Casemaker Goes Mobile
By Laura Calloway
If you rely on your Blackberry, iPhone or other smartphone to stay connected to clients, email and the systems - such as calendar and time and billing - that keep your practice on track, you'll be happy to learn that you can now access the Casemaker legal research service through your phone, too.
Lawriter, LLC recently announced that the Casemaker legal research database for court opinions now runs on almost all web-enabled cell phones, too. (Phones using the Windows Mobile operating system are not currently supported, but a Window's Mobile version is due sometime soon.)
It's as easy as can be to use and there's nothing to download. On your web-enabled cell phone go to http://mobile.lawriter.net to create a user name and password. Then, bookmark this address and return to it to log in each time you wish to access the system.
The first time you visit the link, this is what you'll see:
Click the "Sign Up Here" link to create your self-selected user name and password and you'll be taken to the screen below.
Type the user name you'd like to use on the top line. Type your password twice, once on each of the next two lines.Type either Alabama or Federal (or whichever other state database you'd like to use as your default) on the line with "Default Jurisdiction." Then check the box indicating you've read the Terms of Use, and click "Submit."That's all there is to it.
When you return to the site (http://mobile.lawriter.net) the next time, all you'll have to do is type your user name on the top line, your password on the next line, and click "Submit."
In just seconds you'll be able to pull and read cases right from your mobile phone. For now you'll have access to cases from all the Casemaker jurisdictions, with the ability to set you preferred library (Alabama or Federal) as your default search database. Future versions will incorporate statutes and other items from the Casemaker library.
Try it out, and be sure to let us know what you think at casemaker@alabar.org, so that your comments and suggestions can be incorporated into future versions of this highly useful feature. If you have any problems signing in, you can call Kristi Skipper at (334) 517-2242 for assistance.
Casemaker - The Free Legal Research Service for Members of the Alabama State Bar.
–Laura Calloway, director, ASB Practice Management Assistance Program
