e-Discovery Core Glosssary: A - B

e-Discovery Core Glossary: Terminology

Below is a list of terminologies that are necessary for legal professionals involved with e-Discovery and Discovery litigation support.

#………………………………………………………………………………………………….....

30(b)(6) Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6), a corporation, partnership, association, or governmental agency is subject to the deposition process, and required to provide one or more witnesses to "testify as to matters known or reasonably available to the organization" on the topics requested by the notice without compromising attorney client privilege communications or work product. It is not unusual for the 30(b)(6) topics to be directed toward the discovery process, including procedures for preservation, collection, chain of custody, processing, review, and production. Early in the litigation, when developing a discovery plan, particularly with regard to electronic discovery, a party should be mindful of the obligation to provide one or more 30(b)(6) witnesses should the request be made by another party to the litigation, and include this contingency in the discovery plan.

A………………………………………………………………………………………………….....

Active Data Information residing on the direct access storage media (disc drives or servers) that is readily visible to the operating system and/or application software with which it was created. It is instantly accessible without restoration or reconstruction.

Active Records Records related to current, ongoing or in process activities referred to on a regular basis to respond to day today operational requirements.

ADC (Analog to Digital Converter) Converts analog data to into a digital format.

Agent A program running on a computer that performs as instructed by a central control point to track file and operating system events, and take directed actions, such as transferring a file or deleting a local copy of a file, in response to such events.

Application A collection of one or more related software programs that enable a user to enter, store, view, modify, or extract information from files or databases. Applications may include word processors, Internet browsers, spreadsheets, email clients, personal information managers, and other databases.

Application Metadata Data created by the application specific to the ESI being addressed, embedded in the file and moved with the file when copied; copying can alter application metadata.

Architecture The term architecture refers to the hardware, software or combination of hardware and software comprising a computer system or network.

Archival Data Archival Data is information an organization maintains for long term storage and record keeping purposes, but which is not immediately accessible to the user of a computer system. Archival data may be written to removable media such as a CD, magneto optical media, tape or other electronic storage device, or may be maintained on system hard drives. Some systems allow users to retrieve archival data directly while other systems require the intervention of an IT professional.

Aspect Ratio The relationship of the height to the width of any image, and it must be maintained to prevent distortion.

Author or Originator The person, office or designated position responsible for an item´s initial creation or issuance. In the case of a document in the form of a letter, the author or originator is usually indicated on the letterhead or by signature. In some cases, the software application producing the document may capture the author´s identity and associate it with the document.

B………………………………………………………………………………………………….....

Backfiles Existing paper or microfilm files, or an archive of old editions.

Backup To create a copy of data as a precaution against the loss or damage of the original data. Many users backup their files, and most computer networks utilize automatic backup software to make regular copies of some or all of the data on the network.

Bandwidth The amount of ESI that a network connection can accommodate in a given period of time.

Batch File A set of one or more instructions that are created in a computer program to perform a particular type of computer system function (.BAT is the DOS batch file extension).

Bates Number Sequential numbering used to track documents and images in production data sets, where each page is assigned an exclusive production number. Primarily used in conjunction with a suffix or prefix to ID the producing party, the litigation, or any other relevant information.

Beginning Document Number (BegDoc) The Bates Number identifying the first page of a document or record, and can usually be found in the right-hand side of the footer.

Binary The Base 2 numbering system used in digital computing that represents all numbers using combinations of zero and one.

Bookmark A stored link to a Web site or page previously visited.

Broadband Communications of high capacity and usually of multimedia content.

Browser An application, such as Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox, used to view and navigate the Internet.

Byte (Binary Term) A Byte is the basic measurement of most computer data and consists of 8 bits. Computer storage capacity is generally measured in bytes. Although characters are stored in bytes, a few bytes are of little use for storing a large amount of data. Thus, storage is measured in larger increments of bytes.