Label Maker Plugin Part 1

by Kelly McElligott on Jan 29, 2019

A member of the development team with Bywater Solutions, Kyle Hall, created a new plugin to help solve some of the more complex label questions/situations that libraries have had. The original idea behind the plugin was to accomplish the dilemma of a multi-type label document. This would be the sheets of labels that include maybe a spine label but also have another size for the barcode or faceplate for the book.

Since this is a plugin for Koha, a library would need to upload this plugin from the ByWater Github site and also ensure that the system preference: useplugins is Enabled. If you are a Bywater partner and would like assistance on going through the process, please submit a ticket, we are always happy to help.

Features of the Plugin

Once this plugin has been installed, any/all plugins installed on your Koha system will appear in the Administration module under plugins.

To use this plugin - use the Action button to Run.

The plugin will have three tabs that are labeled, Templates, Layouts and Printer Profiles. In addition, there is the ability to create new templates, new layouts, new printer profiles, and new label batches. A Label Wizard is also available that has been designed to help the library create a new layout or template with help.

The template will determine what will be printed on the label and the layout will be the size and dimensions of the sheet and specific label/s.

Both templates and layouts have two types of labels already setup with this plugin.

The layouts that are included:

• Avery label sheet 5630
• Basix 55-459-007

The Avery label is a basic size barcode label and the Basix is the multi-size label sheet as was described above.

The templates that are included:

• Avery Standard has the Title, Barcode, and Item Number
• Basix has the Title on one small label, title, and barcode on other two labels.

Below are the images of what the pre-defined labels will print out as. The Red, Green and Blue label picture is using the Basix template and layout. The other image is using the Avery Label and template.

Label Batches

Batches in the Label Maker Plugin come from the Batches that have been created in the Label Creator found under the Tools section in Koha. Any batch that has been created there, can be used in the Label Maker Plugin. Each batch is given a number by Koha and the number found in parenthesis is the number of items in the batch. To print your labels, you will use choose the "Print Batch" option.

For more information about the Label Creator tool- can be found in this blog post or here in the manual.

Don't miss out on this tutorial video that Jessie and Kelly created to show the steps on using this new plugin.

More to come on the Label Maker - as we continue to dig into this plugin and show more technical details in our next video and blog post- stay tuned!