What's New in Webform?

Owned by Zalina Alvi (Unlicensed)
Last updated: Jul 05, 2018
5 min read

Check this space to find out more about changes and new features!

April 16, 2018

Webform Release Features:

  • Full Thema support!
    • Plus will automagically create your Thema subject mapped from the main BISAC subject.
  • Ability to add more than one subject. In the previous version of BiblioShare Webform, you could only have a main subject.

Now you can have your main subject plus as many sub-categories as you like. (Okay, don't mix Young Adult Fiction with Adult Non-fiction / Architecture etc., but the power is in your hands.)

  • Added support for Country of Manufacture
  • Now display key datapoints on the Title Catalogue page:
    • has a cover been added?
    • is the author marked as Canadian?
    • what is the Main Subject of the title? 
  • Show date when record was last uploaded to BNC BiblioShare

Want to learn more contact us at biblioshare@booknetcanada.ca

November 30, 2016

We've upgraded and updated! Our new responsive version of Webform has several major additions to suit your needs. We've added support for author and interior images, along with the ability for bulk uploads of cover images for all titles. Users also have access to ONIX 3.0 file exports in Webform.

July 24, 2014

Indigo-friendly XML Exports from Webform

BiblioShare Webform now supports <BASICMainSubject> tags for BISAC codes, which makes it easier for you to send Webform exports to Indigo. <BASICMainSubject> is how Indigo prefers to receive BISAC Subject data and because many Webform users are also Indigo vendors, we switched up our XML exports to make for an easier workflow.
All ONIX records exported as XML documents will now use the <BASICMainSubject> tag instead of <MainSubject> tag to express BISAC codes. Other Subject classification schemes and standards will continue to use the <MainSubject> tag.

BiblioShare and CataList also accept <BASICMainSubject> so this change will not affect your export workflows to these services.

April 9, 2014

We've made a few improvements to Webform based on great feedback from publishers who use the tool. We've added new fields to give you broader access to the ONIX standard and – for you CataList users – to make some data easier to transfer to BNC CataList. We've also added new selection functionality to help you customize your exports.

New CataList-friendly ONIX Fields

Webform now has several new fields that correspond to fields available in BNC CataList. This should hopefully make life a little easier for folks who use Webform to generate data for display on CataList. For those who don't use CataList, these fields will still come in handy because they are often requested by retailers.

Multiple Related Products

Publishers can now identify up to three related products for a single record. These changes can be seen in the Related Product tab, as shown below:

The <RelatedProduct> composite in ONIX allows publishers to identify relationships between products and to expose the nature of these relationships to their donwstream partners. For example, let's say you're creating a record for the hardcover version of Super Awesome Title!. You can link this record to alternate formats for Super Awesome Title! by adding the different formats as different related products. Other useful ways to link your records is by relating comparable titles or a single author's titles to one another.

  Expected Ship Date

Expected ship date (also known as "expected availability date" or "release date") allows you to specify the date on which shipping from the supplier to retailers is expected to begin or resume. This data element allows you to provide further instruction when a product is currently unavailable. For example, if Super Awesome Title! has a Product Availability code of "31 - Out of Stock", then you can provide fuller information about when this product will be back in stock by entering an Expected Ship Date.

A field for Expected Ship Date has been added to the Supply Detail tab, as seen below:

  Promotion Campaign

Your promotions efforts can impact initial buys of your books. Keep your downstream partners current about this information by including it in your ONIX feeds.

The new Promotion Campaign field in the Prize tab allows you to enter free text to describe your promotions efforts for the title.

Additional Subject Schemes

We have added support for two up and coming subject schemes in the Subject & Audience tab.

Thema

Thema is a new global subject classification system for books that is especially suited for international trade. We recommend using it in addition to BISAC because it serves as a common language for when you're dealing with partners whose markets don't use BISAC. It is a flexible standard that provides more granular classification for every distinct national market. This granularity is especially useful in the Canadian context as it provides a large variety of geographical and cultural qualifiers that can be used with main subject headings. Webform does not currently support the use of qualifiers but it will do so in the future.

For more information on Thema, please visit the EDItEUR website.

Keywords

Keywords are words or phrases that describe a book's content and are especially geared to trading with web-based partners who could potentially use them to power search ability on their sites. Keywords do not follow a structured scheme like BISAC or Thema and so offer a large amount of customization when it comes to classifying your books. We recommend using keywords in addition to BISAC and Thema.

Keywords should not repeat titles, contributors, BISACs or other terms that are already present in your metadata. Instead, they should be used to fill in the gaps. Separate your keywords with semi-colons and keep your total character count in this Webform field to a maximum of 250 (including semi-colons).

Select and Export Multiple Titles

You can now export selected multiple titles to XML or BNC BiblioShare. Simply use the handy check boxes beside every title to select the necessary titles and export them using the Import/Export tab as per usual. The resulting export will be limited to the titles that you selected.

We have added a link to our help videos and documentation on top of each page so you have easier access to information as soon as you need it.