WordPerfect 7 Legal Edition

WordPerfect 7 - Legal Edition

The Corel WordPerfect 7 Legal Suite includes a myriad of legal add-ons to enhance your practice. It also includes some minor updates to WordPerfect itself, as well as the other Corel programs in the Suite.

The Suite includes Corel WordPerfect 7, Presentations 7, Quattro Pro 7, Paradox 7, and Envoy 1.0a. There is also Netscape Navigator 2.02, the Desktop Application Director, an integrated Address Book, and hundreds of fonts and clip art images. A copy of the American Heritage Dictionary is included as well. The new Address Book is great. It includes fields for just about any piece of information you might want to record about someone.

WordPerfect itself includes several new features that increase the program's functionality. For example, you can insert a paragraph number anywhere in a document, even within a paragraph, by using Ctrl-Shift-F5. You can view your most recently used fonts in a WYSIWIYG dialog by selecting QuickFonts from the Power Bar. You can also select commonly-used WordPerfect Characters, such as trademark and copyright symbols, from the new Characters pull-down list on the Power Bar.

QuickSpots--small rectangles that appear next to paragraphs, graphics, and table cells as you move your mouse--let you apply a variety of formatting codes to your document using floating pop-up menus.

The legal-specific programs in the Suite include HotDocs 4.1, CompareRite 5.5, FullAuthority 5.5, Corel Amicus Attorney 1.7, NexLaw 7 and Lexicon from Black's Law Dictionary. All of these are useful tools that will be familiar to attorneys. Most of them can be upgraded to their full versions. These are the best parts of the Suite.

The WordPerfect 7 filenames are the same as they were for version 6.1, an attempt to preserve compatibility with document management software. Nevertheless, whenever I try to open a file created in WordPerfect 6.1, SoftSolutions 4.1 keeps telling me that the wrong application is assigned to the file.

Although the Suite offers a lot of functionality, it is not completely integrated. It also includes several duplicative functions. For example, the Address Book tracks names and addresses, and so does Amicus. NexLaw can categorize client documents, and so can Amicus. CompareRite creates blacklined documents, and so does WordPerfect. Nevertheless, all or some of the add-ons will increase your productivity regardless of the duplication.

If you need one or more of the legal-specific products in the Suite (because, for example, CompareRite itself can run you $189), or if you want the latest Windows 3.1 Suite, the upgrade price is worth it.

Corel Corp.
(800) 772-6735
www.corel.com
Windows 3.1

$449; upgrade price: $229

Reviewed by Richard C. Belthoff, Jr., attorney, Grier & Grier, Charlotte, N.C.

Dec/Jan '98 Issue