FAQ - Litigation Chron and Evidence Dashboard

CHRONOLOGY - GENERAL

1. Can issues, facts, and people be connected to each other to indicate a relationship?  For example, “these 5 facts support my wrongful termination issue”.
   The ability to connect issues, facts, and people to each other to establish new dimensions is not included in this release, but will be coming soon.  For example, connecting people and the facts associated with that person, or sorting facts by issue in the Chronology tab.
2. Can I connect issues, facts and people to transcript testimony?
   Issue, fact, and people coding is currently limited to document evidence, but we are working on providing the ability to connect these key case elements to testimony evidence.  
   • Notably, The ability to connect issues to transcript testimony currently exists, but is separate from our new Chronology functionality.  Those issues have to be set up in the database via MORE > Settings > Transcripts as Transcript Issues.
3. Are these features available in the Discovery suite as well?
   These features are not currently available in the Discovery suite; however, we understand the importance of building your story early on in the case. Users can currently denote Key Documents and Issues which will be automatically translated to Case Chronology. You can also create tags for Facts and People to reference as you build your story in Case Chronology. Our next round of updates in September will include deeper integrations with the Discovery suite.
   
   Additional Notes on Transferring from Discovery: 
   • Users can create a "Key Document" single checkbox custom field in Discovery and it will Exchange to Litigation and map to our new built in field
   • Users can create their Responsive Issues and code in Discovery and those will Exchange to Litigation and map to Document Issues in our Chronology/Dashboard
   • Facts and People cannot yet be exchanged, but we will review post-launch. In the interim, users can create custom picklist fields for Facts and People in Discovery and Exchange those to Litigation. Once they do, they can reference their custom coding and update to our new built in fields (screenshot below)

FACT, ISSUE AND PEOPLE MANAGEMENT

1. Which user permission levels in Litigation can access and utilize the case building elements (facts, issues, people)?
   • Advanced users can access the Chronology where they can create/edit/delete facts, issues and people.  At the document-level, Advanced users can create/edit facts, issues and people.
   • Standard users can access the Chronology tab where they can view fact/issue/people coding and navigate throughout relevant data.  At the document-level, Standard users can utilize all existing facts, issues, and people to code their documents.
   • Basic users can access the Chronology tab and view existing facts, issues, and people together with relevant data.  At the document-level, Basic users can view all facts, issues, and people which have been applied to the current document.
   • View only users cannot access the Chronology tab or fact, issue, people coding at the document level.  
2. Where did my issues go in the document coding panel?
   Case Connections section in document coding panel
3. Can I exchange Responsive Issues from Discovery to Litigation and populate my Chronology?
   Yes, Responsive issues in Discovery turn into issues in Litigation when transferred via Exchange
4. How can I create, edit, or delete Facts and People?
   Facts and People are not available in the MORE > Settings, but can be created and edited at both the document-level and Chronology tab.  
   1. To create a fact, issue or person:
      • At the document-level, navigate to the “Case Connections” section of the coding panel, select if you’d like to create a fact, issue or person, and within the drop-down, you will find the opportunity to “Create New’.  
      • In the Chronology tab, toggle to the fact, issue, or people grid and click the green “Create New” button at the top right.
   2. To edit a fact, issue, or person:
      • At the document-level, click on the relevant fact, issue or person once it’s been applied to a document, make your changes in the pop-up modal, and click “Save Changes”.
      • In the Chronology tab, toggle to the relevant grid, and click the relevant fact, issue or person’s name, make your changes in the pop-up modal, and click “Save Changes”.
   3. To delete a fact, issue, or person:
      • In the Chronology tab, toggle to the relevant grid, and click the relevant fact, issue or person’s name.  In the pop-up modal, you will see the opportunity to “Delete” the fact, issue or person and will be provided a confirmation pop-up before your action is final.
5. If you are creating a fact at document level, do you need to input date manually?
   Yes, at this time you need to manually enter dates of facts.
6. What are the colors for Facts and People?
   Facts and People can be assigned colors when created (much like Folders and Issues can be organized now).  By default, a consistent gray tone will be assigned in the event you do not want to color code.
7. Can Facts, Issues, and People be locked down to prevent users from creating new or using to code?
   No. However, only Advanced users can add, edit and delete facts, issues and people in a database. Additionally, only Advanced and Standard users can code document evidence with facts, issues, and people in Litigation.

BULK CODING & SEARCH

8. Are Facts and People available in bulk actions?
   In our initial release, Facts and People will not be available via the Bulk Actions modal in the document grid.  We want to be sure this relevant coding is thoughtful and with intent.  That said, we will be reaching out to our user community post-launch to better understand if this is a need.  
9. Can I search for facts, issues and people?
   Yes.  The search syntaxes for each are as follows:
   • Fact:”fact name”
   • Issue:”issue name”
   • People:”person’s name” OR Person:”person’s name”
   • People:”person’s name” AND Issue:”issue name”
10. Are facts, issues and people in Advanced Search or Filters?
    Issues are available in Advanced Search and Filters in your Litigation database.
    
    Notably, Facts and People will not be added to Advanced search or Filters in our initial launch, but we will be reaching out to our user community post-launch to better understand if this is a need. 

KEY DOCUMENTS

11. Will the new default Key Document tag be added to Discovery as well?
    Not immediately, but any Discovery database which has a “Key Document” custom field can have data exchanged to litigation and the Key Document tag will be mapped to the new Litigation functionality.
12. What I had a Key Document field before deploy?
    On deploy, we will run a script to update all Key Document fields in existing Litigation databases to be our new default/built-in Key Document single checkbox field.
13. If I have a Hot Document checkbox field in Discovery, will that exchange over to Litigation and translate to the new Key Document checkbox?
    • In order for any Hot Document checkbox field to exchange properly from Discovery to Litigation, you can take 1 of 2 routes
    • The first, makes sure to rename your Hot Document field as "Key Document" before initiating your exchange from Discovery to Litigation
    • The second option, and helpful if you've already exchanged your Hot Document field, is to filter or search for hot_document:* and complete a bulk action to update with the "Key Document" field.
14. How do I search for Key Documents in Litigation?
    • Key_document:true
    • -Key_document:true

EXPORTS

16. What’s included in the CSV exports from Facts, Issues, and People?
    The fields which you see displayed in the fact, issue and people grids are what will be included in the CSV export(s)
17. What if I need a visual timeline of my case?
    Every case, case team, story, data set, etc. are different and so we chose to not try and deliver a “one size fits all” timeline visualization in this first release.  However, Nextpoint’s Trial Services Team has a wealth of experience in preparing impactful presentations and can support our users in turning your fact chronologies into visual timelines. 
18. Why are my document ids exported in the fact chronology, issue report, and cast of characters report separated by a space?
    Document ids are exported in a format so you can easily copy/paste as a search in your database formatted as id:(# # # #)

EVIDENCE DASHBOARD

1. Which user permission levels in Litigation can access and utilize the Evidence dashboard?
   Advanced and Standard users are able to access and utilize the Evidence Dashboard.  We will speak with clients to further understand their needs post-release to see if we need to open up to Basic permissions.
2. Can I customize which cards are on the Evidence Dashboard and how they are organized?
   Not at this time
3. What is an unsupported fact?
   An unsupported fact is a fact which does not currently have any document evidence associated with it.  This is typically an indication that the particular fact(s) need to have supporting evidence located and assigned.  
4. Are "most viewed documents" in the Evidence Dashboard specific to an individual or database-wide?
   The Most Viewed Documents card is specific to the database, not a particular user.

INFINITE SCROLL FOR TRANSCRIPTS

1. When will infinite scrolling transcripts be released?
   We are currently scheduled to deploy scrolling transcripts on July 15, 2023.
2. Will users be able to highlight to the middle of lines with this release?
   No.
3. Will my existing designation and issue markups be maintained upon release?
   Yes.

View Full Support Articles:
Facts, Issues, and People

Litigation Chronology Tab

Evidence Dashboard