Amicus Attorney 2008 Small Firm Edition is the latest version of Amicus Attorney built on the popular V+ (C++) platform. It is specifically designed for the solo and small firm market. It has significant enhancements over its predecessors.
These include:
a new navigation pane similar to Amicus 7,
a new Tasks module for managing To Do's all in one place,
real time spell check,
text expansion,
email signatures,
Outlook®
email integration enhancements
and the ability to run in Client/Server mode.

This product is for firms with 10 users or less only. It is a superb upgrade for all V and V+ Advanced and Client/Server customers with 10 licenses or less.

Pricing for the Small Firm Edition will be $449 for the first license and $349 for additional licenses.

Please note that these two products are no longer bundled together.

They need to be purchased separately. Of course they still work together wonderfully. Cost effectively too: the price to "add Accounting to Attorney" will be only $149 per license.

However, it is important to understand that if you are upgrading from the old Amicus Small Firm, you will need to upgrade both the Amicus Attorney side and the Amicus Accounting side if you want to continue using both products.

Pricing for upgrades is as follows

• Upgrading to Amicus Attorney 2008 Small Firm Edition: 1st user / add'l users
• From Amicus Small Firm $199 / $149
• From Amicus Attorney V+ (Advanced or Client/Server) $199 / $149
• From Amicus Attorney V or below (Advanced of Client/Server) $249 / $199

Amicus Accounting 2008 is the new version of our Accounting product. It has many enhancements over the original Amicus Accounting, including easier navigation, the ability to change the Client on an existing matter, enhancements to Accounts Receivable interest, billing and reminder statements, a new payroll add-on option and a more powerful receipt function.

Pricing for Accounting will be $249 per license.

Upgrading from Amicus Accounting to Amicus Accounting 2008 $99 / license

A new feature that Amicus Attorney 7 has added to Microsoft Word is the ability to recognize Smart Tags. Smart Tags are links (which appear as purple dashed underlining, to differentiate them from original content links) and are similar to traditional hyperlinks, but more complex and interactive.

When the cursor hovers over a Smart Tagged word, a drop-down list appears with a selection of items related to the word.

To start utilizing this great new feature, make sure that you are running Amicus Attorney 7.1.0.8 and follow these steps:

1. Open Microsoft Word XP/2003/2007 and make sure Smart Tags are enabled. To do this, select Tools>AutoCorrect Options in Microsoft Word and make sure that the Label text with smart tags is checked. You will then need to check the other smart tag recognizers to utilize the recognition of Amicus Attorney smart tags.
2. Type an Amicus Attorney contact's name or file name in the body of the document. After spacing or hitting enter, you will see a purple dashed underline below the word's). This tells you that the word has been smart tagged.
3. Click the circle "i" drop down list to see all the options available to you. The first image shows the smart tag recognizing an Amicus Attorney contact and the options available to you such as, View Contact, Schedule an Appointment, and Insert the Contact's Address. The second image shows the smart tag recognizing an Amicus Attorney file and the options available to you such as, View File, and Create a time entry.

For more information about this or other functions and features of Amicus Attorney 7, please contact us.

 

A free virtual private network (VPN) for sharing files and folders

Google Docs & Spreadsheets and Zoho Office are Web 2.0 applications that permit real-time collaborative editing of documents. LogMeIn Hamachi permits file sharing of an entirely different sort. It is from the providers of the well-known LogMeIn remote access and control service. As with that service, there is a free and a paid version. The paid version, at a mere $39.95 annually, adds some nice security and management features.

LogMeIn Hamachi is an easy way to set up a virtual private network (VPN) without the server or other network infrastructure that would ordinarily be required. If you had just one stand-alone computer in each of several branch offices (or one at home and perhaps a small peer-to-peer network at the office), you can create a VPN in only a few minutes. LogMeIn Hamachi automatically figures out how to connect your computers through your existing firewall. All you need is Internet access.

Once LogMeIn Hamachi is installed on each of your PC's, you can share files and folders as if the computers were connected by a local area network (LAN). If you are working at home, you will have access to all of the files (documents, spreadsheets, databases) contained in shared folders on your office computers. It is also possible to run database applications over a VPN, but the ability to do so will depend on the application and the speed of the Internet connection.

As with the other Internet-based services, make sure you are comfortable with LogMeIn's privacy policy before you trust your confidential data to their VPN service.

To download a copy of this software click here.

Not just a search engine anymore
 

For years, technology users have complained of Microsoft's seeming monopoly on personal computer technology. Now Microsoft has a clear rival - and it isn't another software company.

Instead, search engine and web services giant Google is poised to challenge Microsoft's dominance of the personal computer desktop with new services such as Google Docs & Spreadsheets.

Once you create a free Google account, you can add Google Docs and Spreadsheets to your available services. Google Docs & Spreadsheets is part of the larger Google Apps suite of web-based applications including email, text and voice messaging, calendar, web page authoring, etc. The basic version of Google Apps, including Google Docs & Spreadsheets, is free.

You can upload or email documents directly to Google Docs & Spreadsheets. Once there, the documents can be shared with lawyers in your firm's other offices, co-counsel, clients, or even opposing counsel for collaborative editing in real time. Changes made by any of the authorized participants appear immediately on screen for your review. You can review your document's revision history and roll back to any prior version.

Google Docs and Spreadsheets works with Word, OpenOffice, RTF, or HTML documents, Excel spreadsheets, and PowerPoint presentations. As with any on-line application, be aware of the service's privacy and security policy.

 

 

Collaborate with what you already have

Windows SharePoint Services (WSS), or simply Windows SharePoint, is the basic SharePoint product. It is included with the Windows Server 2003 operating system (or can be downloaded at no cost of your copy of Server 2003 did not include WSS). Many law firms already use the Server 2003 operating system.

Windows SharePoint Services offers collaboration and document management functions. It does this through the creation of web portals. Those portals provide a centralized repository for shared documents. They also provide browser-based management and administration of them those documents. Entire document libraries can be created. Documents in those libraries can be shared for collaborative editing.

SharePoint also includes a collection of web parts, which are web widgets that can be embedded into web pages to provide a certain functionality. These widgets include workspaces and dashboards, navigation tools, lists, email alerts, shared calendar, contact lists and discussion boards.

For more information on Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services, please contact us.

 

 

Web 2.0 office suite edits and shares well
 

Like Google Docs & Spreadsheets, the free web-based Zoho office suite lets you import documents by uploading them from your Zoho home page or by sending them to a personal email address Zoho creates for you. You can import and edit Word, OpenOffice, RTF, TXT, and HTML documents, Excel spreadsheets, and PowerPoint presentations along with several other file types.

Once the documents on Zoho's servers, the various Zoho applications, which include Writer, Sheet, and Show, among others, give you even more editing capabilities than Google's offering. The Writer toolbar contains many of the editing functions you see in traditional word processors. Once you are done editing, any document can be exported in PDF format as well as several word processing formats.

But collaboration is the name of the game. To permit joint editing of any document in Zoho writer, simply click on the Share toolbar button, enter the email addresses of your colleagues, specify if they have Read Only or full Read/Write permission, and then click Share in the dialog box. You can cancel sharing at any time. The email recipients will receive a link to the document. If they are not already free Zoho account holders, they will be prompted to created a free account in order to edit the document.

As with any on-line application that may hold your firm's or clients' confidential information, closely review their privacy policy to be sure you can live with the protections offered by Zoho.

Below is a list of the current versions of important law office software supported by Cooperative Network Integrators, Inc..

Amicus Attorney: Downloads

• Amicus Attorney 7: build 7.1.0.8)
• Amicus Attorney 2008 Small Firm Edition
• Amicus Attorney V+ with Accounting Integration v. 5.9.1
• Amicus Attorney V+: v. 5.8.1
• Amicus Small Firm: v. 5.8.1
• Amicus Attorney V: v 5.1.1
• Amicus Attorney X: v. SP1.1

Amicus Accounting:

• Amicus Accounting 2008
• Amicus Accounting Small Firm Edition: release 2006.3

Microsoft Office:

• Click here and select Check for Updates.

Corel Word Perfect:

• Click here then select your version.

email: rcarter@cni-incorporated.com

phone: 513-755-1377

web: http://www.cni-incorporated.com