Software - Document Management

LSSe64 Document Management is designed specifically for law firms and the legal industry. It allows attorneys and staff to more efficiently manage, store, organize and access client related files – including documents, spreadsheets, email, images, PDF’s and more.

When saving a document, email, or any other type of file, you simply provide LSS with profile information such as client/matter number, document type, author, typist and other optional data. LSS saves the file in its native format and stores the profile information in a separate fully-indexed database. Files can be quickly and easily saved or retrieved directly from Word, Outlook, Excel and Adobe Acrobat.

The LSSe64 Document Management system can be licensed and installed as its own stand-alone application, or as part of the larger fully-integrated LSSe64 practice management system. Below are just a few features of the LSSe64 Document Management system.

Flexible and powerful search features

Rather than browsing through hundreds or thousands of network folders to find a document, LSS locates documents by searching a fully indexed document profile database. Search by any combination of client, matter, author, typist, document type, subject and more. Or perform full-text searches against the content of your documents, files and emails (including attachments). Nearly instantly, LSS displays a list of all files matching your search criteria, allowing you to open, print, export, preview and more.

Full text search

LSS maintains an indexed catalog of all the words contained in your word processing documents, email messages, attachments and text-searchable PDF files. With LSS, you can perform full-text searches that complete in just a couple of seconds – even when working with hundreds of thousands of files. Just type a few words and LSS will perform a full-text proximity search. The system quickly displays a complete list of all documents containing those words, with a “ranking” score assigned to each document. This allows the search results to be sorted by rank, so that documents where the selected search words appear more frequently and/or in closer proximity to one another appear at the top of the list. Those documents where the search words appear less frequently and/or farther apart from one another appear toward the bottom of the list.

Customizable dashboard

Each user can customize their document management dashboard to best suit their individual needs. Some of the customizable features include small but important options like the ability to specify which search field the cursor appears in as a default when opening the search form. For example, some users might search by client number most of the time, while other users might normally search by subject. Having the system automatically place the cursor in the most commonly used search field for any particular user reduces keystrokes, mouse clicks and saves time.

In the search results grid, users can adjust column widths, move columns left or right and select which column is to be used for sorting the search results. The system remembers these customizations based on the user’s Windows login name, so the next time that user opens LSS document management, the customized settings are automatically applied.

To further maximize efficiency, users can save common search requests as “favorites”. After entering various search criteria, just click the Add Favorite button and give it a name. For example, if a user is often working on documents for one particular matter, the user could set up a search request containing the client/matter number with their name as typist, and then save that request as a favorite. Then in the future, they can simply pick the search request from their “favorites” dropdown rather than having to retype the client/matter number and other search criteria.

Microsoft Office integration

LSS Document Management is tightly integrated with popular Microsoft Office applications like Word, Excel and Outlook. LSS Document Management “save” and “open” functions are integrated directly into the Office application ribbons.

Beyond the basic save and open functions, the ribbon in Word also provides functions for inserting a footer or trailer into a document when saving, for comparing two documents in LSS and for inserting hyperlinks (pointers to other files stored in LSS) into the current document. The ribbons in Outlook also include functions for configuring monitored folders, attaching files and inserting hyperlinks (pointers to other files stored in LSS) into an email message.

As a user preference, the add-in for Outlook can be configured to automatically prompt to save email messages whenever they are sent. Another user preference allows LSS add-ins for Microsoft Office applications to automatically prompt users with an LSS time entry form whenever a file is saved.

LSS add-ins for Microsoft Office applications are available in both 32-bit and 64-bit versions, meaning that the LSS Document management system is compatible with both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Microsoft Office. Add-ins are available for Microsoft Word, Excel and Outlook versions 2010 and newer, including Office 365 “click-to-run” installations..

Adobe Acrobat integration

LSS Document Management includes an add-in for Adobe Acrobat (Standard or Pro) versions X and newer. This add-in for Adobe Acrobat allows users to save PDF’s directly from Acrobat into the LSS Document Management system using LSS menu items and buttons that appear in the Acrobat menu or toolbar.

Drag and drop file save

Drag and drop multiple files at once to quickly import and save several documents or email messages with minimal time and effort. Dropping files into a matter’s document management dashboard will automatically populate the profile “save” form with the current client/matter number.

Monitored folders

When dragging and dropping files into monitored folders configured with “smart profiling”, the system will automatically open the LSS save form prepopulated with the appropriate client/matter number and (optionally) a document type. Similarly, monitored folders with “smart profiling” can be created within your Outlook mailbox and then be used for drag and drop saving of email messages – all from within Outlook.

Integrated security for ethical walls

Document permissions can be assigned by client and/or matter. For any given client or matter, you can provide “full control” access to all users (the default), or you can lock down documents as “read-only” or “no access”. Regardless of the general security setting for a client or matter, the system provides the ability to create exceptions for the client/matter by user name. For example, you could create a matter with security set to “no access”, but then give full control access to just you and your assistant. Or you could create a matter with the default “full control” access, but then deny access to certain individuals.

Document permissions can also be assigned at the user level. For any given user, you can globally allow the user to access all matters, but add individual client/matter exceptions with either read only or deny access. Similarly, you can globally deny access all matters, and then enter individual client/matter numbers as exceptions with either full control or read only access. This method is most useful when a staff member needs to work on a project involving just a few matters, and they need to be blocked from seeing or accessing anything related to other clients.

Permissions in LSS are integrated with Windows Active Directory security at the individual file level. This means that if a user browses out to the document storage locations using Windows Explorer, they will not be able to open or modify any files that have been restricted by LSS permission settings.

Version control

When saving an existing document, LSS provides the option of replacing the existing document, saving the file as a new document, or saving the document as a new version to the existing file. LSS can store and manage up to 999 versions of any single document. The system lets you easily retrieve a list of all versions of any particular document, ordered chronologically by version number. If a user choses to open a version of a document that isn’t the most current version, the system displays a message containing a friendly reminder that the chosen document is not the most current. Each version of a document has its own independent audit history, showing the dates, times and users who have created, opened or saved that particular version of the document.

Customizable user preferences

Similar to other components in LSS, the LSS Document Management component offers many customizable user preferences that allow people to adjust settings so that the system operates in a way that best suits their particular needs. Examples include:

      - General default save option (Replace, New, Version or None)
      - Default Word add-in save option (With footer, With trailer or No footer/trailer)
      - Whether or not to display a confirmation prompt before replacing an existing
      - Whether or not to auto-populate Author/Typist fields when saving a new file
      - Whether or not to auto-populate Author/Typist fields when searching for files
      - Whether or not to automatically prompt to save an email after it has been sent
      - Whether or not to automatically prompt to enter a billable time entry after saving a file
      - Default cursor placement when opening a search request
      - Default naming convention when exporting a file
      - and more…