Ex Parte Craggs

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Mar 10, 2014

11550106 (P.T.A.B. Mar. 10, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte IAN GERALD CRAGGS1
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Appeal 2011-009321
Application 11/550,106
Technology Center 2100
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Before DONALD E. ADAMS, ERIC GRIMES, and MELANIE L.
McCOLLUM, Administrative Patent Judges.

GRIMES, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
This is an appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134 involving claims to a method
of managing subscriptions in a publish/subscribe system, which have been
rejected as anticipated. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.

1 Appellant identifies the Real Party in Interest as IBM Corporation (App.
Br. 1).
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Application 11/550,106

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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Claims 16, 18-24, 26-32, and 34-39 are on appeal. Claim 16 is
illustrative and reads as follows (emphasis added):
16. A method for managing subscriptions to topics and topic sets in a
publish/subscribe system, comprising:
in response to a subscribe request for a subscriber,
identifying a first topic or topic set, and
storing, as a positive subscription, an identifier of the first topic
or topic set;
in response to an unsubscribe request for the subscriber, the
unsubscribe request identifying a second topic or topic set that partially
overlaps the identified first topic or topic set,
storing, as a negative subscription, an identifier of the second
topic or topic set;
and
identifying which received publications to forward to the subscriber
by comparing topics of the received publications with stored identifiers of
topics and topic sets of both the positive subscription and the negative
subscription.

DISCUSSION
The Examiner has rejected all of the claims on appeal under 35 U.S.C.
§ 102(e) as anticipated by Nicholas2 (Ans. 3). The Examiner finds that
Nicholas discloses all of the limitations of claim 16, including “an unsubscribe
request . . . identifying a second topic or topic set that partially overlaps the
identified fist [sic] topic or topic set, storing, as a negative subscription, an
identifier of the second topic or topic set’ at [0194]” (id. at 4).
Appellant argues that “there is no partial overlap described in
paragraph [0194] of Nicholas” (App. Br. 10). Appellant argues that

2 Nicholas et al., US 2008/0126476 A1, May 29, 2008.
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Application 11/550,106

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unsubscribing to one feed in an aggregate feed is not an unsubscribe request
for a topic with a “partial overlap (see Fig. 3(i) of Appellant’s disclosure).
Instead, the aggregate feed completely overlaps the one of the underlying
feeds (see Fig. 3(ii) of Appellant’s disclosure).” (Id.)
We agree with Appellant that the Examiner’s interpretation of “partial
overlap” is not consistent with the use of that term in the Specification.
Figures 3(i) and 3(ii) of the Specification are reproduced below:
Figures 3(i) and 3(ii) show examples of the “function
topicOverlaps(x,y) [that] determines whether the intersection of x and y is
not null” (Spec. 9, ¶ 40)). Figure 3(i) shows that topic set “a/+” overlaps the
set of “+/a”, “the overlap topic being ‘a/a’” (id.). Figure 3(ii) shows that
“the discrete topic ‘a/b’ is wholly included in the set ‘a/+’” (id.).
The Specification states that “[i]t may be noted that partial overlap as
opposed to inclusion can only occur when both x and y are topic sets, and
neither is a discrete topic” (id. at 10, ¶ 40, emphasis added). Thus,
consistent with Appellant’s argument, the Specification draws a distinction
between a discrete topic that is wholly included within a topic set, and two
topic sets that include some, but not all, common topics.
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Application 11/550,106

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Nicholas discloses aggregate feeds that can be formed by combining
“[a]ny number of feeds or selected feed items from feeds” (Nicholas 15,
¶ 188). Nicholas states that “if the user wishes to maintain a subscription to
the aggregate feed, but unsubscribe from one singular original source, an
easy method of unsubscribing from the singular original source has been
provided” (id.). Nicholas also states that “a user may specify portions of the
aggregate feed, as in one or more of the feeds that make up the aggregate
feed, that they do not wish to receive. . . . Specifying not to receive one of
the feeds within the aggregate feed may be accomplished by recording a
negative subscription to one of the underlying feeds.” (Id. at 17, ¶ 194).
As Appellant pointed out, what is described by Nicholas is
unsubscribing from one or more discrete feeds that are wholly included in an
aggregate feed, rather than unsubscribing from a topic or topic set that
partially overlaps the aggregate feed, as required by claim 16.
The Examiner argues that “[c]learly, ‘one of the feeds within the
aggregate feed’ overlaps the ‘aggregated feed’ as required by the claim. For
example, the aggregate feed comprises A, B,C,D, E and the user
unsubscribe[s] to feed C. A,B,C,E,D and C are partially overlapped because
they have only C in common.” (Ans. 7.) This reasoning, however, is not
consistent with the Specification, which, as discussed above, draws a
distinction between a discrete topic that is wholly included within a topic set
and two topic sets that partially overlap. The Examiner’s hypothetical
involves the former, while claim 16 requires the latter.
Claims 24 and 32, the only other independent claims, also require an
“unsubscribe request identifying a second topic or topic set that partially
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overlaps” a first topic or topic set (App. Br., Claims App’x). We therefore
reverse the rejection of claims 16, 18-24, 26-32, and 34-39 as anticipated by
Nicholas.

REVERSED

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