What's this website all about?
Anyone who searches patents is familiar with techniques based on text searching and classification searching. Older searchers may remember a time when patent examiners maintained their own personal, unofficial digests. Walk into such an examiner's office, explain what you were looking for, and frequently the examiner could quickly pull a useful piece of prior art. This was by no means the end of the search, but having a pertinent document in hand could be beneficial for understanding exactly what was being sought and for fine tuning a more complete search.
The purpose of this web site is to encourage the use of digests as a supplement to conventional patent search activities. The site is aimed at practitioners who concentrate on some focussed technology area and would benefit from more detailed breakdowns than provided by official classification systems.
Who is behind this project?
This web site was created by Cliff Shaw, a retired patent examiner. It is a personal effort, with no official connection to any patent office.
