Need more granular staff permissions for the Ares client.
This has been a pressing need for us for many years, and never seems to make it into the development priority list. Collections librarians, as well as learning/curriculum support librarians are constantly asking for access to the Ares client in order to understand what kinds of materials instructors in their subject area are adding to their course lists. But there is no way currently to provide client access without also giving access to user's information as well. Also, we really want them to have "view only" access - not to be able to change or delete materials that instructors have added. Here's a summary of what we need:
• ability to assign view-only client access for any library staff member
• ability to restrict the parts of the client that can be viewed by those who have "view only" access. For example, items and courses are viewable, but not enrolled users, or copyright permission processing, or user information). Ideally it should be as granular as possible, so that the ‘view’ permissions can be customized for individual users based on their need/role.
• ability to restrict the type of data that can be modified by individual staff users; again, a toggle off/on for the ability to update certain item fields but not others would be ideal – same thing for user records, course records, web alerts, etc.
Heather Martin
shared this idea
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Allen Jones commented
We would like some staff (namely reference librarians) to be able to view the processing of Ares items and make notes to items, but NOT move things from queue to queue. This would allow the reference staff to converse with patrons, note outcomes on relevant items without having impacts for the back-office processing staff.
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Jenny Gelman
commented
We give all library staff proxy access to the web. I'm not sure why they need view access to the client when they can view everything on the web.
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Anonymous
commented
We need this - we have to alow circulation staff to have all ability but don't want them to. Only view only or limited staff options would be much better.
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Hilary Thompson
commented
I would love to have a read-only option Ares client access. We would use this for the generic accounts used by the dozens of student assistants who help patrons across 7 library service desks. If a patron cannot log into the learning management system (which for us is increasingly common now that we have multi-factor authentication), the employee at the desk needs to be able to search Ares to see if the item is on reserve without being able to make any changes to these items.
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Heather,
This is a great idea and something we already offer in ILLiad and Aeon. What do you think about restricting the ability to delete users, courses, or items, based on staff permission level, too? I know you're always on top of these things, but just a reminder about the upcoming Virtual User Group:
Thanks so much for your suggestion. If you haven't already registered, please join us at the upcoming Ares Virtual User Group and we can discuss more ways to integrate your ideas.Ares Virtual User Group
Wednesday, November 28, 2018
1:30 PM 4:30 PM
Register Here: https://bit.ly/2CtDz13Thank you,
Kerry Keegan
Ares Product Lead
Atlas Systems -
Heather Martin
commented
I have done the same as Todd in order to provide our librarians with the information they need, but this is not ideal. Librarians need to be able to access collections and usage data within Ares in real time, on an as-needed basis. If they are meeting with a faculty member about purchasing content for the collection, they should be able to view that faculty member's reserve lists as part of that conversation.
This is a serious issue at my institution - it's a significant obstacle to developing an integrated approach to collection management/development. -
Todd Miranda
commented
Our Librarians have asked for similar content and I have found it it easiest to send out lists of items by department. The Librarians don't have any access to Ares at all and they get the list they are ultimately looking for.
I accomplish this quickly using a Custom Item Search searching by the Courses.Department field matching a keyword like Education.
