[ILL-L] Another enhancement suggestion - interactive workform

[kendall vance]

Submitted for your discussion. . . .

I've often thought hat it would be useful if the WCRS Workform  were more
interactive. For example, why isn't 'patron email' a mailto link? Actually,
I would like to see something more than a traditional mailto here: I would
like to able to click on my patron's email address and have WCRS present me
with a form, auto-populated with appropriate details from the request (such
as bibliographic info, dates, request status, etc.) and a free text area
where I could append a message to my patron. It might even be nice to extend
this notion and have WCRS allow me to choose between a number of message
templates upon clicking on said patron email. For example - one template
might be for an overdue notice, another might be a pre-formatted reminder to
the patron that s/he has an item to pick up, another might be a "sorry, but
no dice" unfilled message. All of the data is there on the page, but I find
myself forever copying and pasting this info into my clunky old email
client, and it always strikes me a bit silly, and inefficient. And why stop
there. Why not allow the OCLC# field to link to the WorldCat bib record for
that item, or the let the codes in a lender string link to a given library's
policy directory entry, and so on.

What do others in ILL-land think of this idea? Does it seem like a
reasonable request, or is it too pie-the-sky to bother with?


Thank you,

Kendall Vance
Interlibrary Loan/Periodicals Management Assistant
Waubonsee Community College
Todd Library
Route 47 at Waubonsee Drive
Sugar Grove, IL 60554
Ph# 630.466.7900 x2333
Fax# 630.466.7799
kvance at waubonsee.edu
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