Month: December 2014

Apple has a tradition of running some pretty great Christmas commercials.  The one that they ran last year, called “Misunderstood,” was one of my all-time favorites.  But they have a great one this year too.  It is called “The Song.”  It is less of a commercial and more of just a short movie.  If you haven’t seen it yet on TV or on the Internet, here it is (or click here):

Apple has since released another video that shows a small a part of how they made that commercial, and it is also worth watching.  Here it is (or click here):

If you want to see more great Apple commercials from Christmas Past, here is a roundup that I posted last year.  Even though you have likely seen them before, many are worth watching again.

– – – – –

Here are the ones from the last few years that feature the iPhone and iPad:

• Christmas 2012, I’ll be home for Christmas, featuring the iPad, iPad mini and FaceTime.
• Christmas 2011, Santa, featuring the iPhone and Siri.
• Christmas 2010, Under the Covers, featuring the iPhone and FaceTime.
• Christmas 2009, 12 Days of Christmas, featuring the iPhone and some useful apps.

I think that my all-time favorite Apple Christmas ads were from 2007 and 2008, part of the Get a Mac campaign featuring John Hodgman and Justin Long.  They were an homage to the great Rankin/Bass Christmas shows that I used to love when I was a child and that my own kids still love to watch today.  Here is the first one (or click here):

The two follow-up commercials in 2008 were also cute.  Here they are (or click here):

I hope that you and your family enjoy this most wonderful time of the year.

This week, my third grade son needed to give a presentation to his class about a holiday tradition in our family, so I helped him to create his first Keynote slide show for a presentation on how we pick out and decorate a Christmas tree every year.  He showed it his class by connecting an iPad via HDMI to the SMART Board in his classroom.  He did great, but I mention this today because I have seen countless ineffective PowerPoint presentations over the years (and I know that you have too) in which the presenter wrote virtually every word on the slide, in a font too small for most audience members to read, and with little visuals.  But my son’s instincts were to use lots of big pictures and very few words — e.g. “Step 4. Lights!”  “Step 5. Star!!”  Aside from the fact that he is overly fond of the exclamation point, it was nice to see that his natural instincts for his very first slide show were to keep his slides interesting, minimalistic and punchy.  Needless to say, I was very proud.  And now, the news of note from the past week:

• South Carolina attorney Justin Kahn reviews Day One, a journaling app.
• John Edwards of Law Technology News provides a few tips for using an iPad to give presentations.
• iMore created a really good list of the best iOS apps and accessories this year in its Best of 2014 Awards.
• Federico Viticci of MacStories created a 2014 version of his list of must-have iPad apps.  Most of these apps are designed for power users — e.g. folks who want to use automated tasks — but if that sounds like you, this is a great list.
• Transporter updated its PC and Mac software to version 3.0 yesterday, and it looks like the iOS software will be very updated very soon.  With the updated app, you will be able to use the iOS app to create new folders, and there are other improvements for iOS 8.  On the Mac and PC, there are new folder icons which make it much easier to quickly see the status of each folder.  Another new feature is that you can create read-only folders to share with others.  More information is in the release notes.
• iMore decided to re-evaluate iOS 8 now that we have been using it for and while, and created iOS 8 review: 3 months later.
• We are still in the early days for the HealthKit features of iOS 8, but Ochsner Health System in Louisiana and Duke University teamed up to start to integrate the system into their health care, and Jonah Cornstock of MobiHealthNews describes what they have come up with so far.
• Seth Weintraub of 9to5Mac has named what he considers to be the best Bluetooth speakers of the year.
• And finally, while Seth Weintraub was concerned with sound quality and portability when he reviewed Bluetooth speakers, what if you would prefer something that is not portable and has (I presume) mediocre sound, but is definitely a conversation piece?  Then you will want to look at The Megaphone from designers en&is in Milan.  It is huge, made of ceramic, and has a thin wooden frame.  The prices range from €399 to €599, so you’ll spend a lot more on this than you would on that Bluetooth speaker.  Here is a video if you want to see it in action:

The International Legal Technology Association (ILTA) is a peer networking organization for people who work in the legal technology field, such as the people who work in law firm IT departments.  I know that the folks in my law firm’s tech department frequently take advantage of ILTA resources when seeking advice on selecting and working with hardware and software designed for the legal market and when recruiting new hires.  A few months ago, I reported on the ILTA 2014 Annual Technology Purchasing Survey, and while that survey about what law firms buy was interesting, there is a limit to how much it tells you about the iPad and iPhone because so many attorneys purchase those devices themselves.

ILTA recently released the results of ILTA’s 2014 Technology Survey, which is based on the input of 454 law firms.  ILTA has firms of all size, but ILTA tends towards the larger law firms.  Of the 454 law firms that responded to this survey, 33% had under 50 attorneys, 31% had 50 to 149 attorneys, 19% had 150 to 349 attorneys, 10% had 350 to 699 attorney, and 8% had over 700 attorneys.  It is also worth noting that ILTA firms are not Mac shops.  When asked to identify the primary desktop operating system, virtually all picked Windows 7.  A handful answered that they are primarily using Windows 8, Windows Vista or Windows XP.  Only two law firms indicated “other,” which I presume is Mac but could be something else — could be Microsoft Bob so far as I know.

For the law firms represented by ILTA, this comprehensive survey reveals a lot about the technology being used by lawyers at these firms.  I’m focusing today on the part of the survey that asked about mobile devices.

iPad Use

The survey revealed that 90% of law firms have attorneys using iPads, 44% of law firms have attorneys using an Android tablet, 42% have attorneys using a Microsoft Surface tablet, 17% have attorneys using a Windows tablet (other than Microsoft Surface), 5% have attorneys using a BlackBerry Playbook, and 8% report that none of their attorneys use a tablet.  As for the 90% of law firms that report iPad use at their firm, that represents a slight increase; it was 89% in 2013, 88% in 2012, and 74% in 2011.  These numbers are consistent with the 2014 ABA Tech Survey, in which 84% of attorneys who use a tablet reported that they use an iPad.

When asked to estimate the percentage of attorneys that use tablets such as iPads, the average response was 40% — up from 37% last year, and 26% in 2012.  This was slightly less than, but similar to, what we saw in the 2014 ABA Tech Survey, which found that 49% of all attorneys were using a tablet.

In the Executive Summary, ILTA notes that while tablets are popular, they are an adjunct to, not a replacement for, laptop computers:

I don’t find this very surprising.  Although I do frequently use my iPad as a laptop replacement — I virtually always travel with my iPad instead of a laptop, and I use my iPad, not my laptop, when I am giving presentations — I can’t imagine not having a laptop computer at my desk for those rare occasions when I do need to move my computer to another location.  And I suspect that I make far more extensive use of my iPad than many other attorneys.  The iPad is an amazingly useful tool, one that I think can help virtually every attorney, but I see it as an additional tool; I don’t see it replacing laptop computers for the foreseeable future.

iPhone Use

The ILTA survey did not ask which percentage of attorneys use an iPhone.  Instead, the survey asked about platforms in use at law firms, such as the number of law firms that have attorneys using iOS, which includes both iPhones and iPads.  The survey revealed that basically all law firms, 98%, have attorneys using iOS, whereas 77% of law firms have attorneys using an Android devices, 56% have attorneys using BlackBerry devices, and 44% have attorneys using Windows Mobile or the newer Surface operating system.

82% of law firms report that they provide some sort of financial support for smartphone hardware, which includes 47% that purchase the hardware, 36% that provide a stipend or allowance towards the purchase of a smartphone, and 25% where the user pays the full cost of the smartphone.  (Those numbers don’t add up to 100%, so some firms must be doing more than one.)  In only 5% of firms does the user pay the full cost of monthly data service; the rest of the firms either pay all or some part of the monthly data service. 

Mobile Security

When asked to name the top three technology issues or annoyances in the law firm, the #1 response was security and risk management.  Thus, it comes as no surprise that 83% of law firms report that they force their attorneys to use a passcode on the lock screen.  One way to do this is to use Mobile Device Management (MDM) software.  Most firms (54%) don’t use MDM, but for those who do, popular choices include MobileIron, Good Technology and Airwatch.

Wireless Email Platforms

Microsoft may not make the iPhone or iPad, but it does make the technology that most law firms use to get email to those devices.  The survey asked law firms what types of wireless email platforms are being supported.  Microsoft Exchange (ActiveSync) is supported at 87% of law firms.  BlackBerry Enterprise Server, which had been in use in 84% of law firms back in 2011, is now only used in 48% of law firms.  GoodLink Server is used by 9% of law firms.  4% just allow for standard IMAP connections to the email server.  All of these are solutions that can work with an iPhone or iPad.

About half of all law firms said that they either support one wireless email platform, or they are working to standardize on a single platform.  For those firms, Microsoft Exchange (ActiveSync) was the clear winner at 84%.  The BlackBerry Enterprise Server, which was the standard for 58% of law firms back in 2011, is now the desired sole standard for only 4%.  GoodLink Server was named by 5% of law firms, 4% identified a hosting service from an outside provider or cellphone carrier, and 3% responded “other.”

Popular Apps

The ILTA survey asked law firms to indicate “to the best of your knowledge, which non-native tablet/iPad apps are most used at your firm for business purposes.”  I doubt that IT departments know all of the apps being used by their attorneys, but I’m sure that most do have some sense of the popular apps.  The top 30 apps, identified by at least 5% of the law firms, were:

1. Citrix Receiver
2. Adobe Acrobat
3. LinkedIn
4. Dropbox
5. Skype
6. Documents to Go
7. Facebook
8. Evernote
9. Mimecast
10. GoodReader
11. iAnnotate
12. TrialPad
13. RSA
14. Pages
15. Twitter
16. WorkSite Mobility
17. QuickOffice
18. iTimeKeep
19. Dragon Dictate
20. WebEx
21. VMware View
22. Good Messaging/Enterprise
23. WestlawNext
24. PocketCloud
25. PDF Expert
26. NetDocuments
27. TouchDown

That list is similar to the apps reported in last year’s survey, except that last year, at least 5% of the survey respondents identified remote access apps that connect to an attorney’s specific computer, such as LogMeIn or GoToMyPC.  There are some surprising omissions from that list, including Microsoft Office apps such as Word, TranscriptPad and any of the many apps that contain the text of laws and rules.

I still remember the time, many years ago, when PDF documents seemed novel.  Today, of course, most attorneys work with PDF documents just about every day, especially if you practice in federal court.  And PDF is my preferred file format for storing documents on my iPad.  My GoodReader app has a huge number of folders, each of which is full of PDF documents for the pleadings, correspondence, research, exhibits, and other key documents associated with my case files.  But as much as I work with PDF files, I always feel like there is so much more to know about working with this file format.  I suspect that most of you feel the same way.  (If you don’t, then either you are a PDF genius, or you just don’t know what you are missing.)

Today, I have two good recommendations for helping you to learn more about working with PDF files:  a free podcast, and an inexpensive book.

Mac Power Users – Episode 230:  The Power of PDFs (Dec. 14, 2014)

California attorney David Sparks and Florida attorney Katie Floyd produce the great Mac Power Users podcast.  “Mac” is in the title, but they also talk quite a bit about the iPhone and iPad.  In their most recent episode, they are joined by New Orleans attorney Ernie Svenson, a true expert on PDF files and going paperless.  I’ve know Ernie for almost two decades, and I still remember going to lunch with him around 15 years ago when he told me that the future was for lawyers to scan all of their documents and have a paperless file.  In theory, I liked what he was describing, but at the time it seemed about as realistic as flying a Jetsons-style hovercraft to work.  Of course, nowadays, my litigation practice is almost 100% paperless, and I’m sure that the same is true for many of you.  Sevenson has been doing this stuff for a very long time and he really knows of what he speaks.  So do David Sparks and Katie Floyd — Sparks even wrote a whole book on going paperless — so it comes as no surprise that this episode of the MPU podcast is overflowing with great information on working with PDF files.

Mac Power Users is not supposed to be a podcast aimed at lawyers, but when you get three lawyers together to talk about PDF files, I’m not sure how you can avoid talking about the use of PDFs in a law practice.  Thus, lawyers who listen to this episode will learn litigation-specific tips and tricks in addition to the general advice that could be used no matter what type of work you do.

The podcast lasts less than two hours.  Listen to it in your car, while you are getting ready for work, or maybe while you are having lunch in your office.  You’ll learn a lot.

Click here for the page on the MPU website for this podcast, where you can listen or download the episode.  Or you can just search for Mac Power Users in your podcast app of choice.  My favorite is Overcast, which you can download for free, although it costs $4.99 to get cool advanced features such as the ability to speed up the podcast without making it sound like you are listening to Alvin and the Chipmunks.

Click here to get Overcast (free): 

PDF Essentials for Lawyers by Ernie Svenson

It’s no coincidence that Ernie Svenson was on the latest episode of MPU; he has a new book out for lawyers who want to learn more about PDF.  The book is called PDF Essentials for Lawyers.  Svenson gave me a free copy of the book and I read it last night (mostly on my iPad, in the GoodReader app, but I also read part of it on the Mac that I use at home).

The book itself doesn’t talk about using PDFs on an iPad (or iPhone), and instead it focuses on using the free Adobe Reader software for the PC and Mac.  This makes sense because all attorneys use a computer, and Adobe Reader is free software that can be used by every attorney.  Nevertheless, most of the knowledge that you will get from reading this book will translate to any other PDF software that you use on your computer or on your iPad or iPhone.

The book itself is available only in a digital format as — you guessed it — a PDF file.  So you are literally using a PDF file as you learn about using a PDF file, which makes the book even better.  You will learn about everything from highlighting to hyperlinks to bookmarks while you are actually using those functions in a real document.  Svenson is an excellent teacher in real life, and that comes through in this book, which is clearly written and full of helpful tips.  The graphics in the book are also very well done, making it extremely easy to follow along.

And the book also includes hyperlinks to over a dozen videos to accompany the text.  For example, Svenson gave me permission to share this link for a video for the section of the book that talks about highlighting.  The information in this video on highlighting is itself useful, but I mainly wanted to share this video with you just so that you can get a sense of what a good job that Svenson did in producing the videos.  This is high quality stuff.

The full-price cost of the book is $9.99, but for a limited time, iPhone J.D. readers can get the book for half price, only $4.97

Click here to get PDF Essentials for Lawyers by Ernie Svenson ($4.97).

It is the end of the year, so that means that it is time for the “best of 2014” lists.  TechnoLawyer named its top 25 legal technology products of the year.  There were two iOS-related products on the list:  TrialPad 4.0, an app that you can use to present evidence at trial from an iPad, and the Transporter Genesis, an enterprise version of the Transporter that you can use to store your documents on a private cloud and access them from any computer or iOS device.  It is a good list, but I would have also included Microsoft Word for iPhone/iPad.  And now, the other news of note from the past week:

• Atlanta attorney Kevin Morris wrote a great article for Lawyerist about using an iPad for trial presentation using an Apple TV. 
• Financial Times named Apple CEO Tim Cook the Person of the Year.  And Time magazine considered naming him the Person of the Year; he was nominated, but instead Time gave it to the folks fighting Ebola.
• Apple and IBM have been working together on apps for folks who work sin large companies, and the first set of apps are ready and are described on Apple’s website.  I don’t think that this set of apps would be useful to lawyers, but perhaps some of IBM’s future apps will be.
• If you are looking for a good external keyboard for your iPad, Joanna Stern of the Wall Street Journal tested just about all of them and came up with some good suggestions, plus a fun video to go along with the article.
• Apple has named the best iPhone and iPad apps of 2014.  You can view the full list in iTunes, or Graham Winfrey of Inc. lists them here.  The lists includes some great apps that I use all of the time (such as 1Password) and a lot of apps that were new to me.
• Apple released iOS 8.1.2 this week, a minor update that addressed problems with ringtones purchased through iTunes and fixed other (unspecified) bugs.  I’ve never purchased a ringtone, but bug fixes are always good.
• Macworld posted full reviews of the latest iPhone/iPad versions of Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel and Microsoft PowerPoint.
• Jared Newman of Macworld reports that Iowa may offer a driver’s license app that you can access on your iPhone to show during traffic stops and at airports.  Interesting idea.
• Why yes, there is still time to vote for iPhone J.D. on ABA Journal’s Blawg 100 page. 
• And finally, BuzzFeed prepared a video of five iPhone pranks, some of which are pretty devilish.  Of course, I am not encouraging you to be juvenille with your friends, but if someone else does one of these to you, after watching this video you will know what is going on.

 

Yesterday, I reviewed an app called Codification, which uses for its icon the section symbol — §.  That is certainly a symbol that lawyers need to type a lot, but it isn’t immediately apparent how to do so on an iPhone or iPad.  I was discussing this with Ray Ward, an appellate attorney at my law firm who also publishes the great blogs The (New) Legal Writer and Louisiana Civil Appeals, and he reminded me that it is almost impossible to create the pilcrow on an iPhone.  The what?  Yeah, I had to look that one up too; a pilcrow is a symbol that most lawyers call the paragraph symbol — ¶.

You can type many additional characters using the iPhone and iPad keyboard by holding down on a letter.  I see that I haven’t posted a full list of those shortcuts since 2010, back when iPhone J.D. had far fewer readers, so I thought it might be useful to post the list again, which is largely still the same in iOS 8:

First, there are additional characters that you can access from the iPhone/iPad keyboard by holding your finger down on the vowels A, E, I, O and U:

You can also hold your finger down on the consonants C, L, N, S, Y and Z:

 

Here are the extra characters for the punctuation marks and symbols.  (The blue characters are the one on which you hold down your finger to create the other symbols.)

One small addition since my 2010 post is that now when you hold down your finger on the dash, you have the option of creating an en dash, an em dash or a bullet.  You can also create the bullet directly from the keyboard, but I suppose it makes sense to also put it behind the dash because folks often use either a dash or a bullet to create a list.

I see two other changes since 2010.  First, you can hold down on / to get \.  Second, you can now hold down on $ to get symbols for the Russian Ruble, Japanese Yen, Euro, Cent, British Pound and South Korean Won.  (The Ruble and the Cent are new additions behind the $; the Ruble symbol is itself new, having been adopted by Russia in 2013.)

So as you can see from the above, if you want to create a § on the iPhone keyboard, you can access the & key by pressing the 123 button at the bottom left, and then hold down as you press the ampersand. 

But what about that pesky pilcrow?  As useful as the paragraph symbol is for lawyers, there is no way to create it using the built-in iOS keyboard.  Instead, you need to find a way to copy the ¶ from someplace else so that you can then you can paste it into an email.

Back in 2009, I recommended a free web app called Glyphboard that let you copy a ¶ and paste it into an email.  The web page is still there, but it doesn’t work the same way in iOS 8 so I don’t recommend it anymore.

One solution is to install a third party keyboard on your iPhone or iPad and store the ¶ there.  For example, back in 2009 I interviewed Mike Schneider, an attorney who left the practice of law to write iPhone apps.  He recently released a free keyboard called SnipsKey that lets you store bits of text that you might want to use again, and then access that text by simply tapping a button.  SnipsKey is especially useful if you want to store a long string of text and save yourself the trouble of typing it over and over again, but you can also use it to store something that is one character long, like the ¶.  In the following example, I simply selected the SnipsKey keyboard by tapping the globe icon at the bottom left, then tapped my Paragraph shortcut, which I chose to put at the top for easy access.  (Tap Edit to rearrange your shortcuts.)

 

Click here for SnipKeys (free): 

Another option is to use an app designed to let you create special characters.  Although I haven’t tried it myself, I see that there is an older iPad app called Cymbol which lets you enter symbols, including a pilcrow.

Another option is to use an external bluetooth keyboard with your iPhone or iPad.  You can create a ¶ by typing Option-7, and you can create a § by typing Option-6.  (Those are the same shortcuts that work on an Mac.)

[UPDATE:  As several folks have suggested in the Comments to this post, another option is to create a keyboard shortcut for the ¶.  Great idea!  See the comments for more details.]

And finally, you can always just find a webpage that has the ¶ symbol on it, go to that webpage, and copy the ¶ and then paste it into your email or document on your iPhone or iPad.  Feel free to come back to this specific post as often as you want.

Sukolsak Sakshuwong is a computer science student at Stanford University, and he has come up with some interesting apps, including a sophisticated Japanese-English dictionary called Midori.  Sakshuwong contacted me to tell me that he recently developed an iPhone/iPad app that contains the text of the U.S. Code.  Sakshuwong isn’t a lawyer, but he enjoys working with large amounts of data, and he wanted to attack the challenge of creating lots of cross-reference links with a large data set, so the U.S. Code seemed like a natural project for him.  The result is a $0.99 app called Codification.  He sent me a code so that I could try out the app for free, and it works well.

A main advantage of an app like this is that it does not require an Internet connection to work, which can be useful if you are in court and have neither WiFi nor a stable cell connection.  The app is also incredibly fast and responsive.

From the main screen of the app, you see a list of Titles.  Tap a title to see the chapters.  Tap a chapter to see a list of sections.

 

Tap a section to see the text of the U.S.C. provision.

 

[UPDATE:  When I first wrote this post, I said that there is no way to jump to a specific section.  There is a way, but it is just not obvious.  If you tap the Search button and then type the Title, put a space, and then the Section (such as “28 1441”) you can then jump right to that section.  Click here for more information.]

If you think that you will want to view a statute again and you want to get back to it faster in the future, you can tap the bookmark icon to add a section to a list of bookmarks.  Tapping the Bookmarks icon at the bottom right will show you your list of bookmarks.  Tap the Edit button to delete bookmarks or organize them into folders.

You can also use the search function to search for U.S.C. provisions that contain a word.  Tap two words separated by a space to search for sections that contain both words.

One nice aspect of the app is that it is full of hyperlinks.  Thus, if you are looking at one provision and there is a citation to another provision, just tap to jump right to that second provision.

 

You can select text if you want to copy it, but there is no ability to highlight text in a section so that it will also be highlighted the next time that you use the app. 

If you tap the Share button at the top of the screen (the box with the arrow pointing up), you see some options that you would expect to find there, including Email (to send someone the entire text of the selected statute) and Print.  You’ll also see some commands that seem out of place in that location.  Next and Previous will bring you to the next or previous section of the U.S. Code.  Find will let you search for a word within the section that you are viewing.

This is a universal app, so it works on both the iPhone and the iPad.  One noticeable difference in the iPad version is that there is a font selection button on every screen that you can tap to increase or decrease the font size.  On the iPhone, you need to go to the main screen and tap the information button at the top right of the screen to change font size.

Codification doesn’t have a lot of bells and whistles.  I recall that California lawyer Cliff Maier was selling apps similar to Codification that had far more features over five years ago — although those apps are no longer available.  Nevertheless, I like this app.  It is an easy to use, fast and effective app for accessing the text of the U.S. Code on your iPhone and iPad.  If your law practice ever involves federal statutes, this app is easily work the $1 price to have easy access to the U.S. Code.

Click here to get Codification ($0.99): 

As we approach the holidays, I know that a lot of folks are a few weeks away from a new iPhone or iPad.  What do you do with your old model after you upgrade?  John Edwards of Law Technology News offers a few recommendations.  In my family, my wife gets my old iPhone when I upgrade, and her old iPhones get loaded with age-appropriate apps and movies to keep my kids occupied on a plane or a long car ride.  We take a similar approach with old iPads, with the oldest ones going to my kids for their occasional use.  Nowadays, it seems that the old iPads are used 99% of the time to play Minecraft … which is actually sort of fun for me too, because after my son and daughter build some elaborate castle or other structure, they then invite me to launch Minecraft on my iPad and join their virtual world to get a tour of their creations.  I used to do something similar when I was a kid with my parents, except that instead of using Minecraft on an iPad, I was using Legos, Lincoln Logs, etc.  And now, the news of note from the past week:

• California attorney David Sparks created a 2.5 hour video tutorial for OmniFocus — a sophisticated Mac / iPad / iPhone app for managing tasks — called the OmniFocus Video Field Guide.  The video costs $9.99, and it is really good.  If you are thinking of using OmniFocus, or if you use it and want to get better at it, I recommend that you get it.  Sparks wrote an overview of the video here, and there is a 14 minute sample at the bottom of that post that gives you a sense of the high quality of the video.
• I’ve talked in the past about the Apple in Law Offices survey conducted by Clio.  The full results for the 2014 survey are not out yet, but this week Clio released some preliminary results.  For example, their survey showed 79.8% of attorneys using iPhones.
• Password security is so important for everyone, but especially for lawyers because of our duties to protect confidential information.  Glenn Fleishman of Macworld wrote one of the best articles that I’ve read in a long time with recommendations for creating and managing passwords.  It’s a great read.
• Apple is currently appealing a decision in a case brought by the DOJ alleging price fixing on ebooks.  Oral arguments are on December 15, and Roger Parloff of Fortune wrote an interesting article about the appeal, with quotes from Apple’s Eddy Cue.
• Kara Swisher of re/code writes about the grief that she gets for using the iPhone 6 Plus because it is so large.  To be honest, I just don’t get the iPhone 6 Plus either — to me it seems too big to hold and carry around, but too small to replace a tablet.  But I know that some folks love it, so more power to them.
• If you enjoy reading iPhone J.D., I’d really appreciate it if you voted on ABA Journal’s Blawg 100 page.  One of the newcomers to the Legal Tech portion of the list, the Electronic Discovery Law blog published by K&L Gates, is currently in the lead with a ton of votes.  I realize that K&L Gates is one of the largest law firms in the world, but if enough iPhone J.D. readers vote, perhaps we can get the totals closer.  Thanks!
• And finally, if you want to take your Christmas Tree lights (or other lights) to the next level this season, how about using lights that can be controlled from your iPhone via Bluetooth to change their colors?  That’s what you get with Lumenplay App-Enabled Lights.  The starter kit comes with 12 C9 bulbs (the large kind) for $79.99 (on Amazon) but you can add extenders ($44.99 on Amazon for another 12 lights) and control up to 500 lights with your iPhone.  Here is a video that shows them off:

My American Express card is my primary credit card, and based on what I see other attorneys using, I know that I am certainly not alone.  Thus, I love that since the first day that Apple Pay has been available, I’ve been able to charge to my Amex account whenever I use Apple Pay at supporting stores such as Walgreens, Subway, Whole Foods, etc.  I was surprised that I could even use Apple Pay at the (in?)famous Flora-Bama bar at the beach on the Florida/Alabama border.  This week, my American Express card has become even more valuable because one can now use Touch ID with the Amex Mobile for iPhone app instead of having to type a password.

There isn’t much to say about the feature.  If you are using an iPhone 5s or an iPhone 6 / iPhone 6 Plus, the app gives you the option to turn on Touch ID support.  Once you do so, it just works.  Launch the app, put your finger on the Home Button, and almost instantly you are securely logged in to the app, without having to type anything at all.

This feature works great, and makes it a lot faster and easier to use the app to keep track of purchases, my balance, etc.  Note that the feature currently only works with the iPhone version of the app, so even if you have an iPad Air 2 with Touch ID, you will still need to type a password for now.

Although this isn’t a new feature of the Amex app, I thought that I would also mention that if you turn on notifications for the Amex app, you get a notification every time that your Amex card is used to make a purchase, including the amount of the purchase.  I generally keep notifications turned off for the apps on my iPhone, but this is one of the rare apps for which I allow notifications because the notification is a quick way to make sure that you were charged the right amount.  And the notifications are incredibly fast.  Give a credit card to your waiter, and you’ll get the notification on your iPhone long before the waiter returns with your card.  If you don’t currently have notifications turned on for this app, give it a try and see what you think.

I only have a small number of apps on my iPhone that require a password when you launch the app.  The perfect example is the 1Password app; it is one of the most useful apps on my iPhone, but given the confidential information contained in the app, you better believe that I have a secure password on it.  But secure passwords are a pain to use, which is why I love Touch ID so much more, now that iOS 8 lets apps use Touch ID.  You get the security of knowing that only you can access the app, without the inconvenience of typing a password.  The Amex app was also a perfect candidate for this feature, and I hope to see all banks with iPhone apps adding the feature soon.  (If you use a Discover card, I believe that its app is also Touch ID enabled.)

Click here to get Amex Mobile (for iPhone) (free): 

Last week, Dropbox and Microsoft updated their iOS apps to work together, and the result is really nice.  With the updated versions of the apps, it is easier than ever to take a file from Dropbox to Word and back again.

In the Dropbox app, you can now select any Word file in your Dropbox.  Then tap the edit icon, which is four over at the bottom of the screen.  In fact, when you open your first Word file after the app is updated, the Dropbox app will even give you a friendly reminder of the new feature, as shown in the picture below.  After you tap the edit icon, the Dropbox app lets you select a helper app, and for now Microsoft Word is your only option.

 

This will cause the Microsoft Word app to launch, and once it launches your document will be opened in the Word app.  Why would you want to do this?  Two reasons.  First, while the Dropbox app will show you a preview of your Word files, the document will virtually always look better in the Word app.  The Microsoft Word app is the best way to read a Word document on an iPhone or iPad.  Second, this is useful if you want to edit the document.

When you are done viewing or editing a document, tap the Back button — the one at the top left with an arrow inside of a circle:

This will close the document in Word.  Next, if you made changes it will save the revised document back to Dropbox.  Finally, it will return you to the Dropbox app where you started.

I have a few additional notes on the new feature.  First, I focus in this post on Microsoft Word because it is the Office app that attorneys use the most often, but this same integration also works with Microsoft Excel and PowerPoint files in your Dropbox folder.

Second, note that you don’t need to use the Dropbox app to work with Word files in the Word app.  As I explained last month in my review of the the Word app, you can also browse a list of files in your Dropbox folder from within the Word app itself.  The update last week just makes it easier if you are starting from in the Dropbox app.

Third, I did encounter one hiccup during just one of the times that I was testing this feature — a time that I edited a document in Word and Word had trouble saving it back to my Dropbox.  Fortunately, Word recognized the failure and gave me the chance to try to upload again, save a duplicate version of the document, or discard my latest edits.  This error only occurred once, and every other time it saved the file correctly.

 

Fourth, if you use a Dropbox for Business account, I see that Lance Whitney of CNet reported that the integration only works if you are using an Office 365 account with your Microsoft Word app.  But as I have noted in the past (1, 2), if you are using the Word app for commercial purposes then you should already have an Office 365 subscription.

This is a great update.  It is nice to have apps work so well together that they can pass off documents and close themselves and open the other app — especially when the two apps in question are both already so useful.  I wish that we saw even more apps working together this way.

Click here to get Dropbox (free): 

Click here to get Microsoft Word (free):