The patent viewer shows an overview of a group of patents. In the title bar you can see how many patents were found, which patent view is currently active, keyword highlighting and several Actions like exporting.
There are 3 possible views (List, Thumbnail and Detail) to navigate through the patents:
List view
Shows the patents in a list, which contains (by default) the patent number, the title, the applicant and the publication date. The patents are default sorted by publication date. Click on a column header to change the sort order.
The checkboxes allow you to select patents to perform some Actions on like adding them to your Briefcase or exporting them to Excel or Powerpoint. When a patent has a note attached to it, a clip (
) is displayed in the list view in front of the checkbox. Hover the clip the see how many notes are attached to the patent and click on the note icon to see the notes for that patent.
When you have read a patent in the Detail view, it will be indicated with a lighter color (currently only supported on the Filter page).
TIP: Hover over a patent number to quickly see more bibliographic data about it
Customize the display fields
To customize the fields you would like to see in the List view, click the icon 
in the top right corner.
- Add/Remove fields
To add a field to your List, drag it from the available fields (right column) to the displayed fields (left column). To remove a field, do the opposite. - Sorting
To change the default sorting of the list, click on one of the displayed fields (right column) to set it as the default sorting field. Click on the active sorting field to toggle between ascending and descending. - Resizing
To change the width of a field, drag one of it's edges to the right or left.
Thumbnail view
Shows the patent drawings. If a patent has no patent drawings, a greyed out image with the patent number is shown. Hover over a patent drawing to navigate through all the drawings of the patent, or to zoom in or to go to the patent detail view of the specifice patent.
When you have read a patent in the Detail view, it will indicated with a lighter color (currently only supported on the Filter page).
Detail view
Shows all the data (bibliographic and textual) available for a patent. The title bar in the detail view changes a bit, it shows where exactly you are in your patent group and also allows you to navigate through them by clicking a the arrow keys. The clip (
) next to the patent title allows you to add a note for the patent that you are viewing.
TIP: You can also use the keyboard Left and Right arrow keys to quickly navigate through your patents
On the left hand side:
- Patent title
- Abstract
- Timeline
Show the different documents (Priority,Application,Publication,Granted publication) on a timeline or in table view
TIP: click on the patent number to view it in Espacenet - Drawing
Shows the patent drawings and allows you to navigate through them or see it in more detail - Applicant(s)
- Inventor(s)
- Codes
When hovering over the codes, the detailed description is shown
On the right hand side, there are some additional sheets:
- Claims
- Description
- Citations
Shows the backward and forward citations. It is possible to add the citations to the briefcase by using the Actions menu. - Family data
- Literature
- Notes
Shows the notes that you or your colleagues have created for this patent. The number of notes that are attached to the patent are displayed between brackets.