Tour Polaris on Your Own

Before coming to Polaris, The City Library used Bibliocommons for their discovery layer.  When they moved to Polaris in the summer of 2013 the Library made the decision to use Polaris’s native online catalog.  The Library contracted with Polaris to customize their PowerPAC with the goal of creating a particularly cohesive user experience across their web platforms.

Pierce County Library System has made creative use of the Custom Content area on their initial welcome page.  There are selectable tiles for popular functions like reserving a computer and making a purchase request.

SCCCPL migrated to Polaris from a library system they created on their own called Listen2000.

The Johnston Catalog is extraordinary and perhaps the best example of library staff using the Polaris API’s and open architecture to build their own public interface.

As a multi-site system, Bridges has done a very nice job of personalizing the PowerPAC for the individual member libraries.  If you visit their PowerPAC, be sure and switch between a few of the library locations.  Notice how nicely each library site has been customized.

Maricopa County not only uses PowerPAC as their library website, but they’ve populated the site with some great content. 

TRAC was one of the first Polaris consortia covering such a wide geographical area.  TRAC has always been a progressive site, particularly given the challenges of serving a multi-type, multi-system consortium spread across a large region.

The MDPLS PowerPAC features a custom header and footer consistent with the overall library web presence.  The menu navigation in PowerPAC includes a very clever interactive search prompt built right into the header so the option to start a different search is always available to the user.

Richland Library has accomplished some of the most sophisticated customization work we’ve seen.  Their website features a fully responsive web design and Richland has used the Polaris API to integrate a lot of searching and PAC functionality right into the home page.

DPL has long been one of our favorite examples of a library who has created a consistent and attractive look and feel for both their website and PowerPAC.