The Annotations page allows you to easily identify and understand key narratives and themes from across all your depositions in a single, holistic view and quickly use the appropriate selections as needed.
All annotations created by any user across every deposition in a matter can be viewed and edited from the Annotations page. Further, you can search and sort the annotations in order to find the relevant selections.
You can find annotations based on the selected deposition text and corresponding work product and metadata using the search bar, which operates much like its DISCO Ediscovery counterpart, legal research software (such as Westlaw or Lexis), or Google. Note that when you search on the Annotations page, the search is limited to annotations, while a search on the depositions page searches both deposition text and annotations.
See Case Builder search manual for search basics, supported operators, and order of operations.
Fields
A search query that does not specify a field (i.e., “fieldless”) will search the selected text of annotations, annotation titles, and annotation notes. Identify a field followed by parentheses to focus a search more specifically. Within the parentheses, you can use operators (such as & or quotation marks), and multiple fields can be searched simultaneously to narrow the results (such as date(2019) & isExpert(yes) & “carbon scrubbers”).
Common annotation fields
Command |
Description |
Example |
text |
Selected deposition text that was annotated (excludes page and line numbers) |
text(“carbon scrubbers”) --Any annotation with carbon scrubbers in the selected deposition text |
createdDate3 |
Date the annotation was created |
createdDate(1/1/2019) --Any annotation created on January 1, 2019 |
tag |
Tags in the annotation |
tag(contract or designation) — Any annotation with the contract or designation tag |
note |
Inline annotation notes |
note(carbon % oxygen) --Any annotation note containing carbon but does not have oxygen |
witness |
Name of the witness |
witness(Smith) — Annotations added to depositions of witnesses with Smith as either the first or last name |
partyAlignment4 |
User-provided party alignment of the witness |
partyAlignment(Plaintiff) — Any annotation added to a deposition that has been identified as affiliated with the Plaintiff |
isExpert5 |
User-provided; whether the witness is an expert in this case |
isExpert(yes) — Any annotation added to a deposition that has been identified as an expert |
title |
User-provided title of the annotation |
title(accounting) --Any annotation with accounting in its annotation title |
createdBy |
Email address of user who created the annotation |
createdBy(jones@lawfirm.com) --Any annotation created by the user with the email address of jones@lawfirm.com |
caseImpact |
The rating of a witness's estimated impact on the case |
caseImpact(harmful)
--Any annotations from depositions by witnesses with a harmful (or worse, such as "very harmful") rating |
Work product modifiers
Annotations’ tags and notes can be searched by dates added and users adding them, as well as by the user-appended “impact” evaluation that can be optionally applied to any tag.
Syntax |
Description |
tag(by laywer@lawfirm.com) |
Annotations tagged by lawyer@lawfirm.com |
tag(designation & by lawyer@lawfirm.com) |
Annotations tagged designation by lawyer@lawfirm.com |
tag(damages % by lawyer@lawfirm.com) |
Annotations tagged damages by someone other than lawyer@lawfirm.com |
tag(by lawyer@lawfirm.com & on 10/16/2015) |
Annotations tagged by lawyer@lawfirm.com on 10/16/2015 |
tag(damages & by laywer@lawfirm.com & before 10/16/2015) |
Annotations tagged damages by lawyer@lawfirm.com before 10/16/2015 |
note(“carbon scrubber” & by lawyer@lawfirm.com & before 10/16/2015) |
Annotations with a note containing “carbon scrubber” by lawyer@lawfirm.com before 10/16/2015 |
tag(damages & impact helpful) |
Annotations tagged damages with helpful impact |
Search results can be sorted by the following fields:
- Deposition (by deponent last name, first name, deposition date, and location of the selection within the deposition)
- Title
- Tag count
- Note count
- Created on
- Created by
- Last updated on
- Last updated by
Each field sort can be ordered descending or ascending. In addition to the user’s choice of primary sort field, deposition is the secondary sort field.
Each annotation matching the search in the case is displayed in the results. Results can be expanded, in which case the entire selection is displayed and all actions are available, or collapsed, for quickly skimming the results. When a search result is collapsed, in-line actions are not available. Clicking anywhere within the card will expand the result.
The following information is displayed on each annotation card:
Citation, title, and selection text:
The citation for each annotation is displayed, including the witness’s last name, first name, and the page:line location of the selection. Clicking on the citation will open the viewer, scrolled down to the selected annotation text with the annotation active.
The title of the annotation will also be displayed, if the annotation has a title. A title can be added or edited in line by clicking on the title or “Untitled annotation” text.
The selected text of the annotation is also displayed. The text is formatted in block quote formatting for ease of reading and reviewing. If the annotation is collapsed, the selected text may be truncated. If selection is truncated, an ellipses (...) will be appended to the end of the displayed text.
Tags applied to the annotation
Each tag applied within an annotation, including its valence (if appended) is displayed. When the annotation is collapsed, up to two tags, plus the number of additional tags, are displayed.
To add a new tag to the annotation, click the “Add tag” button when the annotation is expanded and select the tags to apply. You may add a valence (helpful or harmful) when adding the tag or by clicking the tag name after it has been applied.
Tags can be removed from the annotation by clicking on the “x” that appears when a user hovers over the tag. Note that this (or any other changes) made to an annotation on the Annotations page will also apply with the deposition itself.
Notes applied to the annotation
All notes added to the annotation are displayed, including the note text, author, and date that the note was added. When the annotation is collapsed, up to one note will be displayed. If multiple notes have been added, the note authors and number of notes will be displayed.
To add a new note to the annotation, click the “Add note” button when the annotation is expanded, add the text of the note, and click “Add note.”
History
The history column contains information about who created the annotation, the date the annotation was initially created, who last updated the annotation, and when the annotation was last updated. The last updated date will change when the title, tags, notes, or selected text is modified either in the deposition viewer or on the Annotations page.
Actions bar
Users can expand/collapse the annotation, copy/paste text and/or citation, and delete the annotation from the action bar.
For more information about citing testimony, see Citing deposition transcripts.
Deleting an annotation is permanent and cannot be undone.