TechLawyerBlog

Document Management Revisited

From the beginning of my practice in 1998 I have used document management in some form or fashion.  During most of that time my DMS of choice was Worldox, but in 2006, I decided to switch to a program called FileCenter.  FileCenter acts essentially as an improved overlay to the Windows Explorer file system, and organizes matters into "Drawers" and "Folders."  It also indexes the files contained in it on a routine basis and has search capabilities.  My primary reason for the switch was that I was looking for an file management structure that allowed me to point to the client matter using PaperPort. I love PaperPort's visual method of dealing with "virtual paper" in a graphical interface, and sometimes while looking for a document, it is easier to eyball the image of the page rather than searching for all results that come up in an indexed search.  While PaperPort will point to the same folders in Wordox, While that can be done using Worldox, the Worldox method of naming folders using a number makes it difficult to locate the appropriate folder in PaperPort without first going to an external index or the Worldox index to find the folder number.  The same is true with respect to sub-folders in Worldox, which are also numbered rather than named.  So, in 2006 I stopped using Worldox and switched to FileCenter. 

FileCenter worked OK, but not great.  Its indexed searches were considerably slower than Worldox, but were tolerable, no more frequently than I needed to run a text based search.  I liked the simplicity of FileCenter and the fact that it forced standardized practices for saving files in the proper folder.  My biggest objection to FileCenter, and what ultimately caused me to return to Worldox, was the program's inability to consistently preview and open PDF files.  The program has a preview feature which allows the user to see the contents of most file types, including PDF's.  However, frequently when I would view a file, view another, and then return to the first, the first file would on the second viewing be unavailable for viewing.  Likewise, when I would try to open the PDF it would give an error message saying the file was in use.  I presume that the program had somehow failed to completely relesase the file causing the "in use" error, but it was consistent enough and enough of a problem and interruption to work flow that I ultimately chose to return to Worldox. 

Worldox is an excellent program with excellent tech support.  Real people answer the phone when you call, and if the support personell are busy, they will call you back, usually the next day.  They will log into your computer to see what is happening, and any time that I have had a program that did not have a "hook" for saving files into Worldox (a rare event) a custom hook was generated usually within 24 hours of my call to support.  This is a company that understands lawyers and how they work with documents, and understands customer support.  While my experiment with FileCenter was worthwhile, I am glad that I have migrated back to Worldox. 

The cost of Worldox is around $400 per user, with a mandatory annual support fee of $80/seat.  The only discount that I have been able to find is through membership in the British Columbia Legal Management Association, whose members recieve a savings of $45 per seat.  If you are purchasing several seats, it may be economical to join the Association in order to recieve the discount. 

AT&T Wi Fi and Wireless Card

On a recent trip to Arizona I made an impulse buy of an AT&T wireless data card.  The card was free after a rebate and the monthly fee of around $80 included a sufficient amount of data transfer for my purposes plus unlimited internet use at AT&T Wi Fi hot spots.  The GSM works fine, but I have never been able to connect using the hot spots.  I always get an "authentication error." So, at a recent visit to my local Starbucks, I had nothing better to do so I called AT&T WiFi support to see if I could get it working at the hotspots, thinking it would take no more than a few minuts.  An hour and a half later, and after speaking to 3 different support people and winding up on a conference call with Wayport and AT&T, there was no resolution and I had to leave, so we wrote a trouble ticket and they were going to get back with me.  3 days later they called and I returned the call, spent another hour on the phone and was told to go back to the site and call back to AT&T.  I did, and spend another hour and a half with no solution.  I finally logged on using my Starbucks account, just to make sure it was not my computer.  It logged on fine, but logging back on using the AT&T still did not work.  So, I emailed AT&T support and suggested that they either (1) give me a separate WiFi account that I can just use when at hot spots (2) send me a new card; or (3) let me return the product.  So far, they have not been willing to do any of those, I still do not have WiFi use, even though that is part of what I pay them for each month, and I spend another hour on the phone with tech support again today.  They keep linking in wayport, and telling me it should work, but it doesn't.  We have another trouble ticket open and they are supposed to be calling back.  I will update as the saga progresses. 

The other thing I learned in this process is that when AT&T tells you that Wi Fi hot spots are included, it does not include "Premium Hot Spots."  And, there does not seem to be an easy way to determine what kind of hot spot one is.  The AT&T Communications Manager has a place to identify "Locations" that can be searched, but it makes no distinction for "Premium" or "Ordinary" hot spots.  It seems to me this should be made much more clear by AT&T if they are going to by promoting Hot Spot account access as part of this data plan.     

Add Another Monitor

One of the repeated themes in the Paperless Office sessions at Techshow was the improvement that dual monitors brought to the work flow process, so immediately on my return to the office, I bought 2 24" monitors for my desktop.  Now, I probably did not put sufficient thought into this purchase.  I was sitting at my desk on the Monday of my return, when I received in my inbox a promotion for 24" HP refurbished monitors for around $225.  I was at the time using a single 19" Samsung display, and figured that if 19" was good, then 24" was better.  In retrospect, this was probably a little too large.  I at least should have measured, but I have them both hooked up now and they work as advertised. 

I use a laptop as my primary computer docked to a docking station, so rather than try to find a PC Card video card or a half-height video card for the dock, I took a tip from Ross Kodner's blog and purchased a DualHead2Go Digital adapter which essentially tricks your computer to thinking that your single video display is extra wide.  The unit works fine, although instructions were a bit skimpy and it took a call to tech support to get up and running.  The unit does seem to intervere with my Olympus DS-5000, and I am trying to find a work around for this conflict, but the use of dual monitors is great.  The ability to pull up the document I am reviewing on one screen while working in the other screen is a real time (and paper) saver.  I am adding dual monitors to my associate's desktop tomorrow. 

Remote Virtual Assistant

One vendor that I was very impressed with at Techshow was Legal Typist  although its founder,Andrea Cannavina, was at Techsow as an attendee rather than a vendor.  She manages a bunch of legal secretaries that serve as virtual assistants to lawyers in all size law firms.  I have previously used online dictation services like www.speak-write.com, which was fine for getting lots of words on to paper that I could then edit before filing a final product, but Legal Typist goes a step further by assigning you to a specific person to handle your work, so they learn how you want things done.  Although the name implies typing, I am assured that their services are much broader, freeing up the lawyer for the highest and best use of his time.  The next time that work at my office exceeds our internal capacity, I plan on trying this service.   

Just Google my Lawyer

One of the interesting marketing vendors at Techshow 2009 was a company called Jabberclick.  The Company offers to market professionals such as real estate agents and lawyers by purchasing the professional’s name in the paid search placement of the major search engines, Google, Yahoo, an MSN.  The theory is that your clients will not remember your web address or phone number, but they will remember your name. Accordingly, you can tell your clients that if they want to refer their friends and family to you, simply ask those people Google your name.  A link to your web site should be the first to appear. The firm then also creates a very simple landing page that the paid advertising links to, which will supply your other contact information to the prospective client. The company charges $20 per month for this service.

 

In my view it would be much simpler, and far cheaper, to simply purchase the advertising yourself. Assuming that you already have a web page, which almost all lawyers now do, simply create an account with each of the major search engines, and bid on your name.  It is unlikely that there is much competition for your name, so these bids will likely be at the minimum bid level.  The ad would then link back to the contact page of your web site. Ultimately, I see very little value added by Jabberclick for annual $260 charged.  That money would be far better spent adding content each month to your existing website, which will increase the likelihood of achieving higher rankings in the natural search results Google and the other search engines.

Techshow 2009

A couple of weeks ago I attended the ABA Techshow in Chicago in Illinois. It was good to see old law tech friends like Adriana Linares and Tom O’Connor, and to make some new ones like Jim Calloway and Bruce Dorner.   Over the next few weeks I plan to post on some of the innovative, and not some innovative applications for lawyers. If I had to sum up the primary themes of this year’s conference, it would be “e-discovery” and “paperless office.” There were other sections that dealt with other areas of law practice, but these 2 themes dominated, both the presentations and the vendor hall. 

 

On the paperless office front, not much has change over the past 10 years other than the fact that scanners have gotten more affordable and faster, making decentralized scanning to PDF, with OCR, the method of choice. Affordable personal scanners, such as the Fujitsu S1500 Scan Snap scanners, which sell for approximately $450 and include a full copy of Acrobat Standard, making it very affordable to place scanners on every staff member’s desk and require that every piece of paper coming into the office be scanned.  My office has utilized a variation of this system for the past 10 years, following Ross Kodner’s "paper less" office plan, however, inspired by the various offices reporting favorable results at Techshow, we are now abandoning the actual filing of the paper documents, relying solely on the scanned image. I will report on the progress of this project in future posts.

File Sync made Simple

I recently attended Techshow 2009, the annual premier technology conference for lawyers. In future posts, I will discuss some of the products and services featured there. 

 

One of my favorite sessions each year at Techshow is the 60 Sites in 60 minutes session. This year offered two such sessions, and did not disappoint.  A complete list of the sites is available here.   One of the gems revealed in this session was www.syncplicity.com.  This service synchronizes files between multiple computers using an Internet cloud.  In other words, I can create a transfer folder on my desktop that will upload its entire contents, and all additions and changes, to the cloud each time it is connected to the internet.  Matching synchronized folders on my laptop and home computers are synchronized with the contents and changes to the synchronized folder.  Syncplicity will keep the designated folders on all 3 computers synchronized, so that any changes that are made on a file on one machine will be updated to the corresponding file located on the other to synchronized computers. A synchronization occurs any time the computer is connected to the Internet.

So, while I previously had to manually select each file or folder that I wanted to transfer, then connect my lap top to the network, and drag it over as a copy, or alternatively plug in a thumb drive and drag the wanted files onto that, now I simply drag a copy of the file into my sync folder on my desktop.  Once I do my laptop and home computers are also automatically updated, provided they have internet connection. The file is automatically downloaded to my laptop, and I am able to have full access to it at trial or hearing.  The best part is, the services free for two computers up to 2 gigabytes of data. Unlimited computers, up to 100 gigs is only $100 per year. This application is going to make my life considerably easier. As an added bonus, any files that I select for synchronization are also backed up, and are available from any computer with a web browser. This service has already simplified my life. 

As an update to this post, whatever was interfering with the DS5000 has apparently resolved itself, and it does not appear to be the Dual Monitor Adaptor. 

Law School: The Final Frontier

Just in case you thought that law professors have too much time on their hands and are too far removed from the real world, a recent series of blog postings on the whether Star Trek's United Federation of Planets is a true Federal System should remove all doubt.  The analysis, which concludes after great length that the United Federation of Planets (as opposed to the Trade Federation of Star Wars) was a tribute-based system much like the 5th-century B.C. Delian League.   No fewer than 60 responders weighed in on this important debate.  Live long and prosper. 

Backing Up is Hard to Do

Several months ago, my state bar association began a search for a vendor to serve the backup needs of its members.  With the memory of Hurricane Katrina still vivid, and its impact still being felt by many within the Mississippi legal profession, data backup is an area of great interest to lawyers in my state.   I was asked to test drive an online service called CoreVault.  I was amazed at their high level of service, and the ease at which backups could be performed. 

The service is web based, and sends compressed encrypted data to the company's storage facilities in Oklahoma.  The service has remote redundant data storage facilities in the event of failure on their end, and can back up as frequently as required.  Locally, the backup software operates on a local workstation with access to the data to be  backed up.   The software compresses the data and sends it electronically to CoreVault as frequently as scheduled.  For my test, I selected 5 Gigs of data from my server.  I expected the initial download to take several days, given data throughput rates even on a T-1, and scheduled the software to begin at 6:00 p.m. and to end at 7:00 a.m.  To my surprise, the initial download was completed overnight.  Thereafter, incremental downloads take only a matter of minutes.  The service will retain as many versions  of a backed up file as you select.  I chose 5, meaning in the event a file ever became corrupted on my machine, I can restore from up the the 5 previous backed up versions.

Set-up was simple.  A technician from CoreVault logged into my workstation through gotomeeting and took control.  I told him the location of the data to back up, and the times and frequency of backups I desired, and within 15 minutes everything was set.  Backup began that evening right on schedule, and was finished by 5:00 a.m.  Daily thereafter I receive 2 emails confirming that backup began and was successfully completed.  These emails are sent from my workstation.  In the event that my machine fails to send data 2 days in a row, CoreVault contacts me to alert me to the problem and troubleshoot. 

As my friend Ross Kodner is fond of saying, "We don't back up to back up, we back up to restore."  Restoring also went without a hitch.  I merely logged in, selected the files I wanted to restore, and the location to which I wanted to restore them, and seconds later, they were restored from Oklahoma to my local machine.   

I cannot speak to the highly technical issues of security and encryption.  I am told that the data is highly secure, and can only be restored from a machine other than the originating server using a very long password.  Frankly, I am deferring to Jim Calloway's due diligence on the  security front.  The Oklahoma Bar selected CoreVault as its vendor of choice for members after significant investigation, and I am confident that if Jim is satisfied enough to recommend it to his members, it must be really, really secure.

I have tried numerous backup solutions over the past decade, all with unsatisfactory results, and all of which have involved significant time and oversight by me.  My current office shares a server room with another business that uses a very sophisticated and expensive tape backup system.   Every morning, someone from the business has to remove and replace a tape, and be responsible for securely storing the most recent tape, presumably with some off-site rotation.  Every so often, his server maintenance vendor comes in  because something is not working with his backup.  CoreVault eliminates all of that.  I simply set it, and forget it.  If for some reason it fails to back up, the company will contact me, log in, and fix the problem remotely.  No tapes.  No hardware.  And no daily involvement by me or my staff.  I agreed to test the service as part of an evaluation for my bar association, but I liked it so much that I signed on as a client.  Cost varies depending on data size. There are no long term service commitments.   Mine runs a reasonable $50 per month.

"The new phone book is here, the new phone book is here!"

That line from Steve Martin’s “The Jerk” always comes to mind every summer when they deliver the new phone books to my office.  This year, however, I observed what I believe is certain to be a continuing trend.  The yellow pages of this year’s book were noticeably smaller than last year’s.  The lawyer’s section specifically was significantly smaller, with many fewer full page and double page ads.  The legal market is no doubt reacting to the fact that fewer and fewer people use the yellow pages any more to find service providers.  Everyone – especially the clients we all want – uses the Internet now, and that usage will only increase.  But the odd thing is that in the face of tougher competition, the yellow pages publisher, at least in my area, seems to have actually raised rates rather than lowering them. I currently have only a line listing in a couple of practice listing areas, for which I am charged an outrageous rate.  I look forward to the day, very soon, where I can feel comfortable not having a listing at all.