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Court Services & Facilities > Use of IT in Court > E-bundle Hearing > General Guidelines for Preparing EBPDF

General Guidelines for Preparing EBPDF pdf version

1. Introduction

This document is intended to give guidance to parties or their IT Service Providers for preparing and submitting Electronic Bundles in Portable Document Format (“EBPDF”) for use in court hearings. The submitted EBPDF will be used for self-perusal and broadcast in open court.

2. Parties Responsibilities

  1. (1) When preparing the EBPDF, parties should observe the relevant Practice Directions for compiling the paper bundles, since the EBPDF and the paper bundles should be identical.
  2. (2) Parties are responsible for the preparation of the EBPDF in accordance with the requirements laid down herein.
  3. (3) The cost of preparing the EBPDF and subsequent updating of the bundle shall be borne by the parties.
  4. (4) It is the responsibility of the parties to submit virus-free and Trojan-free documents, files, or medium to the court.
  5. (5) Parties shall bring their own electronic devices for their own use of the electronic documents in the courtroom.
  6. (6) Parties are responsible for the security of their own electronic devices and documents.

NOTES

  • The Judiciary will not be held responsible for faults caused by quality of electronic document conversion.

3. Preparation Requirements

3.1 Mandatory Requirements

  • (1) The electronic bundle should be a single PDF file except for the PDF file either exceeding 10,000 pages or of size over 1GB.
  • (2) Each box file of a paper bundle should have a corresponding PDF file. The PDF file(s) should be aggregated to comply with para. (1).
  • (3) PDF file(s) should be submitted to the Court in CD-R, DVD±R, USB flash drive, memory card or hard disk or in accordance with the directives from the Court.
  • (4) The PDF file(s) must be identical to the paper bundle(s). Each page of the electronic bundle in a PDF file should be numbered in ascending order and match with the corresponding page number printed on the paper bundle. For example, if there exists pages 1, 2, 2a, 3, 3-1, 3-2, 4 and 5 in a paper bundle, the page numbers in the PDF file(s) should be numbered accordingly. The consecutive pagination should be available for use at PDF page retriever:
  • (5) For index page(s) without bundle pagination, it should be given the page number starting from “0-” as the prefix. For example, an index of three pages can be numbered as “0-1”, “0-2” and “0-3” before starting with bundle page 1.
  • Please refer to this link cite this link for a video clip on how to achieve uniformity of e-bundles including matching of pagination.
  • (6) All PDF file(s) should have been processed by Optical Character Recognition (“OCR”) to make text searchable and for ease of annotation.
  • (7) The PDF file(s) should have PDF bookmarkscontaining index of the electronic bundle indicating and hyperlinked to the pages they are referring to.
  • Please refer to this link cite this link for a video clip on how to create links (i) within a PDF document and (ii) between PDF documents.
  • (8) All PDF file(s) should be named in terms of the case number and bundle, in accordance with the requirements laid down in Section 3.2.
  • (9) When compiling an electronic list of authority, a citation with a hypertext link with reference to Neutral Citation Number (NCN) could be obtained from the Legal Reference System.
  • Please refer to this link cite this link for a video clip.

3.2 File Name Requirements

The naming convention of the EBPDF files for complete version shall follow this standard:

  • EBPDF

    <bundle abbr.>.<PDF file no.>.<case no.>.pdf

    where <bundle abbr.> is the bundle name abbreviation of the case, <PDF file no.> is the PDF file number of the bundle, necessary only when the PDF file number is more than one, <case no.> is the case number of the hearing with "/" character replaced by "-" character, e.g.

    For CFI criminal case

    Example 1

    • “CB.HCCC9996-2012.pdf” for the Core bundle of HCCC9996/2012.

    For civil appeal case

    Examples 2 and 3

    • “CB.CACV1-2021.pdf” for the core bundle of CACV1/2021.
    • “AB.2.CACV1-2021.pdf” for the 2nd PDF file of the appeal bundle of CACV1/2021.

    In addition to file names, it is preferable to use the same naming abbreviation, “CB” and “AB”, in skeleton submissions.

    <partyS>.<case no.>.pdf

    where <party> is the party of the case, <S> is the abbreviation of skeleton submissions.

    Examples 4 and 5

    • “AppS.CACV1-2021.pdf” for the Applicant's skeleton submissions of CACV1/2021.
    • “ResS.CACV1-2021.pdf” for the Respondent's skeleton submissions of CACV1/2021.

    In addition to file names, it is preferable to use the same naming abbreviation, “AppS” and “ResS”, in skeleton submissions.

    <partyLOA>.<case no.>.pdf

    where <party> is the party of the case, <LOA> is the abbreviation of List of authorities.

    Examples 6 and 7

    • “AppLOA.CACV1-2021.pdf” for the Applicant's List of authorities of CACV1/2021.
    • “ResLOA.CACV1-2021.pdf” for the Respondent's List of authorities of CACV1/2021.

    In addition to file names, it is preferable to use the same naming abbreviation, “AppLOA” and “ResLOA”, in skeleton submissions.

4. Submission Requirements

4.1 First Submission Requirements

For the first time submission, parties shall submit a complete version of EBPDF files – It contains the whole set of bundle in PDF format.

4.2 Subsequent Update Requirements

(1) For subsequent update of the electronic bundle, parties shall submit:

  • (a) A complete updated set of EBPDF files in accordance with the directives of the Court.
  • (b) A covering letter specifying the amendments / replacements for the attention of the Court.

(2) For subsequent update of the electronic bundle during court hearing, parties shall submit:

  • (a) New bundle page(s) to be added as separate PDF file(s).
  • (b) With the approval of the Court, make ready such bundle page(s) in secured USB flash drive for in court distribution.

NOTES

  • After the first submission, users may have made annotation on the EBPDF files. In this case, 1) the new bundle page(s) submitted shall be added as separate PDF file(s); and 2) existing bundle PDF file(s) should be removed by inserting a blank page marked as “Removed with the direction of the Court” with the same pagination.

5. Hardware and Software Requirements

5.1 The parties/ their IT service providers who are responsible for converting paper bundle shall have the following equipment and software for capturing paper bundles to PDF files that fulfill the requirements in this section:

  • Optical scanner – For capturing paper images.
  • Scanning software – For converting paper images to PDF files.
  • OCR software – For text recognition of paper images and output as PDF files. It can be performed by scanning software, PDF manipulation software, or software explicitly for text recognition.
  • PDF writer (manipulation software) – For PDF page ordering, page numbering (e.g. 2a, 3-1, etc.), insertion, deletion, replacement, and bookmarking for opening a page in the same file and for opening another file of the same bundle.
  • PDF reader (viewing software) – For bundle page retrieval by page number and by bookmarks and viewing of PDF file(s).

5.2 The parties/ their IT service providers who are responsible for preparing multimedia evidence (video or audio file(s)) should submit files in appropriate format for playback in the courtroom.

6. General Requirements of EBPDF Files

File format Adobe Portable Document Format (“PDF”) version 1.6 or above
Fast Web View On
Security Method No Security
Initial View Navigation tab: Bookmarks Panel and Page
Page layout: Single Page Continuous
Magnification: Fit Width
Open to page: The first page of the document

7. Scanning and OCR Requirements

Resolution

300 dots per inch (dpi);

To optimize file size whilst maintaining image quality, do not scan in a resolution higher than 300 dpi unless it is necessary.
Colour Depth

To optimize file size whilst maintaining image quality, the following colour depth setting is recommended:

  • 1-bit for black and white pages;
  • 8-bit for coloured pages;
  • 24-bit for pages with photograph
OCR Language

Select “English” if the bundle contains English characters only;
Select “Chinese (Traditional)” if the bundle contains Traditional Chinese characters only;
Select “Chinese (Traditional)” if the bundle contains English and Traditional Chinese characters.
OCR Output Style Searchable Image (Exact)

8. Media Requirements

  • (1) The EBPDF file(s) should be submitted to the court in the following types of media.

    Media Capacity
    CD- R 650 MB
    DVD+R / DVD-R 4.7 GB
    DVD+R DL / DVD-R DL 8.5 GB
    USB flash drive/ memory card/ hard disk No limit
  • (2) The media should be finalized in its burning process to assure that further writing to the disc is not allowed.
  • (3) The parties / their IT service providers shall take all reasonable steps to ensure that all materials submitted are virus free and Trojan-free.

9. Digital Evidence and Exhibit Handling (DEEH)

Electronic Bundles in Portable Document Format (EBPDF) for hearing can be used in conjunction with Digital Evidence and Exhibit Handling (DEEH). For details, please refer to video guide.

10. Enquiry

For general enquiry, please contact respective clerk to Judge / Registrar / Master and / or Court Registry for assistance.

For technical enquiry, please send email to courtav&itsupportteam@judiciary.hk.

11. Video Guide

Please refer to this link for the video guide on Using E-Bundles in Court.