Trademark Search

Trademark Search (TMview API)

Checks a name against the TMview database via its public JSON API (tmdn.org/tmview). One query covers EUIPO (EM) plus national offices (Germany DE, Austria AT, Switzerland CH, WIPO WO, and all EU offices).

No agent-browser, no API key — just curl + jq (1.6 or newer). The API needs HTTP/1.1 and a primed session cookie; the script handles both. If jq is missing or too old the script exits 127 with an install hint.

Usage

scripts/tmview-search.sh "<term>" [offices]      # path relative to this skill dir

scripts/tmview-search.sh "tenderling"            # EUIPO only (default) -> clear
scripts/tmview-search.sh "dendu" -o DACH         # EUIPO + DE + AT + CH
scripts/tmview-search.sh "tendena" -o EM,DE      # custom office list
scripts/tmview-search.sh "acme" -o ALL           # every office in TMview
scripts/tmview-search.sh "nike" -r 0             # heavily taken, print all rows
scripts/tmview-search.sh "acme" -c 25,35 -p 5    # apparel/retail classes, 500 marks
scripts/tmview-search.sh "acme" --json           # merged raw JSON for further processing

The legacy positional form "<term>" DACH still works.

Output

• Total matches (contains) — every mark whose name contains the term (catches similar marks, not just identical ones), plus how many were analysed.
• A table sorted most-relevant-first: mark name · [office] · status · Nice classes · owner, where » marks an identical name and × a dead status.
• Verdict, derived automatically:
  • ✅ clear — no mark contains the term.
  • ✅ likely usable — hits exist but none is identical (all longer/similar words).
  • ⚠️ dead identical — identical mark(s) exist but all are expired/ended.
  • ⚠️ live, other classes — identical live mark(s) outside the conflict classes.
  • ⛔ conflict — an identical, live mark exists in a conflict class (9/35/42 by default).

Exit codes: 0 report produced · 2 API unreachable/unparseable · 3 office filter invalid (see below) · 127 missing curl/jq.

Accuracy notes

• Identical is judged on a normalised name: lowercase, punctuation and spaces removed, so DEN-DU, den du and dendu all count as identical.
• Live uses a dead-status deny list (expired, ended, withdrawn, refused, cancelled, invalid, surrendered, lapsed, …). Unknown statuses count as live, so the verdict errs toward caution.
• The API only matches "contains", so all identical/class analysis happens locally over the fetched pages — raise --pages for very common terms (the header tells you when results were truncated).
• TMview silently returns zero results for invalid office codes instead of an error. The script detects this with a control query and exits 3 rather than reporting a false "clear".

Interpreting results

For SaaS/software the relevant Nice classes are 9 (software), 42 (SaaS/tech services), 35 (business/advertising). When judging a hit, weigh:

1. Identical vs similar — DENDUR ≠ DENDU; substring hits like ADDENDUM, CLOUDENDURE are usually irrelevant.
2. Status — Registered/Filed/Opposition = live; Expired/Ended/ Withdrawn/Refused = dead (much lower risk).
3. Class overlap — an identical live mark in class 9/35/42 is the real blocker; the same word in apparel (25) or cosmetics (3) is usually fine.

The script's ⛔ verdict fires only when all three line up (identical + live + software class). Always still eyeball the table.

Related

Naming a product end-to-end? name-availability combines this check with domain availability across TLDs and produces a per-candidate verdict table.

Caveat

Indicator only, not legal advice. TMview reflects office data with some lag and the API does phonetic/fuzzy matching less aggressively than a professional clearance. Before filing or launching, have a trademark attorney run a full search (including phonetic and similar-mark analysis) and confirm the live national registers.