President's Corner

Lexis Introduces E-Advance Sheets

Bill Carter, chief operating officer, lexisONE

THE LexisNexis Group has launched an e-mail subscription service to help legal professionals keep track of breaking cases. LexisNexis Electronic Advance Sheets is available from lexisONE, which targets small firms. Users can select from one to 10 courts, and from one to 10 legal topics. The service then conducts daily searches for case decisions that meet those criteria, and sends an e-mail alert with a basic summary of the decision. Lawyers can click on a link within the e-mail to retrieve the full text of the decision.

Reed Elsevier plc, the parent company of Lexis, also announced that it has unified its legal and information resources under a single brand, LexisNexis.

Information: Reader Response no. 365.

Digital Practice

Arkfeld Guide Prints 5th Edition

LAW Partner Publishing has published the fifth edition of Michael Arkfeld's legal technology guide, The Digital Practice of Law.

The book and CD package covers the nuts and bolts of integrating technology into your legal practice, and explains why the adoption of technology is necessary. Topics include hardware, software, networking, Internet, litigation support, and more.

Information: Reader Response no. 366.

CRM Software

InterAction Adds 'Intelligence' Tool

INTERFACE Software says its InterAction relationship management software now offers "Relationship Intelligence" functions, uncovering and managing relationship data contained within a firm's applications, (such as time-and-billing programs, Microsoft Outlook, and "legacy" applications).

It can centralize the information for better use in a variety of platforms, including Extranets.

Information: Reader Response no. 370.

Recruiting & Retention

Analyzing Resumes? Try New Web Tools

AMONG new offerings designed to help law firms manage the mechanics of recruiting is OctagoLAW, from Octago Recruiting Management Systems. The software helps firms conduct a needs assessment, and includes a job description wizard to define needs and requirements for both lateral and law school positions.

The company hosts a firm's Web site employment section, automatically posting new positions. Candidates use a job search engine and submit information directly into the firm database. The system generates personalized responses to candidates; then filters and prioritizes the applicants according to pre-set criteria.

It also maintains files for summer interns, to help coordinate that phase of recruitment.

A "five card" system tracks the status of active candidates while in the recruiting process.

Information: Reader Response no. 367.

Quick Takes

Levit & James' Stylizer 1.2 document reformatting utility helps transform Microsoft Word documents sent from clients (or others), into documents based on the firm's internal standards, styles and templates. It also can be used to migrate documents from earlier versions of Word to Word 97/2000/XP.

Information: Reader Response no. 369.

General Electric's Westport Insurance Corp., which provides lawyers' professional liability insurance, has launched GEInsures Lawyers.com, to assist interested attorneys.

Information: Reader Response no. 374.

Bad Kitty? Speaking of insurance, you can protect your PDA against damage by rambunctious children or batting cats.

See Portable Office.

Knowledge Management

ISYS Unveils Version 6

ODYSSEY Development Company says ISYS 6, the latest version of its knowlege management software, is a "radical departure" from previous editions. The upgrade is compatible with Windows 2000, Corel's WordPerfect 9 and Office 2000, among other applications, it says. Version 6 offers a new users interface and new indexing wizards for both SQL and FTP repositories.

Information: Reader Response no. 368.