Report:PatBase/Viewing Results/Saving Results
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Saving Results
Documents found through a PatBase search can be saved for later review and manipulation. These results are saved in “folders” which are specific to the user’s own login, but may also be shared across all user IDs within a company. As of the May 2008 update, access to shared folders may now be limited to one or more user IDs. Records are automatically added to the open folder during browsing; records may also be added to closed folders without having to open them.
Documents can be collected and added to a folder during the reviewing process. Selecting the “add to folder” icon from the floating menu (or attempting to flag a document without an open folder; see the Flagging Results section) will prompt the user to choose or create a folder which will contain the saved documents. Once a folder is opened, the user may select the checkbox that appears on the right side of each record at any time during browsing, and that record will automatically be added to the open folder.
(In other words, having an “open” folder does not mean that the user is browsing records inside the folder, but that the folder is open to having further records placed inside it. Record addition to the open folder is automatic, so the user does not have to go through the folder selection process each time.)
It is also possible for users to add a reference to other private folders while a first folder is currently open. During review, the user may select the yellow box icon found on the far top right of the family record. Clicking this icon will open a pop-up list of other folders, and the reference may be added to any of them (without opening the folder, or closing the currently active folder) by selecting the desired folder name. Then the user may resume reviewing the search results by closing the pop-up window.
A saved folder offers all of the same functionality as a normal hit list in PatBase, with the addition of several features. One new feature is the ability to add user comments to the folder and to individual records. These annotations (“family notes”) can be created for any record in a folder, and saved for later export. In addition, an advanced highlighting scheme may be applied to a folder, saved, and automatically re-applied when the folder is opened; the highlighting can even be exported into an html record of the full text. These are both examples of the flexibility PatBase offers users: allowing user-defined content to be created and exported along with bibliographic and full-text data is an advantage of the system.
Searching can also be conducted within the folder’s contents. This is performed by using the “add to history” feature seen in the figure below. This function will add every family record back into the search history, so that the query can be modified with additional parameters or set as a search filter (for more information on search filters, see the Structured Search form section, earlier in this article). Many competitors do not offer a way to conduct searches within a saved results set (QPAT’s Patent Examiner is a notable exception), so this feature is also a major advantage to the system.
Folders can be merged or combined just like search statements, using Boolean operators. For example, if a user had reviewed the entire contents of folder 1 and had just run a new search string and placed the results in folder 2, she could save herself the trouble of having to see known records again by expanding the Merge Folders menu from the folder management page, and selecting “folder 2” “NOT” “folder 1” from the dropdown options. The user would then name a “target folder” to contain the newly reduced results set – and both original folders would still exist, unharmed.
The May 2008 update brought some new features to the folders. As previously mentioned, access to shared folders can now be specified by user ID, allowing the user to let only some or all of their colleagues to view the shared folder. Further, folders can now be sorted by folder name, number of records, or date by clicking on the header name. This feature is meant to make finding a specific folder easier.
Editor's Note:Although the folder sorting option is a welcome change, there is a downside: each time an action is performed on a folder, the folders revert to being sorted alphabetically. This increases the time needed to find multiple folders to perform actions on each one, because the folders must be re-sorted again after each action.
In October 2009, these features were enhanced further in order to make PatBase a more collaborative tool. Users can now control permissions by defining specific groups of other users who may access a given folder, and can set access levels for the folder (read only vs. read/write access). Additionally, the service now allows users to share folders with others who do not have PatBase access. These access controls are set by selecting the "share" icon next to a saved folder.
To share a saved folder with others, users first select the "share" icon, which immediate places the folder into the company-wide "shared" folder pool. Once this is done, the "owner" of the folder will then see a number of icons to the right of the folder name. These will include the option to re-name the folder, the option to edit the access rights to the folder, and the ability to delete the folder.
When the folder owner selects the option to edit the access rights, a dialog window will open with options for various levels of access (read only vs. read write), and the option to define a specific group of users from a list of available PatBase account users.
When the user selects the latter option, the system will load the list of other available account owners (and any pre-defined groups). The user may then select all other account owners and groups that need permission to view the folder. Once the settings are saved, only those users will have access to the folder.
The User Group Management feature can be used to define pre-determined user groups in PatBase. If the same group of people within a company will regularly be gaining access to shared folders, it may be useful for one of these users to create a pre-set "group" using this tool, to save time when assigning access rights. The User Group Management tool may be accessed from the "Manage User Groups" hyperlink which appears in the top right corner of the search history page, or from the settings tab of the Main Menu. Once accessed, the dialog window is straightforward to use.
