Method and appratus for finding patent-relevant web documents

• US 20020147738A1
• Filed: 04/06/2001
• Published: 10/10/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 04/06/2001
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Scot A. Reader
• Original Assignee: Scot A. Reader
• Inventors: Reader, Scot A.
• Application Number:
  US09/828,649
• Publication Number:
  US 20020147738A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/500
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9566 URL specific, e.g. using aliases, detecting broken or misspelled links

Abstract

Automated search technique for discovering patent-relevant publications on the Internet. A search client resident on an end-user station initiates linked searches for patent language and Web documents in a manner transparent to a user. From the user'"'"'s perspective, a patent-identifying attribute, such as an inventor name, assignee name or patent number, input on an end-user station automatically returns Web document identifiers, such as Uniform Resource Locators (URLs). The Web document search may be conducted in a database including Web document summaries or in a database including full-text Web documents.

Claims

1. A method for finding patent-relevant documents published on the Internet, comprising the steps of:

inputting a patent-identifying attribute on an end-user station;

identifying patent data from the patent-identifying attribute;

identifying Internet publication data from the patent data; and

outputting the Internet publication data on the end-user station.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the patent data are abstracted prior to identifying the Internet publication data.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the sole patent-identifying attribute is an assignee name.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the sole patent-identifying attribute is an inventor name.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the one or more patent-identifying attributes include a patent number.

6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the Internet publication data include a Uniform Resource Locator (URL).

7. A method for locating a plurality of documents published on the Internet relevant to a plurality of attribute-related patents, respectively, comprising the steps of:

inputting a patent-identifying attribute on an end-user station;

identifying patent data for a plurality of patents from the patent-identifying attribute;

identifying Internet publication data for the plurality of patents from the patent data; and

outputting the Internet publication data on the end-user station.

8. The method according to claim 7, wherein the sole patent-identifying attribute is an assignee name.

9. The method according to claim 7, wherein the sole patent-identifying attribute is an inventor name.

10. The method according to claim 7, wherein the Internet publication data include a plurality of URLs.

11. A method for finding a patent-relevant document published on the Internet, comprising:

accepting as a computer input a patent-identifying attribute;

searching a first database using the patent-identifying attribute to locate patent data;

searching a second database using the patent data to locate Web document data; and

returning as a computer output the Web document data.

12. The method according to claim 11, wherein the sole patent-identifying attribute is an assignee name.

13. The method according to claim 11, wherein the sole patent-identifying attribute is an inventor name.

14. The method according to claim 11, wherein the sole patent-identifying attribute is a patent number.

15. The method according to claim 11, wherein the patent-identifying attributes include a patent number and a patent claim number.

16. The method according to claim 11, wherein the patent data include patent claim language.

17. The method according to claim 11, wherein the Web document data include a URL.

19. The system according to claim 18, wherein the plurality of databases include a patent database and a Web document database.

20. The system according to claim 18, wherein the searches in seriatim include a first search in a patent database and a second search in a Web document database.

21. The system according to claim 20, wherein the Web document database includes Web document summaries.

22. The system according to claim 20, wherein the Web document database includes full-text Web documents.

24. The system according to claim 23, wherein the interaction with the network includes a first search in a patent database and a second search in a Web document database.

25. The system according to claim 23, wherein the interaction with the network includes a first search to identify the patent language and a second search to find the location.

26. The system according to claim 23, wherein the patent language includes patent claim language.

27. The system according to claim 23, wherein the location is a URL.

18. A system for locating an Internet publication relevant to a patent, comprising:

a computer for accepting an input and returning an output; and

a plurality of databases;

wherein in response to a patent-identifying attribute accepted as an input the computer initiates searches in the plurality of databases in seriatim to generate Internet publication data returned as an output.

23. A system for finding an Internet publication relevant to a patent, comprising:

a network; and

a computer having a user interface, for interacting with a user, and a network interface, for interacting with the network;

wherein in response to a patent-identifying attribute Input on the user interface the computer interacts with the network transparent to the user to find a location of an Internet publication relevant to patent language identified from the patent-identifying attribute and to output the location on the user interface.