[Koha-devel] Branch Categories

[Chris Cormack]

Hi All

At our meeting on IRC this morning Paul asked me to write a brief
explanation of branch categories and what they can be used for.

The easiest way is with an example.

You could make a category, 
IS for issuing

Then you can go

my $branches = getbranches('IS');
Which will get you all branches that are of that category. This is useful
for libraries that have branches that cant issue.

So you can use this call in the script which chooses which branch you will
be issuing for. 

Or
RE for Reserve Pickups

Then on the opac-reserve.pl you could do
$branches = getbranches('RE');

Then you will only be giving the users the list of branches they can pick
reserves up from.

A branch can belong to more than one category also, so it can be RE, IS, etc
But you could have a 'branch' which is called Mending, which doesnt show up
in circulation, or reserves, but you can transfer books to this branch when
they need to be mended etc.

Or like one of our clients you might have 4 physical branches, but only 3 of
them can circulate books. It just allows you flexibility

I hope this helps, please ask more questions if I havent been clear enough.

Chris
-- 
Chris Cormack                                                     Programmer
027 4500 789                                       Katipo Communications Ltd
address@hidden                                          www.katipo.co.nz