D 2023: first impressions?
To all who sat the D-paper today:
What are your first impressions to this year's D-paper? Any general or specific comments?
How did this year's D-paper compare to the earlier D papers of 2013 - 2022?
Were the D1 questions and the D2 part similar as to its subjects and difficulty as the last few years (apart from the ratio this year being 55:45 rather than 2022's 45:55, 2021's 50:50 or the earlier 40:60)?
How did the split of the paper into 3 parts influence your exam?
Was the additional 20% of time for doing each of the D1 parts and the D2 part sufficient to compensate for the restrictions caused by the fixed time schedule of 3 parts?
How did you use the breaks? Could you forget about the finished part and free your mind for the next part in each break? Were the breaks long enough?
Did you also take any unscheduled breaks?
Were the topics well balanced in the D1-part? Was the balance between EPC and PCT right for you? Any substantive topics in D1 (e.g., partial priority; disclaimers; plants; double patenting)?
Any recent law changes in D1 (Rule 28(2) EPC, G 3/19 and the relevance of 1/7/2017; PCT Rule 20.5bis and the EPO reservation that was still applicable on 31/10/2022; ADA2022)?
Which of the the D1 Questions did you consider particularly difficult, and which relatively 'easy'?
Did you skip any D1-questions? If so, why (e.g., too difficult, allocating the time for another question, no time left)?
Did you use the legal texts that were available online (EPO legal texts, PCT Applicant's Guide, PCT Treaty)? Which, how?
Were the legal issues in the D2-part well doable? Amount of information? Complexity of the inventions/subject-matter? Patentability? Difficult priority analysis? Divisional issues? Opposition? Appeal - reformatio in peuis? Non-standard topics (disclaimers, double patenting, plants)? Non-standard claim formats? Business situation and relevance clear? Exploitation?
Did you experience any technical difficulties during the exam? How & how fast were they solved? Did you use the widget to contact the invigilator?
Please be reminded that, if you wish to lodge a complaint pursuant to point I.8. of the Instructions to candidates concerning the conduct of the examination , you must do so at the latest by the end of the day on which the paper concerned takes place, by filling in the dedicated form on the EQE online page: the Form for paper D is (only) available on 07.03.2023, 16:45 - 23:59, CET (here).
The paper and our answers
Copies of the paper will be provided on this blog as soon as we have received copies of the papers, preferably in all three languages (English, French and German). Should you have a copy, please send it to any of our tutors or to training@deltapatents.com.
The core of our answers are given in two separate blog posts (D1 2023 blog and D2 2023 blog).
The core of our answers are given in two separate blog posts (D1 2023 blog and D2 2023 blog).
Please be reminded that you can view and print/download copy of your exam answer after the exam, via the eye below the "1. Paper"-icon in the bottom left part of the flow window of the respective flow. (It may not be available immediately after the official end of the (part of the) paper, but only 30-60 minutes later.) The paper itself cannot be downloaded (unless you copied it in full into your exam answer).
We look forward to your comments!
Please do not post your comments anonymously - it is allowed, but it makes responding more difficult and rather clumsy ("Dear Mr/Mrs/Ms Anonymous of 07-03-2023 19:20"), whereas using your real name or a nickname is more personal, more interesting and makes a more attractive conversation. You do not need to log in or make an account - it is OK to just put your (nick) name at the end of your post.
Please post your comments as to first impressions and general remarks to the D-paper as a whole, and to the two parts (D1 and D2) as whole part to this blog.
Please post substantial comments/questions to specific D1 questions to our D1 2023 post and D2-related questions to our D2 2023 post. Thanks!
SHARE:
I had a technical problem:
ReplyDeleteWiseflow did not show any questions in Paper D1 at the beginning. I called EPA to solve this problem. More than 10 minutes were wasted ...
Did you try refreshing the page in Wiseflow? I also didn’t see it first but I refreshed and it all appeared (‘lost’ only about 15 seconds!)
DeleteI had the same problem.Asked from the chat, but it took time to get an answer.
DeleteI had the same problem. They warned everyone with a notification at 09:05 that this may happen, and that the solution was to refresh the page. After doing that in the flow immediately, the issue disappeared. I have heard from others that this notification did not necessarily pop up on its own - potentially if logging in to wiseflow after 09:05
DeleteI could not enter into Paper D1-1 workflow. When I first logged in, there was issue fetching assignement. When I refreshed the screen, I was unable to see the editor and assignment. Even after calling support, no help/solution was provided. They tried to blame it on my laptop/network. But, it did not make sense as I was able to sucessfully log in the first time and I had tested the workflows on Feb 15, 2023. I could not answer any question from D1-1. I did not face any issue for D1-2 and D2.
DeleteI had the same with the Mocks, but then learned that you need to browse in the menu to "Assignments".
DeleteI followed the instruction given in the direct message that had popped up when I logged in:
Delete"If at the start of the paper the “Error occurred fetching assignments” appears, refresh your browser."
I had the same issue! it ststes error occured in the place that the assignment was supposed to be!
DeleteGenerally, I found the D1 questions to be similar in difficulty compared to previous years; no crazy outliers. I did not skip any D1 questions, but found Q5 to be the hardest, though that may be due to it being a mixed PCT-EPC question. Overall the topics (within EPC and between EPC-PCT) were balanced fine in my opinion, nothing out of the ordinary. As usual, with some questions, it was difficult for me to determine where I can stop my reasoning.
ReplyDeleteAs for D2, it was somewhat 'easier' due to the short (45 point) length of the paper. It seemed to me like the case itself was not too complex, but the terminology and abbreviations that the paper used had me thinking for quite some time regarding what is and is not disclosed by prior art. Especially the priority situation of EP-Z/US-Z had me scratching my head for a while.
Once I was familiarised with the topic and subject-matter in D2, the rest was more straightforward, but it took me a considerable amount of time to get there in the first place.
The individual splits were fine, but I did work continuously in both D1s and did not take any unscheduled breaks in D2, still barely finishing everything in time in all three flows. I would have had more problems were it not for the additional 20%, especially in the D1s.
The break between D1a and D1b was fine too, but I found my lunch break to be too short to actually take a 'break'. Would have preferred another 15 minutes.
I barely used the online legal texts, and relied instead on my books with which I was generally more familiar in navigating.
There was a notice before the flow started that you may have to refresh the page in the lockdown browser. This was the case for me in D1a. In D1b, the question took a good 30 seconds to open, but was fine afterwards (I quickly copied everything to the draft paper). Other than that, I had no technical difficulties at all.
D2 wasn't a very uneasy topic because I had to go to the bath room XD
Delete2.45…and coffe? I guess you were the only student who wasted time by leaving for bathroom!!! :))/LO
DeleteBtw Q5 must have been inspired by the book from deltapatents I used for preparation "Basic Legal Questions for pre-exam and Paper D", i used edition July 2019 i got. Q5 was a slightly simplified version of question L4-22 😬. It's exactly the same missing abstract, no answer to invitation PCT application declared withdrawn, could it be revived at least before the EPO. As I marked it as quite difficult to answer, when I saw Q5 i just had to open the answers in my book to my mark and type fast 😇 Thx DeltaPatents, hope your answer will earn me the 11 points.
DeleteBtw the book says this question was inspired by Q7 of D1 1998, which is related.
@Nick: Thanks for advertising our Q&A books! But even more importantly: your post shows that practicing questions is crucial to understand the system and to apply the legal system, and to answer (exam) questions efficiently ;)
Deleteand the question about incorrect priority number. It exists also in Dbook. Thanks, Roel!
DeleteI had the same technical problem, lost 8 minutes. I fixed it by refreshing the browser. I did click the invigilator button immediately, but no one reacted until 12 min later when I had solved it already.
ReplyDeleteTo be clear, there was a warning on that it ''could'' happen at the top right of the flow, but that was not visible unless you actively clicked on it, which is not very handy when you are in the middle of a time-sensitive exam trying to understand why you are having this issue.
This is the 3rd year of the e-EQE, we should not have to deal with these things in an exam where 1 min matters.
DeleteI experience the same issue- lost loads of time and never received the "If at the start of the paper the “Error occurred fetching assignments” appears, refresh your browser." message at all. Felt really unfair and I was mega stressed for the rest of D1 part 1.
DeleteIoannis is right, this system is a real shame an insult to the hard work and efforts to candidates
DeleteThere was a problem with the search function on the EPA site at the end of D1 and for a time in D2. When I searched in the legal texts a error came. Next time I print really everything out and make markings...
ReplyDeleteSearhing in the texts wasnt working at all but I guess that filing complaint wont render me any extra, just waste mine and Epos time. Anyhow Im glad to conclude that books made from paper still can be trusted :)/Lo
DeleteSame here.
DeleteSearch function definitely worked before, I was able to use it several times.
DeleteFor me it worked. But not with the magnifying glass which you see up left in the screen, this opens a find window which couldn't find anything. I pressed ctrl+F and a whole verticle search stripe appears on the right of the window. There i could search any term, and they would be marked yellow/orange in the paper.
DeleteSorry I meant D1-2, not D2... They finally fixed it during D1-2 exam.
DeleteI had no real trouble with the searching, but I had to use the same two-step action as in the Compendium flows: when giving a search query, if I recall well, you need to give it twice and click in the searchable window in between those two (or something similar). So not very convenient, but it did work for me.
DeleteBy the way, I hardly used the search function, as I prefer my printed material and reference books (References to the EPC from Hoekstra, Topic-Related Index to the EPC and PCT, Cross-referenced PCT, Applicant's Guide) that I am very familiar with and that are annotated to my needs.
Hm, I worked a lot with the online legal texts in my preparations and I found the relevant information very quick every time via the search function. So it was frustrating finding this function not working over a good amount of exam time. But that's life and bad luck.
DeleteI had the Kley/Grundlach comment on my desk and the printed PCT guidelines. That helped to gather some points still.
I had the same issue in DI-2 as well as D2 - just kept saying an error when I punched in a keyword that I know should give a result (such as "priority", etc.). I asked the invigilator who said that I should not worry and simply browse the guidelines (not helpful at all!!). Sadly that was not an option for me because during practice for the exam I got very familiar with how to quickly find/search stuff in the CLBoA/GL/EPOPCT GLs etc and browsing is a completely different skill to practice.
DeleteAfter a while the EPO website started allowing me to search the guidelines as I had practiced. However, I still lost time on a question, which we all know is precious in the exam. Sadly, I forgot to submit a complaint before the end of the day.
The topics of D1 were "less typical" than in previous years. PCT question regarding excuse art24/25PCT (I guess) was quite difficult as I never practiced it.
ReplyDeleteI think there were more substantive questions than in previous years (unity, medical use, change of claim category in opposition that I can remember).
D2 had quite complicated subject matters and I took a lot of time to organize them in a proper way. After that, It was relatively simple (as far as I could see), like fixing a divisional, filing PCT, filing opposition + invalid priority).
No technical issue, but until last night I was getting error messages, which made me quite nervous for today.
I had the same problem at 9:30 am. Wrote in the chat and the invigilator, who told me to refresh, it worked, took about 2-3 min. I guess there might be a more clear message BEFORE the exam that this happens. E.g. In the e-mail with final instructions we received last week (also maybe put a screen shot where the refresh button is). There was a pop-up message in wiseflow before I started the flow which was saying if you don't see the questions "update" your browser, so unclear to me what that meant. Update a browser ...(like..do I have to install a new version of the browser? And which? i know i have the last version of the Lockdown Browser, so...update Chrome?...very unclear!) Refresh a page in the LockdownBrowser is quite a different things...so my 2-3 min are fine, but if people had to wait 10-12 min for an answer, this is unacceptable.
ReplyDeleteThis is a good point for other papers as well. Can you share which button they were referring to? Was it the normal refresh button?
Deleteby normal, I mean what is on the left side in wiseflow, looking like a normal refresh button that one finds in every web browser.
DeleteI had a text about the refreshing popping up on screen when I was waiting for the flow to start. To refresh I just pushed the f5-tab on the keyboard and it worked, only took a couple of seconds. Was there a refresh button on screen?/LO
DeleteHah. Yes, after the Lockdown browser lets you in, after you type the password, in this main screen, up left there is a circle-arrow, the typical sign for refresh. I pressed that one and the assignment appeared.
DeleteA colleague told me about a cannot-see-paper problem in 2021, and she told me to always do a refresh if there is such type of problem. So I did, and problem solved.
DeleteMK
I still very much dislike not being able to print question papers, for D2 in particular. Feels like a huge disadvantage particularly when the inventions are so “wordy”.
ReplyDeleteI agree. I would prefer printing D2 if possible
DeleteI also agree that a printed copy is easier to use. But being able to copy from the electronic paper and being able to type rather than need to write by hand makes me prefer the current format over the previous paper-based, hand-written, exam-hall version.
DeleteMK
Is there anybody who was not provided printable materials? In my case, no printable material was provided for D1 and D2.
ReplyDeleteNo, no printable material/LO
DeleteWhen I copied the D1 questions and the D2 questions from the paper into my editor, all white space between paragraphs and all layout (esp. the questions of the D2) were gone. That was quite inconvenient.
ReplyDeleteWhen I copied part of my D2 answer in the editor to have a bases for the next sub-question, all formatting was lost: my bulletizing, italics and highlighting were all gone in the copied version. That was also quite inconvenient (I must admit that I did not check this with the Compendium papers, but that I had assumed that the copying issues that were mentioned in the earlier years were solved...)
Ctrl-z worked, copied text vanished also, but I could redo copy paste and then it worked. This year ctrl-c and ctrl-v worked, no crashes, were they supposed to?/LO
DeleteIs next year the last year with this type of a-b-c-d parts? I expected to pass D this time but it took me to long to get everything down on paper, blurred somehow epz and epy and their dates so lost time and had to go back and check everything in my timetable. So anxious that I must resit next year…..no pressure added if next year is last year and then new system so if not passing now having to start with a-b-c again? /LO
ReplyDeleteEQE 2024 has already been announced by a notice of 20 September 2022 on the EQE Notices webpage, as a current-formal Pre-A-B-C-D EQE.
DeleteSee https://www.epo.org/learning/eqe/notices.html -> "Dates for the EQE 2024- notice of 20 September 2022"
It has also been stated that there will be fair transitional provisions. E.g., if there would be a paper/module very similar in scope to the current D paper, you can expect that you will be exempted from that new paper if you passed D already. But as long as we do not know the design of the New EQE and their transitional provisions, we do not know any details.
DeleteCould you tell me when DeltaPatents will make their answers available? Thanks- MG
ReplyDeleteI had quite a few technical issues.
ReplyDeleteThe first two everyone had, I guess.
1. Assignment did not show up. But it was easy to just refresh and it appeared in 5 seconds.
2. Search function did not work. I did not have printed guidelines so that was an issue.
3. I got kicked out of the browser and had to request the invigilator to let me in again. Contacted the invigilator via chat box on wiseflow.
4. After the invigilator let me in, the chatbox did not close and it was hiding my D2 paper the whole time.
I got a pop-up about unauthorized keystrokes or touch pad gestures already before the start of the flow, during countdown, when I was not even touching my keyboard, mouse or touchpad. Made me worried, because it also warned me that I would be kicked out of wiseflow if I did it again sometime during the entire flow. But luckily that didnot happen.
DeleteBut why did the pop-up appear at all while I was inactive?
MK
The D1 and D2 blog posts now include our full answers.
ReplyDeleteOur individual answers were very similar, so we assume that we have considered most expected aspects of the D1 questions and of the D2. But there may/will be some errors or omissions in our answers; it may also happen that we expand more on certain topics than expected by the Exam Committee. For the expected answer, we will all need to wait for the Examiner's Report, which usually becomes available in summer (2022: 6 July; 2021: 19 June).
Please feel free to give your comments, to correct us where wrong, and to supplement us where we have gaps on our D1 and D2 blog posts. We may update our answer based on your feedback if we are made aware of an error or major gap. Please do not post your comments anonymously.
https://eqe-d.blogspot.com/2023/03/d1-2023-55-mark-d1-hard-work.html
https://eqe-d.blogspot.com/2023/03/d2-2023-nappies-getting-wet.html