Ahmed, Zahid et al.Download PDFPatent Trials and Appeals BoardNov 10, 202011647973 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Nov. 10, 2020) Copy Citation UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE United States Patent and Trademark Office Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS P.O. Box 1450 Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450 www.uspto.gov APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. 11/647,973 12/29/2006 Zahid Ahmed 356821-991110 3073 26379 7590 11/10/2020 DLA PIPER LLP (US ) 2000 UNIVERSITY AVENUE EAST PALO ALTO, CA 94303-2248 EXAMINER SINGH, AMRESH ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2159 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 11/10/2020 ELECTRONIC Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding. The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication. Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the following e-mail address(es): PatentDocketingUS-PaloAlto@dlapiper.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________ BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD ____________ Ex parte ZAHID AHMED, ALAN BUSH, HERB STIEL, SHASHI SURAVARAPU, and DAVID YEE ____________ Appeal 2019-003801 Application 11/647,973 Technology Center 2100 ____________ Before JOHN A. JEFFERY, JAMES R. HUGHES, and ERIC S. FRAHM, Administrative Patent Judges. JEFFERY, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from the Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1–46. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We AFFIRM. 1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42. Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Rogers family Trust LLC. Appeal Br. 3. Appeal 2019-003801 Application 11/647,973 2 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellant’s invention is an object-oriented, semantic information model that is the basis for a universal item schema framework. This universal item information model enables consuming, sharing, and publishing content in a system with various types of existing and user- defined content from various sources. See Spec. 1–3. Claim 1 is illustrative: 1. A method for representing content in a system with a universal item taxonomy, the method comprising: providing a memory; storing, in the memory, an abstract base type object for each content definition, the abstract base type object having one or more general characteristic elements of an object including an ltemID element and a KindID element, the ItemID element specifies a unique item identifier and the KindID element that specifies a unique identifier that identifies a type of the content and a plurality of semantic property elements of the type of content, the plurality of sematic property elements including a user defined tag using free form text, multiple system managed tags automatically generated including a time tag, a person tag, a location tag, a category tag and a rating tag, a note generated by a user about an item, a user connection that connects related items and a system connection that is automatically generated; storing, in the memory, a plurality of base components, each base component being a child of the abstract base type object and inheriting the one or more general characteristics, each base component being a container item kind that describes a type of object and encapsulates the particular type of object; and storing a new type of content item on the storage device using the abstract base type object and the one of the base components. Appeal 2019-003801 Application 11/647,973 3 THE REJECTIONS2 The Examiner rejected claims 1–15 and 17–463 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Clark (US 2005/0050054 Al; published Mar. 3, 2005), Chau (US 2002/0133484 Al; published Sept. 19, 2002), and Xu (US 2007/0174247 Al; published July 26, 2007). Final Act. 7–16, 18.4 The Examiner rejected claim 16 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Clark, Chau, and Shi (US 2006/0190475 Al; published Aug. 24, 2006).5 Final Act. 17–18. THE OBVIOUSNESS REJECTION OVER CLARK, CHAU, AND XU Regarding independent claim 1, the Examiner finds that Clark discloses, among other things, storing an abstract base type object in Figure 7 including (1) an ItemID element (“ItemID: IdentityKey [1.1]”), and (2) a 2 Because the Examiner withdrew the rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 101 (Ans. 3), that rejection is not before us. 3 Although the Examiner’s statement of the obviousness rejection over Clark, Chau, and Xu omits claims 24–46, the Examiner nonetheless indicates that these claims were rejected on a basis similar to that articulated for claim 1. See Final Act. 18. Accordingly, we presume that claims 24–46 were rejected as obvious over Clark, Chau, and Xu. We, therefore, present the correct claim listing here, and treat the Examiner’s error in this regard as harmless. 4 Throughout this opinion, we refer to (1) the Final Rejection mailed December 1, 2017 (“Final Act.”); (2) the Appeal Brief filed January 2, 2019 (“Appeal Br.”); (3) the Examiner’s Answer mailed March 14, 2019 (“Ans.”); and (4) the Reply Brief filed April 15, 2019 (“Reply Br.”). 5 Although the Examiner’s rejection of claim 16 omits Xu despite the claim depending from claim 14 that was rejected over Clark, Chau, and Xu, we nonetheless reproduce the rejection here as articulated by the Examiner. We also correct the Examiner’s misspelling of the Shi (not Shin) reference here for clarity, and treat the Examiner’s error in this regard as harmless. Appeal 2019-003801 Application 11/647,973 4 KindID element (“Base.IdentityKey”) that specifies a unique identifier (Type:uniquieidentifier[1:1]”) identifying a content type and associated property elements (“Categories:CategoryRef[0:*]”). Final Act. 7–8. Although the Examiner acknowledges that Clark lacks the recited semantic property elements, the Examiner cites (1) Chau for teaching semantic property elements, and (2) Xu for teaching semantic property elements with the particular recited tags and connections. See Final Act. 9. Based on these collective teachings, the Examiner concludes that the claim would have been obvious. Final Act. 9–10. Appellant argues that the cited prior art does not disclose the recited abstract base type object with the recited ItemID and KindID elements, where the latter element specifies (1) a unique identifier that identifies content type, and (2) the specific recited semantic property elements. Appeal Br. 9–10; Reply Br. 3–5. According to Appellant, not only do Clark and Chau lack the recited KindID element that specifies a content type and semantic property elements of that type, Xu does not disclose the recited person and ratings tags, as well as the recited user connection that connects related items. Appeal Br. 10; Reply Br. 5. ISSUE Under § 103, has the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1 by finding that Clark, Chau, and Xu collectively would have taught or suggested storing an abstract base type object for each content definition, the object including an ItemID element and a KindID element, where the ItemID element specifies a unique item identifier, and the KindID element specifies a unique identifier that identifies a type of the content and plural semantic property Appeal 2019-003801 Application 11/647,973 5 elements of the content type, the semantic property elements including (1) a user defined tag using free form text; (2) automatically-generated system managed tags including a time tag, a person tag, a location tag, a category tag and a rating tag; (3) a user-generated note about an item; (4) a user connection that connects related items; and (5) an automatically-generated system connection (“the abstract base type object limitation”)? ANALYSIS As noted above, claim 1 recites, in pertinent part, an abstract base type object that includes (1) an ItemID element, and (2) a KindID element. As claimed, the KindID element specifies (1) a unique identifier identifying the type of content, and (2) plural semantic property elements of the content type. In the rejection, the Examiner finds that Clark’s abstract base type object in Figure 7 includes (1) an ItemID element, namely “ItemID: IdentityKey [1.1]”; and (2) a KindID element, namely “Base.IdentityKey,” that specifies a unique identifier (Type:uniqueidentifier[1:1]”) identifying a content type and associated property elements, namely “Categories:CategoryRef[0:*].” Final Act. 7–8; Ans. 4. We see no error in these findings. Although Appellant contends that Clark does not disclose the recited KindID element specifying the particular recited semantic property elements (Appeal Br. 10; Reply Br. 4), the Examiner cites Chau and Xu collectively—not Clark—for teaching the KindID element’s recited semantic property elements and their particulars, and that, in light of these teachings, providing these semantic property elements in connection with Clark’s KindID element would have been Appeal 2019-003801 Application 11/647,973 6 obvious. See Final Act. 9–10; Ans. 4–5. Therefore, Appellant’s contentions regarding Clark’s individual shortcomings in this regard (Appeal Br. 10; Reply Br. 4) do not show nonobviousness where, as here, the rejection is not based on Clark alone, but rather the cited references’ collective teachings. See In re Merck & Co., 800 F.2d 1091, 1097 (Fed. Cir. 1986). As noted previously, the recited semantic property elements include five key elements: (1) a user defined tag using free form text; (2) automatically-generated system managed tags including a time tag, a person tag, a location tag, a category tag and a rating tag; (3) a user-generated note about an item; (4) a user connection that connects related items; and (5) an automatically-generated system connection. The Examiner finds that Chau teaches various semantic property elements, including those in connection with the Extensible Style Language Transformer (XSLT) that transforms XML documents, where XSLT semantically defines elements in a specific XML namespace. See Final Act. 9–10; Ans. 6–7. The Examiner, however, acknowledges that Chau’s semantic property elements lack the particular recited tags and connections, but cites Xu to cure that deficiency in concluding that the claim would have been obvious. See Final Act. 9–10; Ans. 6–7. Appellant’s contentions regarding Chau’s individual shortcomings in connection with the recited semantic property elements (Appeal Br. 10; Reply Br. 4–5) do not show nonobviousness where, as here, the rejection is not based on Chau alone, but rather the cited references’ collective teachings. See Merck, 800 F.2d at 1097. Nor are we persuaded of error in the Examiner’s reliance on Xu for at least suggesting the recited semantic property elements’ particular tags and Appeal 2019-003801 Application 11/647,973 7 connections. Despite Appellant’s arguments to the contrary (Appeal Br. 10; Reply Br. 5), Appellant does not persuasively rebut the Examiner’s finding that Xu’s tag-based searching functionality within a trusted social network (e.g., friends and family) in paragraph 9 and user-based tags for rating purposes in paragraph 65 at least suggest a “person tag.” See Final Act. 9; Ans. 6. Nor does Appellant persuasively rebut the Examiner’s finding that Xu’s rating-based annotations in paragraphs 26 and 27, which refer to any descriptive or evaluative metadata related to a Web object as noted in paragraph 26, at least suggests a “rating tag.” See Final Act. 9; Ans. 6. We also see no error in the Examiner’s reliance on Xu’s tag-based searching functionality within a trusted social network (e.g., friends and family) in paragraphs 9, 43, and 44 for at least suggesting a user connection that connects related items. See Final Act. 9; Ans. 6. Appellant does not squarely address—let alone persuasively rebut—the Examiner’s finding based on Xu’s social graphing functionality that when a user shares annotated content to others, such as friends or family, in a common social network, the content is indirectly connected to the sharing user given this common social network. Ans. 6. Accordingly, the weight of the evidence on this record favors the Examiner. Therefore, we are not persuaded that the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1, and claims 2–15 and 17–46 not argued separately with particularity.6 6 Although Appellant nominally argues claim 24 separately (Appeal Br. 10– 11; Reply Br. 6), the arguments are similar to those made in connection with claim 1. Accordingly, we group claim 24 and its dependent claims with claim 1. Appeal 2019-003801 Application 11/647,973 8 THE OTHER OBVIOUSNESS REJECTION We also sustain the Examiner’s obviousness rejection of claim 16. Final Act. 17–18. Because this rejection is not argued separately with particularity, we are not persuaded of error in this rejection for the reasons previously discussed. CONCLUSION In summary: Claims Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/ Basis Affirmed Reversed 1–15, 17–46 103 Clark, Chau, Xu 1–15, 17– 46 16 103 Clark, Chau, Shi 16 Overall Outcome 1–46 TIME PERIOD FOR RESPONSE No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1). AFFIRMED Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation