Report:TotalPatent/Search Interface/The Command Line Interface

The Command Line Interface

The search forms on TotalPatent may be used to input queries in command language. In addition to the various data fields that can be searched using the Guided and Advanced search forms, there are many other less common data elements that may also be searched via the TotalPatent interface by using TotalPatent’s command language and field qualifiers. A complete list of all searchable data fields in TotalPatent is provided in the Searchable Datafields section. Searching using these particular data fields can only be accomplished by using the large “Search Within” text box as a type of command line input, and typing in a search command as shown in the figure below.

The search form used as a command line input, by using accepted TotalPatent field qualifiers.

In the figure, the command (Assignee(Smith) and Applicant-Dstate(United States)) is entered into the main text box. Although “Assignee” is a common search field, the “Applicant-Dstate” term stands for “designated state of the applicant” (the home country of the applicant), a field not searchable through the Guided or Advanced search form interfaces. Using the command line in this way can help users narrow and target their searches beyond the limiting parameters available on the search forms.

The list of all available field qualifiers is available on the TotalPatent website and in the user guide, and a summary has been provided in the Searchable Datafields section. Briefly, it contains many search fields that deal with specific bibliographic and legal details such as PCT application data, former IPC classifications and US fields of search, and applicant and inventor countries and addresses. Additionally, it also provides qualifiers that will restrict searches to English, French, German or Spanish text sections, for EP and PCT authorities which may be published with multiple sets of titles, abstracts and claims (EP patents will have claims in all three official languages of the EPO (English, French and German)).

Editor's Note:

The command line feature in TotalPatent is quite similar to that of Delphion, where a text box that would normally be used for constructing keyword searches can also be used with field qualifiers (the newer Thomson Innovation has a designated Expert Search page that contains a command line form). One downside to the TotalPatent version is that the qualifiers themselves are quite long – for example, users would need to type out the entire words “Attorney,” “Citation-No,” “Expiration,” etc. to limit a search to those fields. Some abbreviations are available for more common fields, such as Ab=Abstract, CLM=Claim, In=inventor, and TI=title.^[1] One typical benefit of a command line interface is that it can be used by experienced searchers for the quick and efficient construction of search queries; unfortunately, that benefit is somewhat hindered in TotalPatent by the need to type out lengthier field qualifiers. It is useful that TotalPatent now has some abbreviations available for common field qualifiers, which may make query construction a quicker process.