Free and Modified: A Look at Alma Inventory Software

Make Alma work better for inventory checks

Posted on April 27, 2026 in Blog Posts

Many libraries run an inventory check on their collection. They look for missing or misplaced items, incorrect labels, and a whole host of other issues affecting circulation and discovery. For Alma users, there is the built-in Shelf Report. It scans a range of barcodes and flags issues pertaining to location and status. Unfortunately, it will not indicate any out-of-order materials—something staff may desire as part of their inventory process.

On our journey to supplement this function, a coworker pointed me to the Alma Inventory Tool by Georgetown University’s Terry Brady. Similar to the Shelf Report, it uses a color code to indicate issues. However, once again, it does not flag order issues nor return an inventory date or note back to Alma.

Another coworker found the Alma cloud app, Super Shelf Inventory.  This app will tell you if a call number is out of order and returns a note to the item record indicating the date when the inventory ran against that record. We found that you can make a set using the software and then run a job to update the inventory date. So far, it has been the strongest fit for our needs. Although it doesn’t run in real-time, it fits within the process already established by our staff.

Using a scanner, someone working the inventory walks the stacks, collects a range of barcodes, then adds them to an Excel spreadsheet. Prior to the cloud app, they had to modify each barcode for their inventory program to properly read it. To complete a set of barcodes, it required roughly 20 steps and a list of barcodes sent through multiple programs. Super Shelf takes the scanned barcodes and analyzes them without any additional steps. The same Excel spreadsheet is directly fed into the application.

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Surveying other alternatives

While searching for solutions, I found a great comparison table created by the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois (CARLI). The comparison points provide a snapshot of functionality for the Alma Shelf Report, Batch Inventory Tool (developed by Purdue University), and CARLI’s Interactive Inventory Tool. The latter tools are robust compared to Alma’s Shelf Report, and their code is available on GitHub.  After a quick “Alma Inventory” search on GitHub, I discovered that a few more libraries were supplementing the Shelf Report with similar programs:

• Inventory
• Alma Inventory 2024 (read-only)
• Alma Inventory Tool
• Inventory App
• Tufts Libraries Alma Inventory App
• Alma Inventory Utility

There are overlapping functions across these tools: location issues, call number problems, etc. Each tool calls for access to your Alma API; this returns your Alma data to the tool based on a matching barcode. Some use similar code with slight modifications. For our instance, we changed the Alma Inventory Tool by Georgetown University to export a CSV instead of a Google Sheet. 

Depending on resources available, modifying a program may be the best solution for a full inventory scan. There are many AI solutions to assist in making these changes, but you may need AI support to make these updates. To name a few:

• GitHub Copilot
• Cursor
• Codeium

I am curious how other systems complete the same type of inventory. In researching our own needs, I found that Koha and Folio use SQL to discover issues—not surprising, as both are more customizable. Evergreen can flag unexpected items via reporting, and WorldShare provides a detailed analytics output that can be used for weeding in addition to inventory processing. Although they are not Alma, these systems provide an output that might prove helpful in identifying the needs of your library and the functionality you desire to complete a thorough inventory.

Final thoughts

Overall, we found the ease of installation a big bonus of using the Super Shelf cloud app. You simply switch on the app (Alma admin access needed) and then add it to your Alma Apps. It saved us the burden of configuring each GitHub packet for each user. As our test run continues, we’ll revisit any outstanding issues or problem areas the app may be discovering or missing. We didn’t need to go down the modification route, even though we started out there.

When it comes to technical solutions for library projects, there is a benefit to scanning what is out there and available. You may find that someone has already put in the effort to solve this problem, and you just need to alter the inputs to meet your end points. 

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