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September 2008

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A Letter to Our Customers

All of us at Dialog are excited about the new opportunities available to you as we join the ProQuest family. The core values of both organizations fit hand in glove with a focus on partnering with librarians and information professionals while increasing our global presence. Not only are the array of Dialog and ProQuest products similarly grounded in aggregating authoritative content to provide you with flexible solutions, but the cultures also are remarkably akin.

Where there are differences, we also are strong. Dialog's concentration in the corporate and government research market complements ProQuest's depth in academic and public libraries. With a continued focus in the corporate R&D market, Dialog provides particular support for intellectual property and scientific research. We also look forward to offering ProQuest customers access to Dialog’s successful and popular Quantum² leadership development program for librarians and information professionals.

We welcome ProQuest’s determination to further strengthen Dialog as we continue our tradition of excellence in customer service, along with a dedicated sales team and a commitment to training. As we move forward, you will be informed of new developments via our reinstated Chronolog, now brought to you in the form of an e-newsletter. You will be kept up to date about product and content news, as well as with announcements about trainings and support materials.

We look forward to continuing to meet your information needs today, and to enhancing Dialog and DataStar^® to meet your needs for tomorrow.

Libby Trudell
Vice-President, Market Development

Derwent World Patents Index Helps Facilitate Prior Art Searching

Two recent additions to Derwent World Patents Index^® (File 350, 351, 352)—Japanese Utility Models, European Classification (ECLA) codes and In Computer Only (ICO) codes — provide information to facilitate searches for prior art.

• Japanese Utility Models, added to DWPI this year, are similar to patents, but require a less stringent process and offer a shorter protection period. Like conventional patents, utility models reveal important new technology advances and are a significant part of any prior art search. The inclusion of the Japanese Utility Models provides the best access in English to Japanese patents and further enhances the value of DWPI for prior art and patentability searches with more complete coverage.

• European Classification (ECLA) codes and In Computer Only (ICO) codes are also available in DWPI. Similarly, the U.S. Patent Classification codes (USPC) have been updated in DWPI to reflect the latest reclassification information. These enhancements, combined with the existing indexing systems available in DWPI (e.g., DWPI Manual Codes, DWPI deep indexing and IPC codes), add greater flexibility for enhanced precision and recall in patent searches.

The ECLA classification system is an extension of the International Patent Classification System (IPC) and contains 134,000 subdivisions. The current 8th edition of IPC (IPC-R) covers 71,000 groups. European Patent Office (EPO) patent examiners assign ECLA classifications to facilitate prior art searching.

U.S. Patent Classification (USPC) codes (CL=) in DWPI are now updated with any recent changes to classifications made by examiners. Reclassifications made since original United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) filing are also added to the DWPI backfile. The USPTO uses USPCs to organize U.S. patent documents into smaller collections based on common subject matter.

See the Dialog Bluesheet for more search information, and try out these new features for your next prior art search.

 Sci-Tech Content Updates

Popular How Do I...? Series Expanded to Include Engineering and Technology Solutions

How Do I...? solutions in the engineering and technology fields are now available on the Dialog website. Approximately 20 applications cover a variety of technical topics.

Engineering How Do I...? applications range from how to use the thesaurus in Inspec^® to how to use DIALINDEX^® to how to find conference information on a specific subject to how to locate experts on a technical topic. Other topics include How Do I:

• Find a Specific Research Location?
• Locate Products by a Specific Company in a Technical Industry?
• Find Hot Areas of Research?
• Find Who Has Cited a Particular Author?
• And more.

The How Do I...? series continues to expand. New applications in business solutions now include more than 20 topics. Examples in both DialogClassic and DialogLink^® 5 are available. Take advantage of these concise, step-by-step instructions for how to find the most-requested information on Dialog. Check back often to find new applications in additional subject areas, and learn how the Dialog How Do I...? series can help you find the answers.

 Business & News Content Updates

Changes to Dialog NewsRoom Coverage

Each year, the coverage of Dialog NewsRoom files shift in order to accommodate the records of the current year. This year File 996 will include the earliest four years (2000-2003). Files 991 through 995 now include articles for each of the years 2008 through 2004, respectively. Files 989 (current 7 days) and 990 (current 3-4 months) remain unchanged.

 Intellectual Property Content Updates

Patents Citation Index Reloaded with New Content and Features

Used to locate cited and citing references for patents, Patents Citation Index™ (PCI) (File 342) now contains more citations per record, resulting in more than 125 million patent citations and over 14 million literature citations to-date. As a result of the reload, the index also has greater compatibility with the companion Derwent World Patents Index^® database (File 350, 351, 352), reloaded in 2006.

Each record in the PCI database describes a patent family for a single invention and contains complete information about the citation. The addition of flexible PN= and AN= search indexes provides various patent and application number formats in addition to the standard Dialog patent number format. Improved record display when accessing Dialog through Web browser interfaces, such as DialogClassic Web™ and DialogLink 5, make it easy to cut-and-paste record contents, including tables, into spreadsheets and word processing documents.

TRADEMARKSCAN^®—Community Trademarks (File 227) Now Contains Color Images

With the reload of TRADEMARKSCAN—Community Trademarks (File 227), color images and other new features are now available. Newer records include Goods/Services, Design Phrase, Lining/Color Claims, and Notes in up to 20 languages. The Notes field is now searchable using NT=, and images as RT=image. The new file contains over 613,000 records and 244,500 images.

In addition, indexing has been modified so fields, such as Goods/Services (GS=), are searchable within the same subfield. The (S) operator can be used to link terms in the same subfield (i.e., in the same language or even the same class of a language). The language name embedded in GS= can be used to restrict a search to a particular language, e.g.:

     S GS=ENGLISH(S)GS=TOY?

See the Dialog Bluesheet for more details.

EPO Simple Families Added to INPADOC Families

Dialog has increased its patent family information with the addition of European Patent Office Simple Family data to INPADOC/Family and Legal Status (File 345). Starting with update week 200816, Dialog began to incorporate this information into File 345 records with the label "EPO Simple Family." Review the sample record to see the new information. For additional information about these INPADOC enhancements, consult the online information page, the Dialog Bluesheet or the Dialog Knowledge Center.

 DataStar Content Updates

Reloads of Biomedical Databases Enhance Cross-File Searching

EMCare (EMCA), covering nursing, health-service management and other healthcare professions, has been reloaded on DataStar^®. The reload aligns EMCare with EMBASE^® (EMED, EMZZ) and Elsevier Biobase (ELBI) in document layout and search functionality. New features include:

• the new 2008 EMTREE thesaurus
• first names (where provided) included with author names
• drug and device trade names displayed with their corresponding manufacturers’ names
• standardization of the document layout across databases

Check the EMCare database guide in BASE for more details. Search as BASE-EMCA.

 Search Techniques

Search Tip for Dialog Trademark Files

To find the latest information in any trademark database on Dialog, TYPE 9999999/23 to obtain information on the latest application filings and registrations received for processing in that database.

Search Tip for TradStat on DataStar

A major revision occurred in 2007 in the Harmonised System (HS) used to classify goods. The Harmonised System is reviewed by the WCO (World Customs Organization) to ensure that it is kept up to date in light of changes in technology or in patterns of international trade.

These changes impact the trade time data series produced by TradStat. However, the product code search tool within TradStat has been updated to reflect the changes. Here is a suggestion on how to search for data across time periods:

• Consult the "product code search" section in TradStat to identify the amended codes, and review their descriptions.
• Use the new product codes to search for data beginning in 2007 forward and the old product codes for data prior to 2007.
• When combining data from both periods, select the product codes individually for each time period.

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