Mobile Computing is a variety of wireless devices that have the mobility to allow people to connect to the internet, providing wireless transmission to access data and information from whatever their location may be. In simple terms, it is "taking a computer and all necessary files and software out into the field".
Mobile computing, which can be traced back to its first use in the 1990s, has become even more popular over the past decade. Since then, it has been under continuous development with advances in hardware, network and applications. With various innovative ideas provided in the information technology market, various solutions and innovations have also been coming out front in the mobile computing industry. Countless number of devices have forayed in the market, bringing a newer sense of wireless communication.
Mobile computing has become an essential part of nearly everyone's daily routine. From the checking of business emails on the go to messaging, paying bills, reading newspapers, reading books, visiting social network sites, getting driving directions, chatting, photography and carrying out various kinds of businesses and transactions, it plays a huge role to bring things together even when physically apart. Simply put, mobile computing, with the use of various high technology gadgets and devices, makes communication easier and the lives of the people more convenient by keeping them informed and updated with the current goings-on.
Mobile technology, particularly smartphones and tablets powered by cloud technologies, is driving productivity improvements and innovation among lawyers. As the companies and individuals have started taking advantage of mobile computing platforms, sales and shipments of smartphones crossed record sales in India as revealed by CyberMedia Research. During the first eleven months of 2011, smartphone shipments in India passed the 10 million mark compared to 2.5 million smartphones that were shipped in 2009. The demand for smartphones is also predicted to grow to 30 Million units by 2016.
Advantages
Law firms are recording incredible growth in productivity and efficiency due to the implementation of mobile - technology based solutions. Below are the some of the advantages of mobile computing:
- Improve business productivity by providing seamless and immediate access to critical data through mobile practice management solution. All the activities including time sheets, expense recording, expense approvals, leave approvals, work in progress review, billing MIS review can be done on the go.
- Improve operational efficiency by reducing paper work, rework and information accuracy.
- Increase effectiveness of the lawyers by providing on the go access capability to information, documents and reminders for court dates, client meetings, etc.
- Strengthen customer relationships by creating more opportunities to connect, providing information at their fingertips when they need it most.
- Gain competitive advantage by creating differentiation in overall customer interactions. Mobile computing is a key enabling technology for the creation of strategic information systems.
Mobile Applications
The real power of mobile computing becomes apparent when mobile hardware, software, and communications are optimally configured and used to accomplish tasks specific to the law firms. Although a variety of applications exists, mobile computing applications can broadly be classified into two categories: general and legal industry specific applications.
General Applications
General applications have broad-based approach and include software that performs general functions including: Communications: Internet Browsing, E-mail, Instant Messaging, Social Networking;
- Multimedia: Graphics/Image Viewer, Presentations Viewers, Video Players, Audio Players;
- Productivity: Calendars, Calculators, Diary, Notepad/Memo/Word Processors, Spreadsheets;
- Travel: Weather, Itinerary Manager, City Guide, Currency Converter, Translators, GPS/Maps, etc.; and, Utilities: Profile Manager, Screensavers, Address Book, Task Manager, Call Manager, File Manager, etc.
These types of applications usually come as pre-installed applications on smart phones and tablets. Further, varieties of applications are available on mobile market places that can be easily downloaded and installed from the Internet.
These apps are specifically built for organizing case presentations for the courtroom. These apps enable lawyers to organize, annotated and manage their case files for court hearings and other meetings
Legal Industry Specific Applications
These applications are legal industry specific and only have appeal within the legal community. Applications commonly used by the legal industry include: Communications: Internet Browsing, E-mail, Instant Messaging, Social Networking;
- Law Practice Management: These apps provide cost effective way to manage a law practice from anywhere. Features include client management, matters, calendaring, time and billing and analytics.
- Document Access and Review: Enables users to carry documents, folders and workspaces with them, quickly access recent documents, search full text to quickly locate documents, edit documents, share documents and upload the documents back to the central server. These solutions get integrated with practice management solutions to provide seamless operational capabilities.
- Project Management: These apps provide project management features for law firms to manage their transactions including tasks/activities, milestones, deadlines and resources management.
- Time and Billing: Time and billing apps provide the features of time recording, task management, timers, expense recording, billing the call made to clients apart from reminder for court dates and calendaring activities. Further, users can export and e-mail the data in CSV, HTML and Excel for preparing bills.
- Legal Notepads: Instead of taking notes with pen and paper, lawyers can use a stylus or even just a fingertip to write notes on the smartphones/tablets.
Document Readers: These apps enable enable lawyers to read the documents on their smartphones/tablets. Further, users can view books, movies, maps, and pictures. Further, these apps also provide the ability to annotate documents, zoom, conduct a text search, and leap from point to point in the document with PDF hyperlinks.
Mobile computing is an inevitable, evolving technology. It enables lawyers on the go to effectively communicate and interact with organizational information systems while remaining unconstrained by physical location.
Mobile Security Concerns
Security is one of the top concerns, when you plan to use a smartphone/ tablet as part of your law practice as there are chances of information theft if someone steals it or you otherwise lose it. You need to take steps to secure your phone against unauthorized access and ensure that information is not accidentally exposed.
Apart from basic measures like password protection for devices, other measures like tracking of lost phones, wiping data remotely, locking specific apps, antivirus and malware protection and data encryption should be considered as part of your mobile strategy.
Mobile computing is an inevitable, evolving technology. It enables lawyers on the go to effectively communicate and interact with organizational information systems while remaining unconstrained by physical location. Effective mobile computing may be implemented using the combinations of cloud applications, smartphones/tablets apps and enterprise solutions. One of the great advantages of today's mobile technology is that its individual features can be turned on and off or added and deleted on demand. With better understanding the technology, proposed use and impact law firms can design effective mobile strategy for overall effectiveness.
About Uberall Practice League
Law firms want security, mobility and ease of use. Clients want lower costs and better service. The cloud fulfils both purposes, so many more law firms will make the switch to cloud. especially now that the tablets like Android and iPad provides the missing device to connect the law firms with the courtroom. We believe 2012 is the year of inevitability. Uberall Practice League offers mobile, cloud based secure, ready-to-use, pay-as-you-go law practice software to assist law, audit and consultancy firms manage their practice in real time. this ready to use software include time keeping, automated billing, client ledgers, case calendars, task management, reminders/alerts and ready dashboards to manage and grow your professional practice.