Mandarin Oasis™•Mandarin M3^®•Optional Modules•Hardware

Mandarin M3^® - Windows OPAC

The patron's gateway to your library's collection

The M3 OPAC is the patron's gateway to your library's collection. Searching your collection for books, magazines, e-books, Web sites, maps, CD-ROM's, full text articles, and more is simple using the M3 OPAC.

Searching from the OPAC

What Can Patrons Search?

If your library system utilizes a Union Catalog, not only can patrons search your local catalog, but they can also search additional sites on the system. From the Databases tab, patrons can select and search any site as though they were in those libraries!

Standard Search

Standard Search allows patrons to enter subject, title or author keywords when searching the collection or online resource. The number of results returned displays at the bottom of the screen. If patrons do not locate what they are looking for, or their search is too broad, they may then browse either the subject, title, or author indexes.

To assist patrons with narrowing search results, the Standard Search supports the AND, OR, and NOT Boolean operators as well as truncation searches (*), wildcard searches (?), and phrase searches (").

Enhanced Search

The Enhanced Search supports the same useful functionality of the Standard Search as well as additional search field selections. In addition to searching by subject, title, or author, the Enhanced Search allows patrons to search MARC fields such as Date of Publication, Material Type, URL, Title Series, and Abstract/Summary from a drop-down menu. Librarians also have the ability to add or delete search fields, thereby customizing this search interface for your library's audience.

Visual Catalog:

The Visual Catalog provides a graphical search alternative. By selecting pertinent graphical buttons, patrons narrow their search utilizing a topic tree approach until specific results are displayed.

Librarians may easily customize the Visual Catalog highlighting holidays, e-books, Web sites, activities, bestsellers lists, Accelerated Reading Lists, New Resources, etc. Librarians can even select to launch applications such as WordPad, Excel, Encyclopedia, Atlases, etc. from the Visual Catalog screen. The OPAC enables you to select topics and appropriate graphic images. Mandarin ships over 60 graphics with the software. You may also choose to design your own graphics and add them to the Visual Catalog.

Search Results

The Search Results window is designed to display results in an organized and easily readable format. Each title is displayed with availability, material type, bibliographic information, and call number information. The librarian can customize these display defaults as well as define the default font and font size of the Search Results list.

From the Search Results list, patrons can:

view book cover images (if library has annual subscription to Syndetic Solutions from Mandarin)
tag/untag individual items or all items
print or save tagged items or all items
add tagged items or all items to the Bookbag, creating a virtual bibliography patrons can print or save
sort the list by author, title, copyright date, call number, and call number by prefix
save and print holdings data

and much more . . .

If your library has the new Authority Control Optional Module, "See" and See also" cross-references are displayed at the top of the results list. These cross references lead patrons to subjects related to their search.

"My Account" Feature

The OPAC now has an optional "My Account" tab. Patrons can select this tab, enter a user name and password, and then view their personal account information. Information patrons can access about their account include:

Current - Open, or current, transactions
History - Closed, or historical, transactions
My Info - Personal information that the library has on file

Additional Features

The Language option allows patrons to change the interface to display in any of the following languages:
- English
- French
- German
- Italian
- Spanish
The Bulletin Board keeps your patrons informed of your library's hours of operation, holidays, or special events by linking to your home page, any Web page you want patrons to view, or a page designed specifically for the bulletin board

Here's What's New in Version 1.7 SP1

( Current Service and Update Agreement Subscribers Only. Includes Service Pack 2 and Service Pack 3 )

Mandarin M3® is known for its powerful, sophisticated yet simple-to-use features – and now there’s more of the same! If you purchased M3 version 1.6 (or earlier) or if you downloaded a free version of M3 (version 1.6 or earlier), now is the time to upgrade to version 1.7 SP1.

Circulation

The Check Holdings for Reserves feature has been corrected. This feature allows you to create holds for all newly-added and available items, where all pre-existing holdings were on loan and reserved.
If the default loan period extends beyond a global recall date, the global recall date is always used as the due date, even if there is a session-based due date that is sooner than the recall date.
When you search for an item and click the barcode in the results list, the item loads in the item pane, but the transaction does not process.
On Windows Vista, you can search using Search Dialog and select the item (or patron) to load into Circulation.
Windows 2003 (including XP x64) and Windows Vista users no longer receive the “Initialization Failed” dialog during start up.
Various scenarios involving adjusting or overriding bookings when loaning items have been addressed: Adjusted loan overlaps first day of booking; first-created, not first-up booking removed by loan override; more than one booking not handled when a loan overrides more than one booking.
If an overdue item is renewed during the Grace Period, the Overdue Item block message is no longer displayed.
When a Booking is canceled, Circulation no longer sends out the Item Hold email.
Cancel override when doing batch processes (renewal) does not stop the transaction from processing on the first item that triggers the override. Some holds may not appear under Item Transactions, but they do show up under Patron Transactions.
When there are multiple reserves, skipping the patron with the hold and loaning the item to another patron causes the hold to be lost.

Inventory

Inventory now operates consistently on multiple-core CPU’s.

( Does Not Include Service Pack 2 or Service Pack 3 )

This release introduces new features in the M3 Core modules as well as several innovative optional modules, including Syndetic Solutions, MARC Magician integrated with M3 Cataloging, and M3 Pocket Module.

New M3 Core module features are outlined below.

Cataloging

Ability to import pictures and to update patron and item records with these pictures.
Ability to create multiple holdings for a bibliographic record at one time.
When sorting, non-filing characters ("the", "a", and so on) are now ignored.
When creating a new holding for an existing bibliographic record, the prefix (852#k) is now copied into the new holding record.
Ability to tag a block of records in the main Cataloging window by selecting the first record and pressing SHIFT while selecting the last record; this tags all records in between.
The removal of empty fields after saving a record is now optional.

Windows^® OPAC

Ability to view book cover images.
Ability to link to Syndetics Solutions, which allows patrons to view summaries, reviews, and other content data for items in your collection. It also provides cover images for thousands of items. This is available on a subscription basis for an additional charge.
Ability to customize your library name on the main window.br />
Ability to save and print holdings data from the Search Results and Bookbag windows.
Ability to view holdings information in the Bookbag Details window.
In libraries with union databases, local holdings are indicated by a star-shaped Availability and Tagging check box.