complete.
>> 
>> MESSAGE CENTER FOR THE PUBLIC CATALOG
>> This project would create a message center that communicates important 
>> messages to patrons. Public patron notes will display here, and sites will 
>> have the ability to configure any action/trigger notice to also deliver a 
>> notice to the message center.
>> 
>> MassLNC's full project requirements are available at 
>> http://masslnc.cwmars.org/node/2927.
>> 
>> Feel free to let me know if you have any questions!
>> 
>> Kathy
> 


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