How to change holdings locations in Voyager

Ambox notice.png This page refers to the Voyager ILS, an Ex Libris product used at the Folger from 1996 to 2022.

For current documentation on using the catalog, see Category:Catalog.
For current documentation on staff use of the ILS, see Category:TIND ILS.


There are several ways to change the "Location" display in catalog records. Which one you pick will depend on how many records are involved, whether or not the items have been barcoded, and whether or not additional changes need to be made. The cataloging module contains a code for each location. The way it displays in other modules and in Hamnet is controlled through the System Administration module.

Location codes exist in up to three places in the Cataloging module:

  1. Bibliographic record (suppressed from public display; it's part of the MARC 852 Location field that gets copied from the Holdings record to the Bib record so that it will be keyword searchable there)
  2. Holdings record, subfield b of the MARC 852 Location field.
  3. Item record, if present (all open-stacks material has item records: that's where the barcode is stored; vault material acquired after the primary subject category began to be recorded as an Item Statistical Category also has item records).

Changing one record at a time

If you only have a few records that need changing, it's easiest to do it "by hand" in the Cataloging module.

  1. First make sure that the Options > Preferences > Workflow tab has check-marks next to the last three choices (see "Setting preferences in Voyager" for the full list of required and suggested settings).
  2. Search for and open the correct Bib record
  3. Open the associated Holdings record (go Ctrl-r or click the "Get Hldgs" button)
  4. Find the 852$b and type in the new location code, replacing the old one (see the ǂb Sublocation or collection section of the Folgerpedia article about MARC 852 Location for a list of the most common ones)
  5. Save the Holdings record to the database (go Ctrl-b or click the "Save to DB" button, the one with the sailboat, hence "Boat it" to mean "save to database")
  6. Go back to the Bib record (go Ctrl-j or click the "Get Bib" button)
  7. Change the location code in the 852$b to match what you have in the 852$b of the Holding record
  8. Save the Bib record to the database (go Ctrl-b or click the "Save to DB" button)
  9. Close the Bib and Holdings records (go Alt > f > c to close the current record; go Alt > f > o to close all open records)
Alternatively: instead of saving and closing each record in two steps, go Ctrl-q to "Save Record to Database and Close"

Bulk changes for barcoded items

This method only works for items that have been barcoded (in practice, all open-stacks books and microfilm, and most A/V material). You will still have to update the item's physical label (if any) by hand.

  1. Collect the bar codes destined for the new location into a .txt file:
    1. Create a new .txt file in Notepad (or a similar text editor) and save it to L:\Transfers with a meaningful name. Note: the file name must not contain spaces, SoMakeItCamelCase or Use_underscores_or_dashes if you want a complicated name.
    2. Take a laptop with a barcode reader to the items (or take the items to any computer with a barcode reader)
    3. Open the .txt file
    4. Use the barcode reader to scan each barcode. Don't worry if you scan the same barcode more than once: duplicates are ignored by the system, and it's better to risk duplication than to risk skipping one.
  2. Open the Cataloging module or the Circulation module
  3. Open "Pick and scan" (in Cat. module: File > Pick and scan; in Circ module: Functions > Pick and scan)
  4. On the "Changes To Make" tab:
    1. Go to "Locations" in the upper left and pick the new location from the "Permanent" drop-down menu (to update the item record)
    2. Go to "Holding Location" in the right-middle and pick the same location from the "Holding Location" drop-down menu (to update the holdings record)
  5. On the "Records to Change" tab
    1. Record Identifier: Item Barcode
    2. Perform Changes against: This item only
    3. What to do: Preview
    4. File: click the "..." and navigate to your .txt file then select "Open" (Note: if there are more than a few dozen barcodes in your .txt file, you'll want to first create a "Preview" version of the file by copy-and-pasting a few of the barcodes into a separate file; navigate to that file for the Preview step ("Preview" previews changes to every record in the file; you probably only need to check the first few in order to make sure the settings are correct).
    5. Select the "Process file" button
    6. Wait while the Preview runs, then use the "up" and "down" arrows to eyeball the results
    7. Once you've used Preview to verify that the right thing will happen:
      1. Select "Update Database" under "What to do"
      2. Navigate to your full file instead of your "preview" file if you've used a smaller file for previewing
    8. Select the "Process file" button
  6. Wait for the process to run (this can take quite a while for large files)
  7. Open a random few changed records in Hamnet or one of the Voyager modules to make sure everything looks right

Note: This will not change the location code in the Bib record, but that's okay: the location code is not meant to be viewed or searched (it's just there because the entire 852 is copied from Holdings to Bib to make the call number and local notes keyword searchable without having to do a separate "Holdings" search).