Tips to soup up your web browser

As more lawyers go mobile and into the cloud, they areincreasingly using their web browsers as personalized, take-it-with-you toolboxes.

By customizing your web browser to give you access to moresoftware directly through your browser page, you can work seamlesslyon all your computers and avoid multiple software downloads andpatches.

"You don't have to take your browser as a finished product. Youcan really make it do and be exactly what you want it to," said ErikMazzone, Director of the Center for Practice Management for theNorth Carolina Bar Association.

Apps originally designed for smartphones are working their waybackwards from those mobile devices onto web browsers, said Mazzone,who will be speaking at ABA TECHSHOW in Chicago in April.

First, choose your browser, because they're not all the same.Mazzone favors Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox because they aremore customizable than Internet Explorer or Safari.

Google Chrome has a brand new web store where you can purchaseand download apps and add-ons, and lots of them are free. Many appsare browser-specific, so what you are able to tweak and add-on willdepend on the browser you choose.

By customizing your browser, you can get to your favoritefunctions faster and from anywhere.

"Once you log in, it's all stored in the web. Whether you log infrom home, on the road or at work, you're right back up andrunning," said Mazzone.

One app that Mazzone likes is Xmarks, which allows yousynchronize all of your bookmarks across different computers.Tweetdeck is another free app that helps you send tweets and manageyour Twitter account. Rather than download it to your computer, youcan add an icon into your browser from Google webstore and tweetfrom anywhere.

If you are always clicking the "forgot password?" link, Last Passis a browser app that retains all your different passwords in oneplace. It operates between your work computer, your iPhone and youriPad because it uses the cloud, said Mazzone.

A few other browser add-ons that lawyers may like, especially theprocrastinating ones, are todo.ly, a to-do list, and Read It Lateror Instapaper, which let you save interesting web pages for readinglater.

It's "like stacking things on your desk," said Mazzone.