Getting Started

• Accessing Legal Hub
• Registering with Legal Hub
• Subsequent Sign in
• Inactivity and Timing Out
• Homepage

Accessing Legal Hub

• Go to www.legalhub.co.uk in your web browser. Recommended browsers are Internet Explorer 6.0, Internet Explorer 7.0 and Mozilla Firefox.

Registering with Legal Hub

Currently, all the information on Legal Hub is free to access. However, to provide a better service, we ask visitors to register with us to use certain features on the site:

• Articles - our range of specialist legal papers
• My Preferences - a tool to store your personal information and customise the site

You do not need to register to access The Bar Directory, The Expert Witness Directory, Top Legal Employers, The In-house Lawyer Directory, Events, News or to view the information in our Feature on Legal Hub facility.

The register / sign in screen will be displayed automatically when registration is required to access a feature. You can also click the "register / sign in" link at the top right hand side of the Homepage to register with us.

Enter your email address in the "Email Address:" field, then enter your mother's maiden name in the "Mother's Maiden Name:" field. Answering this security question will enable us to reset your password if you forget it.

Click "Next" to be taken to the second and final step of the registration process.

Enter your personal details in the fields provided. The fields marked with * must be filled in to complete the registration process successfully. The other fields are optional. You can also take the opportunity to check boxes to receive information by email about the Legal Hub service and other Sweet & Maxwell products and services.

Click "Back" to return to the first step of the registration process. Click "Cancel" to abandon the registration process. Click "Submit" to complete the registration process.

After your registration details have been submitted, you will be taken to the Homepage. A message will be dispayed stating that your new password has been sent to the email address you provided.

Validating Your Account

You will shortly receive an email giving you a new password and asking you to validate your account. To do this, you need to click on the link given in the email or paste it into your browser address field. Clicking the link takes you to the Legal Hub Homepage, where a message confirming that you have validated your account will be displayed.

Change Password?

You will be given the opportunity to change your password as soon as you validate your account. You can also change your password at any time by clicking "My Preferences" and then selecting "Change my Password".

Fill in the form with your current login details and new password. This must be between 6 and 25 letters and numbers. Enter this password again in the "Confirm Password" field and click "Submit".

A message will display confirming that your password has been changed successfully. You will shortly receive an email containing your new password. You should use your new password the next time you sign into Legal Hub.

Subsequent Sign in

Legal Hub uses a cookie to remember your details so that you will be signed in automatically when you return to the website from the same computer. You can prevent your details from being retained in this way by clicking the "Sign Out" link at the top right hand side of the website when you complete your session.

If you have signed out from your last session, or you are using a different computer, you will see the register / sign in screen when registration is required or if you click the "register / sign in" link. Click the "Sign in to Legal Hub" link on the line beginning "Already Registered?" to sign in.

Enter your email address in the "Email Address:" field, then enter your password in the "Password:" field. Click "Sign In".

Forgotten Password?

If you can't remember your password, on the Sign into Legal Hub screen, click the "Forgotten your password?" link.

Enter your email address in the "Email Address:" field, then enter your mother's maiden name in the "Mother's Maiden Name:" field. Click "Submit".

You will shortly receive an email containing a new password. You can then use your new password to sign in. You can change your new password at any time by clicking "My Preferences" and then selecting "Change my Password".

Inactivity and Timing Out

Legal Hub will sign you out after a period of 15 minutes of inactivity.

To continue, simply click on the "here" link, and you will be able to continue using the website as before.

Homepage

From the Homepage you can search across the site (The Bar Directory, The Expert Witness Directory, Top Legal Employers, The In-house Lawyer Directory, Articles, Events and News). You can also use the links on the top left of the Homepage to begin browsing and searching each type of information individually.

The Homepage also features a "News Ticker" displaying headlines from the latest legal news stories. To view a news story in full, simply click on the headline. If you wish to turn the News Ticker off, go to "My Preferences", select "Update my Options" and change the "News Headlines Display" setting to "News Ticker Off".

Search

Enter your terms into the search box.

The search box supports "terms and connectors" functionality. This means that each term that you enter is treated as a separate search term, rather than searching for all the keywords together as a phrase. If you enter words alone using no connectors, Legal Hub will automatically connect the words using the '&' (AND) connector and will return documents where both terms appear.

Terms and Connectors

Legal Hub supports the use of a number of different types of connectors.

The most commonly used connectors are "AND" and "OR". By default if you enter multiple terms with no connectors, Legal Hub will automatically insert the '&' (AND) connector in between them.

The connectors you can use on Legal Hub, their symbols, and an example are listed below:

Connector	Symbol	Retrieves
AND	& (or a space)	Search terms in the same document: "trademark & registration"
OR	or	Either search term or both: "car or automobile"
Phrase	" "	Search terms appearing in the same order as in the quotation marks: "fiduciary duty"
BUT NOT	%	Documents not containing the term or terms following the % symbol: "taxation % income" Use the % connector with caution; it may cause relevant documents to be excluded from your search result.

Searching on Just the Start of a Word (Root Expander)

To search for terms with multiple endings use the ! character.

For example: object! will retrieve object, objected, objection, objecting, objectionable.

Universal Character

To search for words with variable characters, use the * character. When you place the universal character within a term, it requires that a character appear in that position. For example, withdr*w will return withdraw and withdrew.

Irregular Plurals

Legal Hub will automatically retrieve irregular plurals. For example, entering child will also retrieve children and goose will also retrieve geese.

Turning Off Plurals and Equivalents

You can turn off plurals of a particular term by placing the # symbol in front of the term. To retrieve damage but not damages, type #damage. Placing the # symbol in front of a term also turns off the automatic retrieval of equivalencies. To retrieve child but not children enter #child.

Compound Terms

Typing good-will will retrieve good-will, goodwill and good will.

Search Results

Your Search Results from a site-wide search from the Homepage will be displayed as a series of links showing the number of results for each information type.

Click on the relevant link to view results from The Bar Directory, The Expert Witness Directory, Top Legal Employers, The In-house Lawyer Directory, Articles, Events or News.