How to use Inventory Management Version 17 and up Presenter: Yoel Kortick SERI Korea training February 2007

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What is Inventory Management? Inventory Management lets you analyze inventory status with regard to missing or misshelved items. The analysis can be done either as an online process or as a batch process. A comparison is made between what is physically on the shelf and what should not be physically on the shelf (such as an item registered as on loan). Additionally, the order of the items on the shelf may be checked.

What will we do here? Define a range of items on the shelf for which we want to perform inventory management Run the service “Inventory Definition (item-01 )” on the above range of items Take note of the “Shelf Report Number” given to each item in the above range of items by the service “item-01” Use the “Shelf Report Number” to Run manual “on line” inventory management Run Batch inventory management

What will we do here? In this presentation we will look at the item information via: Oracle UTIL F 4 This is merely for informative purposes, it is not a necessary requirement for Inventory Management.

What will we do here? We will use in the examples here a range of 4 LC call numbers which includes five items This is in order to show how different types of items behave in the inventory management In an actual case it is more likely that many more items would be included in each phase of the inventory management. In most cases an entire shelf or several shelves would be included each time.

What will we do here? We will use a range of call numbers from DA151 to DA155. The barcodes of the items we will take off shelf to check inventory are: 50730-10 = In proper place on shelf 50731-10 = In proper place on shelf 50732-10 = In proper place on shelf but registered as on loan 50733-10 = In wrong place on shelf because it has call number out of range 50734-10 = Does not belong to our library. Perhaps it was returned via ILL and mistakenly put on our shelf instead of returned to lending library.

Initiating the Inventory Management The first stage in analyzing an inventory is to define a physical range of items as an inventory. At this stage, the boundaries of the inventory range being checked are defined by parameters such as call number range Sublibrary Collection item status item process status material type.

Initiating the Inventory Management The inventory being checked receives an identifier The identifier is known as a “Shelf Report Number” The “Shelf Report Number” is used later on for executing the Inventory Period. Each item in the predefined range gets a “Shelf Report Number” by running the “Inventory Definition (item-01)” batch service.

The service Inventory Definition (item-01)

The service Inventory Definition (item-01) Here we are retrieving all items with LC item call number between DA151 and DA155 in the East Asian (HYL) sub library. The output file is called “da_items”. The service includes additional retrieval parameters which are not included in this screen capture.

The service Inventory Definition (item-01) The output file appears in the task manager

The service Inventory Definition (item-01) The output file includes the “shelf report number”, which is a number assigned to each item which was retrieved via the service. In this case it is “26”. This number is assigned to the Z30-SHELF-REPORT-NUMBER field. The output here also includes the various parameters used to retrieve the items.

The service Inventory Definition (item-01) 3 items were retrieved via the service “Inventory Definition (item-01)” when we ran it and got “shelf report number” 26. usm50@ALEPH3> select count(*) from Z30 where Z30_SHELF_REPORT_NUMBER = '26'; **** Hit return to continue **** COUNT(*) ---------- 3 1 row selected.

The service Inventory Definition (item-01) All 3 items meet the criteria we specified when running the service (sub library, call number type and call number range) usm50@ALEPH3> select Z30_SUB_LIBRARY,Z30_CALL_NO_TYPE,Z30_CALL_NO from Z30 where Z30_SHELF_REPORT_NUMBER = '26'; **** Hit return to continue **** -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- HYL 0 $$hDA151 .D44$$iT8265 1997 HYL 0 $$hDA152 .L9$$iC37 1994 HYL 0 $$hDA153$$i.B313 1969b 3 rows selected.

The service Inventory Definition (item-01) These are the barcodes of the items which were retrieved and given “shelf report number” 26: usm50@ALEPH3> select Z30_BARCODE from Z30 where Z30_SHELF_REPORT_NUMBER = '26'; **** Hit return to continue **** Z30_BARCODE ------------------------------ 50730-10 50731-10 50732-10 3 rows selected.

The service Inventory Definition (item-01) When viewing the items (Z30) via UTIL F 4 the following appears for each of the three items: 02 z30_shelf_report_number .....26 02 z30_on_shelf \ 03 on_shelf_date .............00000000 03 on_shelf_seq ..............000000

Conducting the Inventory Management After initiating the Inventory Management via the service “Inventory Definition (item-01)” as done in the previous slides, the inventory may be checked. In doing so its current status is compared with the database status. This can be done in either of two ways: Manual Batch

Conducting the Inventory Management In both cases the following happens: Items which are physically on the shelf in the call number range used in item-01 are checked against the database. In our case we go to the shelf of DA151 to DA155 and take the following item barcodes: 50730-10 50731-10 50732-10 50733-10 50734-10

Conducting the Inventory Management Two ways of checking the inventory Manual online inventory - The physical shelf is checked and the ALEPH client is updated online with each item that is scanned. This stage is called Marking. Batch inventory - The physical shelf has been previously checked, and the ALEPH client is updated by using an input file with the items’ barcodes. Each of these options will now be explained

Manual Online Inventory To conduct a manual online inventory (Marking): From the Cataloging module, click Items, then Inventory Marking:

Manual Online Inventory The Inventory Marking command opens the form that defines various parameters to be used for the Marking session: This is the shelf report number we made via item-01 Our final report will include these error messages for the items

Manual Online Inventory When you have finished filling in this form, click OK. This opens the marking box, where the marking of the found items is done by entering the item’s barcode: We already know that there should only be a maximum of three items on the shelf Enter each barcode here and click “submit”

Manual Online Inventory Clicking “submit” marks the item as found, and also displays reports of any errors that have been configured at the beginning of the session as requested for reporting. The errors will be reported by a popup message or a printed report, also depending on what has been configured at the beginning of the session. We will now enter items 50730-10 and 50731-10, both of which are on the shelf and ion the proper place.

Manual Online Inventory After entering barcode 50730-10 no error message appeared and the “items to be processed” reduced from “3” to “2”. The “Items found” went from “0” to “1” Similarly, after entering barcode 50731-10 the “items found” goes up 1 and the “items to be processed” is reduced by 1.

Manual Online Inventory After entering barcode 50732-10 we receive a message that the item is on loan. The item should not be on the shelf if it is on loan, and thus the librarian can check to see what is the proper status of the item. Perhaps it was returned by patron but not registered as returned in the system.

Manual Online Inventory After entering barcode 50733-10 we receive a message that the item is has a call number which does not match the range retrieved. Thus the librarian is alerted that it is the wrong place.

Manual Online Inventory After entering barcode 50734-10 we receive a message that the item should not be in the library: Perhaps a student borrowed this item via ILL and it was mistakenly returned to the home library instead of sent back to ILL lending library.

Manual Online Inventory At this stage items 50730-10, 50731-10, 50732-10 and 50733-10 are considered “marked”. When we view them again via UTIL F 4 we see this: 50730-10 50730-30 02 z30_shelf_report_number .....26 02 z30_on_shelf \ 03 on_shelf_date .............20070202 03 on_shelf_seq ..............000001 02 z30_shelf_report_number .....26 02 z30_on_shelf \ 03 on_shelf_date .............20070202 03 on_shelf_seq ..............000003 50730-20 50730-40 02 z30_shelf_report_number .....26 02 z30_on_shelf \ 03 on_shelf_date .............20070202 03 on_shelf_seq ..............000002 02 z30_shelf_report_number .....26 02 z30_on_shelf \ 03 on_shelf_date .............20070202 03 on_shelf_seq ..............000004 They now have an “on shelf date” and “on shelf seq”

Manual Online Inventory We will later return to the significance of the “on shelf date” and “on shelf seq”. Now let’s see the batch inventory.

Inventory Marking (item-08) The batch inventory is run to mark items as found by running a service. The Inventory Marking (item-08) service receives an input file of item barcodes, located in the ADM library's data_scratch directory, and an Inventory number (shelf report number) to work on. This is very similar to the on line job, except that it uses an input file of barcodes instead of manually entering each barcode.

Inventory Marking (item-08)

Inventory Marking (item-08) Here is an example of an input file of items physically taken from the shelf with LC call numbers DA151 to DA155. Thus these items should match what we previously retrieved here via item-01. This input file may be used in item-08. USM50-YOELK>>cat $data_scratch/input_file 50730-10 50731-10 50732-10 50733-10 50734-10

Inventory Marking (item-08) The service Inventory Marking (item-08) requests a shelf report number. This is the shelf report number created when running item-01. When we ran item-01 here, we received shelf report number 26. We will use here shelf report number 26 to continue the example. We are merely doing the “batch” version of what we already did online

Inventory Marking (item-08) Input file of barcodes in $data_scratch Shelf report number which we created via item-01 The name of our output file Errors we want in report (reasons why item on shelf should not be on shelf)

Inventory Marking (item-08) Here is the output file (report) in the task manager:

Inventory Marking (item-08) In the report we receive the same messages for the same items as when it was run “online”:

Inventory Marking (item-08) Similarly, like the “online” inventory report, the batch report (item-08) updates the “on shelf date” and “on shelf seq”. When we saw this after the “online” inventory management, we stated that we would later return to it, and now we return. These parameters are useful for the following services: Inventory Summary (item-09) Inventory Report (item-10) In this presentation we will show the service Inventory Report (item-10) first, and then the service Inventory Summary (item-09)

Inventory Report (item-10) Inventory Report (item-10) creates a report of the inventory items. This service should be run after running either the online or batch inventory report.

Inventory Report (item-10) Shelf report number created via item-01 Output report file name

Inventory Report (item-10) The output file appears in the task manager

Inventory Report (item-10) And the user receives a summary of the specified inventory

Inventory Report (item-09) We will now do an example of the service Item Summary (item-09)

Inventory Report (item-09) The service Item Summary (item-09) creates a summary report of the inventory status allows updating inventory items according to the inventory check results. We will run it twice, once without updating and once with updating.

Inventory Report (item-09) We will use a range of call numbers from DA151 to DA155. The barcodes of the items we will take off shelf to check inventory are: 50730-10 = In proper place on shelf 50730-20 = In proper place on shelf 50731-10 = In proper place on shelf 50732-10 = In proper place on shelf In addition, there is another item which should be on the shelf but is not: 50732-20 = Mysteriously missing from shelf

Inventory Report (item-09) We run “Inventory Definition (item-01)” on a range of call numbers from LC classification DA151 to DA155.

Inventory Report (item-09) We see in output file that the items get shelf report number 27

Inventory Report (item-09) A total of five items received shelf report number 27: usm50@ALEPH3> select count(*) from Z30 where Z30_SHELF_REPORT_NUMBER = '27'; **** Hit return to continue **** COUNT(*) ---------- 5

Inventory Report (item-09) We go to shelf and take items which are from LC classification DA151 to DA155 and make an input file of the barcodes: il-aleph05.corp.exlibrisgroup.com-17(3) USM50-YOELK>>cat $data_scratch/input_file 50730-10 50730-20 50731-10 50732-10 We now must mark these items as “found” by running either online inventory marking or by running the service “Inventory Marking (item-08)”. We will do the latter.

Inventory Report (item-09) Here we run item-08 so that we can next run item-09. (The items must be marked online or via item-08 in order to use item-09)

Inventory Report (item-09) Now we run item-09 in order to receive a summary of the inventory. We are choosing this time to not update the database.

Inventory Report (item-09) The output file appears in the task manager

Inventory Report (item-09) The output file shows that one item is missing. This item was retrieved via item-01 and given shelf number 27. But, it was not marked as found by item-08. Thus item-09 states that it is NOT found.

Inventory Report (item-09) Now we again run item-09, this time choosing “update database” and automatically changing any item which will be identified as “not found” to process status “Lost”.

Inventory Report (item-09) Before running item-09 After running item-09

Inventory Report (item-09) Inventory Report (item-09) identified that 50732-20 is lost. This is because it got shelf number 27 in item-01 but was not marked as found via item-08 The report for item-09 identified the item as “not found” (as we saw in the report). We reran item-09 with option “update database” and told the system to update items not found by changing the process status to Lost.

Inventory Report (item-09)