Patent Grabber update: EP searching still needs fixing

Sorry folks! There is an old saying about a squeaking wheel getting the grease. I have a new but unreleased version of Patent Grabber in which PCT searching is working again. My next goal before release is to get EP searching back up again. However, both PCT and EP searching have be out of commission for a while, but without any complaints. So I have been spending my scarce bits of free time on other priorities.

If you would like a preview version in which PCT searching works, just let me know.

Patent Grabber: EP searching is broken by changes at EPO. Read more for a workaround.

Those mischievous folks at the European Patent Office have made changes to their search system (again). Those changes have broken Patent Grabber's EP search function. We will get that fixed soon.

In the meantime, as a workaround, search for EP published applications using Patent Grabber's "international" search function, but include "pn/ep" as one of your search terms.

New version of Patent Grabber to cure PCT searching ills!

Well, those mischievous folks at WIPO have done it again! They made changes to their search system that broke Patent Grabber's ability to do PCT searching. I have uploaded Patent Grabber 6.4.2 which cures the problem. Download now from the Patent Tools page of the Blazing Dawn Software web site:

Patent Tools

Patent Grabber 6.4.1 (Final) is now available for download!

Patent Grabber(TM) Version 6.4.1 is a FREE upgrade for registered users of Version 5.x and 6.x. When you start Ver. 6.4.1, it should automatically open up in its registered state. If that does not happen, enter your username and registration code.

The Mac OS X version is now code signed for your protection. Check your settings under "Secuity & Privacy" --> "General" to make sure it is set to allow apps downloaded from "Mac App Store and identified developers." We will release a code signed Windows version of Patent Grabber as soon as we can.

Downloading:

Fixed a lot of “link rot” issues.

Added ability to mix U.S. issued patents and published applications in the “Download” list.

Added the ability to save everything that is downloaded into a single Adobe Acrobat (PDF) file. Especially useful if you are just downloading the bibliographic pages from multiple patents and you want them combined into a single PDF document.
See the "Preferences" section of the Patent Grabber instructions for a description of how you can obtain a free EPO "Open Patent Services" (OPS) account and then generate credentials for you to use with your copy of Patent Grabber. Those credentials will reduce the chance of the EPO temporarily locking you out of their OPS databases for overusage. Several of Patent Grabber's features make use of OPS.

Searching:

Fixed a lot of “link rot” issues.

Download for Mac OS X

Download for Windows

Patent Grabber 6.4.1 beta (Build 11) is available for download!

OK, finally! There has been enough input and enough testing to put Patent Grabber 6.4.1 beta (Build 11) up for downloading. This will hopefully be the production version so long as I do not receive any problem reports.

The big problem was "link rot" issues, especially for features that used the EPO's "Open Patent Services" system. For a while it was a moving target (that's why I never released Version 6.4), but things have hopefully settled down for the time being.

I have added two new features that were requested by users:

First, users may now mix U.S. patent numbers and U.S. published application numbers in the download field. While it may seem like a simple concept, in operation it was a lot more complicated!

Second, I added the ability to combine many documents from one download list into a single Adobe Acrobat (PDF) file. Say you just want to download the bibliographic pages from many patents, and have them as a single PDF file. Previously, you would have had to download the individual bibliographic files using Patent Grabber and then perform that final combining process separately using a PDF manipulation app such as the full version of Acrobat or (on the Mac) Preview. In Version 6.4.1 all you have to do is check the "Single PDF" checkbox and Patent Grabber will do everything for you.

Please download Patent Grabber 6.4.1 beta (Build 11):

Mac OSX

Windows

Patent Grabber 6.3 is now available!

Patent Grabber 6.3 is now available! This version is a free upgrade for licensed users.

Added the ability for a user to save European Patent Office credentials for their copy of Patent Grabber. That allows Patent Grabber to operate at maximum speed without liklihood of being locked out by the EPO for over usage. Obtaining EPO credentials is free, and is highly recommended for all users who: 1) use US Patent Biblio with "Include Family Identifiers" checked, 2) use US Patent Biblio +, download EP, PCT or International patent documents, or download INPADOC legal status reports.

See the "Preferences" section of the Patent Grabber instructions for a description of how you can obtain a free EPO "Open Patent Services" account and then generate credentials for you to use with your copy of Patent Grabber.

The Family-izer™ patent family web apps are back in action!

Family-izer and Family-izer Solo both stopped working recently. We tracked down the problem to an unannounced change at our ISP. We made the appropriate adjustments and both are back in action!

So if you need INPADOC patent family information, for one patent or hundreds, please give them a try!

Patent Grabber 6.2.1 now available

Patent Grabber 6.2.1 is now available to download from the Blazing Dawn Software "Patent Tools" page. This minor update fixed the downloading of EPO and PCT text, and cleaned up some abberations in the US Patent Biblio and US Patent Biblio+ spreadsheets.

Windows users of Patent Grabber: new instructions for installing the PDFTK helper app

Windows users: if you are new to Patent Grabber, then you need to download the PDFTK helper app in order to enable Patent Grabber to combine the individual PDF pages of a patent into a single PDF file. Previously, it was easy for users to download the pdftk.zip file, unzip it, and put the resulting pdftk.exe file into the same folder with Patent Grabber. Once you had it there, you just moved it to another folder whenever you downloaded a newer version of Patent Grabber, or you simply put a new version of Patent Grabber into the same folder with the pdftk.exe file.

Now PDF Labs, the developer of PDFTK, has a fancy new installer instead of a simple zip archive. So if you do not already have a copy of pdftk.exe, you need to go to http://www.pdflabs.com/tools/pdftk-server/ and download the Windows "PDFTK Server" installer. Once downloaded, double-click to start the installer.

You can choose where to install the PDFTK Server folder, so install it somewhere that is easy to find since you will not need most of the files and folders that are included. I installed it into my Documents folder. What you will see upon installation is a folder called PDFTK Server (which of course makes sense!). Inside the PDFTK Server folder are several folders, one of which is called "bin." Open the bin folder and you will find two files, pdftk.exe and libiconv2.dll. Those are the only two files you will need. Just drag those two files into the folder that contains Patent Grabber and you are done. You can now delete the PDFTK Server folder.

Once you have these two files on your PC you do not have to download PDFTK Server again when I release a new version of Patent Grabber. Just move the Patent Grabber files into the same folder with pdftk.exe, or move the pdftk.exe and libiconv2.dll files into the same folder with the new version of Patent Grabber.

Patent Grabber 6.2 is now available!

Patent Grabber 6.2 is now available for download from the Patent Tools page of the Blazing Dawn Software web site. Fixes the ability to download U.S. patents and published patent applications. Full length U.S. patents and applications now download much faster. Adds "International" search through the EPO's library. "Demo mode" now uses a separate patent number entry field .

Patent Grabber update is nearly complete!

The update to Patent Grabber that will reinstate USPTO downloading is nearly complete. Just some fine tuning is left to do. Thank you for your patience!

Patent Grabber: Change at USPTO also effects published applications

Sorry, but contrary to yesterday's post, US patent applications are also adversely effected by the USPTO's switch to PDF downloads. Patent Grabber only appears to be downloading the application pages. However, the pages are blank!

I will be releasing a fix for both US patents and published applications as soon as I can. In the meantime, you may still download US patents and published applications using Patent Grabber's "International" option. Using that option downloads the pages from the EPO's library. Just be sure to precede each patent and publication number with the "US" country code.

USPTO goes to PDF downloads. Patent Grabber needs modification.

USPTO has gone to PDF downloads after years of saying that it was too onerous and expensive to do so. As a result, Patent Grabber will hang if you try to download US patents. You can use the "International" downloading option for US patents as a stopgap measure (remember to add the "US" country code).

Even though US published patent applications are also now available in PDF format from the USPTO, Patent Grabber does is not having a problem with them. Go figure!

The EP searching problem affects Patent Grabber

The EP searching problem that I posted about earlier affects Patent Grabber's ability to do EP searching. So for time being, any EP searches performed using Patent Grabber or Espacenet's "EP-only" collection will not return any hits that were published after August 22, 1012.

EP searching using the "Advanced" option at worldwide.espacenet.com has a problem

If you use the Espacenet "Advanced" searching option and use the "collection" drop down to limit searching to only EP publications, there is a problem. No applications that were published after August 22, 2012 will be returned in your search results!

The EPO is aware of this problem, but the search page does not say anything about it. Their suggestion is to select the "Worldwide" option from the "collection" drop down, and put "EP" into the publication number field to limit search results to EP publications. This suggestion does not help if you wish to use full text searching since the EP collection provides for full text searching and the Worldwide collection does not.

Hopefully this issue will be fixed soon.

Patent Grabber 6.1 is now available.

Patent Grabber 6.1 is now available. Fixed the U.S. published application downloading problem. EPO text is now downloaded more fully. Changed "demo mode" to allow one click to download one full length patent as opposed to the first five pages of an unlimited number of patents.

http://www.blazingdawn.com/patent_tools.html

Patent Grabber: US publication downloads broken by USPTO changes

Changes at the USPTO have broken Patent Grabber's ability to download US published patent applications. I am working on a fix.

In the meantime, the workaround is to download US applications using Patent Grabber's "International" option. That downloads the US applications from the EPO rather than the USPTO. There are, however, two changes that you must make:

1) Each publication number must be preceded by "US";

2) the publication number, itself, must be only 10 digits in length. So delete the zero that follows the four digits of the year.

Patent Grabber 6.1 coming soon!

Working on Patent Grabber(TM) 6.1. If you have found something that needs to be fixed or improved, please let me know.

Patent Grabber 6.0 for Windows is available!

Patent Grabber 6.0 for Windows is now available for download from the Blazing Dawn Software "Patent Tools" page. This includes the two new download options, Claim Report and Abstract Report, as well as a host of fixes.

Patent Grabber 6.0 is here with Mountain Lion compatibility!

Patent Grabber 6.0 for Mac OS X is now available for download from the Blazing Dawn Software "Patent Tools" page. This version is Mountain Lion compatible. It also adds two new download options: Claim Report and Abstract Report. Those reports were previously limited to use with search results. There are also lots of fixes (e.g., PCT searching works again; EP title searching works again).