Upgrade StorageBetter Patent Support Needed (# in bibliography, Country in database)
Summary -- I think there may need to be some fairly major overhauls to how Zotero handles patents as references. Most of the built-in styles do not include the patent number in bibliographies, the database entry for patents does not include the country of issue, and the issuing location is not captured (or created?) from common sites (Google patents).
Details-
I am using Zotero 1.0.9
There are 2 big problems:
1) When I try to cite a patent from the database into a bibliography using APA, CMS (author-date), or Nature [those are all I have tried] the patent number (!) and other specific details are not included at all. For instance the APA style for a patent gives:
Forrester, J. W. (1956, February). Multicooridnate Digital Information Storage Device. Retrieved February 22, 2009, from http://www.google.com/patents?id=MNxYAAAAEBAJ&dq=jay+forrester.
Rather than:
Forrester, J. W. (1956). U.S. Patent No. 2736880. Washington, D.C: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
Based on another forum post . I learned that the IEEE style does handle patents OK, but looking into the details of the IEEE style XML (best viewed with a browser that renders XML doc trees such as firefox) it is a bit of a hack, ...er um I mean required some working around. It looks like the only reason it works is that "US Patent " was manually added as a prefix in the title. What about other issuing countries? Which led me to the other possible problem:
2) Zotero does not seem to capture the issuing country for patents, from which it could build a country specific prefix or guess at the issuing authority. For completeness it also seems that a field for issuing authority is be important in case it was not always COUNTRY_NAME Patent and Trademark Office.
In the process of doing this, I also discovered that when capturing patent information from Google Patents, the issuing place (Washington, DC) is not captured. This however is easy to fix manually in the database. But even when entered it does not show up in citations (tested with APA), so is secondary to the two issues above.
Does anyone know if this is being addressed? Other thoughts on how to proceed?
Thanks,
-Bryan
Details-
I am using Zotero 1.0.9
There are 2 big problems:
1) When I try to cite a patent from the database into a bibliography using APA, CMS (author-date), or Nature [those are all I have tried] the patent number (!) and other specific details are not included at all. For instance the APA style for a patent gives:
Forrester, J. W. (1956, February). Multicooridnate Digital Information Storage Device. Retrieved February 22, 2009, from http://www.google.com/patents?id=MNxYAAAAEBAJ&dq=jay+forrester.
Rather than:
Forrester, J. W. (1956). U.S. Patent No. 2736880. Washington, D.C: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
Based on another forum post . I learned that the IEEE style does handle patents OK, but looking into the details of the IEEE style XML (best viewed with a browser that renders XML doc trees such as firefox) it is a bit of a hack, ...er um I mean required some working around. It looks like the only reason it works is that "US Patent " was manually added as a prefix in the title. What about other issuing countries? Which led me to the other possible problem:
2) Zotero does not seem to capture the issuing country for patents, from which it could build a country specific prefix or guess at the issuing authority. For completeness it also seems that a field for issuing authority is be important in case it was not always COUNTRY_NAME Patent and Trademark Office.
In the process of doing this, I also discovered that when capturing patent information from Google Patents, the issuing place (Washington, DC) is not captured. This however is easy to fix manually in the database. But even when entered it does not show up in citations (tested with APA), so is secondary to the two issues above.
Does anyone know if this is being addressed? Other thoughts on how to proceed?
Thanks,
-Bryan
While I'm at it, it would be great if the google patents translator could auto-import the PDF like it does for journal sites.
Many thanks for adding a ticket on this, much obliged. I'm in the process of pushing/pulling my whole workgroup over to Z and even the current patent handling is much better than any other system we've come up with, so that's a major pull for us.
1/ "submitted" added to CSL but not working in Zotero v2.0.2 (check also csl.js: Zotero.CSL.Item.prototype._createDate)
2/ "authority" exists in CSL but not working in Zotero v2.0.2 (check also csl.js: Zotero.CSL.Item._zoteroFieldMap)
3/ "country" not in CSL
Working mainly with patents, at least I may have found a way to get the patents into Zotero via RIS which may work for me - if I manage to build a "excel->RIS translator". The ZOTERO RIS "mapping" seems to be (comments are in brackets () with german-zoterian aequivalent behind semicolon:
TY - PAT (identifyier for patent type)
AU - Doe, Robert (Inventor surname, prename)
AU - Doe, John (Inventor surname, prename)
A2 - Company (applicant; Herausgeber, Anmelder)
A4 - Doe, Mary (Inventor surname, prename)
AB - Abstract (works)
C1 - 2002/08/17 (priority date; Datum der Einreichung, Anmeldedatum)
C2 - 2004/02/26 (publication date; Erscheinungsdatum, Veröffentlichungsdatum)
C3 - DE (country DE US...; Land)
C4 - Agent (attorney;Anwalt)
C5 - cited docs (works)
C6 - revoked (legal status; Rechtsstatus)
CY - Place Published (Place?; Ort)
EP - End Page (works)
KW - Keywords (works)
LA - Language (works)
OP - PRI1234 (Priotity number; Prioritätsnummer)
PB - Company2 (assignee; Abtretungsempfänger, Rechtsnachfolger, Lizenznehmer)
PY - Year (works, may interfere with other dates?)
SN - DE1234A1 (PATENTNUMBER, at least the IEEE Style seems to include this, some citations apps export patentnumber RIS as "IS - DE1234A1", this seems not to import with ZOTERO)
SP - Start Page (works as expected)
ST - Short Title (works as expected)
TI - Title (works as expected)
UR - URL (works as expected)
ER -
to test, copy the code below starting with "TY -" and including "ER -" into your clipboard, and import into zotero using import from clipboard)
TY - PAT
AU - Doe, Robert
AU - Doe, John
A2 - Company
A4 - Doe, Mary
AB - Abstract
C1 - 2002/08/17
C2 - 2004/02/26
C3 - DE
C4 - Agent
C5 - cited docs
C6 - revoked
CY - Place Published
EP - End Page
KW - test keyword
LA - Language
OP - PRI
PB - Microsoft
PY - 2000
SN - DE1234A1
SP - Start Page
ST - Short Title
TI - RIS Import title test
UR - http://forums.zotero.org/discussion/5780/better-patent-support-needed-in-bibliography-country-in-database/
ER -
if you pasted this, there is a new keyword "test keyword" generated in zotero, if you dont' want this, edit the code above and delete the line "KW - test keyword" bevore pasting.
*I'm afraid I'm part of the problem not part of the solution, so if this input is not appropriate here, feel free to move/delete this post.
But see here:
http://citationstylist.org/
and specifically here:
http://citationstylist.org/wp-content/uploads/patent-1.pdf
any questions about this, do _not_ post to this thread. Instead, start a new thread that has [MLZ] (for multilingual Zotero) in the title
My not so proper workaround plan is now (without MLZ), to use some of the CSL fields (note, page, references) that ARE read by Zotero's citation processor, and place additional relevant information with remapped RIS into the according zotero fields. Then, with a manually edited Style, it might work.
I would have enlarged the IEEE style with some fields but can not figure out how. What does the entry "none" mean here:
http://gsl-nagoya-u.net/http/pub/csl-fields/patent.html
Thanks
Stefan
http://citationstyles.org/downloads/specification.html
Zotero should map its "filingDate" to csl "submitted"-date.
How is this going to happen?
I can confirm that neither are currently used.
- Filed: When it was presented to the patent office
- Published: Important as it defines the prior art date
- Foreign Priority Date (when it was originally sent to a foreign patent office)
- Issued: When it became patent
Zotero provides:
filingDate issueDate
This is probably aligned with CMS 14.230 (example above), which names "filed" and "issued".
csl provides and explains:
issued
date the item was issued/published
original-date
(issue) date of the original version
submitted
date the item (e.g. a manuscript) has been submitted for publication
I would recommend now:
issueDate = issue //Official date, the patent was issued
filingDate = original-date //as is in MLZ
publishDate = submitted //Zotero needs additional label in patent
priorityDate = container //Zotero needs additional label in patent and the existing CSL variable "container" is misused
Does that make sense?
IMHO for now, as a patent or a patent application is in most cases part of a patent family, the most important date is the first priority date of the patent family ( a patent/application can have more than one priority date). See for example:
http://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/biblio?DB=EPODOC&II=4&ND=3&adjacent=true&FT=D&date=20121115&CC=US&NR=2012287205A1&KC=A1
My workaround for now is to place additional dates I like to have in the citation in zotero's "extra" field.
Find-and-replace in combination with extended REGEX capabilities of e.g. notepad++ can be used to remap existing data.
In the CSL-STYLE sheet, the "extra" field is adressed using "note".
With something like:
<if variable="note">
<text term="Priority Date"/>
<text variable="note" />
To add a field to Zotero, we need to be convinced that it is valuable metadata. To add a mapping of that Zotero field to a CSL variable, we need to see evidence that there are styles that display that metadata.
German Institute for Standardization (DIN Deutsches Institut für Normung, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsches_Institut_f%C3%BCr_Normung ) recommends as German national standard DIN 1505-2 for the citation of patents:
title / applicant, inventor name, inventor prename.
[Pr.:] Country Code, Priority Number. Priority Date. [An.:] Country Code, Application Number, Application Date. - Publication Date
(see http://www.haw-ingolstadt.de/fileadmin/daten/bibliothek/dokumente/zitieren_lang.pdf, p. 2)
Admittedly this ist not used very much and the DIN 1505-2 is interpreted rather freely in non-patent literature.
In the rare cases where the priority data is used at all in the citation of patents (in non-patent literature), mostly the "direct" priority of the application/publication is used (own finding).
For infringement analysis, research concerning the newness of a certain patent or validation of patents (see i.e. here http://www.patentlens.net/daisy/PositiveSelection/2136/1806.html ) the first priority data of the patent familiy is of utmost importance.