What are you doing?
The primary aim of this blog is two-fold.
First, to pass on what I have learned about using a Tablet PC and in particular how I have adapted it to my work as a barrister.
Second, to encourage people to let me know what they have learned about using a Tablet PC and in particular how they have made it work for them in their professional lives.
What do I want to achieve with my tablet? I hope to use the Tablet PC to transform the way I work. Ideally I would like to move to a paperless office. Where once was paper let there be digital ink. These are the specific tasks that I think I should be able to use my tablet for:
Reviewing documents in a case: In my work I have to review, absorb and remember large amounts of information. Normally this information comes in paper form as witness statements, exhibits, disclosure documents, expert reports, patent specifications, prior art documents and so on and so forth. Even in a small case I can have several bundles of documents to master. I read them, I note them, I make notes on them, I mark them with post-it notes and tabs. They have to be carted with me to wherever I need them - home, the court, another barrister's chambers. If the indexing is updated by new documents I have to re-arrange all the files. I can only search them manually or by remembering where a particular passage is or by looking for a post-it note that I have left as a marker. With the tablet PC I can import the documents in scanned form and mark them up directly. Re-indexing them is no more than the moving of a file icon. No post-it notes will come unstuck between Chambers and the court. If I need to search I will be able to do so automatically rather than by trying to remember where in a 60 page expert's report a reference is to be found. It should be wonderful.
Annotate on the fly: One of the banes of a junior barrister's life is the creating of a "Transcript Bash". This is the process whereby after each day of trial the junior barrister takes the transcript of the day's proceedings (which usually does not arrive until 7pm) and reads through it making an index of useful evidence references in preparation for the following days proceedings. Depending on the day's events it is a task that can take several hours to finish. If, however, I could directly annotate the witness statement of the person being cross-examined and then take those annotations and automatically generate a neat and distributable document from the annotations the task could be completed much more quickly and virtually as the cross-examination was happening.
Handwrite: Although I can touch type faster than I can handwrite it is sometimes easier to handwrite - especially if the information is unstructured and coming at a speed dictated by another person - like an extempore judgment for example. With the tablet I can take it down by hand and convert it to text later if I want to.
Store all manner of notes: Some things are better done without the constraint of a word-processor. Mindmaps, brainstorming, diagrams, quick notes are all more easily and effectively accomplished by hand. Yet if I want to keep them the easiest way is as a digital image. With the tablet I will be able to do both.
Cart it all about easily: If everything I am working with is digital then it can all be carted about in something less than an inch thick and weighing less than a single text book. No more bicycling home with four lever arch files strapped to my bike. That means that I can work where I want and when I want. Sometimes it is good to get out of the office and away from the distractions of phones, email and internet - impossible if you have to drag five files with you - easy with the tablet.
So these are the things that I think will be useful about the tablet. Is there anything I haven't thought about?
(Obviously I also plan to use this blog to post up anything I please - that is the joy of vanity publishing.)
First, to pass on what I have learned about using a Tablet PC and in particular how I have adapted it to my work as a barrister.
Second, to encourage people to let me know what they have learned about using a Tablet PC and in particular how they have made it work for them in their professional lives.
What do I want to achieve with my tablet? I hope to use the Tablet PC to transform the way I work. Ideally I would like to move to a paperless office. Where once was paper let there be digital ink. These are the specific tasks that I think I should be able to use my tablet for:
Reviewing documents in a case: In my work I have to review, absorb and remember large amounts of information. Normally this information comes in paper form as witness statements, exhibits, disclosure documents, expert reports, patent specifications, prior art documents and so on and so forth. Even in a small case I can have several bundles of documents to master. I read them, I note them, I make notes on them, I mark them with post-it notes and tabs. They have to be carted with me to wherever I need them - home, the court, another barrister's chambers. If the indexing is updated by new documents I have to re-arrange all the files. I can only search them manually or by remembering where a particular passage is or by looking for a post-it note that I have left as a marker. With the tablet PC I can import the documents in scanned form and mark them up directly. Re-indexing them is no more than the moving of a file icon. No post-it notes will come unstuck between Chambers and the court. If I need to search I will be able to do so automatically rather than by trying to remember where in a 60 page expert's report a reference is to be found. It should be wonderful.
Annotate on the fly: One of the banes of a junior barrister's life is the creating of a "Transcript Bash". This is the process whereby after each day of trial the junior barrister takes the transcript of the day's proceedings (which usually does not arrive until 7pm) and reads through it making an index of useful evidence references in preparation for the following days proceedings. Depending on the day's events it is a task that can take several hours to finish. If, however, I could directly annotate the witness statement of the person being cross-examined and then take those annotations and automatically generate a neat and distributable document from the annotations the task could be completed much more quickly and virtually as the cross-examination was happening.
Handwrite: Although I can touch type faster than I can handwrite it is sometimes easier to handwrite - especially if the information is unstructured and coming at a speed dictated by another person - like an extempore judgment for example. With the tablet I can take it down by hand and convert it to text later if I want to.
Store all manner of notes: Some things are better done without the constraint of a word-processor. Mindmaps, brainstorming, diagrams, quick notes are all more easily and effectively accomplished by hand. Yet if I want to keep them the easiest way is as a digital image. With the tablet I will be able to do both.
Cart it all about easily: If everything I am working with is digital then it can all be carted about in something less than an inch thick and weighing less than a single text book. No more bicycling home with four lever arch files strapped to my bike. That means that I can work where I want and when I want. Sometimes it is good to get out of the office and away from the distractions of phones, email and internet - impossible if you have to drag five files with you - easy with the tablet.
So these are the things that I think will be useful about the tablet. Is there anything I haven't thought about?
(Obviously I also plan to use this blog to post up anything I please - that is the joy of vanity publishing.)
posted by Benet at
12:04
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