CJK Indexing Changes in Alma

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Status	IN progress
Description	Alma as currently configured does not map equivalent characters in CJK languages. A special setting and re-index of the database may address this.
Decision summary
Owning group	RM-CMOS
Approver	Operations Team
Consulted	Campus cataloging staff, East Asian Studies CKG, OT, Discovery OST
Informed	sils-cohort
Decision-making process
Priority	High
Target decision date
Date decided

Recommendation

Impact

Stakeholder group	Impact

Stakeholder group	Impact

Reasoning

Background

By default, Alma does not have the ability to automatically recognize when two versions of a word mean the same thing. For example, 群島 (traditional Chinese) and 群岛 (simplified Chinese) should retrieve the same record. However, they don't.

See Searching Alma/Primo for CJK languages - SILS Operations Center - SILS for additional background on the original issue and tickets.

Sandbox Test

After consultation with Ex Libris, Ex Libris suggested we enable the option to Search in Hangul (Korean) and return results in both Hangul and Hanja. They indicated this would also help with the Japanese Kanji and Chinese traditional/simplified issues as well. However, it will not fix similar problems with other languages.

The change was made in UCLA’s and UCSD’s premium sandbox (PSB), as well as the NZ PSB in September 2022. Indexing the sandbox took an extraordinarily long time. NZ indexing started on 8/30/2022 and finished on 9/18/2022. During this time period, we were unable to retrieve the majority of records within the system (bib, user, order, etc). After the initial reindexing finished, users and orders still were not searchable and required additional reindexing jobs.

Ex Libris is asserting that all our issues with reindexing in the sandbox are because full reindexing jobs should not be done in the sandbox (only smaller sets). They also note that semiannual indexing has already happened twice in production and we did not encounter any issues either time. However, they have not yet explained why users and orders needed additional indexing after the first indexing had finished. In our 10/17/222 support meeting, Ex Libris support said they’d try to connect us with a developer for more information.

Test Results

Campuses have tested the indexing for Chinese and Japanese and are pleased with the results. Korean testing is still pending. Read-only copy of testing spreadsheet

Primo VE Note

Similar issues with Primo CJK indexing are outside the direct scope of this decision.

Options Considered

	Option 1	Option 2

	Option 1	Option 2

Questions to consider

Why did user/order searching not work after the initial sandbox reindexing had finished? This doesn’t seem like it would be related to an under allocation of resources.

Action Log

Action/Point Person	Expected Completion Date	Notes	Status

Action/Point Person	Expected Completion Date	Notes	Status