Knowledge Base: Library Help

For a printable version of this article including screenshots, or for a printable tutorial of how to do this process in Polaris, please check the links at the bottom of this article.

How To Do An Item Add In Leap

When you receive an item via donation or you purchase through outside purchase, and there is an existing bibliographic record for the item, you can add the item yourself. Item records pull data directly from bibliographic records. Bibliographic records are created by the catalogers at the four regional systems of TRAC. 

Preparatory Steps

1)    Before creating new items, it is helpful to ensure you have the following:

• Barcode stickers
• Label stickers
• Printer
• STAR receipt printer
• Library property stamp

2)    Before adding your items to Leap, add your barcode stickers to your items. Add the barcode sticker to the back cover of the item in the top right corner, with “Northern Lights Library System” facing outwards.

Item and Bibliographic Records: Background

To add a new item to your library, you create a new item record based on a pre-existing bibliographic (bib) record. A bib record contains all the information about an item that doesn’t change from copy to copy: title, author, size, etc. An item record contains information about an item that can be different for every copy: barcode, loan period, shelf location, and other information that will be different from library to library. 

See our FAQ for more details about the differences between bibliographic records and item records.

Every item record must be linked to a bib record so it can display basic information like title and author. There are usually many item records based off a single bib record. To create a new item record, you will need a bib record to base it off. Most books have an International Standard Book Number (ISBN) barcode and number on the back to help with this – each ISBN corresponds to a particular edition of a particular book, and thus to a particular bib record.
Note: if the item is a DVD, you will want to change your search parameters to search by UPC instead of ISBN. 

 Finding the Bibliographic Record

The first part of creating a new item record is finding the bib record to create it from. Here is how to set it up so you can scan and search by ISBN.
1)    Beside the search bar, click ‘Find’.
2)    In the window that pops up, click the dropdown arrow beside the ‘Patron’ field at the top.
3)    Scroll up until you can find and choose ‘Bibliographic Record’.
4)    Click the dropdown beside the second-last field at the top, which will read "All keywords".
5)    Scroll and choose ‘ISBN’.
6)    Scan or type the ISBN – it will be the barcode printed on the back of the book. 
7)    From the search results that pop up, choose your bib record
8)    Click ‘Open’
Note: if the item is a DVD, you will want to change your search parameters to search by UPC instead of ISBN.

If your search comes up blank - no ISBNs match your item's ISBN - that means there are no bibliographic records already in the system for your item. You will need to fill out a Cat Sheet. Follow the link for instructions on how to fill out Cat Sheets.

Creating The New Item Record

1)    In the Bibliographic Record that opens, click the Items tab.

If you are uncertain which collection to assign the item to, or if you are unsure what the cutter or classification number should be on the item, you can check the list of other items assigned to this bibliographic record. In this example, libraries vary between assigning it to a Juvenile (J) collection or a Young Adult (YA) collection, but all have given it the COL cutter.

If you still can’t decide, you can set the item aside for the moment and send an email to ask@nlls.ab.ca and Northern Lights staff can help you with the decision.

2)    Click the New Item button.

Filling In The New Item Record

The New Item Record workform will open once you've clicked the New Item button.

1)    Scan the barcode of the item into the Barcode field. 
2)    If the item is a non-fiction item (book, DVD, etc), add the Classification number. You can find it in the Items tab of the bibliographic record as the second piece of information in the call number.
3)    Add the Cutter. 

1. If the item is a book, this will be the first three letters of the author’s last name, in all capitals (e.g. Eoin Colfer > COL)
   1. If there are multiple authors, use the name of the author who appears in the item/bibliographic record.
   2. If the author’s last name is fewer than 3 letters, just use the last name as written (e.g. Marie Lu > LU
2. If the item is a DVD or video game, use the title. Skip any articles like "the" or "an" at the beginning. Then the cutter will be the first three letters of the item’s title, in all capitals (e.g. Aladdin > ALA)
   1. If the title is fewer than 3 letters, use as much of the next word as you need to fill it out (e.g. Of Mice And Men > OFM)
   2. If the title begins with a number, spell the number out (e.g. Twenty-Eight Days Later > TWE)

If you are unsure, check the other items in the Items tab of the bibliographic record to see what other libraries have put.

4)    Add the price of the item – this is always the list price of the item, not the discounted price you may have paid when purchasing. 

5)    To fill the rest of the fields, choose an item template from the dropdown based on the collection you want to add the item to – e.g. Fiction, Juvenile Fiction, Non-Fiction. Each item template will auto-fill fields for you slightly differently, based on what is in your library’s cataloguing profile. If you would like to change or view your cataloguing profile, please send a ticket to ask@nlls.ab.ca. 

The values in the bottom section will auto-fill based on the settings in your template.
6)    Ensure Use template values instead of these is checked off (it usually does so automatically after selecting the template).
7)    Click Create Item. The item record for your new item will create and open.

Adding More New Items

To get back to creating the next new item:
1)    Click “Close” on your new item record. This will bring you to the bibliographic record you used.
2)    Click “Results” on the bibliographic record page to return to the search you set up.
3)    Scan or type the ISBN of your next item into the search bar and continue.

Your new items will have the circulation status of “In Processing”, so they will not be selected to fill holds until they have been checked in.
Once you are ready for the items to fill holds and be available to be checked out, simply open the Check In workform and scan the items.