In the words of Dr. Frankenstein, “It’s Aliiive!” – the LibAnswers update, that is. In case you missed our preview post last week, remember: you can check out a full list of the new features available at http://help.springshare.com/laupdate-June2012. We’re super excited to tell you about the new Email features. You can now choose to funnel emails sent to a specific email address – like ask@yourlibrary.edu – straight into your LibAnswers system.
Instructions for setting up the new Email features can be found below. We highly recommend that admins take a look at the new Email Settings page (found under Admin Stuff -> System Settings) to confirm settings.
If your Libanswers system is on the libanswers.com domain:
We’ve set you up with a generic email address already – ask@*.libanswers.com (where * is the lead part of your domain). Change this to whatever you’d like – head to Admin Stuff -> System Settings -> Email Settings.
If your LibAnswers system is on your own domain (ex: school.edu):
We’ll work with you (and your IT folks) on set up – email us at support@springshare.com to get things rolling. There are two primary options:
- Ask your IT folks to redirect a whole domain (like @ask.yourlibrary.edu) to LibAnswers. Similar to setting up Custom Domain Mapping, this requires your IT to set up a DNS record. Contact us for specific instructions. This is the most reliable way to receive and send mail with a non-libanswers.com address. [Please note – this will apply to the entire domain – it won’t work for one address in the domain, like reference@yourlibrary.edu. We recommend using a dedicated domain, like @ask.yourlibrary.edu, for this reason.]
- If your IT folks aren’t keen on setting up a custom domain, you can forward specific email accounts to an Incoming Email Address. Patrons can still email reference@yourlibrary.edu, but the message will forward to something@something.libanswers.com for ingestion into LibAnswers. Contact us and let us know what you’d like something@something.libanswers.com to be (ex: reference@yourlibrary.libanswers.com).
Plus, LibChat is here!
Check out the features and view a 3-minute video of the new functionality. When you’re ready to jump in, email us at sales@springshare.com to get chatting!