ENTIT Software LLC

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

May 19, 2021

2020000560 (P.T.A.B. May. 19, 2021)

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.
15/574,370 11/15/2017 Inbar Shani 92001718 2420
146568 7590 05/19/2021
MICRO FOCUS LLC
500 Westover Drive
#12603
Sanford, NC 27330
EXAMINER
VU, TUAN A
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2193
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
05/19/2021 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):
software.ip.mail@microfocus.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte INBAR SHANI, AMICHAI NITSAN, and YARON BURG
____________

Appeal 2020-000560
Application 15/574,370
Technology Center 2100
____________

Before KARA L. SZPONDOWSKI, SCOTT B. HOWARD, and
STEVEN M. AMUNDSON, Administrative Patent Judges.

AMUNDSON, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant1 seeks our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a final
rejection of claims 1–20, i.e., all pending claims. We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm in part.

1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in
37 C.F.R. § 1.42 (2019). Appellant identifies the real party in interest
as Entit Software LLC. Appeal Br. 1.
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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
The Invention
According to the Specification, the invention concerns software
application testing “to provide information about an application under test
(‘AUT’).” Spec. ¶ 1.2 The Specification explains that “application testing
may be performed to determine whether the AUT includes any errors or
other defects.” Id. The Specification also explains that application testing
procedures “may involve two main types of test steps”: (1) “actions steps
which manipulate, drive, or query an application under test (‘AUT’)”; and
(2) “verification steps which verify the expected outcomes associated with
the action steps.” Id.
According to the Specification, the “basic application testing
procedure may create a dependency between the actions and verifications.”
Spec. ¶ 14. That dependency “may have several shortcomings” including:
(1) “the need to re-run a test execution of an AUT when
the verification changes (even if the actions have not
changed)”;
(2) “a tendency to only verify what is being acted upon (e.g.,
if the action is to click a button, a user will verify that the
button has been clicked)”;
(3) “difficulty correlating action step outcomes with events
at other levels of the AUT (e.g., server logs, database
logs, application logs, etc.)”; and

2 This decision uses the following abbreviations: “Spec.” for the
Specification, filed May 28, 2015; “Final Act.” for the Final Office Action,
mailed February 12, 2019; “Advisory Act.” for the Advisory Action, mailed
April 23, 2019; “Appeal Br.” for the Appeal Brief, filed July 3, 2019; “Ans.”
for the Examiner’s Answer, mailed August 29, 2019; and “Reply Br.” for the
Reply Brief, filed October 29, 2019.
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(4) “various maintenance challenges based on changed
actions and/or changed verifications.”
Id. Hence, the invention endeavors to “avoid the need to revise and
re-execute a test by separating test actions from test verifications.” Id. ¶ 15.
Exemplary Claims
Independent claims 1 and 11 exemplify the claims at issue and read
as follows:
1. A system comprising:
a processor; and
a non-transitory storage medium storing instructions
executable on the processor to:
capture data points during test executions of an
application under test, the data points including test
action data and application action data;
generate a representation of test actions and
associated application actions based on correlating each
of the data points with a particular test execution of the
test executions, each of the data points being correlated
based on a sequence of events that occurred during the
particular test execution;
determine, by querying the representation with a
query that represents an execution sequence comprising
a test action and an associated application action, a
potential test action to perform during a further test
execution of the application under test; and
execute the potential test action during the further
test execution of the application under test.
11. A method performed by a system comprising a hardware
processor, comprising:
generating a representation of test actions and associated
application actions based on correlating data points captured
during test executions of a program under test;
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identifying, responsive to querying the representation
with a query that represents a verification execution sequence
comprising a test action and an associated application action
performed in response to the test action, an absence, in the
representation, of the test action and the associated application
action of the verification execution sequence;
identifying, based on identifying the absence, a potential
test action to perform during a further test execution of the
program under test;
generating, based on the identified potential test action,
a potential test action verification to be executed during the
further test execution of the program under test; and
executing the potential test action verification during
the further test execution of the program under test.
Appeal Br. 18, 20 (Claims App. i, iii).
The Prior Art Supporting the Rejections on Appeal
As evidence of unpatentability under 35 U.S.C. § 103, the Examiner
relies on the following prior art:
Name Reference Date
Buskens et al. (“Buskens”) US 2006/0294507 A1 Dec. 28, 2006
Cheung US 2009/0133006 A1 May 21, 2009
Lawrance et al.
(“Lawrance”) US 2013/0055029 A1 Feb. 28, 2013
Schissel et al. (“Schissel”) US 2014/0109063 A1 Apr. 17, 2014
Altman et al. (“Altman”) US 9,183,387 B1 Nov. 10, 2015 (filed June 5, 2013)
Wingfors et al.
(“Wingfors”) US 2015/0347282 A1
Dec. 3, 2015
(filed Dec. 19, 2014)
Martinez et al.
(“Martinez”) US 2016/0117118 A1
Apr. 28, 2016
(filed June 20, 2014)
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Name Reference Date
Elgarat US 9,727,447 B1 Aug. 8, 2017 (filed Jan. 16, 2015)
The Rejections on Appeal
Claims 1, 17, and 18 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as
unpatentable over Elgarat, Lawrance, Schissel, and Wingfors. Final Act.
2–6; Appeal Br. 6.
Claim 2 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over
Elgarat, Lawrance, Schissel, Wingfors, Cheung, Altman, Martinez, and
Buskens. Final Act. 15–17; Appeal Br. 6.
Claims 3–16, 19, and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as
unpatentable over Elgarat, Lawrance, Schissel, Wingfors, Cheung, Altman,
and Martinez. Final Act. 6–14; Appeal Br. 6.
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the rejections in light of Appellant’s arguments
that the Examiner erred. For the reasons explained below, we agree with the
Examiner about the unpatentability of claims 1, 2, and 16–18 but disagree
with the Examiner about the unpatentability of claims 3–15, 19, and 20. We
adopt the Examiner’s findings and reasoning in the Final Office Action,
Advisory Action, and Answer for claims 1, 2, and 16–18. See Final Act.
2–6, 14–17; Advisory Act. 2; Ans. 3–8, 11–12. We provide the following
to address and emphasize specific findings and arguments.
The § 103 Rejection of Claims 1, 17, and 18
INDEPENDENT CLAIM 1
As noted above, the obviousness rejection of claim 1 rests on Elgarat,
Lawrance, Schissel, and Wingfors. See Final Act. 2–5. Appellant argues
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that the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1 because the references fail to
teach or suggest the following limitation in claim 1: “determine, by querying
the representation with a query that represents an execution sequence
comprising a test action and an associated application action, a potential test
action to perform during a further test execution of the application under
test.” See Appeal Br. 6–10; Reply Br. 1–11. The Examiner cites Elgarat as
teaching or suggesting the disputed limitation in claim 1. See Final Act. 3;
Ans. 4–5.
Specifically, Appellant disputes that Elgarat discloses “querying the
representation with a query that represents an execution sequence
comprising a test action and an associated application action” as claimed.
Appeal Br. 8; see also Reply Br. 4–7. Appellant concedes that Elgarat
discloses constructing a tree or directed acyclic graph (DAG) for exploratory
descriptive programming. Appeal Br. 8 (citing Elgarat 5:7–10); Reply Br. 5.
But Appellant contends that “Elgarat provides no teaching or hint that the
tree or DAG” is “used for querying.” Appeal Br. 8. Further, Appellant
asserts that Elgarat’s descriptive programming “is used for the purpose of
constructing a DAG” and “is not the query that represents an execution
sequence, where the query that represents the execution sequence comprises
a test action and an associated application action.” Reply Br. 5–6 (emphasis
by Appellant).
Appellant’s arguments do not persuade us of Examiner error because
the Examiner properly reasons that nothing in claim 1 distinguishes a query
from “the exploratory analysis of a tree-like sequence as in Elgarat’s
exploratory testing.” Ans. 4–5. Further, the Examiner correctly finds that
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Elgarat discloses “a directed acyclic graph (DAG)” with nodes representing
test actions and application actions. Final Act. 3, 6.
Elgarat’s Figure 2 (reproduced below) “illustrates a system flow
for automated exploratory testing.” Elgarat 1:57–58, 3:51–53.

Figure 2 shows exploratory-testing system 200 with test-planning
system 204. Id. at 3:51–53, 3:59–60, Fig. 2. Test-planning system 204
includes “a testing software platform that may be accessed over one or more
networks or that may be stored locally” by test-planning system 204. Id.
at 3:59–62. “The system 204 may manage both the actions performed and
the actions not performed and generates a directed acyclic graph (DAG)
view 202 of the possible options.” Id. at 4:10–13.
Among other things, a DAG depicts “actions to be performed as part
of the test” including “multiple additional actions for each decision point in
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the flow that could be performed as at least part of the exploratory test as
branches” in the DAG. Elgarat 2:10–18, 2:58–63, Fig. 2; see also id. at
1:39–42, 2:1–9, code (57). Moreover, a DAG may depict “successes,
failures, and various other statuses” by “using text, icons, colors, shading,
and/or in various other manners.” Id. at 3:17–29; see also id. at 1:48–51,
5:50–61, code (57).
Elgarat’s disclosure of a DAG depicting test actions and test statuses
teaches or suggests “an execution sequence comprising a test action and an
associated application action” according to the disputed limitation in
claim 1. See Final Act. 3, 6; Ans. 4–5.
In addition, Elgarat discloses querying a DAG based on user input
similar to the Specification’s disclosure of querying a DAG based on user
input. See Elgarat 5:1–24; Spec. ¶¶ 30, 40–41, 44–47, Figs. 5–6; see also
Final Act. 3, 6; Advisory Act. 2; Ans. 4–5. Specifically, Elgarat explains
that if a DAG as initially constructed contains “every combination of options
along the flow as a possible path,” the DAG may include some invalid paths.
Elgarat 5:5–17. To remove invalid paths, a user may “define a business rule
stating two options from two different activities must never meet.” Id. at
5:19–22. “Once defined, the system 204 searches for all paths which
include that combination and removes it from the tree.” Id. at 5:22–24.
Elgarat’s disclosure of a user-defined search through a DAG teaches
or suggests “querying the representation” according to the disputed
limitation in claim 1. See Final Act. 3, 6; Advisory Act. 2; Ans. 4–5. As the
Examiner properly reasons, “[s]crutinizing relationships of a node graphs (or
test results thereon) as cited entails equivalent of querying representation of
the associated application.” Advisory Act. 2.
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For the reasons discussed above, Appellant’s arguments have not
persuaded us that the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1 for obviousness
based on Elgarat, Lawrance, Schissel, and Wingfors. Hence, we sustain the
§ 103 rejection of claim 1.
DEPENDENT CLAIMS 17 AND 18
Claims 17 and 18 depend directly from claim 1. Appellant does not
argue patentability separately for claims 17 and 18. See Appeal Br. 6–10:
Reply Br. 1–11. Hence, we sustain the § 103 rejection of claims 17 and 18
for the same reasons as claim 1. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv).
The § 103 Rejection of Claim 2
Claim 2 depends directly from claim 1. Appellant does not argue
patentability separately for claim 2. See Appeal Br. 6–16; Reply Br. 1–16.
Hence, we sustain the § 103 rejection of claim 2 for the same reasons as
claim 1. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv).
The § 103 Rejection of Claims 3–16, 19, and 20
INDEPENDENT CLAIMS 11 AND 14
As noted above, the § 103 rejection of claims 11 and 14 rests on
Elgarat, Lawrance, Schissel, Wingfors, Cheung, Altman, and Martinez. See
Final Act. 11–14. Appellant argues that the Examiner erred in rejecting
claims 11 and 14 because the references fail to teach or suggest the
following limitation in claim 11 and a similar limitation in claim 14:
identifying, responsive to querying the representation with
a query that represents a verification execution sequence
comprising a test action and an associated application action
performed in response to the test action, an absence, in the
representation, of the test action and the associated application
action of the verification execution sequence.
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See Appeal Br. 12–14; Reply Br. 12–16. The Examiner cites the combined
disclosures in Elgarat, Martinez, Altman, and Cheung as teaching or
suggesting the disputed limitations in claims 11 and 14. See Final Act. 7–8,
11–14; Ans. 8–11.
In particular, Appellant contends that Elgarat’s disclosure about
depicting “status indications of activities in the graph” does not “provide any
teaching or hint of identifying ‘an absence, in the representation, of the test
action and the associated application action of the verification execution
sequence.’” Appeal Br. 12–13; Reply Br. 13. Appellant distinguishes
claims 11 and 14 from Elgarat’s graph by asserting that the claims require
that a query identify “an absence in the representation of the test action and
the associated application action.” Appeal Br. 13; Reply Br. 13–14. In
addition, Appellant contends that (1) the “‘annotations added to [a] graph’
in Martinez,” (2) the “DAG in Altman,” and (3) the “topology of edges,
vertices, circles, and lines of Cheung” do not overcome the deficiency in
Elgarat. Appeal Br. 13 (alteration by Appellant).
In response, the Examiner explains that “the limitation such as
querying ‘. . . in response to . . . absence of test action and associated
application action’” is “reasonably met” by Elgarat’s disclosure about
(1) “querying a graph for test modifying or providing UI [user interface]
type action as in Elgarat’s exploratory approach geared towards generating
an adjusted/next test execution” and (2) “exploring options and actions
necessitated in response to lack of associated application type of adjustment
or test graph altering actions.” Ans. 9 (emphases by the Examiner).
Further, the Examiner makes the following findings: First, Martinez
discloses “annotations added to graph” including “information indicative of
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a token propagation time, identifying the timestamp from which the edge
is arriving from.” Final Act. 7 (citing Martinez ¶ 64). Second, Altman
discloses a “DAG attached with metadata such as timestamps on the edge
pointed to a node, the timestamp for indicating a directional movement.” Id.
(citing Altman 11:7–20, Fig. 6). Third, Cheung discloses a “graph having
edge and node interconnectivity” including “a topology of edges, vertices,
circles, [and] lines” that may represent “a backbone for the visualizing
interaction between elements of the source code.” Id. (citing Cheung
¶¶ 50–51, Figs. 4, 8).
Based on the record before us, we agree with Appellant that the
Examiner has not adequately explained how the cited portions of Elgarat,
Martinez, Altman, and Cheung teach or suggest the disputed limitations in
claims 11 and 14. See Appeal Br. 12–14; Reply Br. 12–16. As discussed
above, Elgarat discloses querying a DAG based on user input. See Elgarat
5:1–24. Specifically, Elgarat’s system searches the DAG for invalid paths
and removes them from the DAG. Id. at 5:19–24. So Elgarat’s system
identifies the presence—not the absence—of a test action and an associated
application action. Additionally, the Examiner has not adequately explained
how the cited portions of Martinez, Altman, and Cheung overcome the
deficiency in Elgarat about identifying the absence of a test action and an
associated application action. See Final Act. 7–8, 11–14; Ans. 8–11. Hence,
we do not sustain the § 103 rejection of claims 11 and 14.
DEPENDENT CLAIMS 3–10
Claim 3 depends directly from claim 1 and further requires
instructions executable to “determine the potential test action by querying
the directed acyclic graph based on the query, and receiving, in response to
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the query, data indicating that the test action and the associated application
action represented by the query is not included in the directed acyclic
graph.” Appeal Br. 19 (Claims App. ii). The Examiner cites the combined
disclosures in Elgarat, Martinez, Altman, and Cheung as teaching or
suggesting claim 3’s “determine” limitation. See Final Act. 6–8; Ans. 9–11.
Appellant argues that claim 3 “is further allowable for the additional
reasons stated above with respect to claim 11.” Appeal Br. 16; see Reply
Br. 14.
We agree with Appellant that the cited portions of Elgarat, Martinez,
Altman, and Cheung do not teach or suggest claim 3’s “determine”
limitation. Similar to the disputed limitations in claims 11 and 14, claim 3’s
“determine” limitation requires that a query determine that information “is
not included in” (is absent from) a directed acyclic graph. Hence, we do not
sustain the § 103 rejection of claim 3.
Claims 4–10 depend directly or indirectly from claim 3. For the
reasons discussed for claim 3, we do not sustain the § 103 rejection of
claims 4–10.
DEPENDENT CLAIMS 12, 13, 15, 19, AND 20
Claims 12, 13, and 19 depend directly from claim 11; and claims 15
and 20 depend directly from claim 14. For the reasons discussed for
claims 11 and 14, we do not sustain the § 103 rejection of claims 12, 13, 15,
19, and 20.
DEPENDENT CLAIM 16
Claim 16 depends directly from claim 1 and specifies that “the
execution sequence represented by the query comprises an order of a
plurality of test actions and associated application actions.” Appeal Br. 21
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(Claims App. iv). The Examiner cites Elgarat as teaching or suggesting
claim 16’s limitation. See Final Act. 14; Ans. 11–12.
Appellant argues that the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 16
because the claim requires “a query that represents an execution sequence,
where this execution sequence comprises an order of a plurality of test
actions and associated application actions” and the claimed query “does not
exist in Elgarat.” Appeal Br. 14–15 (emphasis by Appellant).
We agree with the Examiner that Elgarat teaches or suggests
claim 16’s limitation. See Final Act. 14; Ans. 11–12. As discussed above,
Elgarat discloses querying a DAG based on user input. See Elgarat 5:1–24.
As also discussed above, a DAG depicts “actions to be performed as part of
the test” including “multiple additional actions for each decision point in the
flow that could be performed as at least part of the exploratory test as
branches” in the DAG. Id. at 2:10–18, 2:58–63, Fig. 2; see also id. at
1:39–42, 2:1–9, code (57). A particular flow along particular branches in the
DAG “comprises an order of a plurality of test actions and associated
application actions” according to claim 16. See Final Act. 14; Ans. 11–12.
As the Examiner properly reasons, “the concept of ‘order of’ being in part
matched with teaching such as flow or branch to be selected.” Ans. 11–12.
For these reasons, we sustain the § 103 rejection of claim 16.
CONCLUSION
We affirm the Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1, 2, and 16–18.
We reverse the Examiner’s decision to reject claims 3–15, 19, and 20.
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In summary:
Claims
Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1, 17, 18 103 Elgarat, Lawrance, Schissel, Wingfors 1, 17, 18
2 103
Elgarat, Lawrance,
Schissel, Wingfors,
Cheung, Altman,
Martinez, Buskens
2
3–16, 19,
20 103
Elgarat, Lawrance,
Schissel, Wingfors,
Cheung, Altman,
Martinez
16 3–15, 19, 20
Overall
Outcome
1, 2, 16–
18
3–15,
19,20
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)(iv).
See 37 C.F.R. § 41.50(f).
AFFIRMED IN PART