Small ideas on legal practice, research and technology

Find Default Router Passwords at routerpasswords.com

Have you ever forgotten the password on your router? Hate when that happens! But don’t fret it, with routerpasswords.com you have no worries.
If you forget your router’s password and want to reconfigure it, you must reset it. Doing this will reset all settings to factory defaults, including the administrator password. Next, visit routerpasswords.com and enter your router’s make and model number. This site will give you your router’s factory default administrator login information. Nice!…

Posted in: Technology

Use Outlook to Manage Limitation Dates


This upcoming monday I will be presenting at a CLE-BC seminar on the new Limitation Act here in British Columbia.

In advance of that presentation, I am taking a snippet from my paper on how to use Microsoft Outlook to manage limitation dates.

Of all the tasks that must be done in a law office, few of them have such long reaching professional implications as missing a limitation date. Missing a limitation date involves significant personal and professional embarrassment, loss of trust with the client, possible negligence liability, having to report to your Insurance Fund and not the least of …

Posted in: Practice

Watch for New Sources

A Government of Canada news release reminded me to remind you to watch for new sources of information.

The Governments of Canada and of Alberta Launch New Online Portal for Accessing Oil Sands Environmental Monitoring Data and Information

OTTAWA, Ont. – April 22, 2013 – Canada’s Environment Minister, the Honourable Peter Kent, and Alberta’s Environment and Sustainable Resource Development Minister, the Honourable Diana McQueen, today announced that access to federal and provincial environmental monitoring data on air, water, land and biodiversity in the oil sands is now available through an online data portal (www.JointOilSandsMonitoring.ca). The new portal represents the next

Posted in: Research & Writing

Canadian Public Weather Alerts Now Available on Google Public Alerts, Search, Maps and Now

Severe weather is a fact of life for Canadians. Thanks to Public Safety Canada, Environment Canada and Google, Google has just announced that Canadians can now receive warnings of drastic weather changes directly to their mobile devices and desktops.
Severe weather notifications for Canada, in English and French, will now appear on the Google Public Alerts page, in Google Search and Google Maps on both desktop and mobile, and in Google Now.
An alert will appear on your desktop or mobile screens when you search for relevant keywords such as flood or with location-based queries like Toronto. On …

Posted in: Technology

Work-Life Balance and Jamaica

It may be a sign of our times, but one of the more complex work-life balance questions I face every year –  a couple of times at least, thankfully – is the appropriate level of work-life balance to maintain while I’m on vacation.

There is no actual paradox in this seeming contradiction in terms. The reality is I have no inclination to wholly disconnect, and I’m pretty sure I am not alone on that.

True confession time – I still work a bit while I’m away.    I’d rather set aside an hour or so a day while I’m on vacation …

Posted in: Practice

Thank That Public Servant

The Federal Courts in Canada have a pretty good website. They also have a very nice docket search tool. Note that this search tool, although it is linked from the Federal Court website, offers a radio button for searching the Federal Court of Appeal docket as well.

Hat Tip to the Courts Administration Service for setting me to rights on that. Thank you especially to the Registry Officer who took the time to locate my email address and send some followup information after providing most of the answer to my question by phone. Above and beyond the call …

Posted in: Research & Writing

Visit Factory-reset.com for Factory Reset Codes

When electronic devices work properly, you have no worries. But when they don’t, it’s a real pain in the rear! One of the most common trouble-shooting options is a factory reset – that special and specific combination of button presses and steps that restarts the device with standard factory settings.
Finding the right reset code usually requires finding the operation manual for the device. Yeah right! It might be in somewhere in the basement, or more likely went out in the garbage with the crumpled holiday wrapping paper.
So what do you do when you need to find a factory …

Posted in: Technology

ABA TECHSHOW THOUGHTS

Having had the benefit of a few days of reflection after attending ABA TECHSHOW 2013 in Chicago last week, I thought I would highlight certain aspects and themes arising from the conference and in particular, why lawyers should be attending this or similar conferences (and indeed why it may be obligatory to do so).

The Borg

Prepare to be assimilated.  Only in this case The Borg = The Cloud.   This was particularly brought home in the session with Wells Anderson and Catherine Sanders Reach.  Microsoft is moving to a monthly subscription model.  The benefits to users to going to Office …

Posted in: Practice

Make Notes

Things get so busy in law that sometimes we get behind.  For instance, Research posts are supposed to appear on Wednesdays here at Slaw Tips.  We all know that notes, tasks, and to do lists help us keep on top of the things we need to do.  The same is true for legal research.

Today’s Tip is to use a detailed  ‘sources consulted’ list.  My personal preference is to put this list in the last section of a research memo.  A Sources Consulted list can take the form of a bibliography (the texts you visited) or it can be more.  …

Posted in: Research & Writing

How to Quickly Tell if a Site Is Down for Everyone or Just You

On many occasions, the frequent surfers among us will have struggled to view a website that refuses to load. This raises a simple but profound question: “Is this website down for everyone or just for me?”
Now, you could call someone or send out an email asking if others are having the same experience. But, you might get a quicker response with a tweet. But even better yet, there is a humble website that will answer this important question: www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com.
What will they think of next?

Posted in: Technology