There is more information—and more detail—in this post than most of you will want to read, so I will give it to you in two versions: short and directive, and long and explanatory.
Here’s the short version: When you shut down on Sunline at the end of this week and come up on PALS, please continue to use iBorrow. It won’t be as slick–at first–on Polaris as it is on Sunline. But it will work, and it is getting better each week. Borrowing should work fine, and lending will not be any worse than it is with OCLC.
If you are a Library Director, you can stop reading here. You’re welcome to read on, but you don’t have to.
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Now, here’s the long version, mostly for ILL staff: The URSA/iBorrow server lives in Utah and communicates with our local library servers through NCIP: the NISO Circulation Interchange Protocol. Every major step in an iBorrow request has an NCIP message. Sometimes two of them. URSA has the easy job. It tells the local library server to “do this”, and the local server has to get it done. The local server does not get to give URSA any instructions. The most it can ever say is “Yes, sir!” or “Sorry. I can’t do that!”
There are actually eleven NCIP messages, but we use only five of them. Two of them already work with Polaris. We are working with their tech guys on the other three. Here is the breakdown.
Requesting
When a patron (PALS or other) logs into the portal, URSA validates him with the NCIP Lookup User message. When he makes a request, it uses the same NCIP message and validates him again. (Why? I don’t know. Seems pointless to me.) The ‘Lookup User’ message works with Polaris, so your patrons can use the iBorrow Portal to make requests after you migrate.
Speed Bump: When your patrons registered for the first time, they were associated with Sunline. After the end of July, they will be associated with Polaris/PALS. They will probably have to re-register in the portal. If ALL of Sunline was moving to Polaris, we might be able to just roll them over. But patrons at four libraries are NOT going to Polaris. We’ll work on this, but don’t get your hopes up.
Receiving
Moving on, still looking at your patrons as borrowers…
When the item that your patron requested in the Portal shows up at your library in the orange Delivery bag, you do Receive Loan in the URSA client. That generates the NCIP Accept Item message—the one that creates a brief bib, an item, and a hold for the patron. That works in Polaris, too.
Now, before we get too excited, I should say that it has worked in Polaris so far. And Polaris staff will have to set up a particular template in your account, once you come up on Polaris. We may be able to arrange to have that template in place on the day you come up. I guess the bottom line is that this can work and has worked. And we may have to fumble around a little at first to make it work in your particular library.
Returning
When your patron checks out, reads, and returns the book you got from some other iBorrow participant, you do Return Loan in the client. That generates no NCIP message at all. It does nothing but move the request from the Return Loan space at your library to the Complete Loan space at the lending library. So, being in Polaris will have no effect, and this will work just fine. So, the borrowing side of iBorrow in Polaris is mostly a piece of cake.
Now, let’s talk lending.
Z39.50 Server
 When any library’s patron does a search, URSA sends the search to all the participants’ Z39.50 servers. They respond, and URSA/iBorrow assembles those results in the Portal. You’ll be happy to know that the PALS Z39.50 server works great.
Placing PALS Holds
 After the patrons clicks on Request Item and gets a Request ID number, URSA/iBorrow decides who to go to first. If it chooses your library, it will send your server the NCIP Request Item message. That one does NOT work yet in Polaris. It is our highest priority, as we work with the Polaris techies, but it isn’t there yet. On the other hand, it doesn’t always work in Sunline either, so it’s an inconvenience, not a disaster. Here’s the detail.
When “Request Item” works, the local server places a Title level hold for one of the URSA dummy patrons. If the local server says, “Yes, sir! I did that!”, URSA puts the request in the Fill Loan workspace, and you work with it there. If it fails, the request goes into your Incoming Loan workspace. You can fill it the same way you would, if the request came from OCLC. You find it on the shelf and lug it back to ILL.
Sidebar: The NCIP Request Item message is also the one URSA uses when it turns a Portal request into a local hold. That is another reason that it is at the top of our list.
Filling PALS Holds
 Once you have a copy of the requested title back at your ILL desk, you would normally scan its barcode in Fill Loan or Incoming Loan. URSA would send your local server the NCIP Lookup Item message, closely followed by the NCIP Checkout Item message.
“Lookup Item” uses the barcode you scan to find the title this barcode belongs to in your bibliographic database. Then it brings back the ISBN from that title and uses that ISBN to find the matching request in the URSA database. If it finds it, it uses “Checkout Item” to tell your server to check out the item to the dummy patron, while you sent the real item to the requesting library. These two NCIP messages do not yet work in Polaris, so you will need to do the kind of checkout you normally do with an OCLC request. Then you just change the request’s status to Filled in the URSA client.
Completing PALS Requests
Now, actually we are through with NCIP, but let’s follow through on this loan, just to give you the full story. You send it to the borrowing library in the orange bag. Their patron reads and returns it. They send it back to you. You open the URSA client, go to Complete Loan, and scan the barcode. URSA archives the request and sends the NCIP Checkin Item message to your local server.
Don’t tell anyone, but that message does not work in Sunline. It never has. So, you have to check returned item in yourself.  This NCIP message may or may not work in Polaris. We haven’t gotten there yet. But, it can’t be worse than Sunline, so you won’t be going backwards.Â
Are you still awake? Are you still with me?
Here’s a summary.
 Of the eleven NCIP messages, we’ve been using only five—two when we borrow and three when we lend.
The two borrowing messages work in Polaris now.
The three lending messages are being beaten into submission as you read this.
Your patrons will probably need to re-register in the Portal once. And their open requests won’t follow them to their new identity.
Aside from that, they can request just as they do now. So, turn ‘em loose, and let them do it.
You’ll have to do more manual work while lending than you do now, but not for long.
Got questions? Got concerns? Got tickets to the next Rays game?
Call me.
–Al Carlson
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