Slowness Issues Development Plan

We met with Equinox to address all of the issues that may be causing general slowness within the system, and specifically slowness pertaining to patron records and billing. We came up with a 4 step plan at the end of which we should see a considerable improvement in speed and processing time:

1. New Server Installation: this server will become the new master database. It should aid in preventing unnecessary downtime, should increase the efficiency and speed of database maintenance and the speed of data retrieval.

2. Upgrade to Postgresql 8.2: should further increase speed and efficiency - allows for fresh install of PINES database.

3. Progress bars: progress bars will appear on staff side and patron side screens to indicate that the search, renewal, bill retrieval, etc. is being conducted. Developing for next upgrade, v.1.6.

4. New billing summary data set*: billings will no longer be calculated on the fly (in the moment). The bills will work on one database row that will be updated nightly. Bills will then be retrieved from that static table and updated with transactions that night. The patron record will only display open transactions. Historical records will be available via a search. Available next upgrade, v. 1.6.

*Clarification: This description may lead to a conclusion that what we will be
seeing is stale data, meaning, that if we add a bill or apply
payment, that it won't show up until the next day.  It's my
understanding that the dataset will be updated in real-time, but that
the individual bills will no longer need to be calculated for the sake
of display.