ENGR 1041/1051: Introduction to Engineering

Coverage: US, WIPO & European patents (USPTO back to 1790, WIPO & EPO back to 1978), US & European published patent applications, includes 'Find Prior Art' option to search multiple sources (Patents, Books, Scholar, web) and fine tune by inventor (People facet) as well as dates.

• Searches patents and applications at the same time.
• Prior art finder.
• Better for keyword searching; classification and date searching can be unreliable.
• OCR is problematic and not all patents are listed (in spite of there being no disclaimer).
• Pre-1976 patents are not reclassified, so classification won't have been updated as classifications evolve. Patents can be bought and sold and pre-1976 patents will only show the original assignee.

• Awful interface; search syntax is clunky 
• Currently granted patents and applications are in separate databases
• New public search system planned for 2017 that will combine searching for granted patents, pending applications, and patents from other countries
• Most up-to-date; new patents and applications are published every Tuesday
• Recent change to Cooperative Classification System - more in line with international patent classifications
• Classification and date searching is more reliable
• Keyword/full-text searching is not possible on pre-1976 patents
• Most reliable interface for full-text searching on post-1976 patents and post-2001 applications

• Covers 90 million documents from 92 different countries; includes backfiles from many countries
• Searches issued patents and published applications simultaneously
• Reliable classification and date searching
• Full-text is not searchable; if an abstract is available in English, the abstract can be searched by keyword
• Coverage can be spotty, translations are not perfect
• One of the more user-friendly databases with a good help/support section
• Historic patents have been reclassified with CPC

• Field combination search offers extensive field searching
• Searches across patent families, not individual documents
• Patent family is the group of patents and patent applications for a single invention. If a patent has been applied for in multiple countries, they are grouped together.
• Translation utility to translate abstracts
• Cross Lingual Expansion feature will translate your query into different language to search foreign language patents rather than searching English translations
• Also suggests synonyms and related terms.
• Uses International Patent Classification system
• Limited full text

• Patent applications and granted patents from around the world
• 1963 to 2015, although coverage may be spotty before 1976
• Links to cited and citing patents
• Result page is a more straightforward summary of the abstract, including the use and advantage of the patent, with links to the full patent
• May include "Equivalent Abstract" prepared by Derwent - a patent that relates to the invention and shares the same priority application date as a patent from a different issuing authority. It may be an exact duplicate that was issued by a different authority.
• Search by keyword (topic), title, inventor, patent number, International Patent Classification, Derwent Class Code, Derwent Manual Code, Derwent Primary Accession Number, Assignee (name), and refine by inventor and subject area.
• Refining options are particularly helpful