Evaluations, Customer Specific Fields, Comments and Corporate Abstract
Evaluations
Complex evaluation structures, where patent portfolios are evaluated under specific aspects have for a long time been an essential part of the Invention Navigator when working with local databases. From version 7.0 these complex evaluation options will be described as advanced evaluation in order to distinguish them from the new simple evaluation.
Simple evaluation is available to all users of the Invention Navigator Portable and Professional with a Knowledge Network and can be used without local databases. Unlike the advanced evaluation it allows allocation of comments and evaluation stages for every publication of a family.
The evaluation scheme is assigned on Knowledge Network level and can be used by all users of an Invention Navigator Network (usually within a company). An administration tool can be used on user and group level to manage the rights which evaluations can be read or allocated.
The Comment Window
The comment window which can be used to give simple evaluations and corporate abstract can be opened by clicking on the pencil symbol in detail view (tool bar left of the image). The window can remain open during your work and is automatically updated when opening a new patent in detail view. You can see the number of the family member you are currently evaluating in the bottom left of the comment window.
Corporate Abstract
The evaluation window is divided in three parts. In the top part you can see the field corporate abstract. Here comments on the patent family can be entered. This field corresponds to the field “Network comment” in the Invention Navigator versions before version 7.0 and the Portable versions. By clicking on the “History” button you can see when and by whom the corporate abstract was edited. After saving the latest entry will instantly be shown in the detail view below the patent family and in front of the office abstract.
This abstract will now appear with all family members and is instantly searchable in the research surface (see below). This feature enables you to allocate your own abstracts and descriptions to an invention on family level.
You can comment on family members and if needed assign an evaluation level in the lower part of the comment window.
Search for Comments, Status and Search in the Corporate Abstract
Once a status, a comment or a corporate abstract has been saved, these entries are instantly indexed and therefore searchable. To do this, pull the fields and/or comments in the search mask using Drag-and-Drop. The search in the corporate abstract is a text search and all features available for the Full text search can be used.
The comment search features a search mask where you can easily enter date and comment as text. Status and author of the comment can be selected via a list. All fields are linked with AND. If you would like to link the fields with OR, open the comment field multiple times and link them with OR or NOT.
Evaluations and Comments
In the middle part of the window you can see the history of evaluations of specific documents of a patent family. When clicking on a new patent in the title list, when selecting a member in the patent family or when scrolling to the next detail view, the comment window will update itself automatically.
In the middle part you find a list containing patent number, date of commenting, name and email of the commentator followed by an icon and a status field.
The patent number specifies which document was commented on. Date and author is automatically entered by the system when saving.
Comment and status can be assigned by clicking on the button “Add comment”.
On the right a selection window will open containing various status descriptions. By default a status ”Memo” with a symbol (usually a white flag) is shown. This status only signifies that a comment on a document is allocated. ´The statuses displayed in the image are possible examples. On network level any number of statuses with any number of icons can be set up individually for a company.
When assigning a status and a comment and saving the entry by clicking the “Save” button the comment is automatically included in the history and the appropriate icon is displayed next to the document in the patent family. If only one comment and status is allocated, this icon appears next to the patent number in the top part of the patent family and in the title list left of the patent number.
What happens when different statuses were allocated? The statuses are weighted. In the example the status “IP Involved” is weighted higher than the status “Monitoring needed”. The highest given status is always displayed next to the number in the top part of the detail view and in the title list.
Additional Fields
With the Invention Navigator Professional solution you can create your own fields locally. Many Invention Navigator customers create for example fields for file numbers, cost centres, departments, etc. These fields can be loaded on the Invention Knowledge Network. They will then be displayed in the result list to authorized users. You can show/hide these fields by selecting View/additional fields.
You can also search the contents (e.g. file numbers) of these fields. To do this drag the field “additional fields” into the search mask. Select the search field and enter your search query.
Like all other company specific fields this field can also be combined with other search fields.
You can find out more about creating your own fields in the manual for the Invention Navigator 5.0.