VuFind Newsletter: October, 2019
Welcome to the first VuFind newsletter. The goal of this publication will be to provide at-a-glance insight into project activity, as well as highlight areas where contributions or further discussion might be needed. It will always be published one week before the monthly Community Call, and readers are encouraged to bring their ideas, questions and feedback to that forum.
VuFind Summit
The 2019 VuFind Summit was held at Villanova University on October 14, 2019. This newsletter was begun as a direct result of conversations there about community outreach and participation. Many of the issues below were also opened to capture Summit conversations. Video of the event will be shared soon.
Recently Completed / Resolved Issues
The following items were completed in the past month:
-
Configurable default search backend (makes it easier to use VuFind without Solr; e.g. as a front-end for EDS/Primo/Summon):
#1476 /
VUFIND-1359 Database adjustments to reduce the chances of IDs overflowing in high-volume tables:
#1471 Error-reporting mechanism for displaying certain search backend errors directly to users (currently only used by Primo Central, to communicate the fact that blank searches are unsupported):
#1455 FOLIO ILS driver improvement:
#1461 Improve extensibility of AbstractSolrBackendFactory:
#1479 More configurable hierarchical facet sort options:
#1452-
More configurable “local host” detection for the VuFindHttp library:
VuFindHttp#13 Off-canvas toggle missing (a report of an older bug that was already fixed prior to release 6.0):
VUFIND-1354-
SMTP improvements (allow connection reset; add configurable timeout):
#1468,
#1475 Translation improvements (including the addition of Croatian support):
#1445,
#1470,
#1473
New Issues
The following items were reported / begun in the past month, but are not yet completed:
Code in Progress
Add support for additional identifier types to the cover image loader:
#1451 Another Alma ILS driver improvement:
#1481 ArchivesSpace integration:
#1469 Geographic indexing support for Dublin Core XML documents:
#1465 Improvements to item status display:
#1466 Make hierarchy logic compatible with additional search backends:
#1478 New view helpers designed to help improve overall theme design:
#1454,
#1458 Resolve SolrMarc log4j warnings:
#1480-
Issue Report / Discussion Only
BUG: Advanced search does not play well with some browsers' “store form entries” functionality:
VUFIND-1369 BUG: Hunt does not always trigger correctly:
VUFIND-1367 IMPROVEMENT: Apply namespacing to all Javascript code:
VUFIND-1361 IMPROVEMENT: Filter user interface needs some inconsistencies addressed:
VUFIND-1353 IMPROVEMENT: Improve design of session handler code:
VUFIND-1355-
NEW FEATURE: Add 'extra' parameter to serialized searches:
VUFIND-1364 NEW FEATURE: Clear the cache through the
API:
VUFIND-1365-
NEW FEATURE: Display result count preview while user fills in advanced search form:
VUFIND-1360 NEW FEATURE: Display user barcode / QR code on account page:
VUFIND-1366 TASK: Brainstorm community call improvements:
VUFIND-1356-
TASK: Provide Docker container for VuFind beginners:
VUFIND-1357
Active Issues
The following items saw significant progress / activity during the past month:
Google Scholar tags:
VUFIND-951 - this older issue has been revived, and a pull request may be forthcoming
Improve Solr spell checking:
VUFIND-745 - there has been some new discussion about using newer Solr spellcheck features in VuFind
-
New Progressive Theme:
VUFIND-1352 - discussion is ongoing about the future of VuFind's themes
Selective dissemination of information (SDI):
#1440 - significant progress has been made on email notification behavior and error tolerance and display of filter values in emails
Use docValues for appropriate Solr fields:
VUFIND-1100 - this long-ongoing conversation has been revived, possibly to be resolved in conjunction with upgrading to Solr 8