"DEPATISnet" translator largely broken

[Ingenieur-K]

Hello everybody,

first of all I would like to thank all those who have so generously developed this great program and continue to maintain it: Thank you very much! Since a couple of weeks I have noticed that the translator of the FireFox plugin for depatisnet (the german patent office site; https://depatisnet.dpma.de/DepatisNet/depatisnet?window=1&space=menu&content=index&action=index), DEPATISnet.js, does not work properly in most parts:

If you try to take over the patent in Zotero on the bibliographic data page (e.g. https://depatisnet.dpma.de/DepatisNet/depatisnet?action=bibdat&docid=FR000001547439A), the only thing that is recognized is that it is a patent. The entry that is then created in Zotero will only contain the patent number in the metadata. The number is also used as the title. The link to the website is also added. The patent pdf will not be downloaded. In the past, all bibliographic data was correctly transferred (title, inventor, publication date, ...) and the corresponding pdf was automatically downloaded. All this does not work anymore.

I took a closer look at the Javascript of the Translator.I have determined that the if block statement from line 203 on (i.e. downloading the pdf) is not executed, because the content of the variable 'pages' does not seem to be correct (always 0 I think). Commenting out the if condition has caused the pdfs to be downloaded automatically again. If you try to transfer a patent to Zotero for which no pdf is stored (e.g. https://depatisnet.dpma.de/DepatisNet/depatisnet?action=bibdat&docid=FR000000346003A), the small infobox that always appears when you click on the icon of the plugin will show a hint that downloading the pdfs did not work. If I have understood the source code correctly, the if statement should prevent just that. However, the bibliographic data is still not transferred to Zotero and all other problems as described above still exist. I suspect that the information from the web page is no longer read correctly in the translator (I also have the impression that the Patent Office web page has changed slightly). I have determined that the if block statement from line 203 on (i.e. downloading the pdf) is not executed, because the content of the variable 'pages' does not seem to be correct (always 0 I think). Commenting out the if condition has caused the pdfs to be downloaded automatically again. If you try to transfer a patent to Zotero for which no pdf is stored (e.g. https://depatisnet.dpma.de/DepatisNet/depatisnet?action=bibdat&docid=FR000000346003A), the small infobox that always appears when you click on the icon of the plugin will show a hint that downloading the pdfs did not work. If I have understood the source code correctly, the if statement should prevent just that. However, the bibliographic data is still not transferred to Zotero and all other problems as described above still exist. I suspect that the information from the web page is no longer read correctly in the Translator (I also have the impression that the Patent Office web page has changed slightly).

By the way: If you try to add a file in Zotero after a patent entry from depatisnet with missing pdf by "right-clicking on the entry --> find available pdf", this function will not be completed. The progress bar does not even start to run. The function can only be terminated by clicking the "Cancel" button.

Unfortunately, my programming skills are not sufficient to find out the error more precisely or even to fix it.Therefore I ask better qualified people to take care of the problem. Therefore I ask better qualified people to take care of the problem. I will gladly support you as far as I can.

Thanks and many greetings

Simon

[Ingenieur-K]

Hello everybody,

it ha been a while that I opend this issu. In the meantime I made a pull request (https://github.com/zotero/translators/pull/2211) myself and solved the problem. All checks have passed and my branch has no conflicts with the base branch. That was on 10th July. But still my pull request is not merged. So the translator is still broken.

What has to be done that my pull request is merged? Maybe @adam3smith can transfer the changes to the master branch.

Manny greetings

Simon

[Jul3k]

Can this be merge in the master branch? Depatisnet is an important source for patents.

[Ingenieur-K]

Can this be merge in the master branch? Depatisnet is an important source for patents.

Hi Jul3k,

You are absolutely right. The DEPATISnet translator is an important extension. Last year I noticed that it did not work properly (as described above). After some effort, I solved the problem myself and posted the corrected version here (I can't say right now whether new problems have arisen in the meantime due to changes to the Patent Office website). Since it was the first time I did something on GitHub so far, I'm not sure if I did the deployment correctly so that it gets transferred to the master. I was in contact with Sebastian Karcher aka adam3smith at the time and he said that they are a bit behind with taking over the updates. I then didn't check if at some point my changes were taken over or if they still use the outdated version. If you have a suggestion on what I need to do to get the translator picked up in the master, please let me know.

Many greetings

Simon

[dstillman]

Reviewed — sorry for the delay.

(We'll be reviewing translator submissions at a much faster pace starting in a couple weeks.)

[Ingenieur-K]

Thank you for reviewing. I will improve the translator in the next weeks. Don't have so much time at the moment as last year.