Google has added another piece of search software to its arsenal, with the launch of Google Patent Search.

The patent search site, launched as a beta on Wednesday night, is designed to sift through the approximately 7 million U.S. patents by a variety of parameters including filing date, issue date, patent number and inventor.

As for its newest site, software engineers are still working on functions that allow patent searchers to easily save and print the patent information they look up, according to a Google blog. In addition, Google’s site does not currently include patent applications, international patents, or U.S. patents issued since mid-2006, but Google said that enhancements are in the works.

Patents in the United States are issued by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which has its own patent search engine available on its Web site. In order to create Google’s patent search, which goes back to the 1790s, the company converted the government site’s data into what it claims is a more searchable format.

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