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  3. Appointment Scheduling

Managing Appointments in the Client

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Brittany De Gail
Updated

This article provides an overview of the different controls and options for managing appointments and reading room calendars in the Aeon Desktop Client and Aeon Web Client.

Note: If you had been using a custom staff template prior to updating to v5.1, you will need to edit your template in the Aeon Desktop Client after updating to manually add the Appointments group tab to the Home form and to add the appointment fields to the relevant forms.

The Appointment Calendar | The Appointment Form | Rescheduling an Appointment | Associating Requests with Appointments (Desktop Client Only) | Managing Appointments from the User Record

The Appointment Calendar

The Aeon Desktop Client and Aeon Web Client will display an appointment calendar for each reading room defined in the Aeon Customization Manager's Appointment Scheduling tab for your site. Double-clicking on an existing appointment in the reading room calendar will open the Appointment form, where you can view the complete appointment details and edit or cancel the appointment. Appointments can also be moved, extended, or shortened directly within the calendar by dragging and dropping. New appointments can be created by double-clicking on an empty space in the reading room calendar or by using the New Appointment button present at the top of each client's calendar interface.

Use the tabs below to learn more about how to access and use the appointment calendar in the Aeon Desktop Client and Aeon Web Client.

Desktop Client Web Client

In the Aeon Desktop Client, the appointment calendar is accessed by clicking on the Appointments tab of the Home form. Sub-tabs for each reading room calendar configured in the Aeon Customization Manager are displayed within the Appointments tab, as well as a Calendar ribbon with options for managing appointments and changing the calendar view.

The Appointments Tab | Reading Room Tabs | The Calendar Ribbon

The Appointments Tab

The Appointments tab is located on the Home form of the Aeon Desktop Client. This tab provides an overview of all scheduled appointments and some tools for managing them. 

Appointments_tab

Reading Room Tabs

A separate sub-tab is added to the Appointments tab for each reading room defined in the Aeon Customization Manager's Appointment Scheduling tab for your site. Each reading room tab within the Client contains a calendar listing the appointments associated with that reading room. These tabs can be re-ordered by dragging and dropping, and the Client will remember both the tab order and the most recently selected tab between sessions.

Reading_Room_tabs

Closures and Reduced Availability

Full and partial closures are displayed on the Reading Room tabs by shading the relevant time periods. A full closure wherein no appointments can be scheduled is represented by dark shading on the calendar. A partial closure wherein the number of available appointments is reduced is represented by light shading, as well as text indicating "Reduced Availability" and the number of seats unavailable during that time. Closures are displayed slightly differently depending on the view option selected:

  • On Day and Timeline views, each time block is shown as either open (no shading), closed (dark shading), or partially closed (light shading).
  • On Week and Month view, a day will only be shown as closed if it is fully closed for the entire day. Partial closures and reduced availability will not be displayed.

The Calendar Ribbon

When the Appointments tab is selected, a new Calendar section will be added to the ribbon. The Calendar ribbon houses groups of options for managing the selected reading room calendar.

Calendar_Ribbon

Appointment Group Create a new appointment for the selected reading room with the New Appointment (Ctrl+N) button.
Navigate Group

Navigate Backward or Forward through the calendar according to the currently selected view. For example, while in Day view, the Backward and Forward buttons will navigate to the previous and following day, respectively. Go to Today will change the date displayed in the current view to the current date. 

Zoom In (Ctrl-Add) and Zoom Out (Ctrl-Subtract) can be used to scale the view up and down for either a more detailed or broader view of the selected area on the calendar.
Arrange Group

Switch the calendar display between the available Day, Week, Month, Timeline, and Agenda views.

The time increments used in the Day and Timeline views are controlled by the value in the Appointment Time Increment field of the selected reading room's settings in the Customization Manager.
Layout Group Alter the display of a specific view with the following options:
  • Compress Weekend (Month view): Compress Saturday and Sunday into a single column.
  • Working Hours (Day view): Show only the reading room's open hours as defined in the reading room's Customization Manager settings.
  • Cell Auto Height (Timeline view): Enable a time cell to automatically adjust its size to accommodate the appointments it contains. 
  • Snap to Cells (Timeline and Day view): Specify a snapping mode for displaying appointments within time cells.
Print Group

Print the active calendar in Day, Week, or Month view based on which view is currently selected. If either the Agenda or Timeline view is selected, the calendar will be printed in Day view.

Calendar printing is not customizable beyond the default options.

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The Appointment Form

The Appointment form is used to create, edit, or cancel appointments in the Aeon Desktop Client and Aeon Web Client. Use the tabs below to learn how to manage or create an appointment using the appointment form and to learn about the types of information stored on the form in each client.

Note: Certain functionality is only available from the Appointment form in the Aeon Desktop Client, including printing callslips and managing an appointment's associated requests.

Desktop Client Web Client

The Appointment form in the Aeon Desktop Client contains different fields and controls for managing the selected appointment.

Accessing the Appointment Form | Using the Appointment Form

Accessing the Appointment Form

In the Aeon Desktop Client, the Appointment form can be accessed while in the Appointments tab by double-clicking on an existing appointment or open space in the calendar, or by clicking New Appointment in the Calendar ribbon. The Appointment form contains its own Appointment ribbon containing options for managing the selected appointment.

Using the Appointment Form

Appointment Ribbon | Detail Tab | History Tab

Appointment Ribbon 

When the Appointment form is opened, an Appointment section will be added to the ribbon. The Appointment ribbon houses groups of options for managing the selected appointment.

Appointment Ribbon

Appointment Group Save or cancel any changes made to the appointment.
Printing Group

Aeon 5.2+

Contains options for printing callslips for requests associated with the appointment.

  • Clicking the top half of the Print Callslips button will print callslips only for requests associated with the appointment in the Awaiting Request Processing status
  • Clicking the bottom half of the Print Callslips button will expand a dropdown menu containing two options:
    • Print Callslips for Requests Awaiting Processing: Print callslips only for requests associated with the appointment that are in Awaiting Request Processing status (this option is the same as clicking the top half of the Print Callslips button)
    • Print Callslips for All Associated Requests: Print callslips for all requests associated with the appointment
User Group Open the User Information form for the user associated with the appointment.
Confirmation Group

Contains options for confirming and unconfirming the appointment.

Confirm and Unconfirm Buttons (Aeon 5.2+):

Changes the appointment's status to Confirmed or Unconfirmed. The Confirm button contains additional toggle options to notify the user by email of the appointment's confirmation.

For a detailed description of these buttons and the appointment confirmation process, see the Appointment Confirmation documentation.

 
Cancellation Group

Click the Cancel button to cancel the appointment with the following options:

  • Clicking the bottom half of the Cancel button will display a dropdown menu with one selectable checkbox option:

    • Cancel Requests: If the Cancel Requests? option is checked, then all requests associated with the appointment will also be canceled after clicking the top half of the Cancel Appointment button:

      Cancel Request

      Note: In Aeon 5.1, the Cancel Requests option will appear as a toggle option next to the Cancel button.
      If appointments are required in the selected reading room for the appointment, then this option cannot be disabled and all requests associated with the appointment will be cancelled when the appointment is cancelled.
  • Send Email: If the Send Email toggle is enabled (shaded with a grey background), the Appointment Cancelled email template will be sent to notify the user that the appointment is canceled after clicking the top half of the Cancel button

  • Edit Email: If the Edit Email toggle is enabled (shaded with a grey background), the Appointment Cancelled email template will open in a new window when the top half of the Cancel button is clicked, allowing staff to edit the email before sending:

    Cancel button email options

    Note: In Aeon 5.1, the email options will display as checkbox options in the Confirm Cancellation window that appears after the Cancel button is clicked.

  • Clicking the top half of the Cancel button will cancel the appointment and optionally send the Appointment Cancelled email and/or cancel the associated requests based on the options that were selected as described above

    The options for cancelling the appointment's associated requests and sending the Appointment Cancelled email will be remembered and applied in the future whenever the top half of the button is clicked. 
Requests Group

Contains options for creating new requests associated with the appointment.

  • Clicking the top half of the New Request button will open a blank request form with the "Appointment" field prepopulated with the appointment information.
  • Clicking the bottom half of the New Request button will display a list of the user's proxies if the "Available to Proxies?" option is checked. Clicking on a proxy's name will open a blank request form for that proxy with the "Request For" field prepopulated with the researcher's information and the "Appointment" field prepopulated with the appointment information.
Email Group

Contains options for sending emails to the user associated with the appointment. Emails sent from the Appointment form are recorded in the user's email history.

  • Clicking the top half of the New Email button opens a blank email form with the "To" field prepopulated with the user's email address.
  • Clicking the bottom half of the New Email button will display a dropdown list containing all email templates of the Appointment type. Clicking on a template name will open the email form with the template preloaded for editing. 
Access Group

Aeon 5.2+

Contains options for signing the user associated with the appointment into and out of the reading room and for marking the user as away.

For a detailed description of these options, see Signing Users In and Out and Marking Users as Away.
Note: Reading room sign-in options available from the Sign User In button correspond to reading rooms configured in the CustomDropDown table. If the name of the reading room in which the appointment is booked matches the name of a reading room defined in the CustomDropDown table, the name of that reading room will be automatically selected in the Reading Room field on the Sign User In dropdown by default.

Detail Tab

The Detail tab of the Appointment form houses several fields and grids containing information about the appointment and its associated requests. 

Detail tab

Username

The username of the user associated with the appointment. The value of this field can be typed in manually or selected from a dropdown list. The droplist list will refine its results based on the text typed into this field.

An appointment's assigned user cannot be changed after the appointment is created.
Name The name of the user associated with the appointment. This field fills in automatically according to the selection in the Username field.
Appointment Name An optional field containing a descriptive name for the appointment. This field can be used by patrons to help them identify and keep track of their appointments, e.g. an appointment for history research might be named "Appointment for History Research." This name will also display if the user chooses to download and import the iCalendar file for the appointment into a calendar application.
Reading Room The reading room in which the appointment is scheduled. The value of this field can be typed in manually or selected from a dropdown list. The droplist list will refine its results based on the text typed into this field.
Start/End Date

The starting/ending date and time for the appointment. These values can be typed in manually or selected from the calendar dropdown:

Calendar_Dropdown

When using the dropdown, click OK to save your selections. Clear will delete the existing contents of the field. Cancel will discard any changes and keep the original value contained in the field before editing.

The up and down arrows next to the time can be used to incrementally change the selected value in the time field. For example, clicking on the hour in the time field will then allow you to use the arrows to adjust the value of the hour up or down by one.

Initial Start Time Behavior for New Appointments

When creating new appointments, the initial start time for the appointment will vary based on where the new appointment is created from in the Aeon Desktop Client:

  • When in the appointment calendar's Day and Timeline views, the start time will default to the time selected on the calendar interface
  • When in the appointment calendar's Week, Month, and Agenda views, the start time will default to the beginning of the open hours defined for the reading room on the selected date
  • When creating a new appointment from the Request and User forms, the start time will default to the beginning of the open hours defined for the reading room on the current date 
  • If no open hours are defined for the reading room on the selected/current date, the start time will default to midnight
The Start and End Dates entered must begin and end on the same calendar date. If you would like to create an appointment for a patron on multiple dates, you must create a separate appointment for each individual date.
Creation Date

Aeon 5.2+

The date and time that the appointment was created. This field is read-only and cannot be edited.
Status

Aeon 5.2+

The current status of the appointment: Confirmed, Unconfirmed, or Cancelled. This field is read-only.

For more information on appointment status and confirmation workflows, including how to change the status of an appointment, see Appointment Confirmation and Notification Settings.
Available to Proxies? If checked, any proxies of the user associated with the appointment will be able to submit requests for that appointment through the web request form.
Transactions A grid displaying all requests associated with the appointment. Requests cannot be added or removed from an appointment directly through the Appointment form. However, double-clicking on a request in this grid will open the request form where you can then change or remove the associated appointment for that request.
Notes

Aeon 5.2+

A grid displaying all notes associated with the appointment. Notes can be added by double-clicking within the grid.

Appointment notes can only be added and viewed by staff users in the Aeon Desktop Client or Aeon Web Client and are not viewable by patrons on the web interface.
Adjusting the start date/time will automatically update the end date/time according to the appointment length. For example, if an appointment has a start time of 8:30 am and an end time of 9:30 am, the appointment length is one hour. Adjusting the start time to 9:30 am would then automatically adjust the end time to 10:30 am. The date of the end time will also be updated according to any changes to the date in the start time.

History Tab (Aeon 5.2+)

The History tab of the Appointment form contains grids that display detailed history tracking information for the appointment.

History tab

History Grid

Changes made to fields containing the appointment's information are tracked on the left side of the History tab in the History grid. This grid shows the date the change was made, the name of the field that was changed, the staff or user performing the action, the old value in the field before the change was made, and the new value in the field after the change. 

Appointment Email History

To the right of the history grid is a grid containing a list of all appointment-type emails sent to the user for that appointment. Clicking on an email in this grid will open up the full text of the email below it.

Note: This grid will only contain appointment-type emails sent after updating to Aeon 5.2. Appointment-type emails sent from Aeon 5.1 are tracked and displayed on the User form and will continue to display on the User form after updating to Aeon 5.2.
Deleting or anonymizing a user record will delete all of the user's appointment-type emails from the Aeon database. 

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Rescheduling an Appointment

Rescheduling an appointment by either adjusting the Start/End Date or Reading Room fields in the Appointment form or by using the cursor to drag and drop or adjust the size of an appointment directly on the reading room calendar will open a window with some options for sending the Appointment Rescheduled email to the patron:

Desktop Client Web Client

In the Aeon Desktop Client, rescheduling the appointment will open the Confirm Rescheduling prompt with the following options:

Confirm Rescheduling window

  • If the Send Email option is checked, the Appointment Rescheduled email template will be sent to notify the user that the appointment is canceled. 
  • If the Edit Email option is checked, the Appointment Rescheduled email template will open before sending and allow for staff to make changes to the email. 

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Validation Exceptions

When creating or editing an appointment in the Aeon Desktop Client or Aeon Web Client, validation will only apply to ensure that a user is assigned to the appointment and that the end date is later than the start date. However, a single appointment should not be created to span multiple dates, i.e., the start date and end date should be entered for the same calendar date.

Other settings configured for the reading room in the Aeon Customization Manager, such as the room's Open Hours and Maximum Appointment Length, will not apply when managing appointments in the desktop client or web client. This allows for staff to make exceptions to the regular policies when necessary. It is recommended to make sure all staff members are aware of the reading room's policies before creating or editing appointments in the desktop client or web client.

Associating Requests with Appointments (Desktop Client Only)

Managing a Single Request from the Request Form

An Appointment field has been added to the Request form in order to control the appointment associated with a request.

Request_Form_Appointment_Control

  • Clicking on the dropdown arrow (Arrow_button) next to this field will display a grid listing the associated user's existing appointments that can be added to the request. If the request is for a researcher, the researcher's appointments that are marked as available to proxies will also display in the grid. Double-clicking or pressing the Enter key after selecting an appointment in this grid will change the appointment associated with the request to the selected appointment.

    • Checking the Hide Completed/Cancelled checkbox will hide all cancelled appointments and appointments that occurred in the past from the grid

      Note: As of Aeon Desktop Client v5.2.2, appointments that are currently in progress are considered active and will only be considered completed once the appointment's stop time is reached.

  • Clicking on the ellipsis button (Dotted_button) next to this field will open a menu with the following options:

    • New: Create a new appointment for the request. This option will open the Appointment form with the user information prepopulated. If the request is for a researcher, the researcher's information will be prepopulated and the "Available to Proxies?" option will be checked. The newly created appointment will be automatically associated with the request once the Appointment form is saved and closed. 

      If the "Available to Proxies?" button is unchecked while creating an appointment for a researcher, then the appointment will be created under the researcher's username, but will not be associated with the request when the Appointment form is saved and closed.

    • Edit: Edit the existing appointment associated with the request. This option will open the Appointment form for the currently associated appointment. Changes to the appointment will be reflected on the Request form when the Appointment form is saved and closed.

    • Clear: Clear the currently associated appointment for the request.

      Appointment_control_options

Important Notes

  • Appointments cannot be associated with requests that are for an activity.
  • If a request is cancelled, the associated appointment will be cleared from that request.
  • If your instance of Aeon has multiple sites configured, the associated appointment must be manually cleared from a request before that request can be routed to a site that is not associated with the reading room for the appointment. You can assign sites to a reading room in the Customization Manager.
  • If the existing appointment on a request is for a researcher and the value in the Request For field is changed from that researcher to an activity, another researcher, or cleared of its value, then the associated appointment will also be removed from the request.

Request Routing Behavior

Requests created in the Aeon Desktop Client (either directly or from a file) are routed to Awaiting Future Request Processing if the dates of their associated appointments are not within the Request Minimum Lead Days of their reading room (or the Minimum Lead Days setting for Aeon 5.1). Once the appointment date is within that Minimum Lead Days value, the System Manager will route the requests to Awaiting Request Processing. The Minimum Lead Days value will control all future request routing and settings in the FutureRoutingDays customization key will no longer apply.

Batch Appointment Association Controls in the Request List

Batch appointment association controls are also available on the Requests tab of the User Information form.

Associating an Appointment with Multiple Requests

An appointment can be associated with multiple requests in batch from a queue:

  1. Select all of the requests you want to associate with the appointment together within the queue.

    The selected requests must be for the same Username or ResearcherUsername (e.g., when assigning requests made by a researcher's various proxies to an appointment for that researcher) and cannot be associated with an activity.
  2. Click the Appointment button on the Process ribbon to bring up a list of the appointments that can be associated with those requests.
  3. Select an appointment from the grid, then double-click or press the Enter key to change the appointment associated with the requests to that appointment.

    • Checking the Hide Completed/Cancelled checkbox will hide all cancelled appointments and appointments that occurred in the past from the grid

      Note: As of Aeon Desktop Client v5.2.2, appointments that are currently in progress are considered active and will only be considered completed once the appointment's stop time is reached.
  4. A Confirm Appointment window will appear asking you to confirm your selection. Click Yes to confirm your decision, or No to cancel.
  5. If confirmed, the requests will now be associated with the selected appointment.

Removing Appointments from Multiple Requests

An appointment can be cleared from multiple requests in batch by first selecting all of the requests together within a queue, then clicking the Remove Appointment button on the Process ribbon.

Associating requests with an activity or changing the associated researcher will clear the appointment association from those requests. 

Appointment_control_grid

Managing Appointments from the User Record

The user record displayed in the Aeon Desktop Client on the User Information form and in the Aeon Web Client on the User Information page contains several options for viewing and managing an individual user's appointments. Use the tabs below to learn how to manage appointments from the user record in the Aeon Desktop Client and Aeon Web Client.

Desktop Client Web Client

In the Aeon Desktop Client, a user's appointments can be viewed and managed via the Appointments tab on the User Information form.

Appointments Tab

The Appointments tab is located on the User Information form. This tab displays a grid of all the user's appointments and associated reading room details in descending order sorted by Start Time. Double-clicking on an appointment in the grid opens the Appointment form for editing.

Creating New Appointments

Clicking the New Appointment button on the Home ribbon of the User Information form will open the Appointment form allowing you to create a new appointment for that user. If the site has only one reading room configured for appointments, the reading room selection will be prepopulated into the form. If the site has multiple reading rooms configured for appointments, none will be selected by default and staff will have to choose a reading room when creating the appointment.

User_Form

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