Software patents

P atent- Image s USPTO MicroPatent covers U.S. granted patents 1990—present backfile to 1975 available uses the same Patsoft software as the ESPACE products... 

A fundamental requirement for obtaining a patent is defining an advance, development, or invention which is within those classes of "subject matter" which the law of the United States regards as patentable. Two classes of patentable subject matter, ie, computer software and biotechnology, are the subject of relatively new and evolving law. However, other types of subject matter rest on fairly certain ground as to patentabiUty. Examples of patents directed to various types of subject matter are described in the following. 

J. Pagenberg and B. Geissler, Eicense Agreements Patents, Utility Models, Know-How, Computer Software, Cad Heymaims, 1989. 

Besides the worldwide WPI database, Derwent provides on the ORBIT system the USPatents database, a bibhographic file of patent front page and cl aim information for U.S. patents since 1971. Derwent also produces a biotechnology database, GENESEQ, that indexes sequence stmetures of proteins or nucleic acids disclosed specifically or genetically in patents. This database is searchable with special sequence software on the InteUiGenetics system, and is a new addition to STN s database catalog. 

Full-Text Patent Databases. The LEXPAT database on the LEXIS— NEXIS system, the first commercially available full-text patent file, receives its greatest use from patent attorneys and has been relatively unused by other patent information speciaUsts. This may be attributed to search software that is quite different from the type familiar to information speciaUsts, no matter what their preferred host system. This situation has changed with dialog s release of the PATEULL files followed by STN s USPATEULL, both searchable by familiar Boolean techniques and featuring greater... 

The Chinese patent file with its abstracts can be used to supplement WPI, which at this writing has only tides for Chinese patents. JAPIO provides abstracts based ia particular oa pateat claims, and can help to clarify uncertainties with Japanese abstracts from Derwent and/or CA. PATOLIS, ia Japanese, is a unique source of Japanese legal status information (37). EPIDOS staff carry out PATOLIS searches on request for those with sufficient need to search the PATOLIS database, software is available to enable those who cannot read Japanese to extract key data. 

There are three major steps to a patent search. (1) There is the US Patent Classification System that is a sort of subject index to all patents, (2) CASSIS is a computerized software information system provided by the USA patent office, and (3) review the patent that takes time involves the weekly official worldwide gazettes, magazines, etc. There are many ways available to search the patent database in both US and worldwide, but one web that is particularly useful to the novice or occasional searcher is one offered by IBM locate at http //www patents.IBM.com... 

The Court of Appeals for the USA Federal Circuit issued (1992) a decision that could strengthen the legal position that so-called pure software could be patented (Arrhythmia Research Technology vs. Corazonix Corp. 22 USPQ2d 103 of CAFC march 12,1992). 

In order to meet the rising demand for information thousands of databases are available worldwide. Nearly all supply technical literature, economic information, patent references, and manufacturers addresses. Materials databases with numerical values are a relatively small part of these programs. Because the majority of these databases are from individual manufacturers of plastics, there is only limited comprehensive, neutral information on most materials in these software programs. 

The proposed European Directive (i.e., EU law) on the patenting of computer-implemented inventions [8] has led to a debate in Europe on the desirability of patents on software. The debate recently culminated in a vote by the European Parliament, which rejected the proposed legislation [9]. 

Bodini S. EU software patent law is dead managing intellectual property. Weekly News, 11 July 2005. Accessible at http //www.managingip.com/ Page= 9 PUBID=198 ISS=17456 SID=524170 SM=ALL SearchStr=computer-... 

But if the property is unlike any the world has yet seen, then it is not clear how such property should be regarded, let alone protected. In other words, the question of just what sort of property software is has not been satisfactorily answered, which contributes to the debate on the uniqueness question. Nonetheless, devices such as copyrights, patents, encryption, trade secrets, and oaths of confidentiality and standard virtues like trustworthiness and loyalty have been tried to protect ownership and the right to property [17, 23]. 

Term extraction and analysis software, in patent searching, 18 244 Terminal model theory, 29 832 Terminal activity coefficients, 8 743 Terminal lakes... 

On November 11, 2003, Ray Kurzweil and John Keklak received U.S. Patent 6,647,395 for software that creates poetry. These programs read a selection of poems and then create a language model that allows the program to write original poems from that model. This means that the system can emulate words and rhythms of human poets to create new masterpieces. The system can also be used to motivate human authors who have writer s block and are looking for help with alliteration and rhyming. 

In 1982 Ayerst Laboratories in Montreal became the first company in Canada to install a commercial software tool (the SYBYL suite from Tripos Associates) to help in the development of pharmacophoric models from structure-activity relationships. The installation of the software was the second ever, worldwide, by a company and is a testimonial to the foresight of the director of medicinal chemistry, Dr. Leslie Humber, for having championed its installation. Dr. Adi M. Treasurywala, then an organic chemist with some experience in medicinal chemistry, became the first industrial computational chemist in Canada that year. The use of modeling approaches contributed in a minor but significant way to the discovery of the compound known as Tolrestat, which was an inhibitor of lens aldose reductase. This led to the acknowledgment of Treasurywala as a coinventor of the drug on several patents that were filed in this research area. Approximately in 1983, Ayerst closed down its discovery effort in Canada and moved to Princeton, New Jersey, where an expanded effort in the area of computational chemistry continues. 

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