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The process starts with a Perl program, newbooks.pl, containing embedded SQL queries. This program connects to Voyager's underlying Oracle database via the magic of the Perl DBI and DBD::Oracle modules.
It is designed to run every night as a cron job and it outputs newbooks.txt, a flat file containing records of newly received items. This file is then transferred to the WebVoyage server.
A search form, generated by newbooks.cgi, gives users a variety of options for displaying new items. Patrons can choose all new books, or only books for a particular location. They can sort results by author, title, or call number, and can select from one to four weeks (or months) worth of items. In addition, the form allows for basic keyword searching, and users can select the number of records to display per page.
For libraries that have implemented the multilingual option, the interface allows users to switch from the default language to a language of their preference.
At runtime, newbooks.cgi reads in functional configuration data from the newbooks.ini file and language-specific information from the appropriate language module.
When a patron does a search, newbooks.cgi reads the flat file database of new items and returns all items that match the selected criteria.
Each item returned has a link back to the corresponding record in the catalog via WebVoyage's Pwebrecon.cgi. Users can print, download, or email selected new item listings.
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