From Softsolutions to GroupWise Document Management?
Or Are There Better Ideas?

Scheduled to appear in the August 2000 issue of Law Technology News:
"Second Opinions" Column

By

Ross L. Kodner, Esq.

We are a 100+ attorney law firm (approx. 250 total users) running Novell Netware 5 and Groupwise 5.5 for email. We need to upgrade our document management program, SoftSolutions 4.1, running with WP6.1. We are considering Groupwise document manager, and we will be upgrading to WordPerfect 9. Suggestions? Alternatives?

With 250 users, that’s the proverbial $128,000 question! First, pat yourself on the back that you survived Y2K with a known non-Y2K compliant product. Let’s focus on the document management part of the question. Before we dive in headlong to address the "Softsolutions migrating to what" question, let’s take a half-step back for the rest of our readership. The threshold question that many people still ask is "What is document management?"

This should make for an interesting topic for discussion because for all the talk and all the "sexiness" of topics like the DoJ v. MS trial, laptop toys, and <gasp, heretical statement coming> even the 'Net itself, most law firms spend most of their time with the "core" techno.basics. That means pumping out documents, tracking and billing time, calendaring dates, checking conflicts, using case and contact info. But document production, a category of operations incorporating word processing, document management and work product retrieval and also document assembly, is still clearly the most used application in most law offices (with e-mail being actually an adjunct to it today for the increasing "practice by e-mail" situations many lawyers face from clients like me who don't want to see any incoming paper).

Document management is less variable than the nebulous concept of case management or the even vaguer notion of "knowledge management" But it is nevertheless subject to different definitions, depending on who you ask, the day of the week and what they had for breakfast on any given day. It may be easier to describe it by capabilities of software that many people actually use, when for example, they use Worldox, one of the major products on the market:

1) The overall goal: to organize documents in a consistent, logical manner so that they are organized in a system analogous to a paper filing system. This makes it mindlessly simple for even total technopeasants in a firm to find their documents when they know what client/matter the work was done for or what practice area the form they seek is for.

1a) The all important corollary to #1 is that the overriding goal should be the EASY ability to find, re-use, re-cycle, etc. the law firm's second most valuable resource (second only to the intellect of its "liveware"), it's inventory of prior work product.

SIDENOTE: #1a can certainly be accomplished by web-style indexers like AltaVista Personal or similar products. But #1 is very important. It's incredibly handy to be able to go to a place that is the equivalent of a manilla folder labeled "Correspondence" and see with a single mouse click, all the correspondence on a litigated matter. Even more so, to see the documents with nice plain-English language filename, conveniently listed in order from newest to oldest (and all externally received correspondence as well if you apply my Paper LESS Office(tm) concepts and scan everything to make completely contiguous electronic client files). You can't do that with the present crop of Web-style text indexers--they are great at searching - but that's the extent of it - I see it as half (or less than half) of the picture.

2) When one doesn't know where a document is, the ability to be able to search with search engine-like/Wexis-like abilities by filling out plain-English query screens. Further, the ability to perform the same or a similar search by saving the search screens for later recall. The key here is a super-simple interface. So no matter what the search technique, if it is not immediately obvious how to fill out a query screen, techno.skeptical and techno.intolerant lawyers will never try again.

3) Everything else is secondary, but other things that are important based on client feedback are version control, document change tracking, automated document archiving, automatic filenaming, ability to check documents out to temporarily lock them so others can't mess with them (sure you can do this with network security but that's hardly useful for the average lawyer or secretary who we certainly don't want playing around with our underlying network structures) . . . and also document categorization via profile fields with require fields which can vary quite a bit. Normally we recommend "Client", "Matter" (which typically correspond to an underlying folder structure of \docs\client\matter), "Area of Practice", "Document Type", "Author" with document comments being available to explain things like when a certain form should be used, West key numbers for firms wedded to that topical mentality, closed file number and location, etc. All are automatically searchable criteria to help quickly nail down documents. I suspect one might be able to do similar things with hidden text in a document that can be found by a Web-style search engine but it requires discipline in having users do it all the time (yeah, right <g> and Microsoft isn’t a monopoly).

4) There are ancillary capabilities that have been Godsends for some of my clients. The biggie is Worldox's "document mirroring" function that saves a secondary copy of networked-saved documents. These are located in a folder structure that mimic the network folder structure, on the user's local hard drive. The Worldox system keeps them there for a certain preset number of days and then purges them to keep the local drive from filling up. In the event of a server failure, the user switches to local operation and can at least work with these mirrored files and get work out. When the server returns to normal functionality it knows the users were working locally and asks if they want to resynchronize those docs back to the server.

4a) The same mirroring/resyncing function is effectively a remote laptop mode for users who will work away from the office and then reconnect to the network.

With all that said, we should now all have a basis to carefully consider the question--one of "migration" of your firm’s second most valuable resource: your massive base of completed client work product and forms (second only to the "smarts" of your liveware").

Once upon a time Softsolutions was part of the "Big Two" in larger firm document management systems. It was a world dominated by PC DOCs and Softsolutions. And then Novell, makers of the venerable Netware network operating system, bought Softsolutions. And with version 4.1, Novell killed the Softsolutions product. Novell then built the features of the Softsolutions document manager into the then-new version 5.0 of their widely-used GroupWise groupware product. There have been five subsequent releases of GroupWise since then - the current version is 5.5 and along with Lotus Notes and Microsoft’s Outlook/Exchange systems, it is one of the "Big Three" in groupware products.

The question is whether it makes sense to migrate your present Softsolutions 4.1 system to the document management features found in GroupWise 5.5 or whether it is time to consider moving to something else. My first opinion in this "Second Opinion" piece is that you should take the time now to convert your base of documents from the old Softsolutions system to a document manager other than GroupWise 5.5.

I believe the battle in the document management marketplace today is between Worldox from World Software (www.worldox.com) and iManage (www.imanage.com). iManage has seen significant success in the last several years, based on a sound and aggressive marketing approach, a reliable application and the harnessed power of the SQL database format--the "engine" upon which it is based.

With its SQL structure, iManage is a potent and competent product but one that I believe really has its place in significantly larger entities--even larger than yours. iManage’s Direct of Legal Markets, Rick Klau, a friend of mine, and I disagree on this, but that’s my opinion. Your firm doesn’t have an NT fileserver or network operating system heritage. Contrary to the beliefs of many, an NT server in your future is not necessarily a foregone conclusion. You cannot run iManage, in any practical sense, without having at least one Windows NT (or Windows 2000) fileserver on your network; it is needed for running the SQL database engine that iManage requires.

The requirement for a SQL database is both a strength and a hindrance to the iManage document manager, at least in your particular set of circumstances. From a purely operational level, the SQL database structure is an industry-standard data machine, capable of processing many transactions with strong error prevention and trapping capability. The drawbacks of the reliance on a SQL database are:

1) It’s going to cost you - it means you need a separate dedicated fileserver running Windows NT 4.0 or Windows 2000 Server and someone’s SQL database software - in a firm your size, that’s going to be a combination roughly equivalent to a new Toyota Corolla in cost;

2) You’re a "Novell shop." Do you have any experience in running an NT/Windows server, especially in a mixed Novell/Windows NT environment? How about experience in the care and feeding of a SQL server? You have 250 users who are already entirely dependent on a document manager for their ability to get every day’s work out. Can you afford to just "muddle" along supporting the system yourself? Probably not--expect to add at least one technical staffer to do the work for you, or to pay handsomely to outsource it.

Is this to say iManage is somehow flawed? Quite the contrary - it’s a terrific and powerful product. But your specific set of circumstances would seem to tip the balance of the scales more towards a non-SQL, non-Windows NT approach to document management as part of your "life after Softsolutions" manifesto.

Compared to iManage, Worldox is not dependent on a SQL structure. Instead it uses a decentralized or distributed approach to document management. Only "lean" profile information is stored in a comparatively compact and cleverly streamlined set of databases on the network server (which for many firms, is actually the primary file/print server on their network). Information about the files located in each document folder is actually stored in hidden files in that folder--in other words, it is distributed across one’s system. This means no costly database to purchase, run or maintain. Worldox scales well and can be used just as easily by solos as 400+ seat entities. World Software refers to the information tracking approach they employ as a "dual database" architecture and outline the concept in detail in white paper on their website at www.worldox.com/pub/wdddwp.htm. Personally, and this is where Rick Klau and I may just have to agree to disagree, I would really not consider iManage in any sub-100 seat situation--it just doesn't add enough to justify the higher cost and administrative overhead.

You're an "in-betweener" size-wise, although with 250 users, you’re either a smaller large firm or a larger mid-size firm. You could use either product, a decision which in part, will be based on your network platform situation. If you already had an NT platform as all or part of your network infrastructure and were already running a SQL database, then iManage would be a viable option and quite practical. If not, there is no reason not to consider Worldox. This document manager has steadily been making inroads into the top 250 largest law firms in the country. Note that on the SQL v. non-SQL document management question, World Software has a document on its website on the subject at www.worldox.com/pub/A653192.htm. Obviously, there is a self-serving element to this, but given the article’s profiling of a 180 lawyer, 400 seat firm who grappled with this very question, it would seem to be worth reading.

Note that cost is another factor. Worldox costs $350 per seat plus $60 per seat/year in software maintenance. There is no server module and no separate fileserver required to run a database. As with any document manager, a PC to run an indexing routine is needed to facilitate document searches. In Worldox’s case, this is technically just a reasonably powerful Windows workstation. It is set up as a "quasi-server" dedicated to the text indexing task. With iManage, you face roughly the same $400/station cost, but also several thousand dollars for the "server module", several thousand dollars for the appropriate licenses for Windows NT Server or Windows 2000 Server, more money (thousands) for a SQL database system and then the "box" to run it all on--likely a $5000-$15,000 piece of equipment in your situation.

And don’t forget support--with Worldox you probably won’t need another in-house addition to your complement of IT department "liveware." With a fire-breathing NT/Windows 2000 Server running a mission-critical SQL database, plan on bulking up your liveware with at least one more "human unit."

Note that as an independent consultant, I often recommend Worldox because I like it--it has proven itself in the field in my clients' offices and in my own offices. You should also read any of several comparative reviews of document managers written by Guy Wiggins, a New Jersey legal technologist.

But why not GroupWise 5.5's document manager? With GroupWise 5.5, all your document information and the documents themselves are stored in an inevitably enormous centralized database called the "BLOB," an acronym which evokes images of 1950's outer space flicks. And like the creatures in those films, the BLOB in GroupWise 5.5 can literally eat your documents alive. Quoting Guy Wiggins in his online review of the product at www.lextechinc.com/reviews/dms/groupwise_1.asp: "GroupWise 5.5 does not store documents in their native format but rather encrypts, compresses and stores them in databases known as BLOBS (for Binary Large Objects), which means there is no way of retrieving your documents if your GroupWise system is down." Not good. Not good at all.

On the other hand, if Worldox stops working, you have documents in their native format, accessible, if a bit harder to access because of the "autoname" function most people use (that results in Ross Kodner's 975th document being autonamed something like "RLK0975" instead of having a Windows long filename - but it would still be in a logical place under \docs\clientname\mattername).

So the bottom line is that if you have a LOCAL very experienced company who can support GroupWise's document management capabilities (and deal with "BLOB" corruption if it occurs), then you could CONSIDER using it. Otherwise, the accessibility to your work product and forms is SO completely mission-critical that an investment in a more mainstream, more easily supported and inherently more reliable DMS (either Worldox or iManage in my opinion) makes eminent long-run sense.

Regardless of the direction you go, some basic rules apply. Violating them virtually assures disaster. Following them will yield a formidable new tool for organizing and later finding and leveraging all your prior work product. A document management system is absolutely *NOT* a piece of software you can simply throw on a system and expect miracles. Proper pre-implementation planning of the document organizational structure, the configuration of the software, planning for an index server--all are 100% essential if there is to be success. And that's true whether you're talking about a 2-station peer-to-peer network with Worldox or the other end of the spectrum with a 500 seat WAN system with either Worldox or iManage. EVERY document management system implementation I've seen WITHOUT such planning AND without PROPER TRAINING has been a miserable failure.

Note that migrating to Worldox from Softsolutions is a well-documented process--I’ve guided a number of firms through this and it works very well--there is no loss of Softsolutions profile information. In fact, Worldox includes a "Conversion Kit" for moving from Softsolutions - info on this is located at www.worldox.com/pub/wdss5.htm.

The following quote appeared on the ABA’s Lawtech listserve in 1999 and may be of interest:

I am a one-person IS Department for a law firm with 70 users. I accomplished a combined SoftSolutions to Worldox and WordPerfect 6.1 to WordPerfect 8.0 conversion over the course of four weekends. Friday afternoons involved a four-hour training session for 12 to 25 user workgroups. Beginning Friday at 6:00 p.m. each work group's documents were successfully imported and converted by Saturday morning with absolutely no glitches (other than a few 3:00 o'clock in the morning mistakes which were purely the result of lack of sleep. . . . All of which were easily corrected by careful backtracking and superb pre-conversion guidance from the Worldox technical staff). I would also like to mention that there was zero downtime for the firm during the conversion, which is an oddity in this day and age of implementation.

After putting much thought into which features the users required and an attempt to minimize the learning curve, Worldox was set up to mimic SoftSolutions as closely as possible. Therefore, the users embraced Worldox with little duress. The additional features will be introduced at later follow-up training sessions as bonus bells and whistles!

Worldox has greatly simplied the file attachment process with GroupWise and has allowed the firm to finally manage our financial spreadsheet and graphic libraries as well.

As an administrator, it is a great relief to know that the profile and text indexes are stable and can be rebuilt from scratch in a matter of hours (and not days as with SoftSolutions) in the unlikely event of corruption.

So, while this may sound like a Worldox promotional spot, it’s not. My bottom-line on your question is that the "BLOB" format used by GroupWise 5.5 to store all your documents . . . well . . . scares the daylights out of me. With your Novell, as opposed to Windows NT, network platform orientation and no stated SQL database experience, Worldox would seem to be the logical least cost, lowest support-impact document management direction for your firm. Take two aspirins, convert your work product and call me in the morning <g>.

Ross Kodner is a "recovering lawyer" who saw the light and founded Milwaukee’s MicroLaw, Inc. a legal technology consultancy and systems integrator way back in 1985. He is the Chair of the ABA Law Practice Management Section’s Computer & Technology Division and is a member of the ABA TECHSHOW 2001 Executive Board. While his personal motto is "Friends don’t let friends word process without Reveal Codes," he does love his Microsoft Force Feedback Steering Wheel. He can be reached via www.microlaw.com, e-mail at rkodner@microlaw.com or by voice at either 877-378-7498 or 414-476-8433.