Patents

Databases

• Espacenet (Great Britain mirror site) - search and view the full text of patents - includes UK patents, patents from the European Patent Office and individual European patenting authorities,World patents,and US Patent Office. Also includes Australian patents.
  
• US Patent Full Text Database
  Full text of US patents from 1976, full page images from 1790.
• Google Patents searches USPTO database from 1790's to last few months - doesn't cover patent applications or foreign patents or recently issued patents.
• Canadian Patent Office
  Search 75 years of patent descriptions and images.
• Japanese Patent Office
  includes searching  patents and trademarks databases 
• Industrial Property Digital Library

Classifications

• United States Patent Classification
• International Patent Classification (IPC)
• Nice classification: International Classification of Goods and Services for the Purposes of the Registration of Marks
• Locarno classification: International Classification for Industrial Designs
• Vienna classification: International Classification of the Figurative Elements of Marks.

Intellectual Property and Copyright

Intellectual property

• IP Australia
  Intellectual property organisations in Australia and overseas

Copyright

• ALIA Copyright Service
• Australian Copyright Act
• Australian Copyright Council
• Copyright Agency Limited
• Copyright at Swinburne

Citing a patent

Citing a patent in a bibliography or reference list:

The minimum data required for an acceptable citation are the inventor's name(s), year of patent issue, title of patent, country of issue, patent number (include additional dating information, if available, at the end)

For example:  

Bernson, SW 1980, Conversion of Methane. U.S Patent 4,199,533. April 22

De Wied, A 1957, Improvements in the packing of sausage casings, GB 769446.