Document Assembly on the iPad
The iPad is never going to be the tool of choice for creating complex legal documents from scratch using a word processor.
However, what about using one of the automated drafting or document assembly tools which are available? Would these let you take some basic information from a client in a meeting and quickly put together a draft document for them to review?
I decided to test the theory using two packages which I have access to:- PLC Fastdraft and Rapidocs Lawdraft. I also wanted to find out what the providers of these services think of the iPad, and I have some interesting comments from both of them which I will pick up in a later post.
PLC Fastdraft
I started off by using PLC Fastdraft on the iPad to create a set of completion board minutes for a share sale (which is fairly typical of how I use the service).
Everything worked more or less the same as the desktop version. The various methods of entering information (typing, tick boxes, radio buttons etc.) all worked perfectly as did the process of pulling in information about a company from Companies House. 
The only thing I found confusing was the pop up windows which appear in places. These need to be scrolled using two fingers on the multi-touch display, but don't have any scrolls bars on the side - so it initially looks as if you can't scroll down the list.
Saving the finished draft into the Fastdraft library worked fine... and then I came to the part which I thought might cause problems:- exporting the finished draft as an MS Word document.
However, clicking on the "Export as Word Document" button brought up the Word document (in rather strange formatting) within the Safari browser window - complete with the"Open Using..." button.
Clicking on this and selecting Documents2Go opened the document in that App. I used Documents2Go to email the draft to my desktop where it appeared with all the formatting intact (exactly the same as a version downloaded straight from Fastdraft using the desktop browser).
One word of warning here:- importing the document into Pages for editing will kill the formatting in the same way as importing any other complex MS Word document into Pages on the iPad. If the document is then emailed on and opened in Word on the desktop the formatting will be trashed.
So... a great result for PLC Fastdraft.
Rapidocs Lawdraft
For this package I chose to produce a set of terms and conditions for the reverse of an invoice.
Once again, the process for creating the document worked flawlessly. The navigation and data entry is a little simpler than FastDraft (just radio buttons and text entry) and there is no requirement to pull in data from other sources like Companies House.
This meant that the only option I had via the "Open Using" button was GoodReader. I wasn't sure what affect this would have on formatting, but after using GoodReader to email to the desktop and comparing the end result with the .rtf document downloaded straight to the desktop it seemed that the formatting was exactly the same. It does mean that you can't edit the finished draft using Documents2Go though.
What was slightly disappointing (although this is a iPad issue rather than a problem with Rapidocs) is that the option to export as a PDF doesn't really work. This is because mobile Safari on the iPad doesn't offer an "Open Using" option for PDF files so all you can do is view them in the browser. However, Mobile Safari on iOS4 on the iPhone does have this functionality, so hopefully this will be resolved when iOS4 hits the iPad.
PDF wrinkles aside it seems that Rapidocs also performs well on the iPad.
If you have access to either of these services then this could be a great way to use the iPad on the move. I can easily see a wills & probate solicitor (for example) using it to draft a simple will at a client meeting which can be emailed to the client for review (or printed once Apple's Airprint is available).
Next up... what do the providers themselves think about the iPad?
