This page contains information on how to use the PTO Web Trademark Database Manual Search Page.

The Manual Search page allows you to make a non-case-sensitive query of the PTO Web trademark database using a command-line style search syntax. There are three steps to using the Manual Search page:

1. Select which database to search from the Select Database list.
   
2. Type your query into the text entry box marked Query, using search terms in the form "[Field Code] / [Search Term]" (e.g., "MS/Cola"), joined by Boolean operators ("AND", "OR", "ANDNOT").
3. Hit the Search button.

Some things to note:

• The search is not case sensitive. Searching for Mountain and searching for mountain will produce the same results.
• The Refine Search box uses the same search syntax as the Manual Search page. The refined search is automatically conducted in the same database as your original search.
• The Start At box allows you to enter a number to skip to in your search results list. For long search results lists, entering '250' in the Start At box is easier than hitting the 'Next 50 Hits' button 5 times.
• For some terms, you must specify the field to search in to get the results you expect. For instance, if you are searching for trademarks filed on June 6, 1990, you must search for FD/6/6/1990 (or any other acceptable date format). Just searching for 6/6/1990 will not turn up hits in this field. If you are having difficulty searching for a specific field, please see the Help on Field Searching. page.

The Manual Search page provides the greatest flexibility for complex searches of the trademark database.

This flexibility includes:

• Boolean expressions
• field searching
• phrase searching
• date range searching
• right truncation
• search statistics

Boolean Expressions

You can use the Manual Search page to create and execute queries using the Boolean operators (OR, AND, ANDNOT) to specify your search. Along with these operators, you can use parentheses to remove ambiguity from your expressions.

Example 1

mountain AND fresh

If you entered this query, you'll receive back a list of all documents which contain both the terms mountain and fresh somewhere on the indexed page.

Example 2

hometown OR (home AND town)

This query will retrieve documents which contain the word hometown OR contain both the words home AND town.

Example 3

national ANDNOT ((united AND states) OR american)

This nested query will retrieve a list of documents that contain the word national, but do not contain the word american. Additionally, none of the documents retrieved would contain the combination of united AND states.

In general, Boolean searches are fairly straight-forward. In the absence of parentheses, all operators associate from left to right.

Field Searching

The Manual Search page allows you to search within the individual fields found within the documents. You can find a list of all indexed fields in the table on the bottom of the page. On the right of each column, all the full names for each of the fields are given; on the left, the field code for for each field is listed.

To narrow your search to hits occurring within a single field, prefix the word you are searching for with the abbreviated field name, followed by a forward slash (/). If you do not specify a specific field to search within, the entire front page will be searched for your search term. If you need help with fielded searching, see the Help on Fielded Searching page.

Example 1

ON/Dobbs

This will search for the word Dobbs within the Owner's Name field of the database. Occurrences of the search term anywhere else in the document will be ignored.

Example 2

IC/035

This query searches for International Class 035, and will return a list of all documents which match that class.

Example 3

ON/FORD AND WM/Mustang

As this example demonstrates, you can mix field searching with Boolean searching. This query would return a list of hits which contain Ford in the Owner Name field, and the word Mustang in the Word Mark field.

Note that field names are not associative. That is, WM/(colt or mustang) is not the correct syntax to retrieve documents which have colt or mustang in the Word Mark. WM/colt or WM/mustang is the correct phrasing.

Phrase Searching

If you surround a group of words with quotation marks ("), everything surrounded by those "s will be treated as a single search term. This allows you to search for a multi-word phrase rather than specifying each word as a separate term.

Example 1

"bowling balls"

Searching on this phrase would return a list of all the documents which have the phrase bowling balls anywhere within the indexed text.

Example 2

ON/"General Motors"

This query would find all occurrences of the phrase general motors within the Owner Name field.

Date Range Searching

You can specify a range of dates you are interested in searching in, rather than having to specify a certain day or month to narrow your search. This feature is only available in date fields, such as Filing date, Registration date and Priority date. This is done by using the -> operator between two dates.

Example

FD/11/1/85->5/12/86

This query would return all documents in the database which were filed any day on or after Nov. 1, 1985 and before or on May. 12, 1986.

Both dates in your query must be properly formatted for your search to work. See the help entries on Filing Date, Registration Date and Priority Date for details.

Right Truncation

The Manual Search page supports right truncation in queries. This allows you to use a wildcard on the right side of a search term, to match words that start with a certain string.

Example 1

elec*

This query will retrieve documents containing words like electricity, electric, electronic, etc.

Example 2

ON/"general mot*" OR ON/Ford OR ON/Chrysler

This query would return a list of all documents which contained Ford or Chrysler or a phrase beginning with General Mot in the Owner Name field.

Search Statistics

Detailed information about your results are available by clicking on the Search Summary link at the top of each search results page. This will show how many times each of your terms occurred in how many documents, and the intermediate results of applying all of your specified Boolean operators. Also, the total time required to conduct the search is listed. This information should assist you in refining your search.