Red Hat, Inc.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Feb 1, 2022

2021000272 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 1, 2022)

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. 15/364,835 11/30/2016 Andrew H. Hecox 1145-034/20161245US 7946 137131 7590 02/01/2022 Red Hat, Inc and Withrow & Terranova, PLLC 106 Pinedale Springs Way Cary, NC 27511 EXAMINER WILSON, YOLANDA L ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2113 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 02/01/2022 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): patents@wt-ip.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________ BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD ____________ Ex parte ANDREW H. HECOX and GAVIN ROMIG-KOCH Appeal 2021-000272 Application 15/364,835 Technology Center 2100 ____________ Before RICHARD M. LEBOVITZ, ST. JOHN COURTENAY, III, and NORMAN H. BEAMER, Administrative Patent Judges. LEBOVITZ, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL The Examiner rejected claims 1, 3, 4, 7, 9-12, 14, 16, 17, 19, and 20 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious. Claims 2, 5, 8, 13, 15, and 18 are canceled. The Examiner allowed claim 21. See Final Act. 10. The Examiner indicates that claim 6 is objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form. Id. Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from the Examiner’s decision to reject the claims. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We REVERSE. 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 Red Hat, Inc. Appeal Br. 2. Appeal 2021-000272 Application 15/364,835 2 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Claims 1, 3, 4, 7, 9-12, 14, 16, 17, 19, and 20 stand rejected by the Examiner as follows: 1. Claims 1, 7, 9, 10, 12, 16, and 17 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious in view of Petukhov et al. (US 2013/0007527 A1, published Jan. 3, 2013) (“Petukhov”), Schnegelberger et al. (US 9,313,091 B1, issued Apr. 12, 2016) (“Schnegelberger”), and Little et al. (US 2002/0052718 A1, published May 2, 2002) (“Little”). Final Act. 2. 2. Claims 4, 11, and 20 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious in view of Petukhov, Schnegelberger, and Baker et al. (US 2013/0089847 A1, published Apr. 11, 2013) (“Baker”). Final Act. 5. 3. Claims 3, 14, and 19 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious in view of Petukhov and Ritz et al. (US 7,263,632 B2, published Aug. 28, 2007) (“Ritz”). Final Act. 9.2 Independent claim 1 is representative and reproduced below (the claim is annotated with bracketed numbers for reference to the limitation in the claim): 1. A method of generating a remediation script to resolve a problem condition in a remote computing device, comprising: [1] receiving at a first time, by a computing device from the remote computing device, a first request for system information collection data that identifies system information to be collected by the remote computing device; [2] sending, by the computing device, to the remote computing device, first system information collection data that 2 It is unclear why the Examiner omitted Schnegelberger from this rejection, when claims 3, 14, and 19 depend from rejected claims 1, 11, and 16, respectively, in which Schnegelberger was included in the first and second- stated rejections. For this reason, we conclude that the omission was an inadvertent error. Appeal 2021-000272 Application 15/364,835 3 identifies first system information to be collected by the remote computing device; [3] receiving, from the remote computing device, the first system information; [4] running, by the computing device, a plurality of rules that process the system information, each rule configured to determine whether a problem condition of a plurality of problem conditions exists in the remote computing device, the problem condition identifying a potential problem that may occur at a future point in time that has not yet occurred on the remote computing device; [5] determining, by at least one rule based on the first system information, that the problem condition exists; and [6] generating, from a template, based on a characteristic of the remote computing device, a remediation script that, if executed on the remote computing device, implements a first solution that resolves the problem condition. Appeal Br. 20 (Claims App.). DECISION The method of claim 1 begins with steps [1]-[3] of claim 1 in which a “computing device” collects system information from a “remote computing device” and then determines in steps [4]-[6], using rules that process the system information, a “problem condition” in the remote computing device and generates a remediation script in response that resolves the problem condition. The Examiner found Petukhov discloses steps [4]-[6] of claim 1 in which a “computing device” runs rules to process and determine a “problem condition” in a “remote computing device,” and then generates a remediation script to resolve the problem condition. Final Act. 2-3. The Examiner found that Petukhov does not describe steps [1]-[3] in which the system information is collected from a “remote computing device” and sent to the “computing device,” which processes the system information. Appeal 2021-000272 Application 15/364,835 4 Final Act. 3. To meet this deficiency, the Examiner cited Schnegelberger, finding it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to apply Schnegelberger to Petukhov because “potential problem[s]” in a remote computing device “are able to be detected from” system information. Id. at 3-4. Little was further cited by the Examiner for describing the limitation in step [4] of “identifying a potential problem that may occur at a future point in time that has not yet occurred on the remote computing device.” Final Act. 4. Appellant argues that Schnegelberger does not describe step [1] of claim 1. Appeal Br. 12-13. Initially, the Examiner cited column 2, lines 38- 52, column 3, lines 38-42, and column 6, lines 41-44 for steps [1]-[3] of claim 1, but did not specifically identify which of these disclosures correspond to step [1] of the claim. Final Act. 3. In the Answer, the Examiner further cited column 6, lines 31-57 for step [1] Ans. 14. We thus turn to the disclosure in Schnegelberger, which is the only disclosure in dispute in this appeal. Schnegelberger describes an automated support agent 104 of a serviced system 100 which sends “selected system information” to data analyzer 140 of an automated, end-to-end system 180. Schnegelberger, Fig. 1, 1:36-43. The data analyzer 140 of automated, end-to-end system 180 sends a remediation package to the automated support agent 104 of a serviced system 100. Id. The Examiner did not make an explicit finding about which elements of Schnegelberger’s system correspond to the claimed “computing device” and “remote computing device,” but we understand the automated support agent 104 of the serviced system 100 to correspond to the Appeal 2021-000272 Application 15/364,835 5 claimed “remote computing device” and the data analyzer 140 of the automated, end-to-end system 180 to correspond to the claimed “computing device.” Appellant has this same understanding (Appeal Br. 13) and the Examiner did not dispute it. Figure 1 of Schnegelberger, copied below, illustrates Schnegelberger’s system: Figure 1 shows the automated support agent 104 of the serviced system 100 (the claimed “remote computing device”) which is shown as sending selected system information to the data analyzer 140 of the automated, end-to-end support system 180 (the claimed “computing device”). Appeal 2021-000272 Application 15/364,835 6 To meet claim limitation [1] of claim 1, the data analyzer 140/ “computing device” must receive a first request from the automated support agent 104/ “remote computing device” for “system information collection data” that “identifies system information to be collected by” the automated support agent 104. The request would be asking the data analyzer 140/ “computing device” what system information should be collected by the automated support agent 104/”remote computing device.” To meet step [2] of the claim, the data analyzer 140/“computing device” must send the system information to the automated support agent 104/“remote computing device”, telling the automated support agent 104 what system information to collect. To meet step [3] of the claim, the data analyzer 140/”computing device” must receive the “system information” identified in the “system information collection data” from the automated support agent 104/“remote computing device.”3 Schnegelberger at column 2, lines 46-48, cited by the Examiner, describes sending system information “from automated support agent 104 on serviced system 100 to data analyzer 140 on support system 180 via network 120.” The sending of the system information by the automated support agent 104 can be automatic (“automated support agent 104 may be installed on serviced system 100 and configured to monitor and automatically transfer specified system information”). Schnegelberger 6:26-28. These disclosures correspond to step [3] of claim 1 of “receiving, from the remote computing 3 Step [3] of claim 1 does not expressly identify what element receives the system information. The Examiner may want to consider whether this deficiency makes the claim indefinite under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b). Appeal 2021-000272 Application 15/364,835 7 device, the first system information” because the data analyzer 140 (the claimed “computing device”) is receiving the system information from automated support agent (the claimed “remote computing device”). The Examiner further cited column 3, lines 38-42 of Schnegelberger, which is the beginning of the description of “guided collection.” Guided collection is described at column 6, which also was cited by the Examiner. Schnegelberger discloses that, when the system information does not indicate the root cause of the negative symptom (i.e., the “problem condition” of claim 1), the “knowledge repository then indicates what additional symptoms should be specified and the data analyzer instructs the automated support agent to return the corresponding selected system information.” Schnegelberger 6:34-38. Schnegelberger explains that the “system information which is specified or selected (e.g., at the automated support agent) is thus guided by the feedback from the knowledge repository, hence the term ‘guided collection.’” Id. 6:41-44. In other words, when the initial system information is insufficient to determine the problem, the data analyzer 140 makes a request for additional information. This disclosure by Schnegelberger describes step [2] of claim 1 in which system information collection data is sent to the automated support agent 104/claimed “remote computing device” by the data analyzer 140/claimed “computing device” which “identifies system information to be collected by” the automated support agent 104/“remote computing device.” The aforementioned disclosure by Schnegelberger also describes step [3] of claim 1 in which the request system information is sent by the automated support agent 104/claimed “remote computing device” and Appeal 2021-000272 Application 15/364,835 8 received by data analyzer 140/claimed “computing device.” See Schnegelberger 6:34-38. What is missing from Schnegelberger is step [1] of claim 1 in which the data analyzer 140/“computing device” receives a request from the automated support agent 104/“remote computing device” to identify the system information that the automated support agent 104/“remote computing device” should collect. In Schnegelberger, the automated support agent 104/“remote computing device” only sends the system information, either automatically or upon request by the data analyzer 140/“computing device.” Schnegelberger 6:26-28, 34-44. The additional disclosure in Schnegelberger at column 6, lines 45-57, cited by the Examiner, is description of analysis of the symptoms sent to the data analyzer to identify the root cause of the problem and does not describe or suggest step [1] of the claim. In sum, as argued by Appellant, the Examiner did not meet the burden of establishing that Schnegelberger, alone, or in combination with Petukhov and Little, describes or suggests step [1] of claim 1. Because Appellant identified an error4 in the rejection, the rejection of claim 1 is reversed. Independent claim 11 is directed to a computer device comprising a processor device which carries out substantially the same steps [1]-[3] recited in claim 1. As discussed above, the Examiner erred in finding that [1] of claim 1 is described or suggested by Schnegelberger, alone, or in combination with Petukhov and Little. Claim 11 substantially recites the 4 We review the appealed rejections for error based upon the issues identified by Appellant and in light of Appellant’s arguments and evidence. Ex parte Frye, 94 USPQ2d 1072, 1075 (BPAI 2010) (precedential). Appeal 2021-000272 Application 15/364,835 9 same limitation5 recited in [1] of claim 1and is reversed for the same reasons. Independent claim 16 is directed to a computer program product “including instructions to cause a processor device to” to carry out substantially the same steps [1]-[3] recited in claim 1. As discussed above, the Examiner erred in finding that [1] of claim 1 is described or suggested by Schnegelberger, alone, or in combination with Petukhov and Little. Claim 16 substantially recites [1]6 and is reversed for the same reasons. Dependent claims 3, 4, 7, 9, 10, 12, 14, 16, 17, 19, and 20 incorporate all the limitations of the independent claims and are reversed for the same reasons. CONCLUSION The Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1, 3, 4, 7, 9, 10-12, 14, 16, 17, 19, and 20 is reversed. 5 “[A] processor device coupled to the memory to: receive at a first time, from a remote computing device, a first request for system information collection data that identifies system information to be collected by the remote computing device.” 6 “[I]nstructions to cause a processor device to: receive at a first time, from a remote computing device, a first request for system information collection data that identifies system information to be collected by the remote computing device.” Appeal 2021-000272 Application 15/364,835 10 DECISION SUMMARY In summary: Claim(s) Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed 1, 7, 9, 10, 12, 16, 17 103 Petukhov, Schnegelberger, Little 1, 7, 9, 10, 12, 16, 17 4, 11, 20 103 Petukhov, Schnegelberger, Baker 4, 11, 20 3, 14, 19 103 Petukhov, Ritz 3, 14, 19 Overall Outcome 1, 3, 4, 7, 9-12, 14, 16, 17, 19, 20 REVERSED