Home Location vs. Current Location

Now that we have talked about a record, let's talk about the details. A record describes a certain material, but we may buy many copies of that book or CD or whatever. These are called items. Each item is given a Home Location, an Item Category 1 and 2, an Item Type, and so on. Today, we'll talk about Locations.

Each item has a "Home Location". This can be something like FICTION, NONFICTION, POPULAR, REFERENCE, etc. The Central library has many unique Home Locations such as HUM_FIC (which stands for Humanities Fiction and is used instead of FICTION), or C_EASY_FIC (which stands for Children's Easy Fiction and is used instead of EASY_FIC).

This is similar but different to an item's "Current Location". If the Current Location is the same as the Home Location, then the item should be on the shelf. But the Current Location can also be CHECKEDOUT, DISCARD, MISSING, INTRANSIT, LOST-ASSUM, LOST-CLAIM, etc.

In WorkFlows, the Home Location and the Current Location can be seen on the Call Number/Item tab. The "item tree" displays the Current Location. The box on the right will show the Home Location as well as the Current Location.

On the Online Public Catalog, the Current Location can be seen by clicking on a title that displays in your results. The ensuing screen will display a list that is similar to the "item tree" that appears on the left side of the Call Number/Item tab in WorkFlows. This lists the Current Location only. The Home Location cannot be seen unless the Current Location is the Home Location. Also, this list does not show items that have a Current Location of MISSING, DISCARD, LOST-ASSUM, LOST-CLAIM, etc. These are "shadowed".