A1-Law / WCFMS Newsletter October 2001

As you may already know......

A1-Law applies to the Windows Case Management System
WCFMS applies to the DOS Case Manager System

Important Notice
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CAAA Convention
It’s Jan 24 - 27, 2002 at the Hilton La Jolla Torrey Pines Resort in San Diego. I’ll be exhibiting there as I have for the past 16 years.  Hope to see you there.

In This Issue
Web Site Updates, A1-Law Version 4.00 completed.  The New Support Forum.  Questions and Answers, other things.

Web Site Update
I have redesigned AppellSoftware.com.  The greatest enhancement is in the support  forum.  It's now a lot more user friendly and capable of really offering support to all of our customers.  We strongly encourage you all to check it out.  You can learn a lot about A1-Law through this forum.

A1-Law Version 4.00 Complete
Several comments about A1-Law.  First, version 4.00 is complete and we are just finalizing the help files and documentation.  It has well over 200 new features.  As promised, you will be able to do pleading directly in A1-Law, spell check with Microsoft Word or directly in A1-Law in either English or Spanish.   There are many many other major new features and modules.

Once again, A1-Law will undergo another price increase November 1, 2001.  This will not affect our current customers.  We have received excellent ideas from some of the largest and most prestigious law firms in the state of California.  More next month.

The New Support Forum
As mentioned above, the more people that use the discussion forum, the greater the benefit to everyone.  I check it regularly and would like to see questions posted there so that everyone can learn from everyone else.  I am receiving a lot of questions via Email which should be posted first at the discussion forum so that everyone may contribute.  I check the support forum daily.  I don't think people realize yet the true value of the support forum.  For more information, see the Support Forum.

Questions and Answers

Question:  Regarding printing, we want, for example, to print a week of the
followup calendar, filtered by attorney: we enter the necessary commands
to do so, but the printer keeps producing a blank sheet of paper. We can
view the data on the screen well enough but we can't print a paper copy
for review. Is there a convention we need to observe? Thanks

Answer:    Yes there is a convention. First and always, click on the Custom tab. Then you will see something in big bold letters that says something like 0 Records Found or maybe 5 Records Found. Click on it and you will then be presented with a dialog where you can enter a starting and ending date as well as the initials of whose calendar you want to print.

Question:  Can A1-Law run with Terminal Server

Answer:    This is the situation - A1-Law creates temporary files on the local C drive. The conflict in the version 3.1.22 is that the temp file for one user would have the same name as a temp file for anyone else - thus you get an error.  Version 4.00 corrects this problem which also means you can run A1-Law several times on the same workstation (with different usernames).  However, there may be other programs that you utilize that have the same problem with Terminal Server.  It's very common for windows to create temp files and folders (which would conflict with multiple users). But, it is possible to configure Terminal Server such that each user can have a custom drive that is limited to that user, and point to that as your temp directory (it's got the same drive and path for all users even though they are seperate).  In other words, Terminal Server can be configured so that temporary files on the the local drive do not conflict when more than one user is signed on.

Question:  How can I send a Fax from within A1-Law

Answer:    The easiest way is to set up a driver like WinFax.  Then you just send a Fax the same way you would send output to a printer.

Question:  We are trying to locate a client in the program where we know the name of the employer but forgot the clients name. In the old program we could print the list of employer but here when i search I get the list of employers but none of the clients (applicants) name appear in the search so have to look at each case individually. how do a print a list of all clients we have with one particular employer. In this case we are looking at the employer County of Stanislaus. 

Answer:    There are several ways. First, we know the employer so we need to search by this employer. Click on Search for a Case. Then where it says Search By (last name) click on it and change it to Firm Name. Next enter in County of Stan (let's not enter more than that since they may have a few typos for the county). Next click Search. You will then see all the cases you have against Stanislaus. Now, if you look in the Title Bar for the Found Cases window, you should see how many cases are found (ie: Found Cases (55) Jon Doe vs. 3M) Notice, it also displays the caption of the highlighted case in the Title Bar. You can press the Down Arrow key to scroll down while viewing the client's name vs. Employer in the title bar of the window. The other option would be to click the Alternate Format checkbox and scroll all the way to the right in the Browse Window and you can see the captions for all the cases (client vs. employer).

Newsletter Back Issues
Looking for some back issues?  You'll find them on our web site at http://www.appellsoftware.com. 

Problems with Email Support
If you send me an Email and I have not replied within 48 hours please send a cc to Appell@AppellSoftware.com.  Better yet, feel free to post your question on the support  forum so that others can offer their input and suggestions and everyone can learn from everyone else.  You can access the discussion forum at http://www.appellsoftware.com.

Remote Access Programs / PC Anywhere
Better support can be obtained if you upgrade to PC Anywhere with DSL.  Check with your consultant about firewalls and security issues.  Some offices are upgrading from DSL to a T1 line which is even faster.  Most important of all, there is no substitute for a good backup.  Have you done your backup this week?

Anti-Virus Programs, Norton, McAfee
They can tremendously slow down network I/O.   If you find your computer or server to be excessively slow, you may want to consider setting parameters in your virus software to not check dbf, cdx and fpt file extensions.

Scanning Medical Reports
This can be done with a light pen for about $150.00.  It may also relieve carpal tunnel.  It's really quite amazing;   you simply trace the pen over the words and it automatically types everything at the cursor.  Therefore, you could be in case activity or extended notes and just scan the paragraphs right into the program.

Next Month
More questions and answers.

And now for my usual sign-off.......