For the holiday weekend, an easy project most people will have done already. Encryption sounds like a hard thing, but it’s really easy. It’s so easy, in fact, that it’s negligent not to encrypt your devices.

Three taps and you’re done. It will take less than a minute to do it right now, and then you can feel productive all weekend.

Encrypting iPhones and iPads

To encrypt and iPhone or iPad, all you have to do is set an unlock code. iOS 8.0 and newer automatically encrypts the contents of your iPhone or iPad once you set a passcode. To do this, just go to the Settings app and tap Passcode or Touch ID & Passcode depending on your device. Then scroll down to Turn Passcode On, tap it, and follow the instructions.

Encrypting Android Devices

If you have an Android device running Android 2.3.4 or newer, make sure you have set up a passcode, then go to the Settings, tap Security, and then tap Encrypt phone/tablet. It may take some time to encrypt your Android device, so it might be best to start this when you won’t be using it for a while and you can leave it plugged in.

Living with Encrypted Devices

When I talk about encryption people usually want to know how if they will have to do something different in order to send attachments, or if it means their email is now encrypted.

Here’s the deal. Once you turn on encryption, you will be able to use your phone and tablet exactly as you do right now. You never have to think about the fact that you are using file encryption unless you want to (for example, if you want to feel good about how secure your devices are, which you are entitled to do after you encrypt your files). When you are logged on and using your device, it will automatically decrypt files on the fly as you need them. You will not have to do anything different in order to access your files or share them with other people.

And no, it does not mean your email will be encrypted.

Your files will only be unreadable to someone who tries to access them in an unauthorized way, like plugging your phone into a computer to scan its contents. When you log in to your phone or tablet as usual, you will be able to use it exactly as you do right now.

Weekend Project: Encrypt Your Phone and Tablet was originally published on Lawyerist.com.

I’ve been operating a paperless office for nearly ten years, ever since I realized a couple of months into my solo practice that I did not want to fill my basement or garage with closed client files. My paperless workflow is simple: I scan all paper that comes into the office and keep most of it until I close a file, when all of the paper gets tossed.

But I have struggled to find a good system for managing my handwritten notes of phone calls, meetings, court appearances, etc. As I wrote on Lawyerist several years ago, taking notes is very important for keeping track of what information you have exchanged with clients and other parties, and it is critical for defending ethics and malpractice complaints.

What to Do with Your Notes

Some paperless lawyers may have shifted to taking notes on their computers but I prefer not to use a speaker phone all the time, and a laptop is cumbersome in meetings. Besides, some studies that show that your brain remembers more when you hand-write your notes.

So, what to do with all those pages of notes? Scanning notes after every phone call or meeting is inefficient because you have to name and save each note. I could scan them to the same file or create a notes file for each client but that, too, was tedious. So I would just stick the paper pages in a folder and scan them all at the end of a case before I trashed them. Relatively efficient, and it meant I didn’t have access to my notes when I was out of the office.

I also used the legal pads as a sort of reminder system to keep track of who had not called me back. This meant I would end up with several legal pads on my desk with notes of active matters. It was kind of a mess.

Then last summer I saw Paul Unger of Affinity Consulting use an iPad Pro and Apple Pencil to take notes right on his iPad. A chorus of angels started singing in my head! Scales fell from my eyes! My note-taking woes would be solved!

Using the Apple Pencil to Take Notes

The transition to taking notes on a screen was seamless. As soon as I started using the Pencil, I was hooked and I have literally not written on a legal pad since. The key feature is that when you are using the Pencil, which is powered by a rechargeable battery, the iPad recognizes its tip instead of your hand. This means you can just rest your hand right on the screen while you are writing, just like you would on a piece of paper (particularly useful for us lefties). The tip of the Pencil is pressure-sensitive, so lines vary in thickness as you write. Writing on glass turns out to be not much different than writing on paper.

GoodNotes 4, an inexpensive app, is loaded with features that make electronic note-taking better than the old-fashioned way. If are a sloppy writer like me, the undo button will wipe away a word you’ll never be able to figure out later. The eraser lets you fix things elsewhere on the page. The “shapes” button will help you draw a box with straight lines or an oval. Of course, you can change colors, line thickness, etc. There’s also a tool that allows you to move blocks of handwriting around on the page, which is great for rearranging notes of calls with your non-linear clients. Your doodles will improve measurably and then you can move them out of your notes so your clients will never see them.

If you write neatly enough the app can translate your handwriting into type with a couple of clicks. I find this not as helpful as I might have thought—if my writing is neat enough for the program to read, then I can read it too. But that same functionality allows the app to search for a handwritten word within a particular file. That’s right, all your handwritten notes—stored as PDFs—are permanently word-searchable.

GoodNotes 4 automatically backs up your files as PDFs to Dropbox, Box, Google Drive, and other programs. It will also back up files you haven’t named yet. It can search for file names within the app. You can import a Word document or PDF, take notes on the document, and then save it as a new PDF. Clients can sign their real signatures on your iPad, not just scrawl with their fingers. My only complaints about GoodNotes 4 is that it does not have an option for automatically numbering pages within a file and that the size of the thumbnails of your files cannot be adjusted.

Notability is another popular note-taking app. And Evernote and its alternatives, of course.

Choosing an iPad Pro

There are two sizes of iPad Pro: regular (the size of the original iPad), and full letter-page size (also known as Ginormous). I went with Ginormous. I’m glad I did, because more than 80% of the time I’m using it for taking notes and I like having the same full-size sheet of “paper” to work from that I’ve always been used to. But it’s a lot of screen space, and many apps don’t seem to know what to do with all that extra real estate.

The only downside for the iPad Pro and Apple Pencil is that the Pencil needs to be recharged periodically. You can stick it in the power jack for the iPad, but then you have this Pencil awkwardly sticking out from your iPad. I tend to use the very small, likely-to-get-lost-but-so-far-so-good power cord adapter. The only way to shut “off” the Pencil is to turn off the Bluetooth on the iPad, which I do at the end of the day so the batteries on both don’t run down. Recharging the Pencil is pretty fast and on a very busy note-taking day I might recharge it once in the afternoon.

… or Microsoft Surface?

In deference to Windows users, I need to acknowledge that I recently tried a client’s SurfacePro 4 with its powered stylus. The stylus is not as elegant as Apple’s (the Windows stylus looks and feels like an engineer’s mechanical pencil) but it is clearly more functional. The top of the stylus works as an eraser, it has a “right-click” button on it, and there is an embedded magnet that attaches it to the tablet. The contact with the screen is slightly different than on the iPad but you can achieve the same handwriting dexterity. Personally, the stylus alone would not motivate me to switch but it is a very good option for Windows users.

Conclusion

Despite the fact that the iPad Pro has been out since the spring of 2015, few lawyers seem to be using it. It’s often a conversation piece when I show up to meetings with it. But this is the best piece of technology I’ve bought since I purchased an iPhone. Now I can say my practice is truly paperless.

Going Really Paperless with iPad Pro and Apple Pencil was originally published on Lawyerist.com.

I recently put TrialPad 4.0 through its paces during  a two-week trial — but not from the start. As in the past, I felt to overwhelmed to add figure out a new app to my trial prep to-do list.

So I started trial using Acrobat to display documents. I am very comfortable with Acrobat, and I knew I would not have to wonder about how to find a particular feature or function in the middle of trial.

After all, like most paperless lawyers, I use Acrobat on a daily basis. But by day two of what I knew would be a two-week trial, I was frustrated with the limitations of Acrobat, particularly the inability to do a call-out on the fly. This was hampering my ability to really emphasize key pieces of evidence.

A heavenly light should have descended.

I had a copy of TrialPad from Ian O’Flaherty, who developed it. Ian was kind enough to provide me with a code to download TrialPad at no cost. This is probably why I felt no need to use it, since I wasn’t invested in it. But now I had to get up and running overnight if I wanted to use something better than Acrobat during my trial. And I did get up and running overnight. I went back to my hotel room, loaded up the documents I knew I would be working with the next day, ran through the process of presenting and annotating, and then set back to prepare for the next day of trial.

With more than a little trepidation, I hooked my iPad up to my projector the next day at trial.

A heavenly light should have descended. I’m not kidding, TrialPad was nearly magical. To say that ease of use is built in is a vast understatement. Using TrialPad was simple and intuitive. I was calling out and highlighting key passages with ease like I had never experienced before. I have tried cases against trial teams with dedicated IT teams, and their process was so cumbersome and prone to error that I had sworn off dedicated trial presentation applications.

By day four of trial, my opposing counsel had switched to his iPad and TrialPad as well.

TrialPad brought all the features of the dedicated trial presentation programs that work (when they work) and more, and it was so simple to use that literally anyone could do it. By day four of trial, my opposing counsel had switched to his iPad and TrialPad as well.

Here are the features I found to be the most important.

Adding Files is Easy

TrialPad 4.0 allows you to add files via Dropbox, Box, and iCloud, using wi-fi or Bluetooth. You can import photos from the Photos app on your iPad, and you can also connect your iPad to your computer to add files in bulk via iTunes.

I used both iTunes and Dropbox to import files throughout the trial. My only complaint is that files added via Dropbox are not automatically updated when you make changes to the file on your computer. I understand that allowing continuous sync of files like this could lead to problems if multiple people are working on the files during the course of a trial, but for a solo like me it would be a huge convenience. Perhaps one solution would be to allow this to be toggled on or off as a setting.

That being said, one thing I found surprising was how quickly I could edit a document on my computer and re-upload it via Dropbox. All I needed was a wi-fi connection. I had to do this on numerous occasions on the fly, during lunch and other breaks.

Presentation Tools Are Simple, Easy to Use, and Great-Looking

Trial Pad has five presentation tools: Callout, Highlight, Pen, Redact and Laser.

I relied almost exclusively on the Callout and Highlight tools. A simple tap on the Callout tool icon allows you to draw a box around the selected text or portion of a document. That portion is immediately enlarged to nearly the full image, emphasizing the selected portion. It is the same process for Highlight. The only trouble was that, on a couple of occasions my fat finger made selecting a small portion of text troublesome. The solution was simple: use a stylus.

The Pen tool simply lets you draw on the document — whether you want to add text or circle a critical element. Redact works just like the Highlight and Callout tools but hides the selected text. And Laser simply “projects” a replica of a laser pointer so you can point things out without looking for your laser pointer.

Another really nice feature of TrialPad is the ability to project two documents side by side for comparison. This is also easy to do.

Presenting with a Projector or External Monitor

The courtroom I was working in had recently added a 50″ monitor I could have used. Instead, I opted to connect my iPad to my own projector via HDMI. As I expected, it was a simple matter of plug and play. No muss, no fuss.

Exhibit Stickers and Introducing Exhibits

I generally pre-mark my exhibits using Acrobat stamps, so I did not use the Exhibit Sticker feature of TrialPad this time — although I probably will use it in the future. It is simple and intuitive.

The feature for tracking evidence that had been admitted was a great addition to version 4.0, although figuring out how to do this in the midst of trial was one of the few things that was not entirely intuitive. To use either the Exhibit Sticker or Admitted feature, you tap and hold on the document image. A window will open allowing you to chose whether to mark the exhibit as admitted, rename the document, or assign and exhibit sticker. That explanation may have been in the quick start tutorial, but I missed it if it was.

Admitted documents get sorted into their own list so you can access them quickly.

The Key Documents Feature

One of the features I appreciated the most was the ability to mark an entire document or even just a page from a document as a key document. Like admitted documents, the key documents can be called up in their own list for quick access.

My particular trial had more than 10,000 pages of medical records and deposition testimony, so it was fairly document intensive (to say the least) and I gave the Key Documents feature quite a workout. One thing I’d love to see added, if possible, would be multiple sets of key documents so that you could pre-identify key documents to use with different witnesses. Instead, I found myself re-shuffling key documents before each day of trial in order to be ready for that day’s witnesses. The ability to do that in advance for multiple witnesses would be a great addition to the application.

Other Features

TrialPad also has the ability to display audio and video files. While I have not tried this live in trial, I can easily understand how this would be useful for short video clips, such as those you might use to impeach a witness. Given the size of most video deposition files, I would doubt that this would be a reasonable method for playing full video depositions.

The video display feature does have basic video editing options for capturing a frame or a video clip. Like other features, it is simple to use and designed so you can use it on the fly, if necessary.

The Bottom Line

Every iPad-toting trial lawyer should buy TrialPad and use it at your next trial or mediation. You won’t regret it.

Overall, TrialPad is an outstanding addition to a trial lawyer’s arsenal. It simply and elegantly duplicates the most often used features of many different trial presentation programs, at far less cost. A single license for Trial Director is $695. While Trial Director obviously does more, I seriously doubt that it does what TrialPad does with the same ease.

TrialPad is an absolute bargain at $89. And unlike Trial Director, there is no annual maintenance cost.

Every iPad-toting trial lawyer should buy TrialPad and use it at your next trial or mediation. You won’t regret it.

TrialPad 4.0: Trial Presentation Made Easy was originally published on Lawyerist.com.

We have reviewed a lot of iPad keyboard cases. Here are some of them:

• Logitech iPad Ultrathin Keyboard Cover
• Logitech Keyboard Case
• Belkin iPad YourType Folio
• Targus Versavu
• iLuv Professional Workstation
• Kensington Keyfolio Pro 2
• Cygnett Lavish Connect

In the end, Randall picked the Logitech cases as the best. But I recently received a Brydge+ with Speakers to review. The Brydge+ is a full-size, all-aluminum Bluetooth keyboard that basically turns your iPad into a small laptop. Build quality is excellent, although you might notice that the lines on the Brydge+ make it look more like a MacBook Pro than an iPad.

Since I no longer have a full-sized iPad, I delegated the testing to my wife, who is a staff attorney for the educator’s union in Minnesota. Her offices uses Windows, but Jess almost never uses a regular computer when she isn’t at work, even for doing work. She has my old ThinkPad, but I bet she hasn’t powered it on more than twice in the last three months. Instead, she uses her iPad 2 for almost everything she does when she is not in her office.

Here is what she liked and didn’t like about the Brydge+ with Speakers.

First she says it is really great for typing. She really likes the keyboard as a keyboard. And battery life is great (without the speakers turned on, anyway). She’s charged it maybe once in the last month. If battery life is a concern, though, you will want to keep the speakers off (there is a hard switch for this, so it’s easy to keep them off until you need them). They are nice if you want to listen to a voicemail or play some music in the background, but they do drain the battery quite a lot faster.

Jess mainly attaches the keyboard when she is actually doing work (answering emails, taking it to meetings, and using the iPad more like a laptop). She especially liked it during a three-day conference, because she was able to keep up with her work without any major compromises.

And the weight of the keyboard means the iPad isn’t tippy. It stands up well, like a laptop ought to, instead of tipping over from the weight of the iPad like many lighter-weight keyboard covers have an annoying tendency to do.

On the negative side, Jess said the Brydge+ isn’t easy to get on and off of the iPad. She doesn’t like leaving it on all the time because she still likes to use her iPad as a tablet most of the time — for reading her favorite blogs, catching up on email, and other stuff. She doesn’t actually want a laptop all the time, after all. Just when she needs to get work done.

(When I mentioned the Logitech Ultrathin cover, she said “oh, I’d love one of those” because all you have to do is drop the iPad into a slot instead of maneuvering it into the grabber things on the Brydge+. Of course, the Logitech Ultrathin is less laptop-y, as well.)

It doesn’t actually protect the iPad very well, either, since it’s just a cover and not a case. And if you want to want to take the Brydge+ off of your iPad, you have no protection at all. It means you may want to carry a protective sleeve or a case with you, if you are worried about your iPad. But that means extra bulk, which seems silly when you are carrying an iPad.

All in all, Jess really likes the Brydge+ with Speakers. It lets her get more done with her iPad so she doesn’t need a laptop.

Brydge+ with Speakers Bluetooth iPad Keyboard Review was originally published on Lawyerist.com.