Step 1 - Finding items to modify

In order to modify items from your system it is necessary to have the barcodes or itemnumbers of the items to be modified. These can be accumulated in a number of ways, however, it is common to use the reports module to gather the information. The type of report created will depend upon what types of items are to be modified e.g: items to be moved to a new collection or location, items that have been damaged etc.

If you require assistance determining what kind of report would be the best to use for your purposes please contact Interleaf Technology and they will be able to advise you. If contacting Interleaf Technology for this purpose, please state the intention of the report is to help with a batch modification. 

If you use a report to retrieve a list of barcodes or itemnumbers for items to be modified, download the results to your computer and, if necessary, delete any columns not containing barcodes. 

Step 2 - The batch item modification tool

Go to Tools > Catalog > Batch item modification.

There are two ways in which barcodes can be added for this procedure.

A CSV file of barcodes can be uploaded from your computer.

Or individual barcodes may be scanned, typed or copied and pasted into the empty box on the page. The empty box cannot be used for itemnumbers.

If you are using a file of barcodes there are two things to be aware of: 

1. The file used must be a CSV file
   

2. Barcodes must be saved in a single column with no spaced between the barcodes on the list.
   

If you are scanning the barcodes, they must be scanned one to a line, with no spaces between the lines.

There is also an option to Populate fields with default values from default framework. 

Koha comes with a number of default frameworks already present in the system. One of these frameworks is the Default Framework, which should never be edited. Some tags in this framework come pre-populated with information already present in their subfields. By clicking this option, this pre-populated information will be added to the various fields in the items being modified. This can be useful for standardising the catalogue, but the process should be tested on a staging server before being attempted on the live to be clear on what the resulting changes would be.  

Step 3 - The actual modification

Once the barcodes have been added, click continue and you will be brought to a new page with a table containing information about the items you have added for modification and at the end of the page, a form with the features of the items available for modification.  

It is possible to change items using the dropdowns or the freeform boxes and it is possible to change multiple features at once.

Once you are satisfied that all aspects you want modified have been addressed, click Save.

This will take you to a new page with a confirmation of how many items have been modified and a table showing the item information where you can check if the modifications you added have been saved.