New Beta Summit System has been Implemented

The Orbis Cascade Alliance, the consortium of libraries that is responsible for the Summit shared catalog, has changed software vendors. As a result there has been a number of modifications to Summit.

Tracking your Summit Requests

May 12 Update
On May 11, 2009 an update was made that affected the way Summit stores patron information. After this date, patrons logging on to their existing account may not be able to see requests made before that date. Those requests are still active and can be processed by Summit staff as usual, but do not appear on the patron view of your Summit account. The requested items will be processed normally and will be visible on your UW Libraries record when they’re received and you will be notified as usual.

Normally you can track your requests in Summit by accessing your Summit Account (click on the "Proxied Insitutional Sign On" link, select "University of Washington" from the pulldown menu and then login with your UWNetID) and Your Library Account to track the progress of your request as it moves from one system to the other. The best course of action now is to check that the item has shipped in the Summit catalog and then wait until you receive a notice that the item has arrived at the pickup location that you specified. Summit status Information

What does the change mean for UW borrowers?

Most books and longer loan material will have a 6 week loan period with no renewals. Shorter loan material, such as cds and dvds, will have a 6 day loan. Items that have been requested will not show in your UW library account until it is received locally in 2-4 days.
The ability for UW borrowers to visit other libraries and check out materials continues, though they will need to verify their status at the remote library by logging into their UW library account. Once the UW borrower is "adopted" in this manner by the remote library they can request that books from other libraries be delivered to that library. Visting patron information for all Summit libraries

Why were changes made?

Our contract with our software vendor expired in December 2008. We needed to implement the new system to replace the earlier system in December so that we would have some continuity during the change.

Questions?

Additional information is available at the main Summit site.

Questions can be sent to the Libraries AskUs service.