Sacred Heart College, Thevara, has come up with arguably a first of its kind initiative by any educational institution in the country of integrating WhatsApp instant messaging service into its library management system thus making the library services more easy to access for its student members.
The college had automated its library by customising Koha, a free and open source library system, back in 2013. But that automated system was largely restricted to basic services like checking the availability of books, date of return etc. The seamless integration of WhatsApp APIs with Koha has taken the automation to the next level facilitating automated notifications, due date reminders, and real-time updates on book availability, reservation notification all underpinned by a robust user authentication system to prioritize data security.
Mahesh Palamuttath, the librarian of the college’s east campus library, had written the code for the integration of WhatsApp into the library management system. The college has been conducting a trial run of the new improved system for the last few months before it was inaugurated on Thursday. A chatbot service has also been weaved into the system for replying to frequently asked questions.
