Missing EPOdoc number and DOCdb-EPOdoc conversion

This space is made available to users of Open Patent Services (OPS) web-service and now also to users of EPO’s bulk data subscription products such as 14. EPO worldwide bibliographic database (DOCDB), 14.11 EPO worldwide legal status database (INPADOC), 14.12 EP full text data, 14.1 EP bibliographic data (EBD)and more.

Users can ask each other questions, exchange experiences and solutions, post ideas. The moderator will use this space to announce changes or other relevant information.
Post Reply

ericg
Posts: 1
Joined: Sun Jun 14, 2015 12:17 am

Missing EPOdoc number and DOCdb-EPOdoc conversion

Post by ericg » Sun Jun 14, 2015 12:29 am

I am trying to get the family of a given application / patent and I must admit that I do not understand much...

For instance, if I have a valid EPOdoc number (e.g. FR3012662) I am able to get the XML of the family
Nevertheless, in the XML some entries have an EPOdoc number (i.e. the publication entries) and some entries does not have any EPOdoc number (i.e. priority and application).

I do not understand why as the documentation is silent regarding this fact (at least I did not see anything).

In addition, when I try to convert some retrieved DOCdb number into EPOdoc I have some surprise and I do not understand why
AU.2014216055.A converts into AU20140216055 (seems ok)
but CA.2860538.A converts into CANDAT2860538 (and it does not seems ok).

Any help would be helpful ...


EPO / OPS Support
Posts: 1298
Joined: Thu Feb 22, 2007 5:32 pm

Re: Missing EPOdoc number and DOCdb-EPOdoc conversion

Post by EPO / OPS Support » Tue Jun 16, 2015 6:56 am

Dear user,

I've checked OPS Family service for your FR document any every family member has its Epodoc number only in publication entries and that is exactly how it is suppose to be:http://ops.epo.org/3.1/rest-services/fa ... FR3012662/

There is also one point that I would like you to pay attention in the future; you should be using EPODOC format only (EPODOC is a special way of simplifying input of numbers for searching in Espacenet) in OPS Published data services. Docdb format (a real number format) should be used for all services related to Legal and Family data. The reason is that legal and family information in OPS are derived from Docdb database and that's why Docdb format is more suitable for that purpose. Another reason is as said above Epodoc is not really a number format and as such it's not available in Docdb for all instances. Epodoc can sometimes also work well as you see but its not very convenient because in certain cases it is important to have kind code included in your query.

About conversion:
I think your Canadian issue is related to the fact that such document does not exist. It should be CA.2860538.A1 instead.

http://ops.epo.org/3.1/rest-services/fa ... CA2860538/

I am not sure what that CANDAT is or how you got to it, this is not familiar to me at all.

I would also suggest that you have a look at our OPS FAQ's where we try to give some more overview about EPODOC and DOCDB format and we explain how EPODOC format is structured: http://www.epo.org/searching/free/ops/faq.html#faq-81

I hope this helps,

Kind regards,
OPS support


Post Reply