Guide

Your Idea and its score

The Idea is the structured record of your invention. It builds up from the conversation, expansion, research and your own edits, and everything else in IPGuru reads from it: the crew, pictures, documents and checks.

The Scenario page

Eight tabs

Scorecard	The score, and which parts of the Idea are strong, thin or missing.
Idea	The invention itself: background, problem, who it helps, the concept, how it works, what it is made of, features, capabilities, and what is new.
Intent	What you are protecting, and your goals for this scenario.
Actions	Work recorded to do.
Pending	Assumptions, tests and gaps still open.
Questions	The most useful questions to ask next, ranked.
Design	Trade-offs in the design and what you decided.
Coverage	Which kinds of work have been done on this idea, and which have not.

The score

What the number means

The score, from 0 to 100, measures how completely the Idea describes the invention, with evidence. It is not a verdict on whether the idea is good, new or patentable.
It reads every part of the Idea, not just the summary. The Scorecard names each part it is not counting yet, so you know what to work on.
It can go down. Changing the Idea can make pictures or descriptions made from the old version out of date until they are brought up to date.
My Work shows the same score on every scenario card.

Improve it

Ways to fill in the Idea

Ask the crew about one part. Each part of the Idea has actions to draft a proposal or ask the crew to discuss it.
Answer the ranked questions on the Questions tab. They come from the Idea, your research and anything still open.
Record assumptions and tests on Pending: what you are assuming, how you would test it, and the result.
Separate criteria from benefits. A criterion says what good means and how it is measured, for example time to rinse clean without tools. A benefit is the result you expect on it, for example under one minute.
Expand the idea section by section. See Expand and deepen.

Treat any claim that the idea goes beyond what exists today as something to check later, not a settled fact.

Intent

What you are protecting, and why

Confirm what you are protecting

Once the Idea has content, Nova proposes what the invention is (a thing, a system, a method, a substance or an appearance) and how it might be claimed, quoting the lines of the Idea it read. Choose Confirm profile, or Change to pick it yourself. Studio makes no pictures until this is confirmed, and then only pictures that fit it: a method or a substance is never drawn as a made-up gadget.

Choose up to three goals

Pick the objectives this scenario should aim for, such as a product fast to market or rigorous method and clear experiments, and set how much each matters. The checks on the idea read these goals.

Check the fit to a challenge

If you are answering a competition, hackathon, assignment or grant, add its rules or brief as a source. Fit to the challenge then lists each criterion the document states, in its own words, and whether the Idea meets it. It has no total and never changes the Idea score.

Design trade-offs

The Design tab shows where improving one thing makes another worse, the options weighed, and what you decided. Settle a trade-off by recording a decision, choosing an option, accepting the trade-off or setting it aside. Rejected options stay on the card with their reason, because they are part of how the design was reached.

History

History keeps every version of the Idea. Compare two versions, or restore an older one. Restoring makes a new current version; nothing in the history is lost.

Expand and deepen the idea, or test it.