Public User's Meeting

Public Records Division (PRD)/Public Search Services Division (PSSD)
Quarterly Public User’s Meeting
March 4, 2015


 

The Public Users’ Meeting was held at 2:00 p.m. in the Global IP Academy, Madison East, 2nd floor, at 600 Dulany Street on the USPTO campus in Alexandria, Virginia. Donna Cooper, Director of PRD, chaired the meeting. There were 10 members of the public in attendance.

Chief Information Officer John Owens was present at the meeting to field questions concerning Information Technology issues.

Martha Sneed’s retirement and Christine Kitchen’s promotion were announced.
 

Public Search Facility (PSF) Updates

The Public User Survey will be conducted between March 16 and March 27, 2015.  It will be the same questions as the last survey in 2013 so that we can compare the data.  It will be available in paper format and on the UPWS system on the General tab.

The LCOR engineers have replaced the sprinkler heads and added insulation in order to lessen the chance that there will be another repeat of the flooding in the front of the PSF.

CPC Training is in the pilot stage for examiners.  Training will be available to the public after USPTO staff is trained.  There were several questions about the training and what will be included as well as what is going to happen to classification prior to 2014.  The 2014 information will remain searchable in EAST.

John Owens announced that when the new search system is made available, there will be no USPC classification information.

There are CBTs available for CPC classification training on our website.  The link to the CBT will be provided to the public. 

John Owens announced that the new search system will be beta in FY 2016 and delivered in FY2017. 

A question was asked if there will be a home version of EAST in future. The answer was yes.

The question was asked if there could be a posting of when areas will be converted into the CPC classification since some USPC classes are still being updated.  Staff will check with Patents to see if there is a schedule that can be posted.  Patents have requested that they keep the classification mapping because it is helpful with training the new examiners about the classifications but not modifying it or improving on it. It helps them learn the new system.  Public users were happy to hear that. 

John Owens suggested that we should see if we can get a link to the Manual of Classification for CPC information and make it available if possible. 

There were complaints and questions about the Wi-Fi system in the PSF.  Has access been changed to PTOGuest? Not yet.  John will look into it. Complaint about the BlueCoat page as well.

The new CPC range searching was complimented by one of the Public users as a great new functionality. 

John Owens mentioned that the CPC system is still evolving in Europe and here.  They are adding Japan, Korea, Canada, and possibly China. 

There was a question about whether IPC is going away. No, it is not.

Two members of the public mentioned “bugs” with EAST.  The bugs will be documented and sent to the developers.  John Owens stated that most of their time and resources are currently being spent on developing the new system rather than on fixing EAST. It is highly likely that the bug will not be fixed but if we can document it perhaps they will investigate and make sure it is resolved in the new system. 

Public Records Division Update

The new Assignment Search tool was discussed. Enhancements to the tool that are planned for the upcoming releases were mentioned.

The Public Users’ Meeting was adjourned at 2:35 p.m.

Next meeting date: TBD