Thank you to GoodCase Apps for sponsoring iPhone J.D. this month to promote its CaseManager apps for the iPad and iPhone. CaseManager was created by New York civil rights attorney John Upton as a fast and inexpensive solution for sole practitioners and small firms who want to use mobile devices to manage their law practice. The app debuted in 2011, and I discussed the app back in August of 2012 when GoodCase Apps last sponsored iPhone J.D. Since then, the app has added many new features including the ability to save a backup of all of your data in Dropbox, synchronize data between multiple devices using Dropbox, the ability to add handwritten notes (and the ability to email those notes), greater user customization, the ability to print lists, etc.
CaseManager is an app in which you can store all of the key information about your cases. You can add documents to the app to carry around the key pleadings, contracts, etc. You can add contact information, calendar entries and tasks that are unique to each case. The app even includes a Facts section so that you can track the key events in the timeline of a case and can help you track your time and expenses. All of the information is stored in the app itself, so you can access your information even when you don't have an Internet connection.
The main screen of the app is the Cases screen. Each case is indicated with a large, easy to tap button, and you can easily add new cases by tapping in the top right. (To delete a case, slide your finger from right to left across a case name and a Delete button will appear on the right.)
Once you select a case, you are brought to the main navigation screen for that case, where you are presented with nine choices such as a Calendar view of your events and tasks, buttons that let you view a list of Events or a list of Tasks, a button that lets you enter Time & Expenses, etc.
For example, to add an event you can tap either the Events or the Calendar button and then tap the Add Event button. You can then enter the title of the event, the date and time, the location, and whatever description that you want to add. And if you would rather draw than type, tap the Pencil button next to the word "Event" and you can sketch a note, diagram, etc. using your finger or a stylus.
To see other information in the case, you can either tap the Back button at the top left of the screen to go to the main navigation page, or better yet you can tap the Case Navigation tab that appears at the bottom of most screens. (It looks like the top of a folder.) That tab gives you quick access too all of the case navigation options.
The Calendar view lets you see all of your events and tasks in a specific case. Or if you want to view all of your events across all of your cases, tap on the Calendar button on the black bar at the bottom of the app. This gives you a calendar with a large number on each day representing the number of events or tasks that you have for that day. (It is optional to include tasks on your calendar — you can decide that as you enter a task.) Just tap a day to see what is on your calendar for that day.
If you give CaseManager access to the main Calendar app on your iPad/iPhone, then when you create an event the event will also be placed on your main iPad/iPhone calendar as a 10 minute entry. That can serve as a reminder for you to go back to the CaseManager app for more details.
You can also use CaseManager to enter time, either manually or via a timer that you start and stop, and to enter expenses. This is a useful way for you to remember your billable hours and expenses when you are out of the office so that when you get back to the office you won't forget what you need to record the time/expense into your billing software.
One of the new features of CaseManager is the ability to save your data on Dropbox. This is useful to save a backup of all of your important data. It also gives the app a way to sync between CaseManager on the iPad and CaseManager on the iPhone. (There are also versions of CaseManager for Windows and for Android, but I did not test those.) To use this feature, you go to the Settings portion of the app and tap a button to Link to Dropbox. This will launch the Dropbox app, where you give CaseManager permission to access the CaseManager folder on your Dropbox, and then returns you to the CaseManager app. Then tap the Sync Dropbox button to sync all of your data with Dropbox. Once you have synced on your iPad, you can then go to your iPhone and sync in all of the new data (and vice versa).
The above screenshots all show CaseManager on the iPad in landscape mode, but the app also works in portrait mode on the iPad. And as indicated above, there is also a version of CaseManager for the iPhone, and here are some screenshots to show you how it looks — basically the same as the iPad version, just formatted for the iPhone screen.
CaseManager doesn't aim to compete with expensive case management software that is designed for dozens or even hundreds of users and often has a monthly fee. Instead, CaseManager aims to provide a simple and easy-to-use solution for folks who want to manage their own case files on a mobile device that is always with them. And at only $20 for the iPad or the iPhone version of CaseManager, it will only cost you a fraction of a billable hour to get up and running.
Click here to get CaseManager for iPad ($19.99):
Click here to get CaseManager for iPhone ($19.99):
