2021-11-16 Bulk Edit Working Group Meeting Notes

Housekeeping:

• Please add your name to the list of attendees
• Make sure Transcript is turned on during the meeting

• Ryan: The goal of the research was to figure out how we move forward with bulk edit functionality in FOLIO by understanding some of the challenges that librarians are facing when making bulk edits, not just in FOLIO, but in all the applications that they are using, which are quite varied. I sit within the UX research team at Ebsco and I work on all kinds of products, so FOLIO is less familiar to me.
• Ryan: I wanted to understand what some of the biggest challenges were in the bulk edit process so that we can account for those challenges in Future FOLIO updates. I wanted to understand specifically what you all saw as the drawbacks and advantages to editing local files, especially CSV files, as opposed to using an in-app editor. I wanted to understand the drawbacks and advantages of both, what would tip the balance for individuals and institutions to accept and adopt a CSV bulk edit workflow?
• Ryan: The goal was not to dig into the specific problems with anyone UI but to understand the challenges that you all face generally in performing bulk edits.
• Ryan: The research was conducted over a series of about two weeks. I did moderated interviews, which were open-ended questions designed to identify the bulk edit workflow and understand the toolset that is used for making those edits.
  
  • Were there student workers involved and how does that add an additional layer of challenge to the process?
  • How they reacted to being able to do local edits in FOLIO if that were an option and what the requirements would be for this option.
• Ryan: People interviewed were librarians involved with metadata management and bulk editing. Spoke with one K-12 library assistant. So it was a varied group considering how specific this audience is. This group was using a number of different platforms.
• Ryan: What are the example use cases for bulk editing uncovered via the interviews?
  • All of these cases would require bulk editing of statuses or locations:
    1. Graphic novels spread out throughout a large academic library combined into a single special collection.
    2. An academic library is moving upwards of 180,000 physical holdings to an offsite annex.
    3. Volumes are being shifted from within the same building may be to a different floor.
    4. Items sent to the bindery
    5. Items being withdrawn
• Ryan: How does bulk edit work?
  • Records need to be identified which can happen using one of two methods:
    • Queries - platform is used to query the DB based on some criteria, e.g., location.
    • Itemized - records in the DB are identified using existing list records, e.g., a list of barcodes or another identifier.
    • In reality, it is ofter a combination of these two methods.
  • Once identified the changes can be made in one of two ways:
    • Native editing - the platform has the ability to make changes to records directly within the app.

...not finished yet. There are more notes to come --Bob

Development updates:

• • Development status
  • Development team scrum board

Bulk Edit Pilot - expectations - continue discussion 

Homework:

• Bulk Edit Limit Size
• Bulk Edit Permissions

Please respond to the surveys before Thursday, November 18th.

Future discussion topic (time permitting):

• Mitigation of reported UX issues
• Bulk Edit Permissions
• Bulk Edit of the linked records
• Max number of records to be edited via User Interface
• Scheduling edits