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Neil Brown
@neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

# Running a law firm on Free software (2024 edition)

Finding @Gina's blogpost yesterday about running a business using FOSS reminded me of this update that I wrote about a year ago.

It needs a few tweaks to represent improvements over the last year, but on the whole, it is still largely accurate.

https://decoded.legal/blog/2024/09/running-a-law-firm-on-free-software-2024-edition/

#FOSS #Linux #lawfedi #blog

Running a law firm on Free software (2024 edition)

Two years ago, I wrote about running decoded.legal - an English law firm - on Free software.
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Neil Brown
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Olivier Mehani
@shtrom@piaille.fr replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@neil Did you get further with ISO-27001?

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Neil Brown
@neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@shtrom Yes, definitely, but still more to do.

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Olivier Mehani
@shtrom@piaille.fr replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@neil can you share some details on easy/hard things?

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Neil Brown
@neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@shtrom I will - I just need to find the time to write it up!

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Ives
@ives@mstdn.social replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@neil @Gina Do you use any kind of version control system for your documents? Our company lawyers don't and it's driving me nuts. I'm always surprised this practice isn't more widespread beyond software development.

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Neil Brown
@neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@ives @Gina

I use git where I only have simple text content e.g. https://forge.neilzone.co.uk/neil/sample_fedi_terms

IME this does not work well for binary blobs like .odt files and other similar files.

For those, I use a script to create a new version, with a unique timestamp, for each editing round, along with tracked changes. That is consistent with other parties' expectations, which is important.

If there are better options for documents where version controlling the text content alone is not a viable option, I'd love to hear them.

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Ives
@ives@mstdn.social replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@neil @Gina Sounds like you're already way ahead of your colleagues :^).
And you're right: version control and binary blobs is unfortunately not a fantastic combination at the moment.

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Neil Brown
@neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

One of my ongoing experiments is whether I could use a Linux-first mobile device, instead of GrapheneOS.

So far, no, I cannot.

I can replicate most of what I need to do, business-wise, but not quite enough, and not with a high enough degree of reliability.

But the process of trying is beneficial in itself.

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theothertom
@tom@epsom.social replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@neil Even though I've (so far) found myself in a similar boat, I've also found the process of reducing dependence helpful. Wanting to jump between iOS/Linux/LineageOS has pushed me towards using far more flexible software, and even though the migration is incomplete I feel far less trapped than I did before.

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Mike Cox
@mikecox@mastodon.iow.social replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@neil I would love to get off the android or apple train but can't seem to get there yet.
My dream has always been to have a portable device that is my phone and computer. I could use it on the go and then plug in a screen and keyboard to use it as my desktop PC.
Everything on one device!
Perfection!

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Neil Brown
@neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@mikecox

> My dream has always been to have a portable device that is my phone and computer. I could use it on the go and then plug in a screen and keyboard to use it as my desktop PC.

I'm not sure I'd want it as my only device, but I'd definitely welcome being able to connect my mobile device to a screen.

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kaosk
@kaosk@mastodon.social replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@neil @mikecox A while back, I plugged my phone (Pixel8 + GrapheneOS) to a monitor and was able to used it with a Bluetooth keyboard + mouse. Haven't tested in a while, but don't see why it won't work.

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Mike Cox
@mikecox@mastodon.iow.social replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@kaosk @neil Great to hear. My concerns (maybe unfounded) are:
1. The apps I have to use (banks, NHS, parking for example) might not work on graphene.
2. Can I run my normal Linux apps on Graphene e.g. VScode

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Neil Brown
@neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk replied  ·  activity timestamp 3 days ago

@kaosk @mikecox

It depends on the hardware, and none of my devices have this :(

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