WorldShare Circulation release notes, September 2026

Administrative actions

These items require immediate action or decisions.

NGN room schedule notifications

Our final set of NGN templates is now available!

If your library uses room scheduling, you can now send Next-Generation Notifications to patrons for their room reservations. Four notification types are available, each supporting email and SMS text delivery:

• Room Schedule Confirmation, sent when a reservation is created.
• Room Schedule Reminder, sent before the reservation period begins.
• Room Schedule Expiration Confirmation, sent after the reservation period ends.
• Room Schedule Deletion Confirmation, sent when staff delete a future reservation.

These notifications are scheduled automatically from your policy configuration; there is no manual version. They are disabled by default, so you need to enable these notifications before your patrons will receive them:

1. Configure a template for each type on the Service Configuration Notifications > Holds and schedules screen.
2. Assign the templates to your room configuration policies.
3. Enable the notification types on the Enable Notification Types screen.

Consistent email address selection for notifications and receipts

Where WMS Circulation automatically chooses which of a patron's email addresses to use, it now follows one consistent order everywhere in WMS Circulation. Previously, each part of the system applied slightly different rules, so the same patron could receive a notice at one address and a receipt at another.

The order is now:

1. The email address recorded under Delivery Notifications on the patron's user record. See Profile Settings > Email notifications for more information.
2. If there is none on the user record, the patron's primary email address in the library record section of their user record (the first alphabetically, if more than one qualifies).
3. If there is none on their library record, any other valid email address on their library record, again the first alphabetically.

Addresses marked as invalid are always skipped. If a patron has no address that qualifies, the behavior remains unchanged.

This order now applies consistently to all your patron types, so the "Use patron-supplied email for notifications" setting no longer appears under your Patron Type Policies.

This order now applies consistently to your circulation notices and receipts, staff-initiated notifications sent from the Staff UI, patron payment flows, SIP2 Patron Information responses, and NCIP Lookup User responses.

Consider whether an item is "readily available" before allowing lender requests

You can now prevent lender-side ZFL and Manual ILL requests when none of your items are readily available to supply them. This ensures that you do not approve an ILL request that is not actually able to be filled.

A new Consider if an Item is Readily Available When Allowing Lender Requests setting is available in both the ZFL and Manual ILL sections of the Service Configuration Integrations > ILL Settings screen. The setting is set to No for all institutions, including existing ones, so your current behavior does not change until you turn it on.

When the setting is turned on, a request fails when the number of your requestable items in a "readily available" status is the same as or fewer than the number of pending holds on the title. Pending holds are those waiting in the hold queue that are not fulfilled, deleted, or expired.

For ZFL requests that fail the check, the response "entliehen" is returned to the ZFL server. For Manual ILL requests, staff see a warning when no readily available items are available and can override it if needed. 

An item is not "readily available" when its status is:

• On loan, including regular, recalled, and restricted loans, and loans that have become overdue or long overdue
• On hold
• Scheduled
• In transit or dispatched

The readily available check is performed only during hold creation.

Holds on items claimed lost, never had, or already returned, or marked missing

You now receive clear, consistent feedback when you try to place a hold on an item that has been marked as missing, or that a patron has claimed lost, never had, or already returned. This originally was only the case for item-level holds, but now the behavior is consistent with title-level holds as well. You will now see an acknowledgement message that you can override, if appropriate, rather than a hold that appears to succeed or fails with an unclear error.

Hold declining logic also takes these claim statuses into account, so items that cannot realistically be supplied are no longer considered to fill a request. This logic reduces the number of holds that sit unfilled and gives your patrons a more accurate picture of when an item will become available.

Service Configuration interface changes

Modernization of the OCLC Service Configuration UI is now underway. We are starting with the Integrations and Groups sections. You may notice that some subpages in these sections have not yet been converted.

These conversions change how the screens look, not what they do. Your existing settings and workflows remain unchanged.

Accessibility and usability improvements in the new interface

This release continues our work toward Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 conformance in the new WMS Circulation interface. If you use a screen reader, keyboard navigation, or high levels of browser zoom, you will find data tables easier to work with.

• Column resize controls now have an accessible name and role, so screen readers announce what they do.
• Column resize icons meet minimum target size requirements, making them easier to use with a mouse, a touch screen, or limited fine motor control.
• Loading status messages are announced automatically, so you know when a table is still retrieving results.
• The Show/Hide All control in the column selector reports its state correctly when unchecked.
• Sort indicators and empty tables now use valid accessibility markup, so your assistive technology announces them correctly.
• Each row's checkbox in a data table now has its own label, so screen readers identify which row you are selecting.
• Toolbar controls in the custom message editor now have accessible names, so you can identify them with a screen reader.
• You can now scroll the search dialog and the Add item dialog when your browser window is small. Previously, content below the visible area of the dialog could not be reached.
• A second scroll bar no longer appears in the search dialog opened from Place hold. Previously, in Chrome and Edge, the extra scroll bar let you scroll to an empty area beneath the dialog.

Items and item records

• You can now open an item by clicking a legacy barcode hyperlink, such as those saved in a spreadsheet inventory list or a bookmark. Previously, these links opened WMS Circulation and displayed a blank page with no error message.
• You can now open legacy barcode hyperlinks when the barcode contains special characters such as an ampersand (&) or a percent sign (%). Previously, these barcodes produced an endless loading indicator or a message stating that the barcode could not be identified.
• You can now view a managed item whose holding location code has been deleted from your institution's configuration. Previously, the page returned an error, and when several items were requested at once, none of them were returned.
• You can now switch tabs while editing a temporary item without losing your work. The sidebar and the Details tab display an unsaved changes indicator, and choosing Cancel with unsaved changes prompts you to confirm. Previously, navigating away from the Details tab discarded your edits with no warning.
• The unsaved changes indicator on a temporary item now appears only when you have actually changed something. Previously, opening a temporary item for editing and then selecting Cancel, or switching tabs and returning, left the indicator showing and could prompt you to discard changes you had not made.
• You can now open the record of a user who has not been set up for circulation. Previously, selecting such a user from your Assist Patrons search results displayed a blank screen, and you had to add the missing circulation details before the record would open.

Holds and interlibrary loan

• You no longer see a Recall option when placing a hold on an item that has been claimed lost, never had, already returned, or marked missing. Previously, selecting Recall in this situation caused the hold to fail.
• You can now fulfill a ZFL request with an item that is in a container. Previously, the request failed because items in containers were not recognized as available.
• You can now see the barcode in the holds table after placing a manual ILL borrower request that uses an external request ID also used by another institution in your group. Previously, the barcode cell was empty.
• Item status now shows a hold as expired after you manually delete a fulfilled hold. Previously, it continued to show the hold as active.
• You can now select any pickup location when placing a Manual ILL borrower hold request. Previously, you had to acknowledge an override message even when the pickup location was permitted.
• Editing the ILL loan due date on a hold request now applies your edited date when you check the item out. Previously, the loan used the date that was entered when the request was created.
• When your library lends an item it owns through the Circulation and ILL integration, the circulation history now reads "Loaned to" the borrowing institution. Previously, it read "Supplied by," which incorrectly indicated your library was the borrower.
• The supplying institution you enter as free text on a Manual ILL borrowing request now appears on the loan and everywhere else the lending library is shown. Previously, it displayed as "Not specified," so the lending library was not visible to your staff.

Notices and notice templates

• A scheduled notification that cannot be delivered because the patron's email address is invalid now appears in the patron's notification history as a failed delivery. Previously, no entry was recorded, so you could not tell that the notification had been attempted.
• You now see an error message when an item's notification history cannot be retrieved. Previously, the page showed the same message that appears when an item genuinely has no notification history, so it looked as though no notices had been sent.
• The email and print dialog on a patron's account overview now tells you when a preview cannot be retrieved. Previously, the dialog continued loading indefinitely with no indication of failure.
• You can now clear the "Unable to find selected option" message from a template after the assigned logo has been deleted. Previously, you had to create and assign a replacement logo to remove the message.
• Labels and values on the custom messages pages are now spaced consistently. Previously, the spacing outside of edit mode made it difficult to see which value belonged to which label.
• Text formatting in your notification templates and custom messages now prints as readable text on point-of-sale (POS) slips. Previously, some formatting was printed as literal characters or disappeared from the slip entirely, affecting emphasis marks, links, bulleted and numbered lists, highlighting, and horizontal rules.
• SIP2 Patron Information responses now return the patron's primary email address. Previously, the response returned the first address on the patron's library record regardless of which one was marked primary, so a patron whose primary address was not listed first had the wrong address returned.

Discover Items

• Hold counts now reflect only the holds that exist on the record you are viewing. Previously, after you viewed a record that had holds, a record with no holds could display a hold count carried over from the earlier record.
• Spacing, font size, and background in the Discover Items panel now match the rest of the sidebar. Previously, the panel's styling was inconsistent with the interface around it.
• A long search term now scrolls within the search box instead of overflowing it. Previously, the text extended beyond the box and became unreadable.
• Selecting the panel now moves your focus into it, so you can continue with your keyboard. Previously, your focus stayed where it was.
• You can now browse forward from the last record on a page of results, and backward from the first record on any page after the first. Previously, doing so displayed a blank page or returned an error.
• Search result pages now announce when a new page of results is loading, so you know the results are being retrieved when you are using a screen reader. Previously, no loading state was announced.
• The results count and refresh control in the search results header are now aligned and spaced consistently, including when a search returns no results or an error. Previously, the refresh icon could overlap the bar above it or sit too close to the error message.
• Searching several ISBNs separated by spaces now returns records that match any of them. Previously, the search required a record to match all of them, so it returned no results.
• You can now open a local holdings record from a result list when the record has no call number. Previously, "No call number" appeared as plain text rather than a link, so a record with neither a call number nor a barcode could not be opened at all.

Navigation and display

• Room scheduling no longer appears in the navigation menu when your institution has no rooms configured. Previously, the option was shown to all institutions and led to a page with no content.
• Pagination controls for data tables now display at a viewport width of 320 pixels, including at 400% browser zoom. Previously, the controls were not visible at these widths, and you could not page through results.
• Selecting Clear in the sidebar search now returns your focus to the search box, so you can enter your next search immediately. Previously, you had to navigate back to the box with your keyboard or screen reader.

Digby

• You now see a clear message in Digby when a barcode you enter in Inventory does not match an item, or matches more than one item. Previously, these barcodes returned a server error.

Save the date: WMS Circulation Office Hours, 5 November 2026

Our next WMS Circulation Office Hours webinar will be held at 11:00 am EST on Thursday, 5 November 2026, where our WorldShare Circulation Product Management team is ready to answer your questions and provide in-depth insights. This is your chance to:

• Get detailed answers to your pre-submitted questions.
• Ask less complex questions during the live session.
• Engage directly with our Product Management team for expert advice.

Registration is not yet open. Be sure you're subscribed to WorldShare Circulation notifications in the OCLC Community Center to receive an email when registration is available.

Support website(s)

Support information for this product and related products can be found at:

• WorldShare Circulation documentation
• WorldShare Circulation training resources
• Contact OCLC Support
• OCLC Community Center
• Browser compatibility chart