It will be recalled that the Patentcenter listserv has secured an hour-long meeting with USPTO’s Chief Information Officer, Jamie Holcombe, on Thursday, March 23. This will run from 11AM to noon Eastern Time. I reported this to you in a blog article dated February 7, 2023. There are two developments about this. Continue reading “The upcoming meeting with USPTO about Patentcenter redux”
DAS Depositing Offices that charge fees
I have consolidated the information about fees charged by DAS Depositing Offices here.
March 17 version of Patentcenter breaks things that worked in previous version
The March 17 version of Patentcenter was clearly not tested before release. It breaks many things that worked properly in the pre-March 17 version. This has given rise to at least ten new trouble tickets in the Patentcenter Trouble Ticket page. Continue reading “March 17 version of Patentcenter breaks things that worked in previous version”
Recorded ePCT webinars are now available for viewing
Hello readers. Some will recall that I am now three lectures into a sixteen-lecture series of webinars about ePCT. I am pleased to report that I was successful in recording each of those first three webinars. The recordings are now available for viewing! Continue reading “Recorded ePCT webinars are now available for viewing”
Pixel waste in content-free icons in the “modernized look and feel” Patentcenter
Today the USPTO rolled out its “modernized look and feel” version of Patentcenter. It contains lots of new content-free “icons” that take up valuable screen space, wasting pixels and forcing users to scroll further down to reach what they need. Continue reading “Pixel waste in content-free icons in the “modernized look and feel” Patentcenter”
A boundary-value programming mistake in Patentcenter
One of the easiest things to get wrong, for some programmers in some programming languages, are “boundary values”. Here we see a classic example of a boundary-value mistake by the developers of Patentcenter. Continue reading “A boundary-value programming mistake in Patentcenter”
USPTO corrupts credit card expiration dates in FM
Hello folks. Here is a warning that I saw today in a USPTO system when I was paying a government fee in Financial Manager:
Credit/Debit Card Expiration Dates
Due to a recent system upgrade, some card expiration dates may have been converted to an incorrect month for cards stored within Financial Manager. …
Try to guess, dear reader, what the next few words were. For example, maybe the next few words explained that the USPTO was working to restore the expiration dates to their correct values, but that this might take a day or two, and they apologize for the inconvenience. Continue reading “USPTO corrupts credit card expiration dates in FM”
Filing at the International Bureau and Daylight Saving Time
It’s that time of year again. The time of year when it is important to keep track of the fact that Daylight Saving Time is different in Switzerland from the way it is in the United States. Continue reading “Filing at the International Bureau and Daylight Saving Time”
Status of DOCX initiative as of right now redux
The USPTO blinked yet again yesterday on DOCX. The bad things that the USPTO was planning to do starting April 3, 2023 have now been postponed to June 30, 2023, according to USPTO speakers during a DOCX propaganda webinar yesterday. At above right is a screen grab by alert listserv member Michael Dryja of a presentation slide during the webinar. Continue reading “Status of DOCX initiative as of right now redux”
Status of DOCX initiative as of right now
(Update: the USPTO has blinked a third time about its $400 non-DOCX penalty.)
In this blog article, I will describe the status of the USPTO’s DOCX initiative as of today. What I describe here is how it is going to get worse for patent applicants and patent practitioners over the next few months, absent the USPTO choosing to “blink” again and perhaps postpone some of the bad things that are imminent. Continue reading “Status of DOCX initiative as of right now”