allCirc™
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Frequently Asked Questions
(FAQs)
allCIRC™
is a user friendly, flexible automation system designed
to provide complete media protection while allowing
patron self service. allCIRC™
is a third generation product, stemming from the development
of the Intelligent Media Manager (IMM)™
product line. Here are some key questions that have
been asked of our staff on various topics over the years.
(not in any order)
Why
has the IMM-3000 been renamed?
Due to a complete paradigm
shift that we have created by redesigning the IMM, we
felt that it deserved its own name.
What
do you mean by a "silo" approach and why is
it important?
One of the key advantages
of the allCirc™ approach is the
flexibility that it provides in placing the units where
the patrons are, much like the current collection classifications
occur in the library today. Unlike the “silo”
approach of the IMM-2000 series models, the allCirc™
allows you a much more efficient use of capacity, because
not only is the patron traffic distributed among many
machines, the loading effort by the staff is distributed
as well.
What we have found is that
as more people started to use the IMM system, less time
was there allotted to loading it, and hence many were
not able to utilize the entire capacity of the machine.
So, a typical 1500 item system would only house 250-350
items on the average due to sheer effort required to
load more while having the unit be off-line –
a waste.
You
refered to an idea of placing the system next to our
media shelves. Can you explain that?
What we found is that
due to the IMM design we were forcing the library to
“unclassify” the collection to move the
empty media cases close to the machine and thereby destroying
or at very least making it very difficult to keep the
classifications intact. This created having with circulation
staff and confusion for the patrons (where do I go to
get my stuff?) This is the goal we are address with
the allCirc™. The intent of the
allCirc™ is to be placed near
or at the place of where the collection is stored. That
is, if a particular machine is slated for “Children’s
DVDs”, the allCirc™ system
will/should be placed in the Children’s area.
How
does the system handle multi-volume CD sets?
If properly loaded
and defined, the allCirc™ would
simply let the user know that more items are to be retrieved.
They will see "retrieving item 1 of 3, 2 of 3,
3 of 3"... etc.,
How
does the system deal with items that are "on hold"?
This capability is
carried over from the IMM-2000 system as it worked extremely
well. Basically, the ILS provides the “permission”
for us to allow for a particular item to be circulated.
If the item is placed on hold and your rules are set
such that hold items are not to be circulated, then
allCirc™ will not allow that
item to circulate.
The staff can retrieve the
item at any time (unload).
What
kind of CDs can be stored in the system?
The allCirc™
system will handle any kind of disk media, which includes
but not limited to:
CD, DVD, Blu-Ray, HD, PlayStation, PS2, Nintendo …
Basically, anything that resembles a standard CD disk
will work with the allCirc™.
Our web designers
insist that to have aesthetically pleasing pages, they
cannot be so long that users need to scroll to reach
the end...well, we are there with these questions. Call
us to ask more questions.
