Overview
ACORN provides
a quick and easy way for court reporters to file their
notes with the courts in electronic format rather than
on paper.
One of the operational problems faced by most courts
today is how to provide secure storage for an ever
increasing volume of court reporter notes. The courts
are mandated by law to store reporter notes for long
periods of time. This can require a significant amount
of physical storage space. Along with the issue of
providing adequate storage space, there is the issue of
ensuring that the note files will not be damaged by
heat, dampness, or other environmental problems.
Finally, there is the issue of how to locate a given
note file when it is needed by the court. This is often
the most challenging problem of all.
ACORN, the Archived Court Reporter Notes service
from ITG solves all these problems. It solves the
storage problem. It solves the security problem. It
solves the access problem. It is simple to install and
easy for the reporters to use.
ACORN was originally developed for the Los
Angeles County Superior Court in 1998. Since that time,
it has been in daily use by more than 600 reporters
working out of 35 different courthouses all across Los
Angeles County. Today, more than 80% of the official
court reporters in California use ACORN to
transmit and store their note files.
ITG provides the ACORN to the courts as a
web service. As a web service, there is no hardware or
software to purchase, no hardware to maintain, and no
time required on the part of the court’s IT staff to
support it. The court is billed a monthly service fee
based upon the number of reporters using the service.
Reporters access the ACORN service from any PC
that has Internet access. There is no special hardware
or software required. Once the reporter’s account has
been set up on the ACORN service, the reporter
can access it 24x7 to upload raw note files,
dictionaries, or even finalize transcripts. Any type of
file that Windows can recognize can be sent to and
stored by the ACORN service. Every file sent to
the ACORN server is stored in exactly the same
format as the original media. ACORN does not
open, check, or modify the files being uploaded. The
upload process is exactly the same as making a copy of a
file on the reporter’s own hard drive.
An ACORN server is set up for each individual
court. Each ACORN server has mirrored hard drives
for data security. Each night, a full backup is made of
all files on the ACORN servers. Each week, an
additional backup copy is written to a backup server. On
a periodic basis, all the note files that have been
archived during the previous period are collected and
copied onto CD media. The CDs are sent to the court as
one additional level of data redundancy.
When a note file is needed, it can be quickly retrieved
from the ACORN service. Some courts allow reporters to
retrieve their own notes, while other courts limit the
retrieval process to only the court appointed ACORN
administrator. The retrieved note files can be copied
onto floppy disk or other media, or emailed to the
reporter.
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The ACORN service: |
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requires no physical storage space |
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provides an
environmentally safe archival method for storing notes |
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requires no physical
storage space |
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is easy to use to
upload or to retrieve note files |
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has been extensively
tested |
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has been in use by a
large number of court reporters for many years |
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requires no new
hardware or software |
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requires no support
time from the court’s IT staff |
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creates multiple,
redundant copies of all note files |
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can store any type of
file uploaded by the reporters |
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California Superior Courts using ACORN |
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Contra Costa County
in Martinez, CA |
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Fresno County in
Fresno, CA |
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Kern County in
Bakersfield, CA |
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Los Angeles County
in Los Angeles, CA |
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Madera County in
Madera, CA
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Marin County in
Sausalito, CA |
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Monterey County
Monterey, CA |
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Napa County in
Napa, CA |
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Orange County in
Santa Ana, CA |
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Riverside County
in Riverside, CA
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San Benito County
in Hollister, CA
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San Bernardino County
in San Bernardino, CA
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San Francisco in
San Francisco, CA
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San Luis Obispo
in San Luis Obispo, CA |
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Santa Clara County
in Santa Clara, CA
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Santa Cruz County
in Santa Cruz, CA
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Sonoma County in
Santa Rosa, CA |
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Stanislaus County
in Modesto, CA |
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Tulare County in
Visalia, CA
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Ventura County in
Ventura, CA |
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