In this article, we`ll show you how to enter legal symbols into your documents, create your own shortcuts, and share alternatives across devices. We are the world`s leading provider of cloud-based legal software. With Clio`s affordable, barrier-free solutions, lawyers can manage and grow their law firms more efficiently, cost-effectively and with a better client experience. We`re redefining the way lawyers run their law firms by equipping them with essential tools to securely manage their law firms from any device, anywhere. The § section character is a typographic symbol used to refer to individually numbered sections of a document. It is often used when citing articles from a legal code. [1] It is also known as section symbol, section marker, double-s or silcrow. [2] [3] The section sign is often used to designate a particular article of a legal code. For example, in the Bluebook style, “16 of Section 580p U.S.C. § 580p” becomes “16 U.S.C.
§ 580p.” [4] The section character is often used with the pilcrow (¶), also known as a “paragraph mark”, to designate a specific paragraph in a section of a document. While § is generally read as a section of a word in spoken English, many other languages use the word “paragraph” exclusively to refer to a section of a document (specifically the text of the law) and use other words to describe a paragraph in the English sense. Therefore, in these cases, it can be read as a paragraph and sometimes referred to as a “paragraph mark”, but this is a description of its use, not a formal name. [5] [6] When duplicated as §§, it is read as plural “sections”. For example, “§§ 13-21” would be read as “sections 13 to 21”, just as pp. (pages) is the plural of p., meaning page. Keyboard shortcuts for legal symbols prevent you from stopping your writing flow by quickly routing your symbol across the page without stopping. Mac and Windows computers already have built-in keyboard shortcuts. But the way you trigger them is different. In Windows, hold down the Alt key, and then enter the sequence of numbers listed in the table above.
For the section icon on a Windows computer, hold down the Alt key. Next, enter the numbers “0167” and release the Alt key. This would create the section icon (§) in your text. While Windows alt keyboard shortcuts are huge, only a few icons are needed to create legal documents. Mac has simpler keyboard shortcuts for these icons. Get all the guidance and best practices for assessing, implementing, and adopting software solutions to automate legal documents. Keyboard shortcuts should not be limited to icons. You can program entire sections to insert themselves. The AutoText feature of Microsoft Word can be programmed to insert both expressions and formatting when they are used.
You can enter the header and signature blocks once in court applications, save them as auto-insert, and then quickly insert them into your documents. If you don`t want to write your own keyboard shortcuts, you can purchase add-ins to configure them for you. Lawcut§ (Lawcuts) is an add-in for Microsoft Word that adds a list of Word-specific keyboard shortcuts to the right. The monthly fee to run Lawcut§ on Microsoft Word is $1.99. We`ve put together a quick guide that you can refer to for all standard keyboard shortcuts. Before I learn the shortcuts for some of the symbols I use frequently, I would copy and paste them from Google. However, this often leads to mistakes, either by using the wrong symbol or by copying and pasting something completely different. Keyboard shortcuts for legal symbols also avoid unnecessary errors. If you know your keyboard shortcuts for legal symbols, lawyers can get the right icon the first time.
If you don`t use keyboard shortcuts, you may insert the wrong icon. Knowing the right keyboard shortcuts for legal symbols reduces the likelihood of mistakes and the added stress that comes with them. Documents to be reviewed by the Bankruptcy Notice Centre (NCB) must comply with the guidelines established by the NCB, otherwise the notice will not be generated. The guidelines are defined in the document “Creating PDF Documents for CM/ECF”, which is published on our website in the Electronic File Filing menu. The document contains a list of acceptable fonts for the BNC. These rules also apply to special characters used in documents. Instead of assigning keyboard shortcuts for each legal symbol, you can also hack AutoCorrect to insert your legal symbols for you by assigning a quick phrase to each symbol. In our sample video, we assign the word “cults” to the section icon for self-correction. Among the legal symbols listed, the only one with a standard iPhone shortcut is the section icon. Long press the & symbol and you will have the option to enter a § in its place. As mentioned earlier, I used to copy and paste icons from Google or other documents. The problem with this is that you are not only copying the icon, but also the formatting associated with it.
This list of allowed keyboard jumps may not contain icons that your industry, jurisdiction, or judge prefers. You may not want to learn the alternative keyboard shortcuts and use something memorable instead. You can always create more by customizing your keyboard shortcuts. Keyboard shortcuts are a sequence of keys that, when pressed, insert a symbol or special character into a document. They can be used to enter punctuation marks like a dash, but in our case we want to use links to enter legal symbols. Without keyboard shortcuts for legal symbols, typing a section icon would require a lot of clicks. Need to create a document on the go? If so, you`ll be happy to know that you can create legal symbols on your mobile device. Now enter your legal symbol letters, press the spacebar and AutoCorrect will paste the symbol into your Word document. You can easily customize your own shortcuts in Word. Choose the legal symbols you use most often and follow these steps to set up your own shortcuts, or watch our video to see how to do this. Learning how to be more efficient with your legal documents is an easy way to improve your bottom line without spending a dime.
If you don`t want to remember a lot of Windows or Mac shortcuts, you can also set up your own or hack Word`s AutoCorrect feature to enter symbols in just a few steps. Read below or watch the “how to” video. Save time and stay in the flow by using these quick keyboard shortcuts to add straight icons to your documents. If learning and programming your own keyboard shortcuts seems difficult, there is an alternative. Legalboard sells keyboards specific to lawyers. These keyboards have special keys that insert symbols such as § or ¶ for you. Keyboards also have keys for common legal words, such as defendant or defendant. You can insert these words simply by pressing a single key. Finally, Legalboard also has some formatting options such as keystrokes.
Changing your fonts to small caps for quotes is just a simple typing is an example of a feature that this keyboard provides. Keyboard shortcuts are a combination of keys that insert a special character or trigger a special action in a computer program.