IGeLU 2026

Developers Day

Invoicing readers for lost books is a slow, error-prone task — each invoice involves multiple manual steps across different systems. In Oxford, this was further complicated by every library doing things its own way: different wording, different design, different policies. Boomerang is a web application that collapses the whole process into a quick guided workflow: it pulls the data from Alma, applies the right library's branding and policy, posts the fees and notes back to Alma, and sends the reader a tailored invoice with a PDF attached. The result is a much faster and more accurate process for staff, with the added benefit of a more consistent experience for patrons across the libraries.

This talk looks at what we built and the difference it has made, what we learned from developing Boomerang alongside the staff who use it, and the choices and challenges we faced in doing so.

IGeLU 2026 theme: "Pearls of Technology: Think deeply, explore widely"
Development / Initiative
Practical Applications

Alma