FIRMS TALK DIGITALThree law firms have recently begun rolling out digital dictation software across their practices - Birmingham's Lee Crowder has chosen nFlow's DictaFlow package to compliment its VisualFiles and Elite set-ups, while Tonbridge Wells-based Cripps Harries Hall has opted to extend its use of BigHand's TotalSpeech product across the firm following a successful pilot.

City firm Denton Wilde Sapte will also extend BigHand's package out to an extra 1,000 users across three offices.

Meanwhile, City-based Baker & Mackenzie has bought an 8,500-user licence for the new version of Hummingbird's document management system and Lee & Pembertons has snapped up a 54-user Timeslice LAWMAN integrated case and practice system - this will replace the firm's current Norwel system.

LAWYERS IN THE KNOWLawyers working on multi-party litigation relating to property stolen during the Holocaust are set to benefit from an IT product that will archive all the relevant documentation and make it available at the touch of a button.

First to Know - developed by researcher Steve Clare and database expert Ellen Van London - will enable lawyers to search through thousands of documents which are decades old by converting them from paper or microfilm into PDF or Word formats.

The developers say the product could ultimately be used in any litigation where lawyers need to extract information from masses of documents.LINKS: www.1sttoknow.com

CLIENTS GET ON THE CASEBristol-based law firm AMD Solicitors has launched a Web site that will enable clients and agents to log on to their own pages and check the status of their cases.

They will automatically be notified about changes via e-mail.

In Surrey, Hart Brown has relaunched its Web site with the help of Cproject, which removed the site's frameset to optimise navigation and search engine visibility.

It now also features a private client case-tracking facility.