Author Archives

    Bryan Sims

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    Favorites: Firefox Extensions

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    As I mentioned in an earlier post, my favorite aspect of Firefox is that I can customize it using Extensions. Below are my favorite Firefox extensions, provided in alphabetical order.

    Bug Me Not (the extension) allows you to use Bug Me Not (the service) to access websites requiring registration without having to divulge your private information or completing the annoying registrations.

    Colorful Tabs makes each of your tabs a different color. Sure this extension has no practical purpose, but it sure does make the browser prettier.

    Copy Plain Text allows you to copy text from web pages and paste it as plain text.

    Down Them All allows you to download several files from a web page at once. A nifty extension that is absolutely invaluable in those situations where it is needed.

    Forecast Fox places information in your status bar at the bottom of your web browser to tell you the current temperature and the forecast.

    IE Tab allows you to open a web page in Internet Explorer in a Firefox tab.

    IE View allows you to open a particular web page in Internet Explorer. You can also mark certain pages to always be opened in Internet Explorer. This extension is necessary because some short-sighted people refuse to make their web compatible with Firefox.

    Image Zoom allows you to zoom in or out on a particular image.

    Map+ allows you to easily view a map of a selected address.

    Tab Mix Plus provides you with several options to customize your tabs. One of the best customizations is the ability to put a close tab x on both the tab and the tab bar. This extension may disable other tab modifying extensions that you have.

    Tiny URL Creator allows you to create a Tiny URL simply by right clicking on a web page. I use this extension all of the time when I am sending links to other people.

    Track Package allows you to track a package from a web page or email simply by selecting the tracking number and selecting track package. It currently works with UPS, USPS, FedEX, DHL, and a couple of other services.

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    Favorites: Firefox

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    I am a big fan of Firefox and have been using it as my primary web browser for a little more than two years. The tabbed browsing is a great feature (and one that was incorporated into the latest version of Internet Explorer). Additionally, Firefox 2.0 integrates very nicely with RSS feeds.

    Firefox also allows you to customize how the browser looks by allowing you to download and install different themes.
    The best feature, of Firefox, however, is that there are hundreds of extensions that you can use to customize Firefox to make it work the way the you want it to. I have several extensions that I use regularly. Because I have several favorite extensions, however, I will make those the subject of a later post.

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    Microsoft Excel and Timelines

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    I am a big fan of spreadsheets and I believe that most lawyers never leverage the power available in these programs. If you have never used a spreadsheet such as Microsoft Excel or Open Office Calc, do yourself a favor and take a class to learn how to use it. You can manage, sort, and analyze data in a spreadsheet in ways that you could never contemplate on either pen and paper or a word processor.

    Related to the power of a spreadsheet is a post from Tom Mighell at Inter Alia, where he talks about creating a timeline using Excel. Tom points to a helpful article detailing how to create timelines in Excel.

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    Essentials: Virtual Faxes

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    We live in an increasingly mobile world. We receive email via our handhelds, we make telephone calls via cellular phones, and we do our computing at hot spots rather than at our desk. Notwithstanding this, many of us are still tied to the office by our fax machine.

    No longer, however, does the fax machine have to be an anchor. Now, you can free yourself from your fax machine. To do so, you simply need to obtain a virtual fax number. There are a variety of providers that offer just such a service. Perhaps the best known is eFax. In addition to third party providers, most business class VOIP providers can provide you with a fax number that allows you to receive faxes via email.

    For almost two years, I have used a service called Venali. Venali also does not require you to install any software. Thus, you can use the program regardless of whether your favored platform is Mac or Linux instead of Windows, WordPerfect instead of Word, Lotus Notes instead of Outlook, or Mac instead of Windows. As long as you have access to your email you can use Venali.

    Sending a fax with Venali is simple. To address the fax, simply type the fax number and add @venali.net. Thus, a fax address might read 18005551212@venali.net. You then attach the document that you want to fax. Once you select send, Venali sends your document off to be faxed. A short while later you receive a confirmation report via email.

    If you sign on to your account on Venali’s website, you can review your fax log. The fax log will show you all of the faxes that you have sent during the time period you specify. On this same page, you can instruct Venali to resend a fax.

    You can also choose to have Venali email you a call data record. The call data record includes information on the date and time the fax was sent, how many pages were sent, the cost of sending the fax, and the subject line included in the email sending the fax. If you use descriptive subject lines to identify a client name or number you can track the faxes sent or received on a particular matter. This information can be used if you charge your clients to send or receive faxes. The call data record is sent in a csv format, thus it can easily be imported into a spreadsheet.

    In addition to the fact that the service will work with any email program, Venali also integrates with a variety of other programs including Microsoft Office 2003, Hummingbird, Lotus Notes, and others.

    I use Venali with Microsoft Office 2003. Sending a fax from Outlook is easy. You select New > Internet Fax. Doing this brings up an email message. You simply address the message using the fax number of the person you are sending to and attach the document you want faxed. Office 2003 comes with fax cover sheets that you can use, or you can create one of your own. You can also send a document directly from Word simply by choosing File > Send To > Recipient Using Internet Fax Service.

    Although sending a fax through Venali is a simple and easy process, receiving a fax through Venali is even easier. Venali allows you to select a local fax number. Once your account is set up, you receive by email any faxes sent to that number. The faxes arrive in PDF format and can easily be printed, saved, or forwarded to someone else, by either fax or email. Because the fax arrives via email, you can review from anywhere in the world that you have email access. Further, for received faxes, Venali has available all of the same reporting functions that it provides for sent faxes.

    I have been very happy with Venali and would never go without a virtual fax again.

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    Signatures in Acrobat

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    Rick Borstein at Acrobat for Legal Professionals has a great post on creating and using a transparent signature stamp. This is something I do fairly often when generating a letter that I am sending via fax. I simply draft the letter, apply a stamp of my signature, and fax the letter using a virtual fax service. Thus, I can send a letter and not have to kill any trees to do it.

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    Favorites: Network Unplugged

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    For about three years I have used a laptop as my primary computer. I love the portability of it and would never consider going back to a desktop model. When I first switched to a laptop, however, I had problems keeping track of whether the most current version of a file resided on my laptop’s hard drive or whether it was on our network server. I now no longer have that concern. With Mobiliti’s Network Unplugged, I know that any local file I work on will automatically be synchronized with the network file when I return to the office.

    Before finding Network Unplugged, I had tried making my network files available offline by using the utility built into Windows. I found this to be a less than ideal solution, however, because Windows simply dumped all of the files in a single folder. I wanted to be able to navigate to my files the same way I would if I were connected to the network.

    Network Unplugged creates a virtual network on my laptop that allows me to access the network files that I designate regardless of whether I am connected to the network. Further, the program preserves all of the file path names. Thus, whether I am connected to the network is now irrelevant to my computing. When I am away from the office, I work on the file stored in the virtual network. When I return to the office, I simply synchronize the files.

    Installing the program was quite easy and took only a few minutes. Once the program was installed, it was just as easy to select the folders that I wanted the program to synchronize. I began by creating a “project.” In the program terms, a project is a name you give to a group of related files. You can define a project as broadly or as narrowly as you like. Additionally, you can have as many projects as you want. I created a single project for my network files.

    After creating the project, I then designated the folders that I wanted to be available to me when I was no longer connected to my network. Using My Computer, I dragged and dropped the folders that I wanted into my project. Once I did this, I told the program to synchronize.

    I had selected several folders for synchronization. Thus the first synchronization took several minutes. After that first synchronization, however, my subsequent synchronizations take about two minutes. Also, I can easily add additional folders to my project by simply dragging that folder and dropping it in the project.

    Network Unplugged works by creating a virtual network on my laptop. Thus, the number of files I want to have available to me are limited only by my hard drive space. If my hard drive were big enough, I could take all of my network files with me.

    When I am connected to the network, I work just as I normally would. When I am disconnected, I have available to me the folders and files that I had earlier designated. I access the files just as I would if I were still connected to the network. From my perspective, the only difference that I see when I am disconnected is that the folders I did not synchronize are not present. Otherwise, I would never know that I am not connected to the network.

    In addition to allowing me to virtually work on my network. Network Unplugged also allows me to easily back up the data on my laptop. Establishing a backup project, was no different from establishing a synchronization project. I simply named the project and selected the data folders I wanted to backup. In addition to backing up my data files, Network Unplugged will also backup my registry and it will synchronize any two folders that I designate.

    I can tell the program to synchronize all projects at the same time or I can select different synchronization properties for each project. Also, I can set the program to automatically synchronize at a particular time every day, to automatically synchronize every time I reconnect to the network, and to automatically synchronize when I shutdown. Alternatively I can set the program to take no action at those times or to prompt me and ask me if I want to synchronize. In short, the program allows me to customize my synchronization schedule to whatever best suits my needs.

    The best thing about Network Unplugged, however, is that it allows me to use CaseMap and TextMap with minimal fuss. I no longer have to worry about making sure that I have a local copy of my linked files. Instead, I now know that the file paths for all of my files are the same, even when I am not connected to the network. Thus CaseMap, or any other similar program, need not search for linked files. Instead, the files reside on my virtual network in the exact same location that they reside on my real network.

    I have a fondness for programs that do one thing and do it well. Network Unplugged surpasses this criteria in that it does one thing and does it exceptionally well. Everyone who uses a laptop as their primary computer should own this program.

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    I Have to Have This: Tom Tom Navigator 6

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    Futurelawyer blogs about something I have been desiring for quite some time. A GPS that integrates with my Treo. Futurelawyer tells us about the Tom Tom Navigator 6. The software and maps of all of the United States and Canada take up only about 1 gigabyte on an expansion card. This leaves plenty of room for podcasts, books, etc. on even just a 2 gigabyte card.

    I have got to find some way to get me one of these.

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    10 Minute Mail

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    Most people hate giving out their email address to a website to access a portion of a website. In most of these situations, you have to give out a real email address because the website will send a confirmation email that you will have to access. Some people have set up a separate email address just to deal with this issue.

    A different, but very useful, solution comes our way from 10 Minute Mail. 10 Minute Mail provides you with an email address that  automatically expires after 10 minutes. During the 10 minutes you can access the email that arrives at the address. This allows you sufficient time to respond to a verification email.

    Once you do that, however, you need not worry about having provided that email address and you don’t have to worry about wading through the spam created for that address. According to the operator of the website, he gets between 20,000 and 30,000 emails a day, all addressed to expired email accounts. Let his server deal with that spam instead of yours.

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    A New Twist to an Old Scam

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    The Detroit Free Press reports on a county treasurer who was charged with embezzling public funds to invest in an online Nigerian banking scam. The Free Press reports that the man had transferred at least $72,500 of his own money to the con artists before he allegedly sent up to an additional $1.25 million in public funds.

    The news story is an interesting read, with the best quote coming from a spokesman for the Attorney General who said “Every part of this makes you wonder, ‘What was he thinking?’ ”

    I have seen many news stories about these scams and people being taken advantage of by them. However, this is the first story I have seen in which a person stole money to invest in one of these scams.

    These scams (which are commonly known as 419 scams) appear to still be finding victims. I know that I have warned a least two people of these scams when they contacted me to seek help setting up accounts to transfer the money.

    It looks like that, in addition to warning our friends and family about these scams, we also need to be warning our public officials.