Checkout

Checkout involves selecting a patron (or in-library use) then scanning copy barcodes to loan the copies out.

Getting to the checkout screen

Go to Library level navigation path: Circulation then Check Out.
Identify the patron. Scan their barcode, or pick them from the list.
Scan a copy barcode into the field: scan bar. Lyra loans the copy and adds it to the session list.
Repeat for each copy, then select button: Done.

The rest of this page covers each part in more detail.

Identifying the patron

Before scanning items, identify the patron. Two paths:

Scan their barcode. Fastest. Their checkout screen opens automatically. If no patron has that barcode you get message: No patron has that barcode. Check the card, or find them below. under the field, and the number stays there so you can read it. On a device with a camera, button: Scan with the camera under the field reads one card and closes.
Pick a patron from the list. It’s the library’s screen: Patrons table: search by name or card barcode, filter, sort, pick and arrange columns, and open a saved query the same way. The columns you pick here are remembered apart from the ones on screen: Patrons, so the desk list can stay lean. Select anywhere on a row to start checking out to that patron.

You can also start from the Library level navigation path: Patrons list: button: Check out on a patron’s row opens the same screen for that patron.

Once a patron is open, the top of the screen is their record: name, barcode, ID, homerooms, and what they already have out, including a count of anything overdue and anything waiting for them on the hold shelf. It’s worth a glance before you hand anything over.

In-library use

Sometimes you need to track a use without checking the item out to a person: a class set pulled for an in-room activity, a reference book consulted at the desk.

For these, use button: In-library use at the top right of the Check Out screen. It opens the same scanning screen with no patron attached, and Lyra writes each loan against nobody. It records the use without putting the item on anybody’s account.

Scanning

The scan bar

The field: scan bar sits above the session list, under the patron, and is focused by default when the page loads.

You don’t have to do anything to get back to it. If the cursor has landed on a button, a row, or the page itself, the first character of the next scan pulls focus back to the field: scan bar and is typed into it, so the scan still lands.
Pressing key: / does the same thing deliberately, without taking your hand off the scanner.
Neither fires while the cursor is in another text box, since Lyra can’t tell your typing from a scanner’s. If a barcode lands in a search box, click into the field: scan bar and scan again.
Both stand aside while a dialog or a popover is open, since you opened it to type or click in it. Closing it puts the cursor back in the field: scan bar.
If a scan does nothing or types into the wrong field, the cause is almost always focus or a browser extension. See Troubleshooting: scanning.

On a device with a camera there’s a third way in: button: Scan with the camera under the field: scan bar opens a full-screen scanner that stays open while you work through a stack. Each read goes through the same checks as a wedge scan, and because the camera covers the screen, whatever Lyra has to say about a scan — the confirmation, a block with its button: Override — appears inside the camera view. button: Done closes it.

What a scan does

A scan is a request to loan a copy, not a guaranteed loan. Lyra runs each scanned barcode through a series of checks and writes a loan record only if the request clears all of them. A scan that’s rejected writes nothing, Lyra tells you why and leaves the scan bar ready for the next item.

Whatever Lyra has to say about a scan appears directly under the field: scan bar, and stays there until the next scan replaces it. It doesn’t time out, so you can look at the book in your hand first and read the screen after. If you’ve read it and decided not to act on it, the button: ✕ at its right closes it and puts the cursor back in the field: scan bar.

For each barcode you scan, Lyra works through roughly this order:

Looks up the copy. The barcode has to match a copy in this library. If it doesn’t, you get message: Barcode not found. Check the number, or find the copy by title. The barcode stays in the field, selected, so you can read what the scanner actually sent, and button: Find a copy under the field is the next step it points at. Nothing is written.
Checks whether the copy is reported lost. A copy with an open lost report stops here: Lyra asks whether to mark it found. Nothing is loaned until you confirm, see Lost & found.
Checks whether the copy is already on loan. If it’s already out to this patron (or, for in-library use, already on an in-library-use loan), you get message: Copy is already checked out. with an option to button: Renew instead, no new record is written. If it’s out to a different patron, Lyra checks it in from them and loans it to your patron in one step, but only if the request clears the checks in the next step.
Runs the eligibility checks. Whether the copy is reference only, whether it’s on hold for someone else, whether the patron is under their loan limit, whether overdue items block them, whether their grade is in range, and whether the due-date ceiling has passed (see Policies for how a patron’s and item’s policies are resolved). If any check fails, Lyra lists the reasons and writes nothing; a library manager can button: Override and proceed anyway. See When a checkout is blocked.
Writes the loan. Only once the request clears every check (or a manager overrides) does Lyra compute the due date and write the loan record, archiving the prior loan first if it auto-checked the copy in from someone else.
Adds a row to the session list with the cover, title, barcode, and the new due date.

The due date you see is computed. It already accounts for the library default, any faculty or grade-level override, and any item-policy cap. It also reflects the library’s loan-period unit: with school days the period counts only open days, so the due date skips weekends and holidays and always lands on a day the library is open; with calendar days the period is added directly, optionally rolled off a weekend or holiday by the setting: Never due on weekends or holidays setting (see School days vs. calendar days).

Why a due date came out the way it did

Select the due date on any row in the session list and Lyra shows card: Why This Date?: the layers that produced that one date, stacked in the order they apply, with the running date beside each one that moved it.

key: Checked out — the day the period was counted from. A renewed loan says key: Renewed from and names the date it extended from instead.
key: Library default — the library’s loan period, and where it lands.
key: Patron override — the faculty or grade-level loan period, when one applies. message: none when nothing overrides.
key: Item policy — the cap from the item’s policy, when it has one; it moves the date only when it is shorter than the period so far. message: no cap when the policy sets no cap. When one applies, a chip at the top names the policy and links to it.
key: Library ceiling — the setting: Due date ceiling, when one is set; it moves the date only when it clamps the result. message: none when no ceiling is set.
key: Due — the answer.

A layer that sets nothing carries no date, so the dates that do appear are the moments the due date moved. This is worth reaching for when one book comes back with a different date from the rest, which usually means an item policy is capping it.

Occasionally Lyra says these rules no longer produce the date on the loan. That means the loan was made under different rules — a policy changed since — and the date on the loan stands; the rules shown are the ones in force now.

To see every rule that applies to an item rather than just the ones behind its due date, open the item and read its card: Circulation Policy card.

Overriding a due date

A library manager has two ways to set a date by hand; staff without that grant take the computed date.

button: Set custom due date under the field: scan bar applies to every copy scanned after it, for the rest of the session.
button: Change inside card: Why This Date? changes that one loan.

A loan whose date was set by hand says so beneath the date. card: Why This Date? leads with that — the key: Due row is the date you set, marked message: Set by hand — and shows the rules underneath as context, captioned with what they would have given instead. The calendar opens on the month the due date is in, and button: Why this date? at its top goes back to the explanation.

When a checkout is blocked

If Lyra refuses a checkout, it says message: This copy cannot be checked out. under the field: scan bar and lists every reason underneath. The common causes:

message: Patron loan limit reached. The patron is at the concurrent-loan cap from their library default or patron policy override. Either return something first or, if appropriate, attach an item policy set to ignore the patron’s concurrent-loan limit so the new item doesn’t count against the cap.
message: Patron's grade is outside this item's allowed range. The item carries a min or max grade and this patron’s grade is outside it.
message: Patron has overdue items. If the library has setting: Deny loans to patrons with overdue items on, a patron with overdue items can’t take out new ones until they return them. Some libraries leave this off and use delinquency as a soft signal in reports instead.
message: This item is on hold for another patron. Another patron has an active hold for this item and this copy hasn’t been assigned to a different patron. Set the copy aside for pickup instead.
message: This copy is on the hold shelf for another patron. This specific copy is already reserved against somebody else’s hold. Grab a different copy, or set this one aside for pickup.
message: Due date ceiling has passed. A library manager may need to update or remove it. The library’s setting: Due date ceiling has been reached relative to today, so no new due date can be computed. A library manager can edit or remove it on Library level navigation path: Configure then Policies.
message: This copy is reference only. The copy is marked reference only. Reference materials and similar in-library-only items hit this.

In most cases, a library manager can button: Override the blocking issue (see Staff).

Multiple items in one session

The patron context persists across scans. Once a patron is selected, every subsequent item scan checks out to them until you select button: Done or leave the page.