Introduction to CLAIMS SOLR Search Basics

CLAIMS Direct is a web service that provides access to the IFI CLAIMS Global Patent Database, a Data Warehouse that contains patent records from over 90 patenting authorities stored in a common XML format. Each publication, including all published applications and granted patents, is represented by a separate record in the data.

The Data Warehouse is indexed in SOLR, the fast open-source enterprise search platform from the Apache Lucene project. The search interface is a single search box, into which you can type simple or complex queries. The data warehouse is searchable by field; field names and sample searches are provided below. For more information about SOLR searching, see https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/solr/Searching.

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Boolean Operators

The SOLR index supports AND, OR, and NOT as Boolean operators. Boolean operators must be ALL CAPS. If you enter these operators in lower case letters, the system will search them as terms.

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Default Operator

In CLAIMS DIrect, the default operator is AND. This means that if no operator is specified, the system assumes AND. In the above examples, we explicitly included the operator in all cases for purposes of clarity.

Default Fields

When no field is specified in the query, the search is directed to the title, abstract, description and claims fields.

Wildcards

? -- Use the question mark to represent a single character (one and only one) at the end or within a word. To search for British or American spellings, use a query like this: sterili?e

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Note: You cannot use a * or ? symbol as the first character of a search.

Range Searching

Range Queries allow you to match documents whose field(s) values are between the lower and upper bound specified by the Range Query.

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A phrase is a group of words surrounded by double quotes, such as "fuel cell." To retrieve only documents containing the phrase exactly as searched, place the phrase within quotes, as shown in the example below:

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{!complexphrase}ab:"(thermal OR thermic OR thermo) barrier"~8

Fuzzy Search 

This upgrade to SOLR 4.8.1 also allows for fuzzy search based on the Levenshtein Distance. A fuzzy search query returns terms similar to the queried term. (See http://lucene.apache.org/core/2_9_4/queryparsersyntax.html#Fuzzy%20Searches for more information about fuzzy searches.)

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Case Sensitivity

Searches in CLAIMS® SOLR are not case-sensitive. Search terms may be entered in caps or lower case, regardless of case in the documents.

Note: You must enter Operators in ALL CAPS and enter field names in lower case.

Complex Queries

Searches in CLAIMS SOLR can include multiple search fields and multiple criteria per field. A few examples are provided to illustrate these more complex queries. Please consult the table at the end of this document for descriptions and additional search examples on a field-by-field basis.

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