Mediawiki as a Patent Law Firm’s Knowledge Management System

May 29, 2008 on 8:18 am | In The-Practice-of-Law, Web/Tech | 5 Comments

The Law has a number of maxims. For instance, “in court, never ask a question you don’t already know the answer to.” One of my favorites is “never do work someone else has already done for you.”

I’ve followed that (later) one to the letter…compiling hundreds of “nutshells,” “summaries,” and “cheat-sheets” stored in a folder on my file server; dozens of draft e-mails for easy “cut-and-paste” usage; MindManager mind maps; a three-ring binder on my desk called “The Deskbook”; and countless other knowledge collecting “buckets.” My own personal knowledge management system (hopefully Jack Vinson would approve).

The problem with such a hodge-podge knowledge collection system is that it isn’t easy to share. Sure, if someone in my office were to ask me a question, I could likely point them directly to where I previously summarized the answer (or forward it to them by email)…but I had a hard time (1) getting others in my Firm to ask for help and (2) training them where to look for the information I had previously compiled.

In reworking our network at our office, I came upon a solution….

Due to a hardware failure, we recently added a new server. Having a friend that was a huge fan of “ClarkConnect,” I decided to give it a try. I had my IT guy (independent contractor) take an old, out of service computer the Firm had lying around (along with an extra network card pirated from another computer) and install ClarkConnect on it.

ClarkConnect is a Linux based server/gateway. Traffic from our Internet connection goes through the ClarkConnect box before going out to our network (switch/hub). The ClarkConnect box (for $85/year):

Provides core server applications
- mail, web, VPN, backup, file and print services…
Protects network and data
- antivirus, antispam, firewall, intrusion prevention…
Enforces Internet usage policies
- content filter, peer-to-peer filter, bandwidth manager…
Simplifies management and monitoring
- system monitoring, software updates, mail backup…

One of the most important of those features is the VPN ability which allows anyone in the office to securely access files on the server from home via the Internet. No more emailing files to yourself. No more thumb drives.

One of the other benefits to running our ClarkConnect box is that, being built on Linux, it is really easy to install other “modules” and programs. That gave me an idea…why couldn’t I install Mediawiki (the software program that Wikipedia uses) on the box? After a little bit of checking, I found that it was not only possible, but they had even created step-by-step instructions regarding how to do it. After a few minutes…I had the wiki running.
Wiki Main

One note, while it is “step-by-step,” it is pretty geeky. For a second “module” that I wanted installed on our box (ProjectPier project collaboration software (an open source clone of BaseCamp, based upon ActiveCollab)), I merely paid the ClarkConnect guys hourly to install it on my box remotely. This (paying them to install) is highly recommended if you don’t want to spend the time figuring it all out. I’ll save my review of ProjectPier for another day.

Back to the wiki… We intentionally decided to shut off the web server on our ClarkConnect box, meaning that the wiki is not publicly available (you can’t access it from the Internet, but could access it if you connect via the VPN).

Now that the wiki is up and running, every time I pull out an old nutshell (etc.), I spend an extra 2 minutes copying the information over to a wiki page. I even found a Microsoft Word script that converts .doc files into the appropriate formatting. Over the last few months I have added, literally, hundreds of pages. For instance, our Trademarks sub-page looks like this:
Wiki TM

The wiki experiment is going pretty well so far. While about 95% of the content has been uploaded by me, the others in my Firm (after coming to learn that it is a great resource) are starting to add/edit it too. Every time someone asks me a question and I answer it…the answer gets dumped onto the wiki (if it wasn’t already there). Those questions can be legal based, procedure based, office policy based, etc. All knowledge gets archived to the wiki. The wiki will be invaluable for helping new staff get up to speed (I’ve been having my staff create wiki summaries of “how to do X” and “how to do Y”).

Every person in your law office has valuable knowledge, knowledge that if you don’t capture it…when they leave, the knowledge leaves with them. Collect it! Share it!

Your clients aren’t paying you to reinvent the wheel….

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QuickLinks for 27 May 2008

May 27, 2008 on 2:32 pm | In QuickLinks | Comments Off

Thumbs up for having time to blog again…

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Reason number one to build a law school in Boise…

May 16, 2008 on 6:54 am | In Idaho | Comments Off

The rush is on to build a law school in Boise, with the University of Idaho and Concordia University (Portland) clamoring to be first. Sounding like it came straight from a Letterman Top Ten list, Concordia apparently has one very interesting rationale for choosing Boise…

Concordia University has a history with Idaho, from enrolling its students, to its farmers providing food to our campus. The proposed law school is a natural extension of that history.

Source: Concordia University Law School’s website.
[Hat tip: Idaho Business Review]

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