Replication & Reuse Building Document Assembly Apps Based on Prior Work Alan Soudakoff Marc Lauritsen Capstone Practice Systems December 7, 2007

Overview Intro – document assembly as reuse An example and some history Going meta – reusing systems Getting specific – tools and techniques Wrap up Questions

Reusing law practice knowledge What –Information to gather –Forms to use –What words go where –Other steps to take –Resources –Data DA methods –Dynamic interviews –Template libraries –Modeled documents –Modeled tasks –Links and materials –Answer files and databases

Communities and challenges Sharing common knowledge and tools in law practice Obstacles and inhibitions Not invented here Need for delivery system Need for support infrastructure

Reusing law practice systems What –Know-how (technical, substantive, project management) –Good practices –Decision frameworks (e.g. RTF vs. PDF) –Templates –Components How –Trainings, mentoring, list serve, articles –Standards –NPADO contributor portal –System kits –Internal reuse (modularization)

Specific steps for NPADO folks Find out whos already done some of what youre about to do Find the closest systems Download from contributor portal Explore through component manager Copy, revise, extend Post results for others to use!

Cautions and drawbacks Jurisdictional variations Danger of careless copying Reuse can constrain creativity Danger of monoculture, suboptimal ruts Blessing and curse of standards – whats the right balance?

Family law system kit Distilled wisdom from a dozen projects New product from Legal Systematics, Inc. (Alan, Bart, Doug, Marc) Partially funded through a TIG awarded to Legal Assistance of Western New York (Jeff Hogue, project manager) Beta version early 2008; release mid year Free to LSC grantees

Kit contents Model component file - data variables, computations, dialogs, interview(s) Component documentation Illustrative support for –both advocates and pro se users –foreign languages Collection of issues/solutions, covering e.g. –design and planning –testing –case mgt integration Overview(s) of the subjects and system for both technical authors and family law advocates

To conclude … Innovate and improve, dont reinvent Reuse begins with awareness Dont forget to reuse your own stuff Design for reusability (generality, consistency, documentation, …) Dont get paralyzed by standards

Resources LSNTAP document assembly section Standards & Practices NPADO contributor portal (for approved template providers) Ontologies and Openness in Law Practice Automation -

Questions?