The document workspace
Drafting, editing, reviewing and preparing a matter's documents in the browser.
Where your firm drafts in the browser, a matter's documents open there. The trust, the wills, the powers of attorney, the deeds and the engagement and disengagement letters are drafted from the matter record, edited on the page, reviewed, and prepared for signing without leaving the platform. The page is the document: what you see there is what the client receives once it's reviewed and shared.
The document stays connected to the record while you work. A name, a date or a trustee drawn from the matter is a connected field, so correcting the record corrects every document that uses it, and wording you write by hand stays yours. This page covers working on one document, then the whole set together. Templates, packages and sharing are on documents and templates.
Opening a document
Documents live in the Produce lane of the matter's Assembly tab. Each row drafted in the browser offers Open, which loads the document in its own page; Word documents keep their own actions (see where Word documents fit). A document the matter plans but hasn't drafted yet opens the same way: the platform drafts it from the record as it opens, so there is no separate generate step and nothing needs to be filled in first. Missing details show up as open items inside the document rather than blocking you at the door.
Open plan, beside the document list in Produce, opens the whole set in Execution.
The arrow at the top left, labelled Documents, takes you back. Leaving the page saves your work first.
The page and its panels
Joint revocable living trust
Reviewed
Pour-over will Eleanor
Draft
Pour-over will Thomas
Draft
Durable power of attorney Eleanor
Draft
Last Will of Eleanor Whitcombe
I, Eleanor Whitcombe, of Lane County, Oregon, declare this to be my will.
I give the residue of my estate to the trustee of The Whitcombe Family Trust, to be held under its terms.
I nominate Maren Whitcombe as personal representative, to serve without bond in any jurisdiction.
Personal representative, 1st
Maren Whitcombe · from the matter
‹ Locate · 1 of 2 ›
Sections
If any child of mine is a minor…
Not included
I give my tangible personal property…
Included
The top row names the document (and whose copy it is, when the matter has one for each spouse), shows its status, and says whether your latest edits are saved. Saving is automatic. The row carries one main action for the document's state, such as Mark reviewed on a draft or Share on a reviewed document, and everything else sits in the ⋮ menu beside it.
The documents list on the left shows the matter's other documents. Opening it folds the console's sidebar out of the way; closing it brings the sidebar back. Each row gives a document's name and status, and the open document lists its copies underneath: Current draft, or Reviewed copy with its PDF once it has been reviewed.
The pages sit in the middle with a formatting toolbar above them. Connected fields are tinted on the page, and the Highlights switch in the footer turns the tint on and off. The legend names the colors in use: Merged for a value filled from the record, Edited for wording changed by hand in this document, Added for new wording since the last review, and Needs review for something waiting on a decision. That legend color marks wording on the page; it isn't the document's status, which can also read Needs review (see reviewing a document). Insert connected fact, in the toolbar, places a field from the record where your cursor is.
The panel on the right has four tabs:
- Document lists this document's connected fields and its sections, with a count of the fields.
- Changes shows what has changed since the document was last reviewed, each change with Locate to find it on the page and Restore to put the earlier wording back (or Remove, for wording that was added).
- Matter shows the record facts the document draws on: the people, their roles, the matter's lists and values. A dot on the tab means something there needs attention.
- History lists each review with its PDF, and any copies the platform kept along the way.
Above the tabs' contents, a short line counts the open items for the document, such as a required field with no value. Expand it to see each one; Show me goes to the place it's resolved.
Fields and the matter record
Selecting a field on the page opens its card in the Document tab, and the card's ‹ Locate · 1 of 2 › steps through every place the field appears. A use that isn't on the page, because its section doesn't apply, is listed as Not on the page.
There are two ways to change what a field says, and they do different things:
- Edit the wording in this document. Type over the field on the page, or in its card with This use selected, and only that spot changes. With This document selected, the card changes every use of the field in this document at once; when those uses already differ, it shows the differences and waits for Replace all uses. Hand wording is marked Edited and stays put when the record changes later.
- Change the record. Edit the fact in the Matter tab and save, or choose Everywhere in the field's card, type the new value and pick Review update…. Either way the change lands on the matter record, and every document that uses the value follows it. The card says how far the change reaches: a person's details can be used on other matters too, while a matter value stays on this matter.
Before an Everywhere change goes through, a confirmation lists each document it reaches and what will happen to it. A draft updates; a reviewed document goes back to draft and needs another review; a copy already shared with the client stays exactly as the client has it. Older Word drafts that use the value are listed too, since they'll show that their data changed. Confirm update makes the change.
Changing the record from a document this way needs the Decide permission under Record decisions; see staff access.
If a value has to be cleared rather than changed, the card points you to the record itself, since an empty document field is not how a record loses a value.
Sections and conditions
Some wording only belongs in a document under certain facts: a guardianship clause when there are minor children, a joint clause when spouses plan together. The Sections list in the Document tab shows each such section with its status, Included, Not included or Left out in this document, and expanding a row explains the condition in plain words, with Locate and Open Matter to change the facts behind it.
A section can be left out of one document on purpose. Its menu offers Leave out of this document, which removes it here without touching the template or any other document; Use template rule puts the section back under its normal condition.
When a list the condition depends on has no entries yet (no children recorded, say), the document assumes there are none for now. An Assumptions group above Sections names that list as Assumed none and the wording it affects. Add the entries on the record and the document adjusts.
Questions that must be answered before review
When a condition turns on a question nobody has answered yet, the document doesn't guess. While you're drafting, the wording that depends on it stays visible and editable, including both alternatives where the answer chooses between two. The section row reads Waiting on, followed by the question.
A document can't be marked reviewed while such a question is open. Mark reviewed lists the question by name, and its action takes you to the Matter tab where the answer lives. Answer it there and the document keeps the wording that applies. Leaving one alternative out of the document by hand doesn't count as an answer, because the other alternative is still waiting on the same question.
Undoing a change
The page has its own undo and redo, from the toolbar or the usual keyboard shortcuts, for the wording and formatting you change on the page.
A change to the matter record is undone separately, because it may have reached other documents. Right after a record update, Undo record change is offered beside the field you changed. It restores the record only, for 15 minutes or until the document is saved again; documents that went back to draft because of the change stay in draft. Page undo never reverses a record change, and record undo never reverses your wording.
Reviewing a document
Reviewing is one action. Mark reviewed saves the draft, checks it, and either records the review or tells you what's missing, with each item pointing to where it's fixed. There is nothing to prepare and no separate confirmation.
A reviewed document is read-only and says so: Reviewed and read-only. Edit returns it to draft. Edit document reopens it as a draft when something needs to change; it then needs another review before it goes out, and until it's reviewed again its status reads Needs review.
The PDF of record
Each review produces the document's PDF of record, made from exactly the copy that was reviewed. It is what the client receives when the document is shared, unless you choose to share the editable Word file instead (see sharing a document with the client). It's listed in History beside the review, with who reviewed it and when. Download PDF in the ⋮ menu fetches it once a document has been reviewed; a draft has no PDF of record.
Download Word is always in the menu and gives a clean Word copy. On a draft, Download current copy gives the copy exactly as it stands in the editor, even before your latest edits are saved.
After review
Share sends a reviewed document to the client's portal. The ⋮ menu also carries Mark done, for a document finished without sharing, and later Pull from portal and Reopen. These work as they do anywhere else in the platform; see sharing a document with the client and finishing a document.
A shared document can still be edited. Your changes stay in the firm's working copy, and the page says so: the client keeps the copy you shared until you review the new one and choose Share again. Until then the document's status reads Shared · edited, needs review.
Starting over
Start over, in a draft's menu, redrafts the document from the template and the current record. The draft you had is kept, and Recover previous draft brings it back until the document is next reviewed.
The Execution view
Execution shows a matter's instruments together, in the order they'll be signed. Switch to it with Execution at the top of the documents list, or with Open plan in Produce; Document switches back to the selected document's own page.
Joint revocable living trust
Reviewed
Pour-over will Eleanor
Draft
Pour-over will Thomas
Draft
Certification of trust
Draft
Bargain and sale deed
Left out of this execution
The Whitcombe Family Trust
This agreement is made by Eleanor Whitcombe and Thomas Whitcombe, as settlors and as the first trustees…
Article One · Name and purpose
Share
Mark done
Download PDF
Download Word
Leave out of this execution
Every instrument the matter plans appears in the list, including ones not drafted yet, Word documents and documents fulfilled by an uploaded file. Selecting a row shows that document. One drafted in the browser opens for editing just as it does on its own page; a Word or uploaded document shows where to work on it instead.
The Matter tab in Execution covers the facts every document in the set draws on, so a correction made there reaches all of them, and Changes covers the set's changes since its last review.
Once every document going into the execution is reviewed, the execution set is built from the Produce lane.
Leaving a document out of an execution
Not every planned document is signed at the same sitting. In Execution, Leave out of this execution in a document's ⋮ menu takes it out of the set being prepared without removing it from the matter. It keeps its place in the list, marked Left out of this execution, and a line above the pages counts how many documents are left out; choosing it lists them. Restore to execution brings one back. Neither asks for a reason.
A left-out document is still work on the matter. It stays editable, its record facts still update, and it isn't put into the execution set until it's restored. While it's outstanding, sharing the rest doesn't count the matter's drafting as finished: once everything else is shared, the matter's next step reads Review remaining work.
This is different from leaving a section out of one document. Leave out of this document drops wording inside a document; Leave out of this execution sets a whole document aside for now.
When the template changes
When the firm publishes a new version of a template, drafts made from it follow on their own. Wording you haven't touched picks up the new version, and your edits carry over where they still fit. The draft you had is kept in History.
Where a change in the template collides with something you wrote, the draft keeps your work and raises an item instead. The Changes tab then shows a Template update comparison, with the current and proposed wording side by side for each collision. Choose Keep current wording or Use proposed wording (you can edit the proposal first), and Adopt template update once every comparison is settled.
A reviewed document stays exactly as it was reviewed. A shared document never updates by itself: adopting the update asks you to confirm that only the firm's working copy changes, and the client keeps what was shared.
When the matter's choice changes
Sometimes the facts change which document the matter needs, for instance a couple's two single trusts becoming one joint trust. Work done on the document that's no longer chosen isn't lost. The document that replaces it opens with Previous edits, naming where the edits came from.
Review previous edits shows the proposed result with the carried-over wording highlighted. Choose Apply previous edits to bring them in, or Keep current version to start from the new document as drafted. Each resulting document gets its own decision, so a matter that now needs two documents decides for each. Until you decide, that document can be read but not edited; the matter's other documents carry on as usual. The earlier copies stay in History either way.
When someone else has the document open
One person edits a document at a time. While a colleague has it open, its row in Produce reads Editing now with their name. If you open it then, it opens read-only and says Someone else is editing this document, so it is open read-only. The same happens in a second tab or window of your own. Reload once they're done to edit it.
If the document goes read-only while you have unsaved changes, nothing you typed is lost: the changes are kept as a copy, listed under Kept copies in History after you reload, where Use this copy can bring them back.
History and kept copies
History lists every review, newest first, each with its PDF and a View that opens the reviewed copy read-only in place. Below the reviews, Kept copies holds the versions the platform saved along the way: a draft replaced by Start over, a draft that a template update or a change of choice moved past, or edits saved while someone else had the document open. View opens one, and Use this copy makes it the working draft again.
Letters
Engagement and disengagement letters open in the same kind of page, with the same panels, and are reviewed the same way. A reviewed engagement letter offers Send for signing, and a disengagement letter is sent from its page. See the engagement letter for how letters fit the matter.
On a letter that's signed electronically, each signature and date shows on the page as a colored box labelled with its signer, such as Client 1 signature or Attorney date. The boxes are placed over the signature lines automatically and follow the line as the text around it moves. You can drag a box, or resize a signature box, if the placement needs adjusting. The boxes never print and never appear in the PDF; they tell the signing step where each person signs, just above their line. A box can be moved but not deleted, and the signature block stays on one page as the letter reflows.
Mark reviewed checks the boxes before the letter can go out: each signer on the matter has one signature box and one date box, each fits on its page and is large enough to sign in, and a box that's missing, doubled or moved into or out of a conditional passage is named so you can put it right. A letter drafted before signature boxes existed is updated the next time you edit and save it.
Where Word documents fit
Not every document is drafted in the browser. Documents from templates the firm still keeps in Word, and drafts made before the firm's templates moved to the browser, stay Word documents. They keep their own tools in the Produce lane: Revise in Word, refreshing from the record when their data changes, and the rest described on documents and templates.
Both kinds sit side by side in the same matter, the same list and the same execution, and both are shared with the client the same way. A document drafted in the browser can always be downloaded as a Word file, but its working copy is the one on the page.