First to file system

USA operate a first to invent system rather than the first to file system operated in other countries. 

In the first to file system, the first person who makes a patent application at the Patent Office wins the race for patent rights regardless of whether or not he was the first to make the invention covered by the application. 

The general adoption of a first to file system including a grace period for filing patent applications following disclosure by an inventor, with small entity fee reductions would assist smaller companies and may prevent them from losing patent rights to their irmovative products and processes. 

Unlike the rest of the world, US patent practice is a first-to-invent rather than first-to-file system, the argument being that the Constitutional basis for the patent system was to secure rights for inventors not for hasty filers. This occasionally leads to a quasi-judicial proceeding known as an interference. 

Currently there is considerable interest in the world community for the United States to harmonize its laws with those of the rest of the industrialized world and adopt the first-to-file system. Although efforts have been made in the United States to adopt the first-to-file rule, there has been considerable resistance to such a change. Adoption of a first-to-file rule does not appear likely in the near future. Should... 

First-to-File versus First-to-Invent. The United States applies a first-to-invent patent system, which means that if two different patent applications describe the same invention, the patent right will be issued to the invention that can be proven to have been invented first [84]. By contrast, the patent law of Canada, the EPO, and Japan, impose a first-to-file system, meaning that if two patent applications for the same invention are filed, the patent right will be granted to the applicant who filed an application at the earliest date [85], which is true even if the two identical inventions were arrived at independently. For this reason, first-to-file systems are often referred to as creating a high stakes race [86]. 

Unlike the rest of the world, US patent practice is a first-to-invent rather than first-to-file system. 

To prevent extended controversies and long delays in the issuance of patents when two or more inventors are clalj9 > ing the same improvement, the nation should change to a first-to-file system, whereby the first inventor to file his patent application would receive the patent. 

This is called the first to conceive type of patent which was the rule in the US until 2007 when Congress tried to change the patent law to a first to file system, which is used in most of the rest of the world. As of this writing the change in the law is under litigation. 

By the turn of the century the U.S. PTO may be operating under a system that includes (/) pubHcation of patent appHcations (2) opposition of allowed appHcations for purposes of testing vaHdity (J) the dawn of first-to-file priority examination and (4) the end of the antiquated test of inventorship called "interference practice." Legislation implementing many of these changes is pending before the U.S. Congress. 

The US first to invent system allows a person to obtain a US patent if he can prove that he made the invention prior to another party who filed an earlier patent application for the same invention. Proof of invention can involve submission of lab note books, making diligent record keeping extremely important to preserve US patent rights. 

Only one party can be awarded a patent to an invention (die same invention cannot be patented twice), and die prize usually goes to the party that can establish that it was die first party to invent the contested subject matter. This is a consequence of die United States being a first-to-invent country (more will be explained regarding this facet of U.S. law in Chapter 3). The first-to-invent system makes a provisional patent application less critical than if die United States were a first-to-file country like the rest of the world. However, filing a provisional patent application in the United States is still advantageous because any... 

Another major difference, between the US patent system and others that exist as of the date of this writing (November, 2007) has to do with who should be granted a patent, if more than one applicant should claim the same invention. Should priority be given to the party that files the application first (first to file) or to the party that actually came up with the idea and reduced it to practice first (first to invent) The first to invent system currently applies in the US and the Philippines, while first to file reigns everywhere else. 

For a good discussion of the merits and demerits of first to file versus first to invent, see A Patent System for the 21st Century , Merrill, S.A., Levin, R.C., Myers, M.B., Eds. (Washington, DC, National Academies Press, 2004). Available at www.nap.edu/html/patentsystem/0309089107.pdf. 

With the advent of on-line searching in the 1970s, the Derwent file was one of the first to go on-line. It had subject retrieval capabiUty by the manual and punch code systems, tide terms, IPC, and broad subject groupings called Derwent classes, whose primary function had been to allocate patents to appropriate segments of the Derwent system. By 1981, abstracts were added to the database, after which abstracts for the entire back-file were added. 

Because Microsoft Office is so widely used, it is sometimes necessary for you to import data directly from Microsoft Excel or Microsoft Access. Excel files make for a poor database, however. First, Excel files are almost guaranteed to come from a system that is not compliant with CFR 21 - Part 11. Second, it is often the case that the Excel files were created in such a way that the data are not WYSIWYG ( what you see is what you get ). In other words, each cell in Excel could be entered with a different Excel format, which you would not see until you either reformat an entire column in Excel or try to have some other software like SAS read the contents of the Excel file. For these reasons, it is best not to accept Microsoft Excel data as a data source for clinical trials if at all possible. 

Traditionally data, properties, information etc has been stored in files on computer disks. More recently, it has become common practice on Macintosh computers, when using Microsoft software or some UNIX applications, to use either extensions to the file name or the first few bytes in the file (or another file) to indicate some aspects of the data, for example that it is suitable for Microsoft Excel. While this approach is practical to indicate something about files containing columns of data, it is not appropriate to store information about the values in cells in spreadsheet or how it relates to data in other columns. This requires a relational database such as ORACLE, and for performance reasons the values in the cells may only be accessed via the ORACLE API (Application Programming Interface) or SQL (Standard Query Language), in other words, it is suggested that relational databases such as ORACLE should be viewed as sophisticated file systems which allow the values to be organised, efficiently stored, rapidly retrieved etc. 

The observance of critical sequences must be assured. System function checks should be implemented to verify steps that need to be performed in a particular order. For example, in the process Input Data Check Data Release Data, the system must not permit step 2 to be performed before step 1, and step 3 must not be performed before step 2. Similarly, when a document is first created, the system should automatically check whether another document with the same file name exists. If the file name is already in use on the system, the system needs to force the user to change it. After confirming the acceptability of a file name the document can be stored. 

Tests. A series of potassium dichromate solutions of concentration 20, 40, 60, 80, and 100 mg/L in 0.005 M sulfuric acid can be used to test tlie linearity of file system. First, 0.005 M sulfuric acid as reference is scanned and then the potassiiun dichromate solutions at 235, 257, 313, and 350 nm. The absorbance values at various wavelengtli are plotted against tlie concentration of tlie solutions and file correlation coefficients are calculated. 

The files on the CD-ROM are contained in the Excel for Chemists folder and are read-only. To work with a document and save the changes, you must first copy the files to your hard drive. If you are using a PC, you can run the INSTALL.EXE file on the CD an unzip the files to your hard drive. If you are a Macintosh user, copy the Excel for Chemists folder to your system. 

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