Monday, February 01, 2021 Mock 2's Pre-Exam (1 Feb 2021)

"To allow candidates to test the system also close to the real examination conditions, a second mock (Mock 2) is planned for the week of 1 to 5 February 2021. The examination papers will take place during that week at the same week days and times as the real examination, see here." (see e-EQE webpage)

Today, 1 February 2021, the Pre-Exam of Mock 2 was organized, using the Wiseflow platform which will be used for the e-EQE 2021 in the week of 1-5 March 2021.

The Pre-Exam was split into four parts of 70 minutes, 5 questions each: two parts with legal questions and two parts with claims analysis questions. Each part had be completed before the start of the next break, with the next set of questions only becoming available after the break. Candidates were allowed to print only the calendar for the legal part and the prior-art documents for the claim analysis parts before the start of the appropriate part. (Also refer to our earlier blogs here and here, and here).

Please feel invited to share your experiences with the platform, as well as any comments to the paper.

When doing the two legal parts, Part 1 and Part 2, of Mock 2, I noted:

• Mock 2 corresponds to the legal part of the Pre-Exam 2019, but with some changes as to how the paper is presented:
• ...with questions presented in a different, randomized order - in the legal part as well as the claims analysis part. 
• ...within each of the legal parts and within each of the claims analysis parts
• E.g., for Part 1, I got them presented in the order Q.4 – Q.1 – Q.3 – Q.2 – Q.5; a colleague tutor got them in a different order.
• In Part 3, the first claims analysis case, my questions came in the order Q.11 – Q.15 – Q.13 –  Q.11 –  Q.14. As result, I started with claim set I in my first question, my second question already jumped to claim set II, and my third to last question went back to claim set I.  
• Also, in part 4 of the original exam, the prior arts D11 and D12 were not immediately introduced at the beginning of the second case of the paper, but only after Q.17 and Q.18 respectively. Q.16 related just to the description, no claims were provided yet, nor prior art, so the question was "clean". Q.17-19 related to the same claim set III; Q.20 to a new claim set A. This logical structure was not present anymore now that I got the questions presented in the order Q.18 – Q.16 – Q.17 – Q.20 – Q.19.
• ...within a question, (for most questions) the statements were in a different, randomized order. 
• E.g., in Q.1 (my second), my sequence corresponded to original 1.2, 1.3, 1.1, 1.4.
• This sometimes looses the logical order of the original question (e.g., Q.8 originally has a 1m/ 2m / 4m time limit for statement 1/ 2 /4), but it nowhere has substantive effect in the legal parts (the statements are independent, but in some questions in other papers the order helps to understand the question better).
• In the claims analysis part, the randomized order lost some of the original design of the paper. E.g., in original Q.18, the order of assessing the novelty of the claims was III.2 – 5 – 6 – 8: a logical order. Now, I got them presented in the order of claims III.8 – 5 – 6 – 2.
• This varying order of questions and statements was, as far as I am aware, not present in Mock 1. Whether the order will also be randomized in the real e-EQE is not yet known.
• So, within a part, the order of questions and statements is different between candidates. 
  
  
• We refer to our P-book (updated) or the Compendium (original) for the Pre-Exam 2019 paper and the answers. 
• The version in our P-book is updated for the legal status on 31.10.2020, for e-EQE 2021.
• You may also wish to check to our original Pre-Exam 2019 blogs on the legal part and on the claims part for discussions on some questions and answers
• Note that two statements were neutralized in the claims analysis part; no statements were neutralized in the legal part.
• Note that an appeal was successful w.r.t. original statement 4.1 ("...translation must be filed within two months..."). The decision was only issued on 01.07.2020, and did not lead to an amendment of the examiner's report, probably in view of when the appeal was decided and/or in view of the advances due to Covid-19. See our blog on D 3/19. 

• The Pre-Exam paper presents the questions and statements in all three languages, as in Mock 1; you cannot choose to see a single language only.
• In longer legal questions, that has the disadvantage that you cannot see the question in English as well as all 4 statements in English at the same time: you need to scroll up and down to see the question when you answer the last statement.
• You may consider to copy the question into a Notepad or Sticky Note and move it downward to your statements. You can however not use any formatting options like boldface or underline, nor annotate in Notepad nor in Sticky Notes.
• Notepads move with you with all Questions. Sticky Notes are limited to the Question. Sticky Notes have a limited size (may not be able to copy the complete question in it).
  
  
• In the claims analysis questions, the application description and the prior art documentd (D1, D2 in part 3; DII, D12 in part 4) are available as a tri-lingual pdf-file (the same that one can print in advance) via a hyperlink  called "HYPERLINK to the text made available for printing" at the beginning of the question (not via External resources), from where the file open in a separate tab. 
• This Tab can not be viewed side-by-side with the question: one needs to switch between the Tab with the question and the Tab with the application description and the prior art. 
• The pdf cannot be annotated.
• Note:You can copy (there is no menu, but Ctrl-C + Ctrl-V works for the main exam papers) part of the pdf into a Notepad/Sticky Note in the answer tab. The Sticky Notes have a limited size (D11 fits in, but not D11 and D12 together). It may be worth trying if you do not have a printed version of the description and prior art. You can not format nor annotate in Notepad nor in Sticky Notes.
• It is strongly recommended to print the pdf available for printing (description, prior art, figures if any) in advance!
• ...so the description can be annotated and can be kept side-by-side to the question;
• ...so the prior art can be annotated and can be kept side-by-side to the question.
  
  

• In the claims analysis questionns first the complete claim sets are are shown in DE, EN and FR, and then all statements, also each in DE, EN and FR. Unfortunately, as a result one cannot see the statements together with the claims that are referred to in the statements: you will need to scroll up-and-down between the claim sets and the statements, or to copy the claims, in your preferred language, into the Notepad/Sticky Notes and drag the Notepad to just above the statements (Note: I ran into a limit there, I could not always drag the Note to the last statements; e.g., in Q.18 I could move the Sticky Notes to just above the statements, to where the FR version of the claims is). Also, it makes annotation with the Drawing tools (e.g., drawing an arrow from a reference to a claims feature to a statement feature) more cumbersome than if a single-lingual version of the question would be provided that is visible as a whole on the screen.

  

• The calendars (2018/2019) were available under "External resources", in all three official EPO languages, as a pdf-file that opens in a new Tab of the browser
• The calendars could also be printed in advance (2 pages).
  
  
• The legal texts on the EPO website were available under "External resources"
• The Guidelines (GL/EPO as well as GL/PCT-EPO) could only be opened as HTML, not as pdf.
• OJ EPO publications could be opened in HTMLas well as in pdf.
• No PCT legal texts were available (except for the GL/PCT-EPO).
• Links to external websites, such as the WIPO PCT website, were blocked.
• Including links to PCT Articles and Rules in GL/PCT-EPO
• I could not just browse the Legal Texts webpage of the EPO website, but I could also navigate the rest of the EPO website and thereby access, e.g., the Forms as well as the Euro-PCT Guide. In view of the information given in the FAQ, it does not seem certain that this will also be possible in the real e-EQE. 
  
  
• When I answered the questions, I used Highlighting as well as the Drawings Tools (also see our other blog post here). Note that you can change the color of the Drawing Tools so that you can choose to annotate different type of information with different colors:
  
  
  

Hand-in

• After hand-in, I could request a "Receipt for hand in", which provides an email with the text:
• You have handed in your paper on 01-02-2021 HH:MM on the following flow:
  Mock 2 Pre-Examination Part 1
  This is your documentation for a timely hand in.
• The receipt did not include a copy of my answers nor of the paper.
• So if you wish you keep a copy of your answers, note your answers on paper together with an indication of the topic tested for each statement (as the questions and statements for the legal parts may/will not be in the same order for all candidates).

Please feel invited share your experiences with the platform, as well as any comments to the paper.

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