Bug 37007 - Should we move vendors out of the acq module?
Summary: Should we move vendors out of the acq module?
Status: NEW
Alias: None
Product: Koha
Classification: Unclassified
Component: System Administration (show other bugs)
Version: Main
Hardware: All All
: P5 - low enhancement
Assignee: Bugs List
QA Contact: Testopia
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Reported: 2024-06-02 10:35 UTC by Katrin Fischer
Modified: 2024-07-26 10:14 UTC (History)
8 users (show)

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Description Katrin Fischer 2024-06-02 10:35:05 UTC
Vendors are now used by serials, acquisitions and the ERM module. It's already a little awkward right now, that a serials librarian would needs an acquisitions permissions.

It makes me wonder if we should move vendors into a separate area.
Another idea might be to integrate them into the other modules. So if someone just had vendors_manage, they would not need to access/see the acq module.
Comment 1 Caroline Cyr La Rose 2024-06-19 18:00:39 UTC
Good idea!

I'm not sure where I'd put them however... Administration?
Comment 2 Michaela Sieber 2024-06-20 09:43:05 UTC
I think it doesn't matter in which module the vendors are managed, acquistion is ok for us. It is more important to have more granular permissions, the vendors_manage is not enough.
Comment 3 Aude Charillon 2024-06-21 10:42:13 UTC
I agree with this idea; there are library teams who use Serials or ERM but do not order through the acquisitions module. It doesn't make sense for them to have to go to Acquisitions only to manage their vendors.

If we move vendors out of Acquisitions, I was also thinking Administration would be the only place we could stick them in :D
Moving vendors would also require a serious revamp of Acquisitions, wouldn't it?

So integrating vendors elsewhere as Katrin suggests may be easier? This approach makes sense too.
Comment 4 Katrin Fischer 2024-06-21 10:44:42 UTC
I think moving in the GUI not that much, mostly templates. But similar to the problems we had when moving the cataloguing tools maybe.

Administration doesn't feel quite right to me - same issue here: I am not a system librarian, why do I need to go into admin...

What about making it it's own thing?
Comment 5 Aude Charillon 2024-06-21 10:49:15 UTC
Budgets and funds are already in Administration... so some of the people dealing with that side of things will already be used to going to that module. It also depends on the permissions: if I'm just in the stock team, I could end up with a rather clean view in the Admin module, with just the Acquisitions parameters.

I'd be against making it its own thing (I already have enough tiles on my home screen!!) but I know others feel differently.
Comment 6 Jonathan Field 2024-06-21 10:54:12 UTC
I think there’s a good argument for moving them, particularly in the context of ERM. I also wonder whether "Vendors" is even the right term any longer? Should it be something broader, like "Providers" or “Organisations” as they potentially cover book sellers, publishers, content providers, donors and so on.

I'm not sure the admin area is the right place either, maybe their own space with better permissions?
Comment 7 Katrin Fischer 2024-06-21 11:00:24 UTC
Good point about the naming, I have been thinking about that as well. 
I lean a bit towards Organisations as a very general term.
Comment 8 Jonathan Field 2024-06-21 11:04:17 UTC
(In reply to Katrin Fischer from comment #7)
> Good point about the naming, I have been thinking about that as well. 
> I lean a bit towards Organisations as a very general term.

I think I agree with you!
Comment 9 Andrew Fuerste-Henry 2024-06-21 14:47:36 UTC
The change to make Vendors more independent of acquisitions makes sense, as they're being used outside of acquisitions. I also think changing the name to something broader makes sense. I like how broad "organizations" is in some ways, but at the same time I like how "providers" gives a little sense of who/what is expected to be recorded here.

A perhaps-obvious note, I'd love to see the database table names change to reflect this change when/if it is made. Currently, vendors are stored in "aqbooksellers" and it's confusing because we don't call them "booksellers" outside of the schema. It'll get more confusing if we don't call them booksellers *and* it's not fundamentally part of aq.