Small ideas on legal practice, research and technology

Archive for ‘Technology’

Online Whiteboard for Collaboration

With everyone working from home, I have been looking for better tools to collaborate with my team. I recently found one that is super cool – Miro.

Miro enables users to map out a workflow, brainstorm new ideas or develop a business strategy on a shared online whiteboard. To create a board, you can start with a blank canvas or use a template, such as ones for flowcharts, mind maps, or kanban frameworks.

Once in the whiteboard, it is easy to edit by clicking and dragging boxes, arrows or other shapes, or creating your own sketches with a drawing …

Posted in: Technology

Master Research Tools While Working Remotely

The Law Society of Saskatchewan has just launched a new series of video tutorials for remote research resources – perfect for a time when more people than ever are working away from their office or usual workspace.

The series has four videos with more on the way. The first batch covers:

The videos are aimed at Law Society members in that province, but will be of interest to legal professionals across the country who have …

Posted in: Technology

Get Free Help With Publishing Reference Docs Online During COVID-19

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Canadian legal tech industry is stepping up to help.

Joining Clio and Optimize Compliance in offering generous assistance during this challenging time is Lexum, which today made the following announcement: Need to Provide Open Access to Key Documents and Materials? Lexum Will Help at No Cost.

“Lexum is waiving the fees of its Qweri product for organizations in need of quickly providing public access to any kind of reference documents. We are waiving our onboarding fees, as well as our subscription fee for the next 12 months, so that important

Posted in: Technology

Free Access to Easy-to-Use Compliance App

To say COVID-19 has sped up the pace of legal change is an understatement. Usually it takes months (or even years!) to make changes to Canadian laws, but now we are seeing significant amendments announced and in force on the same day. With many businesses worrying about day-to-day survival, there is little or no time to stay on top of legal compliance requirements.

We wanted to simplify this task.  So, to help Canadian businesses and law firms understand and stay on top of these quickly evolving legal changes, Optimize Compliance is offering time-limited, free access to its easy-to-use compliance app.…

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My Favourite Apps – Part V

Passwords. The bane of most people’s existence. So many to remember!

I know a few people who swear they have figured it all out – using some kind of mnemonic to remember all of their passwords. Apparently, I am not that clever. So I recently turned to LastPass. You remember one password and LastPass stores the rest. 

What I like about LastPass:

  • Once you’ve entered your master password, it will auto complete all the rest of your passwords for you. No need to go and look them up in a separate password keeper.
  • It syncs across my Mac, iphone and iPad. 
  • LastPass
Posted in: Technology

Bookmarking Web Pages in Lexbox

Administrator’s note: thanks to Lexum for sharing this tip.

Do you know you can save links pointing to any site of interest with Lexbox? The bookmarking feature of Lexbox is available for this purpose. The “New Bookmark” button is located at the bottom of the page of your Lexbox account.

It couldn’t be more simple: chose your preferred folder in your Lexbox account. Click the orange button titled “New Bookmark”. A dialog box appears. Copy the URL of your choice from your browser navigation bar, and paste it in the box. No more looking for your file information from one …

Posted in: Technology

My Favourite Apps – Part IV

Nowadays, I think most transit systems probably have an app that tells you when the next bus or train is coming. Handy, but I found a new app – Citymapper – which is great for planning out how to get where you need to go.

Citymapper will help you find your away around cities across North America, Europe, Asia and Australia. Most of the time you don’t even need an address. Just type in the name of the restaurant, museum, building, etc. and the app will tell you numerous ways to get there via public transit.

And if you want …

Posted in: Technology

A Tool to Improve Your Writing

I recently read about a great tool that helps you to simplify your writing. The Hemingway App highlights:

  • sentences that are difficult to read – yellow sentences are hard to read, while red are “egregious”;
  • use of the passive voice; and
  • phrases that have simpler alternatives (e.g., with respect to).

It also provides a grade level-based readability rating of your prose.

I tried out Hemingway by entering a legal summary that I had written for a non-legal audience. A sea of yellow and red! And a readability rating of “Post-Graduate”. Gasp!

After adding bullets and making some fairly minor revisions, …

Posted in: Technology

My Favourite Apps – Part III

I love planning trips almost as much as going on the trip itself. So, I am always on the lookout for cool travel apps.

Ulmon CityMaps2Go is now my key tool for planning (and executing) city trips. You can use different coloured markers to map out all of the tourist attractions, restaurants and shops that you want to visit. I find the visual grouping of sites makes it easy to plan a day. Or, in the midst of a trip, to determine where to go next.

Ulmon also enables you to share your great ideas with travel companions. Once I …

Posted in: Technology