TechnoLawyer: Business Productivity/Word Processing

In today's issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, lawyer and legal technology legend Dennis Kennedy covers an online document repository for transactional lawyers, an inexpensive PDF creation tool for Windows, and a suite of PDF utilities for Mac. Don't miss the next issue.

Below you'll find one of the three articles from today's edition:

How to Find a Good Deal Document
By Dennis Kennedy

Large firm transactional lawyers often have the benefit of a handy document bank of prior agreements that they can use when working on a new deal. An agreement similar to what you need can serve as an initial prototype, a checklist for issues, or as a useful way to determine how others treat similar deals.

But even the largest firms don't have every possible document available in house. And what about smaller firms?

Real Practice's RealDealDocs provides access to hundreds of thousands of exhibits from public filings from the SEC EDGAR database selected for relevance to transactional lawyers. Real Practice has categorized these documents and made them searchable using its own technology. As a result, you get access to not only thousands of agreements, but also millions of deal clauses, created by lawyers from the leading law firms in the U.S.

RealDealDocs organizes these materials so you can use simple pull-down menus to find the type of agreements you want. You can search by document or clause, or browse document categories. For document searches, you simply select the type of document and then drill down into sub-types. You can run full-text searches. The search results display of relevant documents with titles, parties, law firms, and other information to help you select a relevant document.

RealDealDocs currently highlights four main topic areas — mergers and acquisitions, securities and corporate finance, labor and employment, and real property and leases, but also provides materials in other practice areas.

You can use RealDealDocs for many other useful purposes than document creation. Documents from other deals make excellent issue checklists, indicate how a party you're negotiating with might have modified standard provisions in the past, and make for an effective parry when opposing counsel tells you that lawyers never change a certain provision.

Real Practice offers a 10-day free trial, with RealDealDocs available in daily ($9.95), weekly ($19.95), and monthly ($29.95 or $39.95) plans. Multiple user plans exist. Learn more about RealDealDocs.

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Published on Wednesdays, TechnoLawyer NewsWire is a weekly newsletter that enables you to learn about new technology products and services of interest to legal professionals. Like all of our newsletters, it's free. Please subscribe now.

BlawgWorld 2007 with TechnoLawyer Problem/Solution Guide is a free eBook. Actually, it's two eBooks in one PDF file.

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The 2007 TechnoLawyer Problem/Solution Guide is a revolutionary new way to find Solutions to Problems your law firm is experiencing. Specifically, it contains 185 Problems and corresponding Solutions.

Each Problem is written in the form of a question from the point of view of a law firm and organized by topic. Topics include case management, depositions, discovery, document management, legal research, time-billing, and many more — 58 topics in all.

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Coming August 3, 2007 to Fat Friday: Miriam Jacobson tells us what public interest lawyers really earn and what she sees as the problem, Charles T. Lester, Jr. reviews an online password generator service, Douglas Shachtman explains why one lawyer's paperless workflow won't work for his litigation practice, Celia Elwell clarifies a previous Post she penned about Word v. WordPerfect, and Meg Spencer Dixon pokes fun at Seth Rowland's defense of his now infamous "recovered attorney" quip. Don't miss this issue.

How to Receive this Newsletter
Published on Fridays, Fat Friday is a weekly newsletter that features a grab bag full of genuinely useful product reviews and tips on a wide variety of topics. Like all of our newsletters, it's free. Please subscribe now.

Coming August 2, 2007 to Answers to Questions: Richard Schmitt reviews two search tools — Examine32 and exalead, Norman Van Treeck provides step by step instructions for setting up dual monitors, Richard Schafer reviews Roboform, John Harding discusses Amicus Attorney 7's integration capabilities, and Charles T. Lester Jr. reviews lexisONE as a free legal research alternative. Don't miss this issue.

How to Receive this Newsletter
Published Thursdays, Answers to Questions is a weekly newsletter in which TechnoLawyer members answer legal technology and practice management questions submitted by their peers (including you if you join TechnoLawyer). Like all of our newsletters, it's free. Please subscribe now.

Coming July 26, 2007 to Answers to Questions: Stephen Lambeth explains why he would want to see a Microsoft branded PC, Sanjay Singh explains how QuickFile 4 Outlook works and why, Pam Rolph suggests a quick solution for anyone who can't print a large PDF file (use at your own risk), Daniel Fennick claims to have the answer that will end the Word v. WordPerfect debate, and Ernest Marquez explains how to set up and use multiple monitors. Don't miss this issue.

How to Receive this Newsletter
Published Thursdays, Answers to Questions is a weekly newsletter in which TechnoLawyer members answer legal technology and practice management questions submitted by their peers (including you if you join TechnoLawyer). Like all of our newsletters, it's free. Please subscribe now.

In today's special "best friends" issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, lawyer and legal technology legend Dennis Kennedy covers a document comparison, security, and review tool that integrates with Word, an Outlook add-on that makes it easy to schedule meetings, and a voicemail-to-text service that integrates with any cell phone or smartphone. Don't miss the next issue.

Below you'll find one of the three articles from today's edition:

Microsoft Office's Best Friend
By Dennis Kennedy

Your documents have rich and interesting lives with fascinating stories to tell. Documents are created, revised, shared, printed, filed, archived, etc. Some of these stories you want told and others you don't.

As a result, management of documents throughout the entire lifecycle has become an important priority. The new Workshare Professional 5 delivers an integrated approach to document lifecycle management, providing control and reducing risks of information leaks during document review and other document usage without changing the tools you use today (i.e., Word, Outlook, your document management system, extranet, etc.).

In short, Workshare has significantly beefed up its comparison, security, and document review functionality. Regarding document comparison, accuracy is critical, especially when you work with complex tables, intricate paragraph numbering, or complex formatting. Workshare Professional's improved document comparison engine should be able to handle anything you throw at it.

Among the notable new features is a tabbed view within documents similar to the tabs in modern Web browsers. With its "One-to-Many" technology you can now compare multiple document versions inside this tabbed view, which makes it easy to accept or reject changes across all document versions in one place.

As you work on documents, Workshare Professional maintains the entire history of all changes and proposed changes. You now have the ability to eliminate the risk that inadvertent formatting changes, new styles, template changes, or file corruption will, for lack of a better word, screw up your documents.

Workshare Professional also provides a platform for managing collaboration and review of documents. You can exchange documents by email or SharePoint extranets and never have to worry about juggling multiple document versions or losing track of the master. Workshare Professional manages all of the review copies and ensures that you always work on the correct master document, whether it is stored in a document management system, a network drive or a local file system.

Once you finalize a document, Workshare Professional goes beyond metadata management with "content risk discovery and remediation" prior to PDF conversion. It then helps you safely publish your document in a secure PDF format without the need for additional software. With the ability to create and impose business policies for PDF creation and distribution you can now enforce PDF security across your firm. You can also create PDFs from any application, not just Office.

This latest iteration of Workshare Professional is not only compatible with Microsoft Office 2007 and earlier versions, it actually integrates into the Office 2007 Ribbon and task panes. Another nice touch is its support for SharePoint Server 2007's collaborative workspaces and Live Meeting for "real-time collaboration."

Workshare Professional also comes with out of the box integration options for document management systems. Metadata links allow you to leverage your document management system to track matters across documents when sent for review from and to anywhere. It even retains a full audit trail of review and sharing activities. Learn more about Workshare Professional 5.

How to Receive this Newsletter
Published on Wednesdays, TechnoLawyer NewsWire is a weekly newsletter that enables you to learn about new technology products and services of interest to legal professionals. Like all of our newsletters, it's free. Please subscribe now.

In today's issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, lawyer and legal technology legend Dennis Kennedy covers a document comparison, security, and review tool that integrates with Word, an Outlook add-on that makes it easy to schedule meetings, and a voicemail-to-text service that integrates with any cell phone or smartphone. Don't miss the next issue.

Below you'll find one of the three articles from today's edition:

Your Calendar's Best Friend
By Dennis Kennedy

The day-to-day practice of law often looks like a series of meetings and conference calls. Some suggest that the effort of scheduling these calls and meetings — playing phone tag, exchanging email, looking for available dates and times, and re-scheduling — might average seven separate exchanges per meeting and 25 minutes per working day over the course of a year. Finding a way to automate some of that scheduling process would save time and money — not to mention your sanity.

iPolipo is a Web-based service with a Windows software component that integrates with Outlook to assist in automating your schedule by securely sharing your calendar with those who want to meet with you. The key lies in the way that iPolipo lets you selectively share portions of your calendar with others.

iPolipo adds a toolbar to Outlook with all of its functions just a click away. Your contacts need only use a browser to schedule meetings with you and do not have to subscribe to iPolipo.

You can make your Outlook calendar available on a 24/7 basis with as many of your Outlook contacts as you choose. You can also insert a link to your calendar into your email messages with a single click of your mouse. iPolipo automatically synchronizes with Outlook in real time and automatically handles time zone conversions for you.

Only the contacts that you invite will have access to your calendar and their view is limited only to your available time slots. You can categorize your contacts and offer available time slots based on group membership, limiting client access to regular office hours and keeping evenings and weekends free for friends and family.

No one can see any information about your other scheduled meetings. You can also share your calendar for a limited time period and make meeting slots available only for a limited time.

iPolipo comes in two versions — Basic ($99/year) and Premium ($149/year). The Basic version enables you to share your calendar and offer limited-time meeting invitations for a 3 weeks period. The Premium version doubles this window to 6 weeks. Learn more about iPolipo.

How to Receive this Newsletter
Published on Wednesdays, TechnoLawyer NewsWire is a weekly newsletter that enables you to learn about new technology products and services of interest to legal professionals. Like all of our newsletters, it's free. Please subscribe now.

Coming July 20, 2007 to Fat Friday: Matt Baker reviews LogMeIn for secure remote access, Brett Thompson challenges Word lovers with a list of gripes, Carroll Straus reviews her experience with Dell customer service and tech support, David Caracappa responds to Dennis Kennedy's prediction that many lawyers will move to Mac notebooks this year, and Colleen Appleton praises one TechnoLawyer's kind-hearted Post about what he would do if he won the lottery. Don't miss this issue.

How to Receive this Newsletter
Published on Fridays, Fat Friday is a weekly newsletter that features a grab bag full of genuinely useful product reviews and tips on a wide variety of topics. Like all of our newsletters, it's free. Please subscribe now.

Coming July 19, 2007 to Answers to Questions: Mark Deal discusses the costs involved in switching from Windows to Linux, Stephen Taylor offers a solution for GroupWise notification problems and explains why his firm continues to chose GroupWise over Outlook, Rick Borstein explains how to enable the Typewriter tool in Acrobat Reader, Kristin LaMont reviews her experience using Time Matters over the past 11 years, and Celia Elwell shares her thoughts on which word processor today's law students should use. Don't miss this issue.

How to Receive this Newsletter
Published Thursdays, Answers to Questions is a weekly newsletter in which TechnoLawyer members answer legal technology and practice management questions submitted by their peers (including you if you join TechnoLawyer). Like all of our newsletters, it's free. Please subscribe now.

In this special issue of TechnoLawyer NewsWire, lawyer and legal technology legend Dennis Kennedy covers three personal knowledge management tools — two for Windows PCs and one for Macs. Don't miss the next issue.

Below you'll find one of the three articles from today's edition:

Become a Wiz Kid
By Dennis Kennedy

The typical Microsoft Word user sees a screen with hundred of icons spread out over several toolbars and menus. Often, lawyers simply want to jot down some notes or organize their thoughts in an outline. For such tasks Microsoft Word is both overkill and inefficient.

AvniTech Solutions' WhizFolders Organizer focuses solely on notes and outlines, with the goal of making it easy to create, manage, and connect your ideas. This focus eliminates the clutter and difficulty of word processing and other programs for note-taking and gives you a great platform for working with your notes and great flexibility in using notes and outlines.

WhizFolders Organizer gives you fast access to all of your notes. The program features a two-pane list/edit interface so you can see the hierarchal list of your notes and outlines as you work. You can rearrange your lists by dragging and dropping, or even use duplicate names. It is this listing technology that gives the program its power and usefulness. You might also use the full screen edit mode, vertical panes, multiple windows, or other flexible approaches to best match the way you work.

You can enter your notes in a variety of ways and in a variety of formats. You can drag and drop text, insert pictures, links, and objects, and even insert links to other notes, documents, and files. You can merge groups of individual notes into larger documents.

WhizFolders Organizer uses lists to help you categorize, sequence, and organize your notes. You can then move them around, color or highlight items, and define a tree structure that works best for you. The ability to drop in links to other notes turns WhizFolders Organizer into a personal wiki. WhizFolders Organizer also prints out a convenient table of contents with your notes.

WhizFolders Organizer offers Boolean search tools and the ability to export your notes in RTF and HTML formats. There is a free viewer you can use for distributing your notes. Sensitive notes can be password protected.

WhizFolders Organizer comes in two versions — Pro and Deluxe. The latter version features tables, keyword tagging, and templates. It sells for $80. The Pro version sells for $39. Learn more about WhizFolders Organizer.

How to Receive this Newsletter
Published on Wednesdays, TechnoLawyer NewsWire is a weekly newsletter that enables you to learn about new technology products and services of interest to legal professionals. Like all of our newsletters, it's free. Please subscribe now.