 |
| HomeSite
MapCustomer Logon |
|
Dialog1 |
 |
 |
|
||
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||||||||||||||||
|
Support : eNewsletters : Chronolog Archives
Dialog’s commitment to your success Companies have long recognized the significance and value of training, and it has always been an integral part of Dialog’s commitment to you, our customers. Subscribing to the notion that adults learn best by hearing, seeing and doing, Dialog combines on-site training with live Web-based sessions and a variety of self-paced eLearning opportunities. We make it convenient, too, with quick tips, How Do I…? applications and online courses you can review as your schedule permits. In addition, Online Training and Practice (ONTAP) databases allow you to practice in free databases to reinforce what you learned in Dialog classes. Be sure to review the articles in this issue about new training materials, Biotech How Do I…? applications, and search tips on Dialog and DataStar. Expert instructors All Dialog trainers, including our Knowledge Center specialists, are dedicated professionals with a passion for helping people. They realize that accurate and timely information is vital for you. Each member of our team is well versed on our services and the challenges facing information professionals and highly qualified to help you take full advantage of our services. Indeed, about half of our specialists hold a master's degree or higher, including a Master's in Library and Information Sciences, law degrees and post-graduate degrees in the sciences. So, whatever your skill level—novice to power searcher—Dialog has training to expand your search skills and knowledge on Dialog and DataStar in all subject areas. We are planning a host of events that will be of interest to you at London Online, and we look forward to seeing and talking to you there. Mark your calendars now for these special sessions.
The Dialog and ProQuest booths are located across the aisle from each other at the front of the Olympia Grand Hall exhibit entrance near registration under the banner “Central to Research Around the World.” See you at Dialog Booth 404! EMBASE Alert reloaded in XML format EMBASE® Alert (File 172) now has XML source data format so the indexing and display features in EMBASE Alert, EMBASE® (File 72,73) and other biomedical files are now similar, simplifying multi-file searching. Watch for several new fields in EMBASE Alert:
How Do I…? series expands SciTech offerings to include Biotech topics Customers rave about the How Do I…? series. Now, applications in a new subject area—Biotech—are available. Some applications deal with content, while others address special features to enhance Dialog searching. Here’s a sampling of some of the topics:
Take a look at the new topics and remember to check back frequently to see additional applications in more subject areas. World News Connection: The most requested source for non-classified world news Knowledge of international affairs is essential to participate successfully in today’s global economy. Today, all countries depend on each other, as exemplified in the latest meltdown of the financial markets worldwide. It has become increasingly important to get news quickly from a local perspective; however, most Americans receive their news from U.S. outlets and don’t have access to foreign news as it is being reported locally. The World News Connection® (WNC) (File 985) presents in-depth news covering Europe and hard-to-monitor countries. Compiled by the U.S. Open Source Center and distributed by NTIS: National Technical Information Service, WNC brings news from around the world, translated into English, to users’ desktops, usually within 24-72 hours from the time of the original publication or broadcast. This hard-to-find information is obtained from fulltext and summaries of newspaper articles, television and radio broadcasts, online sources, conference proceedings, periodicals, and non-classified technical reports that cover regions around the world, including China and Taiwan, Eastern Europe, Central Eurasia, East Asia, South Asia, the Middle East and Africa. This information is collected and translated to aid decision-makers at the highest levels of the Executive and Legislative branches of the U.S. Government who need to know what is happening abroad and how it is being reported locally. WNC is also valuable to customers in targeted areas, such as news desks; supply chain managers working with unstable countries; global organizations with offices in these countries; humanitarian aid groups monitoring natural disasters; and policy organizations researching human rights, education and related topics. Dialog senior content specialist, Ron Rodrigues, recalls: WNC, or the Foreign Broadcast Information Service" (FBIS) as it was originally known, was created by "elements" of the U.S. Government responsible for providing news for other agencies of the U.S. Government, such as libraries and analysts responsible for monitoring world affairs, etc. I was the Principal Reference Librarian at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey in the 80s, and I can tell you this: FBIS, now called WNC, was, hands down, the most requested/used source for non-classified world news! This same content within WNC now can provide Dialog subscribers with global insight and perspective . Different cultures and customs affect how the same information is reported and understood. Consequently, Americans may not fully comprehend all that is happening in the world around them, a shortcoming resolved by WNC. An overview of the WNC is available, including instructions for a free trial. J.P. Morgan Securities is back in Investext J.P. Morgan Securities, ranked as one of the top eight Institutional Investor All-Star Teams globally, is now included in Investext® (File 745). Currently, Dialog File 745 contains nearly 125,952 newly loaded records from Corporate Source J.P. Morgan Securities. The records are also available in PDF format in the DialogWeb, DialogClassic Web and DialogLink 5 platforms. These new records encompass March 18, 2008 to October 27, 2008. Additional research will continue to expand the collection until a full history of approximately 230,179 reports is completed. Comprehensive trademark report templates for DialogLink 5 New comprehensive trademark templates for generating Microsoft® Word and Excel reports in Dialog Classic and DialogLink® 5 are now available to facilitate your post-processing needs. Two Microsoft Word templates provide coverage for the entire collection of TRADEMARKSCAN® files, including the new Chinese trademark file. One template outputs records in the order downloaded by the client; the other template orders records by trademark country/authority. Additional features of the Word templates include:
In addition, a new TRADEMARKSCAN Excel template includes:
In DialogLink 5, just click the Reports Tab > Get Templates for Word or Excel. You can also download templates for use with Dialog Classic Web. By: Ron Kaminecki Similarly, words in patents are typically twisted around and changed; a patent drafter, for example, can be her own lexicographer and is allowed to make up words, though the normal meaning of common words is expected to be used. After all, patents deal with new technology that hasn’t been named yet! Word order Many patents are written in English, and this language has its nuances, especially with word order. Sending someone a marketing brochure with a letter asking the requester to “look over” the material has a lot more impact than asking this person to “over look” the material. In patents, word order is often changed from everyday English because this tends to broaden the expression to cover more species. For example, a “beef in a bun” is a very specific two-component sandwich, but a ”bun with beef” almost begs the question of what else may be included. Claims typically favor the second, broader form as long as it is within the bounds of what is already known (the prior art). And, if the patent drafter incorporates a Markush-type claim, this changes the sentence to, “a bun with meat, said meat taken from the group consisting of ham, turkey, pastrami and beef.” Though the inventor may have only created one sandwich, the associated patent can be broadened to cover close copies. Broadening the wording complicates searching because not only was the word order changed, but more words have entered into the equation, and it is an open question as to how many words to allow between such search terms. Understanding how to search claims Searching the claims of a patent also has its idiosyncrasies. First of all, note that the claims are the portion of the patent the attorney uses to identify the “metes and bounds” of the patent, that is, the part that carves out the legal definition of the invention and which will be used to defend the patent in court, if necessary. Patent claims are identical to the method of identifying the boundaries of a piece of real estate insofar as they relate to what is included in concrete terms. Claims are steeped in over two centuries of case law and so must be crafted according to accepted usage. For example, in patents the word “comprising” means “having at least the following qualities” while the phrase “consisting of” means “having only the following qualities,” thus making the former much broader than the latter. So, “comprising” covers any very similar invention that simply adds on to the patented invention, like a recipe that adds one more ingredient. Another major point to consider when searching patents is that claims are one sentence long. Because of this restriction, I once found a claim that was six pages in length, a total of about 2,000 words. Talk about a run-on sentence! Thus, there could be a lot of words in between the words you wish to search. And, when searching claims, you must think broadly as the broadest claim will often be used to cover more species than the narrower claims. So, from the example above, don’t fret if the claim to “meat” turns into the much broader term “proteinaceous product.” Yes, this is what a dedicated lexicographer can do – make up words! Many patent drafters are taught to compose the claims first, then cut and paste the broadest one into the abstract field. Add in commas and periods where the clauses are, and you have an abstract that assures the claim will not be rejected because it did not have an “antecedent basis.” If you don’t believe me, check how many times the word “said” (a legalism meaning “the”) occurs in an abstract. This is a direct result of copying the claims into the abstract field without editing out the legalese. Thus, sometimes when reading abstracts you might be tempted to look at the claims to learn more and you find that there is not a lot of difference between the two. So how do I search patents? Some tips will help you take patent wording, word order and other quirks into account.
Please feel free to write to me directly with questions. And, don’t cry over spilled lactatious products.
|
Dialog’s commitment to your success Business & News Content Updates Intellectual Property Content Updates OnDisc and Dialog@Site changes Effective December, 2008, Dialog will no longer support the OnDisc product platform. This change applies to databases distributed via disc and via the Dialog@site delivery mechanism. Current subscriptions that expire in 2009 will be upgraded at no additional charge to an online service superior to OnDisc. As a reminder, the services will be provided through the end of your subscription date. If you would like to continue receiving these online services after that date, please contact your Dialog representative at least 30 days prior to the expiration period to discuss establishing a contract. This will ensure there are no interruptions to your service. New Fast Start workbook highlights DialogClassic Web functionality A new Fast Start to DialogClassic Web provides concise, step-by-step instructions on how to make the most of this powerful search tool. Covering the basic features of the Web interface plus discussion of its numerous advanced features, both novice and expert users will find this guide to be an indispensable resource.
For example, if you believe certain functionality is exclusively available via DialogLink 5 software, then think again! Section 5: Creating Reports explains how to use the Dialog XML and XSLT Commands to save records in XML format, and then export them into pre-formatted Report Templates creating output in Microsoft Word or Excel format. Live training sessions on searching Dialog with DialogClassic Web are offered on a regular basis by our experienced search experts. Consult our Live Web-based Training schedules for details of classes offered in your region. Now you can download just the OneSearch® categories for Dialog and CROS groups for DataStar. You also may want to review the complete Dialog® Database Selection Guide and the DataStar ® Database Selection Guide, which provide step-by-step examples of how to select appropriate databases for your searches. You may download these valuable Guides in PDF format from the Dialog website or just the OneSearch and CROS categories separately.
In addition, the first issue of our new quarterly Training Newsletter is now available. Subscribe to the Training Newsletter and the monthly Chronolog® to stay informed of new training courses, search tips, expert insights and more.
Check the live Web-based training schedule for the remainder of 2008 and register now for the sessions of your choice.
Dialog Search Tip: Adding new files in the middle of a search Have you ever worked through a search strategy in certain databases and wished you had included another file? You may have thought you had to BEGIN over to include all of the desired databases. The good news is that you don’t have to stop and start over. You can use the ADD and REPEAT commands and keep going to save yourself valuable time and work, especially when you are searching for hard-to-find data. Here’s how it works. In this example, we want to get some information about the investment bank Moelis & Co. to see how they are handling the credit crunch and the financial crisis. We’ll start the search in three general industry databases: Gale Group Promt® (File 16), Business & Industry™ (File 9) and Gale Group Trade and Industry Database™ (File 148) and enter our search terms. However, the search retrieves no results. Instead of repeating the entire search, we can add another business database ABI Inform® (File 15) (e.g., ADD 15) and enter REPEAT to redo the search in all four files. Now we have the article we need. DataStar Search Tip: Using the Root Command in DataStarWeb Occasionally you may find yourself in the midst of a search struggling to find the right indexing for company names, descriptors and authors. DataStarWeb makes it easy to use DataStar’s Root (..root) command. Just add a question mark to the end of a term, and click the Search button in Easy or Advanced Search. For example, enter the search term ECONOMIC?, select Descriptor from the drop-down box, and you will retrieve indexed terms, including ECONOMICS, ECONOMIC-ACTIVITY, ECONOMIC-CRISIS, ECONOMIC-DEVELOPMENT. The question mark works well with authors, too. If you enter the last name followed by a hyphen and a question mark, DataStar will go directly to the author field. So, for example, if you want to find articles written by Ben Bernanke, you can check indexing by entering bernanke-?. Likewise, you can run a quick search on an author by searching, for example, bernanke-$, as long as you know there is only one author indexed in the database by that last name. |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
Support Home
View
as PDF
This month I had to handwrite this patent column because I lost my charger while traveling. This reminds me of an earlier life when we wrote proposals longhand and had a typist convert them to text. Of course, everyone’s writing was not always legible, and I recall a colleague who wrote about his “Turnkey” system. However, it was typed as a “Twinkie” system, and the error was not found until it was sent to the potential client. Needless to say, he didn’t win that one! 
