The Northern District debuted a new website design based upon survey input.  The new layout is much more streamlined and user friendly than the prior design.  There are buttons on the front page that take you directly to the most used features on the site:  the daily calendar and ECF/Pacer.  Additionally, there are pull down menus along the top of the page that allow you to go directly to each judge’s page, as well as to the Local Rules.  All of these features reduce the number of pages you have to navigate through to get to the information you want.  Even the judge’s pages have been revised with a much more user friendly layout, including more linked information as opposed to the long text descriptions in the previous design.  And the Northern District is planning to provide a version of the site for mobile browsers.  That way if you get stuck on the way to court, you will be able to find the chambers’ phone number from your Blackberry or iPhone.  My only complaint about the site has been resolved.  Early in the week the site required that you have the latest version of your browser before you could access it (not ideal for an institution that strives to provide broad public access), but that was apparently a mistake and has been fixed.