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FYI for August 2006
Get an update on how the acquisition of
CaseSoft by LexisNexis® affects the
CaseMap® and TimeMap® integration with
many fine products. You'll want to check out the status of our
current integrations and the exciting new ones that are
currently in development!
When was the last time you
reviewed the library of informative articles at our website?
If it's been awhile you might want to take a few moments to
see what's new. They're a great resource to help hone your
case analysis and assessment skills.
In the same vein
of honing your skills, we hope you'll consider taking a live
webinar in September that will cover CaseMap Reporting Tips
& Tricks. Just follow the links below to register. You
don't have to wait until September to learn something new—read
Enhancing Interviews with "Cast of Character Debriefings" and
then pick up a quick tip with the "Send To NoteMap" feature
that is available in CaseMap 6.
Integration
with CaseMap/TimeMap Changing Under
LexisNexis?
In May of this year, CaseSoft was
acquired by LexisNexis. Since the acquisition, we've heard
from clients and prospective clients with questions about how
things might change. Perhaps the most common concern has been
whether something would happen to the dozens of integrations
that exist between CaseSoft tools and products made by other
organizations.
All the integrations between our tools
and other products, including those products developed by
other organizations, will only get better now that CaseSoft is
part of LexisNexis.
We will not disable or degrade the
20+ links between our CaseMap case analysis tool and other
litigation support, EDD, and DMS products. Similarly, we will
not disable or degrade the many integrations between our
TimeMap timeline graphing tool and other
products.
Moreover, we're aggressively pursuing
additional and enhanced integrations.
As you would
expect, some of these new and improved integrations will be
with other LexisNexis tools and services. For example, we've
just released a version of CaseMap that links to Applied
Discovery's® EDD solution. And new integration
is also in the works with Total Litigator,
Concordance®,
CourtLink® and numerous
other LexisNexis offerings. LexisNexis is dramatically
enhancing all of its litigation offerings and CaseMap is
becoming the glue that ties these offerings together across
the lifecycle of a case.
Other new and enhanced
integrations are being developed for products from vendors
other than LexisNexis. For example, we're in the midst of
creating a new utility that integrates CaseMap with the
Worldox DMS used at many firms.
One of the key benefits
of the acquisition is increased development bandwidth. We'll
be releasing important new versions of our tools more
frequently putting enhancements based on client feedback in
your hands much sooner. The new integrations discussed above
are one example of what's coming.
Have you seen the way
CaseMap and TimeMap link to Adobe Acrobat®, Applied Discovery, Concordance,
Summation®, our TextMap
transcript summary tool and dozens of other products? If not,
please let us show you how. We can give you a quick
integration tour over the Internet. Please write tour@casesoft.com to
schedule a session at a time convenient to your
schedule.
If you have questions or concerns of any sort
please email us at info@casesoft.com or
contact your LexisNexis CaseSoft Account Representative if
you're a current client at 904-273-5000.
^ back to TOC
A
Bates Stamper on Steroids, a NewsWire release by Jill Bauerle,
published in TechnoLawyer, May 24, 2006
Once upon a time, lawyers manually
affixed bates stamps to documents. Thanks to xerography, copy
machines eventually replaced the hand stamps of old. Last
week, LexisNexis CaseSoft announced the latest in bates
stamping technology — CaseMap Bates Stamper. This nifty
utility plugs into Acrobat Standard or Professional 6 or 7,
and enables you to apply bates stamps to one or more PDF
files. A wizard walks you through the bates stamping process,
providing options along the way. You can use any combination
of letters and numbers for the bates stamp (prefix plus number
— up to 34 characters total), and then store that particular
format for future use. You can use any font, position the
bates stamp anywhere in the document, and even add a white
background to ensure that the bates number will be visible.
When batch processing, you can have the CaseMap Bates Stamper
ignore documents that you've already stamped. This way, you
won't have to select only the new files, which kind of defeats
the purpose of batch processing. When you finish applying
bates stamps, you can use the Send PDFs to CaseMap wizard to
incorporate the documents into CaseMap. A new addition to this
wizard enables you to list the documents in CaseMap by bates
number. Once in CaseMap, you can create facts and issues from
the documents along with the corresponding bates numbers and
hyperlinks.
You can see the CaseMap PDF Bates Stamper
in action by viewing the ~15-minute online tutorial that's
available 24/7 by clicking here or email info@casesoft.com for more
information.
About
TechnoLawyer NewsWire
Published on Wednesdays,
TechnoLawyer NewsWire is a weekly newsletter written by
tech expert Jill Bauerle that briefly discusses and provides
links to three new or little-known technology products and
services of interest to legal professionals. Short and to the
point, with clever headlines, pop culture references, and a
touch of humor, this newsletter enables you to stay on top of
the latest and greatest products and services. Learn more about TechnoLawyer
NewsWire.
^ back to TOC
Live
Free Webinar—CaseMap Reporting Tips &
Tricks
CaseMap
gives users many reporting options to produce professional
work product with ease. This webinar will give existing
CaseMap users an assortment of tips and tricks to fully
utilize CaseMap's reporting capabilities.
Have you ever
sent information from CaseMap to your word processor for use
in Motions for Summary Judgment, Exhibit Lists, Witness Lists,
other types of court filings and other types of reports? It
takes just one mouse click on CaseMap's File/Send To
menu.
Are you using the ReportBook feature? A
ReportBook is a compilation of any number of saved CaseMap
case analysis reports packaged together with a cover page, a
table of contents, and report-specific title pages. It takes
just three clicks to generate a ReportBook. While you can
create ReportBooks from scratch, each CaseMap case file
already offers a series of pre-built ReportBooks.
Whether you are a seasoned CaseMap user or a novice,
you'll pick up tips and tricks to creating polished work
product that will knock the socks off your clients, impress
the judge and scare the pants off the
competition!
When?
Thursday, September 7,
2006, 2:00 pm, Eastern Daylight Time (GMT -04:00, New
York). Click here to register >>
^ back to TOC
CaseMap
6's New Intake Interview Jumpstart Feature
The new Intake Interview
Jumpstart feature is another example of the great innovations
in CaseMap 6.
This feature makes it easy to email
clients or prospective clients a word-processing document they
can use to provide you with background information about the
persons, organizations and facts in their case and also about
the questions they have regarding how you're going to handle
their matter.
When clients return the completed CaseMap
Intake Interview Form to you, a wizard imports it into CaseMap
6 filling in five spreadsheets and jumpstarting the creation
of a new case file or augmenting the information you've
already collected. CaseMap 6 even automatically creates a
ReportBook that summarizes the information your clients
provided and lays out the next steps in the case analysis
process.
The result of the Intake Interview Jumpstart?
You get a case file up and rolling with incredibly little work
at the same time you honor your clients by getting them
heavily involved in the case analysis process.
The
Intake Interview Jumpstart feature works well with numerous
types of clients, including with corporate counsel who so
frequently live with a dispute for months or years before it
turns into a piece of litigation.
View the 17-minute
online tutorial that shows the Intake Interview Jumpstart
feature in action . . .
Click to view the Intake Interview Jumpstart
prerecorded webinar
You can also check out the input
and one of the outputs from the Intake Interview Jumpstart
process . . .
Click to view a PDF of the default Interview
Template Form that CaseMap 6 sends to your
clients
Click to view a sample of the Intake Interview
Jumpstart ReportBook that CaseMap 6 creates
^ back to TOC
Hone
Your Case Assessment Skills—Review Feature Articles at our
Website
To
make the most out of the work you do with CaseMap, our case
analysis tool, we'd like to direct your attention to the many
articles that are available for you. Articles that can help
you use CaseMap, TimeMap and TextMap to their fullest
potential. The articles are penned by the same person who
initially developed our software products—so they can't help
but give you an insight into the best way to put them to use!
Visit http://courtlink.lexisnexismail.com/cgi-bin8/DM/y/hA0E2YL50A0BX260Ea
to download and read:
The Bell
Curve & Document Indexing/Imaging - Let's apply
the "bell curve" from statistics class to the document
collections produced during discovery.
Creating & Using Issue Analysis
Memos - Of the thousands of hours you invest in a
case, the handful it takes to work up an issue analysis memo
could easily be the most important.
The Three Flavors of Acrobat -
Adobe Systems offers three versions of its ubiquitous Acrobat
software. Which version or combination of versions is right
for your organization?
Making
the Most of a Cast of Characters - Do you create a
Cast of Characters for every case? What could be easier and
more basic? Despite its simplicity, a cataloging of key
players is of great value.
Brainstorming Your Way to a Winning Case
Strategy - Brainstorming sessions make it easy to
think clearly about complex cases.
Chronology Best Practices - A fact
chronology can be a tremendous asset as you prepare a case for
trial.
Getting Case Analysis Off
to a Fast Start - From your first conversation with
a prospective client, you're learning about the dispute that
led the individual or corporation to seek
counsel.
Timelines, They're Not
Just For Trial Anymore - Timelines are a
particularly powerful form of demonstrative evidence. In many
cases, timeline graphs have been a decisive factor in
obtaining a favorable trial outcome.
^ back to TOC
Enhancing
Interviews with "Cast of Character
Debriefings"
Here's one example of the many practical uses
for a cast of characters: improving the results of witness
interviews.
We've designed the "Cast of Characters
Debriefing" process so that it can simply be appended to your
current interview methods. This addition should turn up facts
that even friendly witnesses would otherwise fail to mention.
It should also help identify players missing from the cast of
characters, thereby making this case analysis tool all the
more valuable during the next interview.
Please give
our "Cast of Characters Debriefing" procedure a try at the
first opportunity. We believe you'll be pleased with the
results.
| 1. |
Take a copy of
the case's cast of characters to the
interview.
|
| 2. |
Conduct your
traditional interview. When answering your questions,
the interviewee will mention the names of case
players.
- If these players are
already listed in the cast of characters, place check
marks in front of their names.
- If these players aren't
in the cast of characters, jot down their names
(phonetically, so as to avoid interrupting the
interviewee's train of thought).
|
| 3. |
Once the
initial stage of the interview wraps up, use the cast of
characters to guide further questioning.
- Discuss cast of
characters members that you check-marked during the
initial interview.
- Work player by player
asking the interviewee to provide as much detail as
possible about each.
- Consider a line of
questioning such as: "Earlier in our discussions,
you mentioned X. I'd like to know more about X. How
does X fit into this case? What's your impression of
X? What are the facts for which X may be a source?
When you think about X, what other case players come
to mind? Why?"
- These questions should
turn up additional facts and also rumors to be
explored. This questioning is also likely to elicit
the names of other players missing from the cast of
characters.
- Once finished with the
check-marked players, discuss those players the
interviewee mentioned that were not in the cast of
characters.
- Confirm the spelling
of each player's name, then employ the same line of
questions as above to pin down what the interviewee
knows about the player.
- Finally, review the
cast-of-characters members the interviewee did not
mention -- the players without check marks.
- This is a particularly
important aspect of the "Cast-of-Characters
Debriefing" process. It almost always turns up facts
that would have been missed otherwise.
- Locate the first
player in the cast of characters that hasn't been
check-marked. See if the interviewee has heard of
this player. If the answer is yes, follow up with
questions. If the answer is no, supply a few details
about the player to see if they jog the
interviewee's memory, and follow up with questions
if they do. Repeat this process for each unchecked
player.
|
| 4. |
Following the
interview, use the information collected to update the
cast of characters and the fact
chronology. |
^ back to TOC
Learn
a Key Feature in 30 Seconds: "Send To
NoteMap"
If
you're not already using our easy to use outlining tool,
NoteMap, the simplicity of these "Send to NoteMap" from
CaseMap instructions will certainly make you want to give it a
try!
Client Tom Ruwe of Cincinnati, OH recently shared
how he uses this feature:
You can directly send any
facts – with the supporting text from any transcript –
from CaseMap to a NoteMap outline. Using NoteMap makes it
sinfully easy to organize any written argument (motion for
summary judgment; appellate brief; any motion) in outline form
– with the supporting questions and answers right in your
outline! Because you have extracted directly from the
electronic transcript, you never re-type or proofread the
testimony. All you do is think and analyze, and the rest is
done with a few mouse clicks.
Go to the "File" tab
on the CaseMap toolbar and select "Send to NoteMap". You can
choose to send a selection or the entire spreadsheet. A dialog
box pops up and asks you to select what column you would like
to designate as the "Parent" note. After selecting the Parent,
you are then prompted to select which columns you want to
include as "Children". Select as many as you want and then you
will be prompted that your selections are ready to be pasted
into NoteMap. Open up NoteMap and select "Paste" from the
"Edit" tab or "Cntrl V" and you instantly have an outline
pasted into NoteMap. It's that easy!!
^ back to TOC
Thank you so
much for being a client!
LexisNexis, the Knowledge Burst logo and
Shepard's are registered trademarks of Reed Elsevier
Properties Inc., used under license. CaseMap, TimeMap,
NoteMap, TextMap and DepPrep are registered trademarks of
LexisNexis CourtLink, Inc. Applied Discovery is a registered
trademark of Applied Discovery, Inc. Other products and
services may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their
respective companies.
LexisNexis, 9443 Springboro Pike, Miamisburg, OH
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