Ex Parte Cudak et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Mar 28, 2016

13659216 (P.T.A.B. Mar. 28, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
13/659,216 10/24/2012
56102 7590 03/30/2016
IBM (ROC-KLS)
c/o Kennedy Lenart Spraggins LLP
8601 Ranch Road 2222
Ste. 1-225
AUSTIN, TX 78730
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
GARYD.CUDAK
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
ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
RPS920120099US2 2942
EXAMINER
A YOTUNDE, AYODEJI 0
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2649
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
03/30/2016 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):
office@klspatents.com
kate@klspatents.com
hanna@klspatents.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte GARY D. CUDAK, CHRISTOPHER J. HARDEE,
RANDALL C. HUMES, and ADAM ROBERTS
Appeal2014-006894
Application 13/659,216
Technology Center 2600
Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, JOHNNY A. KUMAR, and
JOYCE CRAIG, Administrative Patent Judges.
SAADAT, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants 1 appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's
Final Rejection of claims 1---6, which constitute all the claims pending in this
application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
1 According to Appellants, the real party in interest is International Business
Machines Corporation (Br. 1 ).
Appeal2014-006894
Application 13/659,216
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Introduction
Appellants' invention relates to a system and method for evaluating
wireless network access connections via near field communications (Spec.
1: 14--16).
Claim 1 is illustrative and reads as follows:
1. A method evaluating wireless network access
connections via near field communications, the method
compnsmg:
identifying, by a requesting device, one or more network
connections available to the requesting device;
requesting, by the requesting device to one or more
responding devices using a near field communications
connection, information describing the performance of the
network connections experienced by the one or more responding
devices;
receiving, by the requesting device, the information
describing the performance of the network connections
experienced by the one or more responding devices; and
connecting, by the requesting device, to a preferred
network connection in dependence upon the information
describing the performance of the network connections
experienced by the one or more responding devices.
The Examiner's Rejections
The Examiner rejected claims 1-5 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as being
anticipated by Kolehmainen (US 2006/0183462 Al; Aug. 17, 2006) (Final
Act. 3-6).
The Examiner further added Floros (US 2006/0045050 Al; Mar. 2,
2006) to reject claim 6 as unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) (Final Act.
6-7).
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Appeal2014-006894
Application 13/659,216
Issue on Appeal
Appellants' contentions present the following issue:
Has the Examiner erred in finding Kolehmainen discloses the steps of
requesting and receiving by the requesting device "the information
describing the performance of the network connections experienced by the
one or more responding devices" and connecting to a preferred network
based on that information, as recited in claim 1?
ANALYSIS
With respect to independent claim 1, Appellants contend the cited
portions of Kolehmainen in paragraphs 4 and 23 do not disclose the disputed
claimed method steps because "the cited reference does not make any use of
information describing the performance of the network connections
experienced by the one or more responding devices" (Br. 4). Appellants
argue that:
Kolemainen's credentials are clearly not information describing
the performance of the network connections experienced by a
device. Instead, credentials are described by Kolemainen at
paragraph 0065 as including "a password, account information,
public key certificate, cost limits, a single key challenge-
response such as s/key, and the like," none of which represent
information describing the performance of the network
connections experienced by a device.
(Br. 5). Appellants further assert their Specification defines the information
describing the requesting device as "information about the requesting device
- not information describing the performance of the responding devices"
(Br. 6).
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Appeal2014-006894
Application 13/659,216
In response, the Examiner finds the cited portion of Kolehmainen in
paragraph 41 discloses that the performance of the network, which take
place through using authorization of computing device as remote access
manager 269 for obtaining an appropriate credential and performing other
actions such as requesting an account environment, is described to be
established at the other computing device (Ans. 3). The Examiner further
finds paragraph 23 of Kolehmainen provides for the information describing
the performance of the network connection as one or more client
applications that are included in the mobile device 104 and are configured to
manage the described actions or performance on behalf of the client device
or the responding device (Ans. 3--4).
We agree with the Examiner's findings and conclusion. We also
observe that the broadest reasonable interpretation of the recited
"information describing the performance of the network connections
experienced by the one or more responding devices'' encompasses the
information describing the requesting device. As further found by the
Examiner (Ans. 4) and consistent with Appellants' disclosure (see Spec.
7:6-7), Kolehmainen's credentials may include information such as a
password, account information, public key certificate, or cost limits (see
Kolehmainen i-f 65). These types of credentials are associated with the
responding device and may include "information identifying secure network
resources that the responding devices is [sic] authorized to access" (Ans. 4
(citing Kolehmainen i-f 67)). Therefore, by identifying the credentials
associated with a resource that the responding device is authorized to access,
Kolehmainen's requesting device requests, receives, and connect based on
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Appeal2014-006894
Application 13/659,216
the information describing the network connection performance experienced
by the responding device, as required by claim 1.
For the above-stated reasons, we are not persuaded by Appellants'
arguments that the Examiner erred in finding the disclosure of Kolehmainen
teaches the disputed features of claim 1. Accordingly, we sustain the
35 U.S.C. § 102(b) rejection of claim 1, as well as claims 2-5 which are not
argued separately (see Br. 3---6). We also sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
rejection of claim 6, which is argued based on the same reasons presented
for claim 1 and the failure of Floros to cure the alleged deficiency of
Kolehmainen (see Br. 7).
DECISION
The decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1---6 is affirmed.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l)(iv).
AFFIRMED
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