The "Flavors" of PDF

PDF has many different capabilities that can be confusing.  This article explains some of them.

This and That in Court Tech - July 2012

 E-courts education program, Canadian court tech conference, SJI assists Minnesota self-represented E-filing, mandatory E-filing in Utah and Florida, and Pennsylvania tweets court rules.

South Carolina legislature overrides governor, allows CJ to set e-filing fees to pay for court technology

Cross-posted at Gavel to Gavel

I mentioned two weeks ago the e-filing fees situation in South Carolina. In sum, the legislature unanimously adopted HB 4821, which would have allowed the state's chief justice to set an e-filing fee to pay for court technology

for filing court documents by electronic means from an integrated electronic filing (e-filing) system owned and operated by the South Carolina Judicial Department in an amount set by the Chief Justice of the South Carolina Supreme Court and all fees must be remitted to the South Carolina Judicial Department to be dedicated to the support of court technology

Despite the legislature's unanimity, the governor vetoed the bill, arguing no "branch of government should be provided with such comprehensive, unilateral authority to impose fees without regulatory or other comparable review." The South Carolina legislature has now voted to override the governor's veto: 93-14 in the House and 39-3 in the Senate.

Michigan legislature set to officially kill off its cyber court?

Cross-posted at Gavel to Gavel

Back in 2001 amid another recession, Michigan's legislature made an attempt to address the issue of technology-related litigation by authorizing the creation of a "Cyber Court", the purpose of which was (MCL 600.8001(2)) to:

Court Case Management Systems 2012 Part 1: It’s About Change

It’s all about change.  The technology has changed.  The expectations have changed.  Therefore, court case management has changed.

Third Annual Social Media and Courts Survey

The NCSC announced the third annual social media and the courts survey.

This and That in Court Tech - June, 2012

News about Oregon's eCourts project, a new blog by ProBono.net, LawTech Camp 2012, New Mexico's website attack, Password security, and an excellent change management article.

Court Case Management 2012

Some of my colleagues and I are planning on writing a series of articles on Court Case Management Systems over the next year (or two).

Courts Go Mobile

Recently I've been looking at various court's efforts to provide information via mobile devices (Smart Phones and Pad/Tablet Computers) and there is some very nice work out there.

More This and That in Court Tech - May 2012

We have more court technology news to share for the month of May, 2012.  Notes include a radio interview for a CMS upgrade in Ohio, a Washington state courts report, podcasts from the Center for Court Innovation, NIEM Technical Training course announcement, and the LexUM Decisia cloud service.

All Federal Courts Now Accepting Electronic Filing

Via Press Release - The DC-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has begun accepting electronic filings via the judiciary’s Case Management-Electronic Case Files (CM/ECF) system, joining every other federal appellate, district, and bankruptcy court in doing so.

CM/ECF provides courts enhanced and updated docket management. It allows courts to maintain case documents in electronic form. And it gives each court the option of permitting case documents – pleadings, motions, petitions – to be filed with the court over the Internet. Implementation of that option began a decade ago, and now is complete.

You can learn more about CM/ECF here.

The Benefits of Automating Your Employee Performance Reviews

By Sean Conrad*

Public sector organizations face ongoing pressures to be transparent, efficient and accountable. Employee performance reviews are a critical tool for ensuring staff know what is expected of them, and are accountable for their results and performance. Yet many public sector organizations struggle to do employee reviews.

This and That in Court Tech – May 2012

News about E-filing in five states, courtroom tweeting, the NAJIS annual conference, Peoria’s new CMS, and a history of the establishment of West Publishing.

Missouri Court CIO Job Opening

We at the NCSC are very sorry to learn that our good friend, Jim Roggero, the CIO for the Missouri Office of State Courts Administrator has decided to retire.  However, his and his staff's good work continues, and so the job opening has been posted (PDF) at: http://www.courts.mo.gov/file.jsp?id=5600 

Also please note that there are several other technical staff job opportunities at the OSCA listed at: http://www.courts.mo.gov/page.jsp?id=3191

We will post more about Jim and his significant legacy at a later date.

Montana Issues Statewide E-Filing RFP

The Montana Supreme Court, Office of the Court Administrator has issued an RFP for E-filing.

An Electronic Signature Maxim

By: Vojtěch Kment, http://www.linkedin.com/in/vojtechkment

Summary:  An E-signature Deployment Maxim: 1. Replaces the handwritten signature; 2. Legally permissible; 3. Evidence of intent; 4. False identification avoided/minimized; 5. Easy to use, affordable and widely compatible.

(Maxim: A brief expression of a general truth, principle, or rule of conduct http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Maxim )

Internet Bar Organization Offers Webinar and Research

By Mr. Jeff Aresty, Internet Bar Organization

As we all know, government’s everywhere are confronted with limited budgets and court systems are suffering.  Therefore, many courts are using technology creatively to increase the throughput of their caseloads.

Federal Courts Update CM/ECF Case Management System Plans

US Federal Courts sends news of several automation related efforts including case management, discovery practice recommendations for electronically stored evidence, kiosk use in US Federal Probation offices, and videoconferencing.

The Need for Court E-Forms Identification (Meta-Data) Standards - Part 2

In Part 1 of this series we looked at the ability to create XML meta-data identifiers in commonly used word processing and PDF applications. In this part we will explore the benefits of electronic forms identification.

The Need for Court E-Forms Identification (Meta-Data) Standards - Part 1

There is a fundamental problem with the way that electronic court forms have been implemented.  This series discusses some ideas to address the current shortcomings.