The Connected Lawyer

Rocket Matter has announced that they are offering RocketMatter free of charge to attorneys who have been displaced by the recent floods. The free service will be available to those attorneys for the balance of 2008, or until the attorney establishes their new permanent home.

This is a gracious offer from Rocket Matter, as well as a great opportunity for those attorneys to try out Rocket Matter and see how it works.

On a related note, I will heed Ernie the Attorney’s call and link to the Linn County Bar Association. According to Ernier, the Linn County Bar Assocaition does not have a Google page rank. So hopefully a few links will help that.

Yesterday I had the pleasure of having my review of the Canon ScanFront 220P scanner published as a TechnoFeature by TechnoLawyer. A reprint of my review can be found on my Files page or by clicking here.

My summary of the review is that I loved this scanner and I would recommend it for anyone who is looking for a network scanner.

On a somewhat related note, I would also recommend that if you are not currently subscribed to TechnoLawyer, that you click over to their website and sign up. It is one of the best sources of the practical application of technology to the practice of law that I have found.

Recently I spent some time the Pacific Northwest. We spent time in Portland and Astoria Oregon as well as Ocean Shores, Washington. I love this area and always enjoy visiting. While in Portland, I found the best doughnuts that I have ever eaten at  VooDoo Doughnut. The doughnut shop is a little hole in the wall shop next to an adult theater. However, the doughnuts are absolutely to die for.

I had a Triple Chocolate Penetration, which was a chocolate cake doughnut (picture the taste and texture of a cake, not a typical cake doughnut). The doughnut was topped with a delicous chocolate frosting and then covered in Cocoa Puffs. I also had a dirt doughnut, which was a raised doughnut covered in vanilla glaze and covered in Oreo cookies.

If you ever visit Portland, I cannot suggest highly enough that you stop at VooDoo Doughnut to pick up some doughnuts. We were there at about 9 am on a Sunday morning and the line was out the door.

The best meal that we had in Portland was at the Multnomah Falls Lodge. I particularly enjoyed the French Onion Soup (topped with swiss cheese). My wife loved the Salmon Salad Croissant. The bonus is that this restaurant not only has great food, but that it also has beautiful views. The falls here is absolutely beautiful. Plus, there are great views of the Columbia River. Further, if you are so inclined, you can hike to the top of the falls for a view from 600 feet up.

Also in Portland, we tried the Brazil Grill. I wasn’t crazy about the Brazilian steakhouse mehtod of serving. I think I prefer choosing my meat and how it is cooked. However, they had the best roasted cinnamon  pineapple. It had just the right amount of cinnamon and was roasted perfectly. I will definately have to try this dish at home.

Another great dining experience that we had was in Astoria, at the Bridgewater Bistro. My wife had the dungeness crab savory cheesecake, which she swore was delicous. I had a fantastic prime rib. If you ever happen to find yourself in Astoria (a Goonies convention, perhaps), I recommend that you try the Bridgewater Bistro. I recommend that you make reservation, however. We were there on a Monday night, and were lucky to get a table.

My wife has asked me why I blog about the books that I read and the hotels that I stay at. After she asked the question, I realized that one of the main reasons that I do this, is so that I can find the information again when I need it.

Sure, I could make notes about the various hotels, or books, or cool software programs that I find, but where would I store them so that I could find them again? A blog, however, is a perfect way to store this information.

Not long ago, Kevin O’Keefe blogged about using a blog as a personal knowledge management tool. Kevin explained:

With a blog, you file what you read or hear and want to keep in a blog post. Make a note or two offering why the information is worthwhile. Upload key files to your blog. Blog live from seminars you attend. Why make hard copy notes that end up getting tossed or lost?

A blog gives you complete navigation by category & sub-category, tags, and a complete search. You can find what you want over the years.

Plus, the blog is fully searchable using Google.

In the little more than a year that I have had this blog, I have found myself searching my past posts to recover some information that I could not easily find another way. You may not want to post information for everyone in the world to see. Nevertheless, you may want to create a blog that is not publicly available, just to manage your own information.

A couple of months ago, Matt Homan recommended PicLens for anyone who “EVER view photos or other images in the web.” At the time, I thought the suggestion was interesting, but I did nothing other than bookmark Matt’s post and the PicLens site.

Recently I was using Flickr and was again frustrated at how awful their browsing ability is. After getting frustrated, I remembered PicLens and quickly installed the software in my browser. After using it for just a few seconds, I was hooked.

PicLens allows you to create full screen immersive views of pictures on a variety of websites, including Flickr, Google Images, MySpace, Facebook, and others.

It is a great program and it is easy to use. I recommend you try it out.

I am a huge advocate of moving to a paperless office. In my experience, it is simply a more efficient way of doing things. If you have not yet made the decision to move to a paperless office, Lawyer’s Weekly has a good article on how to get started.

The two attorneys interview for the article both stated that would not go back to paper, one of them stated “I don’t see how digital could not be more efficient.”

While in Portland, I was able to visit Powell’s Books, which claims to be the world’s largest independent used and new bookstore. I can’t verify this, but I can verify that it is huge, and, without a doubt, the coolest bookstore I have ever been in. To get an idea of the organizational structure of the store, check out this diagram.

It has loads of books lots of different floors and rooms in which the books are displayed. Fortunately there are maps available at the information desks, and the books are well catagroized. Thus, despite the fact that there are thousands of books to choose from, it was relatively simple for me to wander into the Fantasy & Science Fiction area and spend the better part of an hour browsing books.

The big problem was trying to decide what books not to buy. I got out of there buying only four books. However, there were many more that I wanted. Further, they had Cory Doctorow’s Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town on sale and I did not pick it up. I am still kicking myself over that. Although I love Little Brother, Someone Comes to Town is my favorite Doctorow book. Yet I do not yet own it.

Other than that, my visit to Powells was wonderful. If you like books and you are ever in Portland, you must visit this bookstore.

I have written before about TripIt. TripIt is a travel organization website that allows you to forward your reservation confirmations to the website and it automatically builds a travel itinerary for you. When I wrote about TripIt before, I had not yet tried it.

I am currently traveling in the Pacific Northwest right now and have used TripIt to organize my trips. After trying it out, I admit that I love it.

Adding reservations is a piece of cake. You simply forward them to plans@tripit.com. You assign them to a trip on the website and your trip is automatically populated with the reservation information as well as information such as weather, maps, and directions.

Also, they have great customer service. I made reservations with a regional hotel chain as well as a single hotel. TripIt could not automatically interpret the reservation information. This means that I had to enter the information manually (not really an onerous task). Given that I might stay with either hotel in the future, however, I submitted a request to TripIt for them to add these reservations to their programming.

I received a personal response from someone at TripIt who asked me to resubmit the reservation email and copy her on it. After doing so, I received a second email from her telling me that TripIt has parsed the information from my emails and added them to my trip.

Additionally, I can easily access TripIt via the web browser on my telephone. Plus, I can send an email to TripIt and the service will email my trip to me. This is very convienant while traveling.

In sum, this is a great service, that is easy to use, and is staffed by friendly, helpful people. What is not to like? I will be using TripIt for any future trips.

I just received the registration brochure for the 2008 ISBA Solo and Small Firm Conference. This is shaping up to be another great conference and I am really looking forward to it. There are three programing tracks with lots of good programs and speakers scheduled. I urge you to attend if at all possible.

If you register before July 15, you can take advantage of the early bird discount.

You can find out more information about the conference here. You can download the registration brochure here.

Recently I had a self imposed (or maybe a wife imposed) moratorium on purchasing new software. Some days I think I like to collect software as much as I do other gadgets. To that end, I download a lot of free trial software, play with it for a while, and then discard it when the trial period expires.

A little more than 60 days ago, I decided to download a free trial of ActiveWords, which was developed by Buzz Bruggeman. The principal behind ActiveWords is simple. You type in a few letters or a word and ActiveWords replaces what you typed either with other text, or by navigating to a website, or by launching a program, or by performing a set of actions.

I have heard of ActiveWords for years, but I had never tried it before, figuring that I don’t really do that many things that it would be useful for. Oh how I was wrong.

When I downloaded it, it took me a while to get things started. I quickly realized, however, that this program was designed for me. I am a minimalist when it comes to my desktop, my menus and my quick launch bar. I keep very few icons on my desktop and only my used programs on my quick launch bar. Additionally, I keep my menu very organized with folders and subfolders. This means that for programs I have to navigate through several submenus to launch a program I use infrequently.

With ActiveWords, however, I simply assign an active word to the program. So, for example, when I type CM, ActiveWords launches CaseMap for me. If I type GM, ActiveWords launches Firefox and navigates to my GMail account. Similarly, Lit, navigates to my Litigation folder in My Computer.

The program is easy to use. Adding new active words is easy and takes only a few seconds. Another great feature is that you can assign as many different words to perform the same function. For example, with the My Documents folder, depending on the day, I may think of it as mydocuments, docs, or mydocs. With ActiveWords I can associate each of these with the action of opening the My Documents folder. Thus, regardless of which word I type, the My Documents folder opens.

In a very sneaky move, ActiveWords gives you a 60 day free trial of the program. This means that it gives you plenty of time to learn to use the program and get hooked on it. Once you start using ActiveWords, my guess is that you will not give it up easily. On day 61 I tried to perform an ActiveWords function and it did not work. After checking a few things, quickly realized that my free trial had expired. I briefly considered bravely computing without ActiveWords. After about 15 seconds, I had shelved that idea and was on ActiveWords’ website buying a copy of the program.

Download this program and give it a whirl. If you start using, you will wonder how you lived without it. On day 61, I predict that you too will be taking Buzz’s name in vain and pulling out your credit card.

One of the goals I have with this blog is to discuss the ways in which we can leverage technology to practice law more effectively. I know of no other utility that allows you to do this more efficiently and effectively than ActiveWords.

Update: I wanted to add a couple of updates to this post. First, as alluded to in the comments below, ActiveWords installs a monitor bar that stretches across the top of you monitor. This bar allows easy access to ActiveWords and its features. It also shows when you are entering an active word. Personally, I hate when programs install monitor bars like this. I want to control my own desktop. Fortunately, the monitor bar is easily disabled. Had I not been able to disable the monitor bar, I would have uninstalled the program.

Second, I do have one minor quibble with the program that I forgot to mention. When you are adding a command to navigate to a website or to open a particular folder, ActiveWords has a “Use Current” button that allows you to designate the open folder or website as the location to navigate to. My problem is that I use Firefox for web browsing and the Use Current button does not pull the address from the Firefox window.

Update #2: The scripts that Buzz refers to below (that would not show up in the comments) are:

To add an internet site:

<alt>d</alt><ctrl>c</ctrl><ADD WIZARD:INTERNET><wait for window:title=Add New ActiveWord><ctrl>v</ctrl><tab><alt>n</alt>

To toggle the Monitor Bar:

<HIDE SHOW AWMONITOR>

Thanks to Buzz for sharing these.