24 Mar 2025
Koha is the first free and open source software library automation package (ILS). Development is sponsored by libraries of varying types and sizes, volunteers, and support companies from around the world. The website for the Koha project is:
Koha 24.05.08 can be downloaded from:
Installation instructions can be found at:
Koha 24.05.08 is a bugfix/maintenance release.
It includes 2 enhancements, 14 bugfixes and 2 security fixes.
System requirements
You can learn about the system components (like OS and database) needed for running Koha on the community wiki.
37784 Patron password hash can be fetched using report dictionary
Sponsored by Reserve Bank of New Zealand
This fixes authentication checking so that the $sessionID is consistently returned (sometimes it was returning the session object). (Note: $sessionID is returned on a successful login, while $session is returned when there is a cookie for an authenticated session.)
This fixes the OCLC Connexion import daemon (misc/bin/connexion_import_daemon.pl) - the connection was failing after the CSRF token expired (after 8 hours). It now generates a new user agent when reauthenticating when the CSRF token for the session has expired. (This is related to the CSRF changes added in Koha 24.05 to improve form security.)
This fixes installer files so that the default patron restriction types are now translatable.
This fixes the installation process - instead of getting "Try again" when there is nothing left to do (after updating the database structure) and not being able to finish, you now get "Everything went okay. Update done."
This updates the default UNIMARC bibliographic record framework to remove the mandatory flag from some subfields and fields.
For UNIMARC, several subfields are only mandatory if the field is actually used (MARC21 does not have this requirement).
A change made to the default framework by bug 30373 in Koha 22.05 meant that if the mandatory subfield was empty, and the field itself was optional (not mandatory), you couldn't save the record.
For example, if field 410 (Series) is used (this is an optional field), then subfield $t (Title) is required. However, the way the default framework was set up (subfield $t was marked as mandatory) you couldn't save the record - as subfield $t was mandatory, even though the 410 is optional.
As Koha is not currently able to manage both the UNIMARC and MARC21 requirements without significant changes, a practical decision was made to configure the otherwise mandatory subfields as not mandatory.
Important note: This only affects NEW UNIMARC installations. Existing installations should edit their default UNIMARC framework to make these changes (although, it is likely that they have already done so).
This removes unneeded Debian package dependencies. Previously we provided them in the Koha Debian repository, but we no longer need to as they are now available in the standard repositories.
deleted_on
This fixes SIP so that it allows noblock checkouts, regardless of normal patron checkout blocks.
Explanation: The purpose of no block checkouts in SIP is to indicate that the SIP machine has made an offline ("store and forward") transaction. The patron already has the item. As such, the item must be checked out to the patron or the library risks losing the item due to lack of tracking. As such, no block checkouts should not be blocked under any circumstances.
31450 HTML customizations and news will not display on OPAC without a publication date
This fixes the display of news, HTML customizations, and pages on the OPAC - a publication date is now required for all types of additional content. Previously, news items and HTML customizations were not shown if they didn't have a publication date (this behavour was not obvious from the forms).
Sponsored by Athens County Public Libraries
This fixes the inventory tool so that it ignores case sensitivity for barcodes, similar to other areas of Koha such as checking in and checking out items (for example, ABC123 and abc123 are treated the same).
This enhancement moves the ILL test files to the correct folder structure - t/db_dependent/Koha/ILL/.
38483 C4::Heading::preferred_authorities is not used
This removes an unused method 'preferred_authorities' (Return a list of authority records for headings that are a preferred form of the heading).
Sponsored by Ignatianum University in Cracow
The Koha manual is maintained in Sphinx. The home page for Koha documentation is
Koha Documentation As of the date of these release notes, the Koha manual is available in the following languages:
Armenian (hy_ARMN) (100%)
The Git repository for the Koha manual can be found at
Complete or near-complete translations of the OPAC and staff interface are available in this release for the following languages:
Partial translations are available for various other languages.
The Koha team welcomes additional translations; please see
For information about translating Koha, and join the koha-translate list to volunteer:
The most up-to-date translations can be found at:
The release team for Koha 24.05.08 is
Release Manager: Katrin Fischer
Release Manager assistants:
QA Manager: Martin Renvoize
QA Team:
Security Manager: Tomás Cohen Arazi
Topic Experts:
Bug Wranglers:
Packaging Manager: Mason James
Documentation Manager: Philip Orr
Documentation Team:
Wiki curators:
Release Maintainers:
We thank the following libraries, companies, and other institutions who are known to have sponsored new features in Koha 24.05.08
We thank the following individuals who contributed patches to Koha 24.05.08
We thank the following libraries, companies, and other institutions who contributed patches to Koha 24.05.08
We also especially thank the following individuals who tested patches for Koha
We regret any omissions. If a contributor has been inadvertently missed, please send a patch against these release notes to koha-devel@lists.koha-community.org.
The Koha project uses Git for version control. The current development version of Koha can be retrieved by checking out the main branch of:
The branch for this version of Koha and future bugfixes in this release line is 24.05.x.
Bug reports and feature requests can be filed at the Koha bug tracker at:
He rau ringa e oti ai. (Many hands finish the work)
Autogenerated release notes updated last on 24 Mar 2025 08:05:00.