Does It Compute?

Worldox GX4 Now Available

Worldox GX4 will be available for purchase beginning with the ABA Tech Show later this week. I have been working with it for about three months, and it has a massive number of new features and a totally revamped interface. In keeping with Worldox’s long-standing practice, the old interface is still available for those who prefer it. Versions of the old interface will appeal to long standing and power users. “Executive” users who don’t do much heavy lifting may prefer the new interface, which features a “tile” view.

In the process of experimenting with the beta, I have also been updating my documentation.

There will be a new edition of Worldox in One Hour for Lawyers, published by the Law Practice Division of the ABA. The manuscript has gone to the ABA and the book should be available some time in late June/early July.

For those who want to get a look at what they will be getting, there are three documents on the Cheat Sheet page of my web site. 

• What’s New in Worldox GX4

• Worldox GX4 Cheat Sheet

• Frequently Asked Questions (updated for GX4)

Feel free to download them. Any comments or queries would be welcome.

Indexer Issues in Worldox

Some of the most common issues that arise with Worldox have to do with the indexer. The end user becomes aware of this problem because in one form or another searches “don’t work” or Worldox says it is “off line.” Fortunately, these issues are generally easy to troubleshoot and fix, and firms should enable the ability for Worldox administrators or other tech-savvy user to do this.

When the indexes are updated at night, Worldox copies the files from the server to the local drive of the indexer and marks the server indexes as “off-line” so that no changes are made while it rebuilds them locally (this is dramatically faster than rebuilding them over the network). It then copies the rebuilt indexes back to the server and puts the indexer back “on-line”. If anything happens to disrupt the network connection during this process, the indexer can be left in an “off-line” status and searches will not work.

The main reasons this happens have to do with your network configuration. The application of Microsoft patches can disrupt the process. Running various other network operations might also have that effect. If you are having on-going indexer issues you need to review your network configuration in detail (including disabling your anti-virus for certain directories).

Whatever the underlying causes, fixing the immediate issue is usually fairly simple:

•    If you see any one of a variety of error messages, dismiss them and restart the indexer by click on the “Close Server” button at the bottom of the indexer screen and “Agree” to confirm closing. Then select Server | Start at the menu at the top of the server screen

•    If the indexer is “hung” and you don’t see a counting down message (Nest pass in 10 seconds ... 9 seconds ... 8 seconds), close and restart the indexer.

•    If the indexer appears to be running, but searches are not working, it is probably off-line. Select a given drive letter, then Profile | Properties. At the bottom of the window in the “Current Status” box, make sure “On-line - ready to find by Profile” is checked. Repeat for Text | Properties and each drive letter.

In rare cases, you will need to contact your consultant or Worldox for more advanced solutions. If it happens regularly, you need to contact your IT people to review the network setup.