Patent Information: Open Patent Services

3rd Annual Forum for SMEs

Information Workshop on European Bioinformatics Resources

Vienna, September 2009

Nigel S. Clarke

Manager Online Products and User Support

Open Patent Services:the evolution of a web service

Written by: Davide Lingua

Presented by: Nigel Clarke

EPO Vienna September 2009

esp@cenet and OPS:

A different look at the same picture

EPO Mainframe

Databases

generate XML

Web ServicesClient

(non-EPO)

Web ServicesClient

(non-EPO)

generate HTML

generate XML

Web ServicesClient

(non-EPO)

Web ServicesClient

(non-EPO)OPS v.1

OPS v.2OPS v.2

The "Fair use" charter

"Fair use" charter

esp@cenet and OPS:

• Free of charge• 24x7 Availability : 24 hours/day, 7 days/week• (Note: regular and extraordinary outages)

• esp@cenet has been developed for human users only no robots please

• OPS: is dedicated to integrated systems/automated access restrictions when bulk downloading

• And: EPO resources are limited

The "Fair use" charter

• To give clarity on:– what the EPO can offer– how the users are expected to behave

• Visible on:– http://ep.espacenet.com and– http://ops.epo.org/

• Main principle: Human users always come first!

Specific to OPS

• Integrated systems and robots must:– let us know who they are (IP address used)!– Sign a data user agreement– Observe restrictions as indicated

• Enforcement of these principles is being implemented gradually

Open Patent Services v.1 http://ops.espacenet.com

Open Patent Services (OPS) v.1

To be discontinued in October/November 2009

Retrieval of data for single input numbersIn operation since Summer 2003

The latest statistics for OPS v.1 (week 20/2009)

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Open Patent Services v.2http://ops.epo.org

OPS version 2

A complete overhaul of the version 1 XML and more:

• Launched in December 2008• Makes OPS a "document literal" web service• New elements are supported in the input XML• Returns bibliography and full-text in St. 36 XML• Adds operations to allow bibliographic search• Adds equivalents and full-text inquiry

The latest statistics for OPS v.2 (week 20/2009)

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Information page http://ops.epo.org

New documentation to be added soon!

Check the input examples

OPS v.2: Document literal

OPS v.1 request OPS v.2 request

• Based on ACTION attribute• Is a string

<input_request xsi:type="xsd:string">&lt;OpenPatentServices ACTION=&quot;Biblio&quot;&gt;&lt;

WORLDPATENTDATA&gt; &lt;BIBLIO SEED=&quot;EP1000000&quot; SEED_FORMAT=&quot;E&quot; SEED_TYPE=&quot;PN&quot;/&gt; &lt;/WORLDPATENTDATA&gt;&lt;/OpenPatentServices&gt;</input_request>

• Operation addressed to different URI• Is an XML document<ops:biblio-retrieval>

<ops:publication-reference data-

format="epodoc">

<document-id>

<doc-number>EP100000</doc-number>

</document-id>

</ops:publication-reference>

</ops:biblio-retrieval>

Biblio and full-text in St. 36 XML

• Bibliographic data is returned in XML derived from the WIPO St. 36 used in DOCDB exchange

• Full-text data is returned in XML compatible with the extensions to the WIPO St. 36 planned for full-text exchange

Bibliographic search

• Completely new feature• Input is query in Contextual Query Language (CQL):

<ops:query>ti=bicycle and gear and pr=IT</ops:query>

• For more info check http://zing.z3950.org/cql/intro.html • Allows retrieval of multiple IDs for documents found• IDs can be used in improved bibliographic retrieval to

obtain data for multiple publications

Full-text inquiry

• Completely new feature• Inquiry for full-text availability• Input is a publication number• Indicates whether claims or description texts are

available

Equivalents inquiry

• Completely new feature• Input is a publication number• Provides list of equivalents ("simple family")• Only one number per publication cycle (full

publication cycle available in "biblio request")

Tips on using OPS v.2

The DOCDB format

Always contains

CC: ISO two letter country code NNNNNNNNNNNN: up to 12 digit number KK: DOCDB kind code, always 2 positions, can be wildcard (%, #)

<document-id><country>US</country><doc-number>5000014</doc-number><kind>A#</kind>

</document-id>

Check the link:http://documents.epo.org/projects/babylon/eponet.nsf/0/46B8A2BFCD345BB8C12572990053478F/$File/publication_formats_numbers_0708_en.pdf

The EPODOC publication format

Is of the kind: CCNNNNNNNNNNNN(K)

CC: ISO two letter country code N(N...): can be up to 12 digits (EP is 7), NO SPACES (K): attached kind code (kc) letter

<document-id><country></country> <doc-number>EP1915004</doc-number> <kind></kind>

</document-id>

(K): if kc A(n), letter A never attachedif kc D(n) to Z(n), first letter always attachedif kc B(n) or C(n), first letter (up to 2 characters forJP) can be attached i(f this is necessary to differentiate documentsbelonging to overlapping number-series)

Tips

Namespaces "exc:" and "ops:"

Wildcards: % (0 or 1 character), # (space)

Beware of PCT application number formats in DOCDB

Use the SOAP request examples

SOAP fault "Ambiguous seed"

Other error's handling

Two namespaces - two sets of references

• exc:publication-reference

• exc:application-reference

• exc:priority-claim

• ops:publication-reference

• ops:application-reference

• ops:priority-claim

• ops:query

• ops:document-retrieval

WO application formats in DOCDB

• Until 1.1.2004: CCyynnnnnW• After 1.1.2004: CCccyynnnnnnW

• CC=country code where filing took place (IB=International Buro)

• cc=century (20), yy=year

• nnnnnn=sequential number (6 digits, 5 digits before 2004)

• W= mandatory application kind code

• Examples:

• PCT/FR00/01957 DOC-DB "_FR_____0001957W%"• PCT/GB02/04635 DOC-DB "_GB_____0204635W%"• PCT/IB2004/000639 DOC-DB "_IB__2004000639W%"

WO application formats in DOCDB: examples

<exch:application-reference data-format="docdb"><document-id>

<country>IB</country> <doc-number>2004000639</doc-number> <kind>%%</kind>

</document-id> </exch:application-reference>

<exch:application-reference data-format="docdb"> <document-id>

<country>FR</country> <doc-number>0001957</doc-number> <kind>%%</kind>

</document-id> </exch:application-reference>

Tip: use the wildcard

Search for an application number

Ambiguous seed

Published application JP3119522 A 19910521 Utility model JP3119522U U 19911210 Granted patent JP3119522B2 B2 20001225

OPS Request<ops:biblio-retrieval xmlns:ops="http://ops.epo.org"

xmlns:exch="http://www.epo.org/exchange"> <exch:publication-reference data-format="docdb"> <document-id> <country>JP</country> <doc-number>3119522</doc-number> <kind>%%</kind> </document-id> </exch:publication-reference></ops:biblio-retrieval>

Three different inventions

OPS response

<SOAP-ENV:Envelope xmlns:SOAP-ENV="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/">........................<faultstring xml:lang="en-US">The requested reference was ambiguous.</faultstring>..................... </ambiguous-input> <resolution> <exch:publication-reference xmlns:exch="http://www.epo.org/exchange"

xmlns:ops="http://ops.epo.org" data-format="docdb"> <document-id> <country>JP</country> <doc-number>3119522</doc-number> <kind>B2</kind> </document-id> </exch:publication-reference> </resolution> <resolution> <exch:publication-reference xmlns:exch="http://www.epo.org/exchange"

xmlns:ops="http://ops.epo.org" data-format="docdb"> <document-id> <country>JP</country> <doc-number>3119522</doc-number> <kind>U</kind> </document-id> </exch:publication-reference> </resolution>........................</SOAP-ENV:Envelope>

Error handling

OPS returns now SOAP faults instead of errors. For instance:

<SOAP-ENV:Envelope xmlns:SOAP-ENV="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/"><SOAP-ENV:Header/> <SOAP-ENV:Body>

<SOAP-ENV:Fault> <faultcode>SOAP-ENV:Client</faultcode> <faultstring xml:lang="en">The request was

invalid.</faultstring> </SOAP-ENV:Fault>

</SOAP-ENV:Body> </SOAP-ENV:Envelope>

Additional features of OPS v.2

• More citations: EP/WO, US, GB, FR, DE, AU, NL, ES, CH, BE, ...

• More full text documents (description and/or claims): EP, WO, AT, CA, CH

Further planning

• Implementation of fair use policy• Retrieval of ECLA classes in XML format• Number services• Extension of full text coverage• Full text search in En, De, Fr• New operations for the EP Register

Thank you for yourattention

D 5.5.2Davide Linguadlingua@epo.org