June 23, 2016
Alma APIs are serving thousands of users at 400 Alma institutions
Jerusalem, Israel—June 23, 2016. Ex Libris®, a ProQuest company, is proud to announce that its Alma library management service now routinely handles over one million API transactions daily from hundreds of institutions around the world.
Over the last two years, Ex Libris has created more than 120 Alma REST APIs in major areas of library management, such as acquisitions, user administration, fulfillment, and resource management. Library developers access the APIs through the Ex Libris Developer Network—an open environment in which library professionals and developers at libraries across the globe collaborate with each other and with Ex Libris. Aligned with the long-standing Ex Libris policy on openness, the Developer Network provides all the resources needed to develop applications and extensions for Ex Libris products. In addition, Ex Libris developers and staff at customer libraries have posted more than one hundred blog entries about sharing applications, ideas, tips, and tricks.
The API transactions that Alma processes every day provide patrons with access to services contributed by library developers as well as bringing automation to many of the daily tasks performed by library staff.
”The Alma REST APIs enable libraries to expand their services for patrons and to facilitate the work of librarians,” explained Mehmet Celik of KU Leuven LIBIS and chairman of the Joint IGeLU/ELUNA Interoperability special interest working group.
Bar Veinstein, vice president of resource management, commented: ”The huge number of API transactions served by the Alma open platform is a compelling demonstration of the platform’s value to the customer community.
”Using the APIs, customers benefit from new ways to integrate Alma with institutional systems, create innovative services, and increase the library value relative to institutional goals and objectives.”
