Ex Parte Zhou et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jan 20, 2015

11739985 (P.T.A.B. Jan. 20, 2015)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte YU CHEN ZHOU, LI YI, and MAO XINSHENG
____________

Appeal 2012-007758
Application 11/739,985
Technology Center 2400
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Before DENISE M. POTHIER, BRETT C. MARTIN, and
JEREMY J. CURCURI, Administrative Patent Judges.

POTHIER, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s
rejection of claims 1–35.1 We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.

1 Throughout this opinion, we refer to the Appeal Brief (App. Br.) filed on
October 31, 2011; (2) the Examiner’s Answer (Ans.) mailed on February 17,
2012; and (3) the Reply Brief (Reply Br.) filed on April 16, 2012.
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Invention
Appellants’ invention relates to a method, system, and medium for
creating and/or updating resource property-based indexes for Web Service
(WS) Resources among multiple Web Services ServiceGroups (WS-Service
Group). See generally Spec. ¶¶ 3, 14–15, Abstract. Claim 1 is reproduced
below with the key disputed limitations emphasized:
1. A method comprising:
publishing with a client computer, from a first Web Service
ServiceGroup, at least one topic, said first Web Service ServiceGroup
having a Web Service Resource being defined by one or more
properties associated with the at least one topic;
notifying, with the client computer, a second Web Service
ServiceGroup of one or more values of said one or more properties,
said second Web Service ServiceGroup having subscribed to said at
least one topic published by said first Web Service ServiceGroup, said
second Web Service ServiceGroup being connected to said first Web
Service ServiceGroup;
creating, with the client computer, one or more index entities for
each of the one or more properties such that each of the one or more
index entities stores a property value; and
notifying, with the client computer, the second Web Service
ServiceGroup of a change to the property value in at least one of the
one or more index entities without notifying any Web Service
ServiceGroup that does not subscribe to the at least one topic of the
change.

The Examiner relies on the following as evidence of unpatentability:
Crowle US 5,857,072 Jan. 5, 1999
Wallach US 6,292,905 B1 Sept. 18, 2001
Tomisawa US 2006/0210051 A1 Sept. 21, 2006
(field Mar. 17, 2006)

OASIS WEB SERVICES TOPICS 1.3 (WS-TOPICS), PUBLIC REVIEW DRAFT 01
1–39 (William Vambenepe et al. eds., 2005) (hereinafter “Vambenepe”).

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OASIS WEB SERVICES GROUP 1.2 (WS-SERVICEGROUP), OASIS STANDARD
1–41 (Tom Maguire et al., 2006) (hereinafter “Maguire”).

JAVA.LANG CLASS STRING, JAVATM 2 PLATFORM STD. ED. V.1.4.2, Sun
Microsystems, Inc., 15, 26, 33 (2003), available at
http://web.archive.org/web/20030605035323/http://java.sun.com/j2se/l.4 . . .
(last visited on November 3, 2009 6:55 PM) (hereinafter “Java String”).

The Rejections
Claims 1, 6–13, 18–23, and 29–35 are rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as unpatentable over Maguire, Vambenepe, and Wallach.
Ans. 5–11.
Claims 2, 14, and 24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Maguire, Vambenepe, Wallach, and Crowle. Ans. 12–13.
Claims 3, 15, and 26 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Maguire, Vambenepe, Wallach, Tomisawa, and Crowle.
Ans. 13–15.
Claims 4, 16, 25, and 27 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Maguire, Vambenepe, Wallach, and Tomisawa.
Ans. 15–17.
Claims 5, 17, and 28 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Maguire, Vambenepe, Wallach, Tomisawa, and Java
String. Ans. 17–19.

OBVIOUSNESS REJECTION OVER MAGUIRE, VAMBENEPE,
AND WALLACH

Regarding independent claim 1, the Examiner finds that Maguire
teaches a WS-Service Group that includes a WS-BaseNotification standard
defining how subscribers are informed of changes to the ServiceGroup and
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WS-ResourceProperties. Ans. 5, 19–20 (citing Maguire 1:21–24).
Additionally, the Examiner finds Vambenepe teaches a WS-Topics standard
that organizes items of interest (e.g., a WS-Resource Properties) for
subscription and in combination with Maguire’s WS-BaseNotification
notification mechanism teaches categorizing resource properties by
assigning notification of resource property changes to one or more topics.
Ans. 6, 19–20 (citing Vambenepe 1:31–22, 7:180–81).
Appellants argue the Examiner misconstrues claim 1 to require a
notification of the change in a topic. App. Br. 8. Additionally, Appellants
contend that Maguire fails to teach the recited notification of change to the
property value of the same topic. App. Br. 8–9, Reply Br. 4–5. Rather,
Appellants assert that Maguire teaches the WS-Base Notification informs a
subscriber of changes to the ServiceGroup only. Reply Br. 4–6. Lastly,
Appellants argue that Vambenepe does not cure this missing limitation.
Reply Br. 6.

ISSUE
Under § 103, has the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1 by finding
that Maguire, Vambenepe, and Wallach collectively would have taught or
suggested notifying the second Web Service ServiceGroup of a change to
the property value in at least one of the one or more index entities?

ANALYSIS
Based on the record before us, we find no error in the Examiner’s
rejection of independent claim 1. We agree that Maguire fails to state
explicitly a Web service standard of a ServiceGroup that includes
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WS-BaseNotification informs a subscriber of a change to
WS-ResourceProperties. Reply Br. 4–6. However, upon reviewing the cited
portion in Maguire’s Abstract (Ans. 20), Maguire discloses the Web service
associated with a ServiceGroup entry can be composed from Web services
standards including WS-BaseNotification, which defines how third parties
may subscribe to be informed of changes to the ServiceGroup. Maguire
1:18–22. Additionally, Maguire teaches the WS-ResourceProperties defines
how properties of a ServiceGroup and its entries are made accessible
through a Web service interface. Maguire 1:22–24. Given that WS-
ResourceProperties define how properties of a ServiceGroup and its entries
are accessible through a web service interface, Maguire suggests that there is
a relationship between the properties in the WS-ResourceProperties and a
ServiceGroup in context of Web services. See Maguire 1:14–16, 21–24.
Additionally, this discussion in Maguire further suggests to one
skilled in the art that changes to the ServiceGroup provided by the
WS-BaseNotification would include any changes in the properties of a
ServiceGroup, given that the WS-ResourceProperties define how
ServiceGroup properties and its entries are accessible. See Ans. 20 (citing
Maguire 1:2124). As such, Maguire at least suggests to an ordinary artisan
that notifying a subscriber of changes to a ServiceGroup using
WS-BaseNotification as taught by Maguire also involves notifying a
subscriber of any changes to the properties of a ServiceGroup and its entries
made accessible through a Web service interface.
The Examiner further relies upon Vambenepe to teach the disputed
“notifying” step of claim 1. Ans. 6, 19–20 (citing Vambenepe 1:31–33,
7:177–78, 180–81). Vambenepe teaches a WS-Notification specification
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allows for organizing and categorizing notifications using Topics. See id.
Thus, Vambenepe teaches topics are used in conjunction with the
notification mechanism defined in WS-BaseNotification. Vambenepe
1:3133, 7:177–78, 180–81. When combining this teaching with Maguire,
the references collectively suggest to an ordinary artisan that notifying a
subscriber of changes to a ServiceGroup using WS-BaseNotification,
organized and categorized by Topics, would have involved notifying a
subscriber of any changes to the properties of a ServiceGroup and its entries.
Accordingly, Maguire and Vambenepe suggest to an ordinarily skilled
artisan notifying the second WS ServiceGroup of a change to a property
value associated with a topic as recited in claim 1.
Moreover, Maguire teaches that services implementing the
ServiceGroupEntry interface, which implements message exchanges and
resource properties from the NotificationProducer interface,
WS-BaseNotification, supports resource property value change notification
as defined in WS-ResourceProperties. Maguire 15:385–89, 16:43842.
Although our decision to affirm the Examiner’s rejection is not based on this
additional finding, this portion of Maguire further illustrates the relationship
between changes in properties of ServiceGroup and its entries and the
WS-BaseNotification, which defines how subscribers are informed of
changes in a ServiceGroup.
Thus, for the foregoing reasons and based on the record, Appellants
have not persuaded us of error in the rejection of: (1) independent claim 1;
(2) independent claims 13 and 23, for which Appellants rely on the same
arguments as claim 1; and (2) claims 6–12, 18–22, and 29–35, which are not
separately argued. App. Br. 10–11.
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THE REMAINING REJECTIONS
As for each of the remaining rejections, Appellants refer to the
previous arguments of claims 1, 13, or 23. App. Br. 11–14. The issues
before us, then, are the same as those in connection with claim 1, and we
refer Appellants to our previous discussion. Accordingly, we sustain the
rejections of the remaining claims. Appellants have not persuaded us of
error in the rejections of claims 2–5, 14–17, and 24–28.

CONCLUSION
The Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 1–35 under § 103.

DECISION
The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1–35 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)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED

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