Ex Parte Appalla et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardDec 23, 201613303347 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 23, 2016) 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. 13/303,347 11/23/2011 Rama Suryanarayana Appalla AVA11 -29(911018) 7483 136582 7590 12/28/2016 STEVENS & SHOWALTER, LLP Box AVAYA Inc. 7019 Corporate Way Dayton, OH 45459-4238 EXAMINER MUI, GARY ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2464 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 12/28/2016 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): pto @ sspatlaw. com pair_avaya@ firsttofile.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte RAMA SURYANARAYANA APPALLA, PAMELA LEBLANC, and MICHAEL HAIGHT Appeal 2016-000910 Application 13/303,3471 Technology Center 2400 Before CAROLYN D. THOMAS, JEREMY J. CURCURI, and SHARON FENICK Administrative Patent Judges. FENICK, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL This is an appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s Final Rejection of claims 1, 2, 4—9, 11—16 and 18—24. (Appeal Br. 2.) Claims 3, 10 and 17 have been canceled. (Id.) We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b)(1). We affirm. Invention Appellants’ invention relates to designated router transitions in broadcast networks. (Abstract.) A network includes a designated router 1 Appellants identify Avaya, Inc. as the real party in interest. (Appeal Br. 2.) Appeal 2016-000910 Application 13/303,347 (DR) and an alternate designated router (ADR) and other nodes. Upon detection of failure of the DR, the ADR floods the network with a link state packet indicating pseudonode information to be used in the network. At least one node in the network, upon its detection of failure of the DR, uses the link state packet to compute new routes which take into account the failure of the DR. (Abstract.) Representative Claim Claim 1, reproduced below, is representative: 1. A computer-implemented method in which a computer system performs operations comprising: detecting, by an Alternate Designated Router (ADR) in a network, node failure of a Designated Router (DR) prior to other nodes of said network detecting said failure of said DR; in response to said detecting node failure of said DR by said ADR, flooding said network with a link state packet of a pseudonode within said network; detecting by at least one other node of said network failure of said DR; and computing routes to take into account said failure of said DR by said at least one other node of said network, wherein there is minimal traffic loss since said pseudonodes link state packet is already present before said computing routes takes place. References and Rejections The Examiner rejects claims 22—24 under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b) or pre- AIA 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph, as indefinite for failure to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter regarded as the invention. (Final Action 2.) The Examiner rejects claims 1, 2, 4—9, 11—16 and 18—24 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Csaszar et al. (US 2010/0189113 Al; 2 Appeal 2016-000910 Application 13/303,347 July 29, 2010) and Kini et al. (US 2011/0044348 Al; Feb. 24, 2011) (Final Action 3—11.) Issues (A) Did the Examiner err in finding Csaszar teaches or suggests “detecting, by an Alternate Designated Router (ADR) in a network, node failure of a Designated Router (DR) prior to other nodes of said network detecting said failure of said DR,” as recited in claim 1? (B) Did the Examiner err in finding the combination of Kini and Csaszar teaches or suggests, “flooding said network with a link state packet of a pseudonode within said network,” as recited in claim 1? (C) Did the Examiner err in findings relating to the claim limitation, “wherein there is minimal traffic loss since said pseudonodes link state packet is already present before said computing routes takes place,” as recited in claim 1? ANALYSIS 35 U.S.C. f 112 rejection The Examiner’s rejection of claims 22—24 under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph, are not addressed by the Appellants in the Briefs or by the Examiner in the Answer, and thus we summarily sustain this rejection. See Manual of Patent Examining Procedure (MPEP) § 1205.02 (9th ed., rev. July 2015) (“If a ground of rejection stated by the examiner is not addressed in the appellant's brief, that ground of rejection will be summarily sustained by the Board.”); see also In re Berger, 279 F.3d 975, 984 (Fed. Cir. 2002) (affirming the Board's decision to sustain an uncontested rejection of claims under 35 U.S.C. 112, second paragraph and finding the appellant had waived his right to contest 3 Appeal 2016-000910 Application 13/303,347 the indefiniteness rejection by not presenting arguments as to error in the rejection on appeal to the Board). 35 U.S.C. § 103 rejection (A) “detecting, by an Alternate Designated Router (ADR) in a network, node failure of a Designated Router (DR) prior to other nodes of said network detecting said failure of said DR ” The Examiner finds that Csaszar teaches or suggests the detection, by an ADR, of node failure of a DR, prior to other nodes of the network, including the determination of higher order entities. (Final Action 3.) Csaszar is directed towards a recovery method for link failure in a packet switched network domain with nodes. (Csaszar Abstract, 11.) Csaszar describes prior art recovery procedures used to mitigate the effects of link failures. (Id. ^3.) The Examiner cites Csaszar’s disclosure as teaching the detection of a node failure of a DR by an ADR prior to other nodes detecting the failure. (Final Action 3.) Appellants argue that Csaszar does not disclose that detection of a node failure by an ADR occurs before other nodes detect the failure. (Appeal Br. 7.) However, as the Examiner finds, Csaszar discloses that when the router, mapped to the claimed ADR, detects a failure and “floods” the change of link state to neighboring nodes, “the flood messages act[] as a notification to the neighbours of the failure.” (Answer 12.) We agree with the Examiner’s finding. Csaszar discloses that routers in the network learn of the link failure “either by direct detection or by being informed via signaling message'1'’ (Csaszar 13, emphasis added). We find that Csaszar’s disclosure that some routers learn of the link failure via the signaling message teaches or suggests that some nodes in the network (mapped to the limitation’s “other nodes of said network”) detect the failure after receiving 4 Appeal 2016-000910 Application 13/303,347 the signal message, i.e., the ADR detects failure of the DR prior to other nodes detecting the failure. The claims as written do not require this occur prior to all other nodes detecting the failure. Appellants, in their Reply Brief, additionally argue that Csaszar does not mention an ADR, and thus does not disclose or suggest that node failure is detected by an ADR. (Reply Br. 2.) This argument was raised for the first time in the Reply Brief without a showing of good cause, and is deemed waived. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.41(b)(2) (“Any argument raised in the reply brief which was not raised in the appeal brief, or is not responsive to an argument raised in the examiner's answer, including any designated new ground of rejection, will not be considered by the Board for purposes of the present appeal, unless good cause is shown.”) (B) “flooding said network with a link state packet of a pseudonode within said network” The Examiner finds that Csaszar teaches flooding a network with a link state packet, and that the combination of Csaszar’s teachings with Kini’s teachings relating to pseudonodes in networks, which form adjacencies with other network elements, teaches or suggests the disputed limitation regarding flooding of a network with the link state packet of a pseudonode. (Final Action 4.) Appellants argue that, “Kini teaches a pseudonode but fails to teach flooding the network with a link state packet of a pseudonode.” (Appeal Br. 8.) However, Appellants have not addressed the Examiner’s findings regarding the combination of Csaszar and Kini. The test for obviousness is whether the combination of references, taken as a whole, would have suggested the patentee’s invention to a person having ordinary skill in the 5 Appeal 2016-000910 Application 13/303,347 art. In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425 (CCPA 1981). Therefore, we are not persuaded of error in the Examiner’s findings with respect to this limitation. (C) “wherein there is minimal traffic loss since said pseudonodes link state packet is already present before said computing routes takes place ” The Examiner finds that the claimed “wherein there is minimal traffic loss since said pseudonodes link state packet is already present before said computing routes takes place” merely expresses an intended result. (Final Action 12.) In any case, the Examiner additionally finds that the combination of Csaszar and Kini teaches that a router that learns of the failure through the flooded message will “obtain the flood message before it recomputes the routing table” based on the message, and that this prevents “flapping” (two recomputations.) (Answer 13—14; Final Action 4, 12.) The Examiner further finds that this would result in the restoration of the network and yield the claimed result of minimal traffic loss. (Answer at 14.) Appellants argue, and we agree, that the aforementioned wherein limitation must be given patentable weight, specifically arguing that “said pseudonodes link state packet is already present before said computing routes takes place” should be given weight. (Appeal Br. 8; Reply Br. 3.) However, Appellants do not address the Examiner’s additional finding that the combination of Csaszar and Kini teaches this limitation. Therefore, we are not persuaded of error in the Examiner’s findings with respect to this limitation. Conclusion: 35 U.S.C. § 103 rejection We have reviewed each of Appellants’ arguments in their Appeal Brief and Reply Brief. We are not convinced the Examiner erred in 6 Appeal 2016-000910 Application 13/303,347 rejecting claim 1, or in rejecting independent claims 8 and 15 and dependent claims 2, 4—7, 9, 11—14, 16 and 18—24 argued on the same bases (Appeal Br. 8) and we sustain the Examiner’s rejection of these claims under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Csaszar and Kini. DECISION We summarily affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 22—24 under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph, as indefinite for failure to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter regarded as the invention. We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1, 2, 4—9, 11—16, and 18—24 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable. Pursuant to 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l)(iv), no time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended. AFFIRMED 7 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation