Look and feel

Post Reply

rnoll
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Nov 21, 2019 1:54 pm

Look and feel

Post by rnoll » Thu Nov 21, 2019 2:13 pm

As a regular professional user of the "classic" Espacenet interface, I wanted to share some preliminary feedback regarding the look and feel of the new Espacenet interface. I have to admit that I have yet to make extensive use of the new Espacenet interface, but I believe that it is important to share my initial feelings on this new interface and its user-friendlyness, especially with regard to the Advanced search section.

With regard to the Advanced search section, I must admit that I am somewhat taken aback and confused by the look and feel of this section. The font used in the query section is way too large in my view, and the section where the query parametrers can be entered is way too limited in size. Almost 3/4 of the screen is simply blank white space that could be used for the purpose of improving ease of use and input of the query parameters. In that respect, the "classic" advanced search interface is far more convenient to use.

If I may suggest one possible modification of the new Advanced search section, I would suggest making use of this blank white space.

It may furthermore be worthwhile to contemplate adding an "extended" search function (between the "simple" and "advanced" search functions) where query parameters can basically be inputted in a manner similar to the classic version, with predefined fields like "abstract", "title", "applicant name", "date of publication", etc.

I will surely come back with further comments as I continue to make use of the new interface, but the above is really what strikes me as a main "shortcoming" of the new interface.

Keep up the hard work though !


Patent Information Marketing
Posts: 358
Joined: Fri Mar 03, 2017 1:16 pm

Advanced search: Look and feel

Post by Patent Information Marketing » Fri Nov 22, 2019 12:30 pm

Dear user,
Thank you for sharing your initial feelings with us. Especially the better use of the white spaces is something that we will analyse in more detail.

With regard to the new features of the Advanced Search it is noteworthy to mention that it becomes similar to the one of classic Espacenet when starting it with an empty search or by clicking on the reset button.

At a first glance Advanced Search still looks more complex, but hopefully you will appreciate the additional functionality and flexibility that it offers e.g. that you may combine a classification symbols with key words using the OR operator rather than the obligatory AND operator in the Advanced search of classic Espacenet.

Such features and additional functionality allow us to keep the Advanced search in synchronisation with the Smart search with the advantage that e.g. the proximity operator syntax does not have to be memorised, but can simply be selected in a drop-down menu and complex bracketing in Smart search will be graphically displayed by grouping the terms together.

Hopefully after some time of adaptation the new features available in Advanced search will make your life easier and your search results more precise and complete.

Please find more information on Advanced search in the article Advanced searching with new Espacenet on page 6 of the Patent Information News issue 2/2019.
Kind regards

Patent Information Marketing


Post Reply