Membership, HE & libraries site features

Liberate modules

Front Desk
The Front Desk module has been designed for the librarian to use for all 'front of house' activities. It manages all procedures associated with customer relationship management through a simple, easy to use interface the is appealing to staff. At its core is the catalogue function, which offers staff flexible and effecient cataloguing operations that support the library's bibliographic database. Circulation control handles all circulation activity and allows user profiles to be set up for item types, locations and loan periods, maintained by category of reader and media type.

Customer Centre
The Customer Centre module enables members of the public to 'self-serve' using the internet through Liberate's online public access catalogue (OPAC) which offers excellent levels of functionality, whilst still being easy to use. The OPAC incorporates advanced features for reserving and renewing stock items, whilst also providing clear, easy to use search facilities for young readers and casual enquirers. It enables users to search the catalogue, which immediately provides ready access to specific information about the customer's account. Circulation functions, such as reserve and/or renew are also available to customers remotely through the OPAC. User details are held in the system to assist library staff in both the general circulation of items and the production of reports and statistics.

Stock
The Stock module looks after all aspects of the library’s stock including acquisitions, circulations and inter-library loans. It enables the library to automate procedures, control expenditure and implement commitment accounting with the capability for electronic data exchange (EDI). At its core is the catalogue, which manages any number of different stock items such as books, DVD’s and CD-ROMS. It automatically inputs all cataloguing data in MARC format into the Liberate database, including subject matter, classification, photos and bibliographic details. Acquisitions tracks the purchase of materials through ordering, claiming, receiving, invoicing and processing, with budgeting accounts being kept for each financial year. The stock module also provides an interactive authority control system to establish a single, authoritative form for all headings. Generated and updated from authority records, this thesaurus provides online catalogue users with references to aid in searching.

Reporting
The reporting module is used by the library to create and distribute management reports that show how the library is performing against its targets. By successfully tracking the progress and effetiveness of the library, important decisions about how services are delivered to customers can be made. Reports can be distributed to anyone within the library who needs them and can include information such as reader satisfaction surveys, computer based training, anaysis of seraches made through the web OPAC and footfall . Reports can be displayed in a ‘digital dashboard’ style interface to create a visual image of critical pieces of information.

Administration Centre
The Administration Centre module is used to control global settings and the configuration of the Liberate library management solution at a system-wide and site level. It is typically used when the system is initially being set up or when operational changes are being done.

RFID
Radio Frequency Identification tags are the replacement for barcodes as the new way for suppliers to label, identify and track products from their manufacture, through to delivery to the consumer. As part of the government’s agenda for modernisation, libraries are benefiting from RFID technology as a cost effective way of tracking library stock.

Smartcards
Liberate integrates with any council or institute-wide smartcard initiative to enable library customers to take advantage of other community services.

MARC21
The Liberate MARC21 catalogue module is available for libraries that want to transfer and exchange catalogue records between difference systems.

Inter-Library Loans
ILL manages an entire library's loan needs and can be used to request items from any library via fax or letter template. It automates those procedures invovled when requesting items from member libraries and enables readers to track the progress of their request.

Online Payments
As an addition to the Customer Centre module, we provide the means of interfacing with any 3rd party payment provider and updating customer account information within the Liberate library management system.

Mobile Library Units
Liberate mobile provides an offline catalogue and detailed circulation functionality for use on board a mobile library. It has been designed to meet the needs of remote or housebound customers.