Changing the Ownership of a Library

There are occasions when you might want to transfer the ownership of a library to another user.  The owner of the library is responsible for paying the annual subscription service fee.   Sometimes larger organizations want one user to pay for all the libraries at once.   Transferring ownership to a single user makes this task much easier to manage.  There are other occasions when the original user who created the library would like to transfer the ownership to another user.  

A new feature in LibraryWorld allows this to be done quickly, easily and with full security.  To transfer ownership of a library from one user to another, access the library and click on the Settings link, then click on the Subscription link.  This will display the subscription information.  If you are the owner of the library, a link will display allowing you to transfer the ownership.   Next, click on the ‘Change Owner of the Library’ link to display a page that prompts for the new owners username.  Enter the new owner’s username and click on the Change Owner button.  A confirming page will appear displaying the new owner’s username, personal name and organization.  If this is correct, enter your own password to confirm the transfer and click on the ‘Confirm Change’ button.

If there are no errors the ownership of the library will be transferred and both you and the new owner will receive confirming emails.   

Once you transfer the ownership of the library, the library will not appear on your list of libraries.  If you continue to want access to the library, the new owner will need to setup permissions for your username and you will then have to join the library with the Join command on the My Home page. 

Only the user who owns the library subscription can transfer ownership to another user and that transfer must be confirmed with the correct password.   Emails are sent to each user and internal records are kept at LibraryWorld logging the change.

Using the Z39.50 Search Feature to Add Catalog Records

One way to add a new catalog record to your library is to search the Library of Congress z39.50 database of over 14 million records (or one of the other available z39.50 databases) and copy it into your collection.

Steps to search for a record:

1. On the Catalog page, click on the New Record link.
2. Select the database you want to search.
3. Enter an ISBN, or Title and Author last name and click the Search button.
   Note: If you have a bar code scanner, you may be able to scan in the ISBN bar code number usually found on the back cover of books.
4. If matching records are found, click on the divot to the left of each title to see the ISBN, author and publication information to make sure you select the correct record.
5. If you want to add a record to your collection, simply click on the title.
6. The record is added to your collection and displayed with other recently added records.
7. Click on the pencil icon to the right of the title to edit the record. You'll want to do this to add copies and other local holding information.
8. Click the Add a New Record link to return to the New Record page and continue adding records.

General Database Information

• The Library of Congress catalog does not include records for every book published – only those that they have added to their catalog.  Also, not all of their records contain an ISBN.  Sometimes you will get better results if you search by Title.

• Most books published before 1971 are not in the Library of Congress catalog.

• Many, if not most, of the books published by Scholastic are not included in the Library of Congress catalog.

• Many users have reported getting better results when searching the OhioLINK Central Catalog.  If you’re having trouble finding records in the Library of Congress catalog, try using the OhioLINK catalog for some searches to see if you get better results.

• Occasionally one of the databases may be unavailable (offline). This becomes evident when you do several searches and get no results.  When this happens, try searching one of the other databases for your titles and then you can try the original database again the next time you are adding records.

Searching Tips

• When searching by ISBN, do not include hyphens.
• You don’t have to enter the entire title or author when searching.
• If the title contains very common words, enter the title and the author’s last name.  This will speed up the search.
• Enter author names with last name then first name.  Punctuation is not necessary.
• It’s best not to search by author alone.  Searching by author and title will provide faster results.