This is the home page for Lexis+. Some of the highlights are as follows:
1. Lexis+ drop down menu;
2. Client ID feature;
3. History drop down menu;
4. Additional features of Lexis+ (folders, alerts, etc.);
5. Search bar with filter features;
6. Starting points for legal research, practical guidance, and brief analysis; and
7. Explore function for easy access to different types of content.
Lexis+'s Shepard's feature provides an editorial analysis over a range of legal documents. Shepard's provide a complete range of editorial analysis from negative (e.g., overruled) to neutral (e.g., explained) to true positive (e.g., followed). This is a powerful tool that assists in keeping research up to date. Shepard's is an important feature of Lexis+ and should be used when you are updating your research.
1. You can locate this feature when looking at a document that has a Shepard's analysis (e.g., court opinions). It is located to the right of the document text in a box marked Shepard's.
2. The Shepard's box shows a quick overview of the positive, neutral, negative, and citing sources of that particular document.
3. Clicking on "Shepardize this document" will open a new page showing the actual documents that were referenced in the Shepard's box. The information will be divided into four categories: (1) appellate history, (2) citing decisions, (3) other citing sources, and (4) table of authorities.
4. Citing decisions will give a list of primary sources citing the initial document and other citing sources will link to secondary sources. The options on the right allow the sources to be narrowed by various parameters. Additionally, the information can be viewed in a visual friendly manner by clicking on the grid option on the left side at the top.
5. This is the Grid view. The grid view gives a nice visual representation of the treatment the initial case has received from other sources.
1. The top bar of Lexis+ allows for quick access to some of the commonly used features in Lexis+. This bar will be located at the top of any page in Lexis+.
2. The Lexis+ drop-down menu gives access to the various features available to the Lexis+ platform. The most commonly used features will be the research, Interactive Citation Workstation, and LexisNexis for Law Schools. The other features might not be accessible under the Law School's Lexis+ Subscription.
3. The Search feature is used to narrow your search parameters before beginning your initial search. The category selector allows you to filter results by categories, including primary and secondary sources, practice forms and documents, dockets, court filings, and other types of content. Once you have narrowed to the desired source, all the search results will be confined to that source.
4. The Search feature also allows you to narrow your search according to any jurisdiction(s) you're interested in. You are able to choose as many jurisdictions as you want. Once you have narrowed to the desired jurisdiction(s), all the search results will be confined to that jurisdiction.
5. The client feature allows you to create separate ID for each client. This will partition your searches and documents to that specific client ID. This can be useful for keeping tabs on how much time has been spent on an individual or project.
1. Users may access search history from the drop-down menu at the top of the screen. This will show recent searches or documents without moving to a new page.
1. The "More" drop-down provides access to the remaining features of Lexis+. Such as, the folder feature which allows you to collect documents into a folder for quick recovery. These features are explained more in-depth later in this guide (you can navigate to a specific feature using the tabs at the top of this guide).
This is the Lexis Advance search bar. It is located in the center of the homepage or in the middle of the top bar when viewing other pages in Lexis Advance. The search bar serves the same purpose as the browse feature and has many of the same filtering options.
1. You can apply filters to the search to narrow the search results. The different filters in the search box and in the Explore box below are:
1. Category;
2. Jurisdiction;
3. Practice Area & Topic; and
This is the filter for Category in the search bar. It allows you to filter by the document type.
2. Jurisdiction allows you to filter by as many different jurisdictions as you want, including both state and federal jurisdictions.
3. Below, is what the Practice Area filter box looks like. You can click on any of the Practice Areas and it will narrow whatever you search for to results within the Practice Area.
1. User search history can be accessed from the drop-down menu at the top of the screen or from the history box located at the bottom of the homepage. Both of these options will show your recent searches or documents without moving to a new page.
2. This is the full research history page. From here you can search within your research history to locate documents you have previously located. Useful for when you forget to save a document in your folder during a research session.
3. This is the research map feature. This gives a visual representation of your searches. This can help visualize how your search evolved from the initial search terms to the final results.
4. For example, this search began with the term copyright. Next, the search was narrowed to only show cases and further narrowed to only show Texas cases within a time frame of Jan. 1, 2020 to Dec. 31, 2020. This gives a quick overview of how the research progressed from over 64,572 results to 6.
1. The folders feature is located in the More drop-down menu. This feature allows you to organize documents located from your searches into user defined folders.
2. This is the My Folder page. You can access folders you have created or even share those folders with others. This is a great organizational tool for research and collaboration.
At Texas Tech University School of Law, Lexis provided free printing from Lexis Advance. There are three printers in the library (basement, second floor, and the third floor) that can be used by students. To print from a Lexis printer make sure the option to print from a LexisNexis printer is picked.
This can be done by clicking on "Choose settings" when clicking the printer drop down menu. Once you have the proper printer selected you can print and it will be sent to the printer you selected. This can be done from any computer as long as you are logged into Lexis Advance.
