Ex Parte Fanning et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Dec 6, 2018

13167229 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 6, 2018)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
13/167,229 06/23/2011
69316 7590 12/10/2018
MICROSOFT CORPORATION
ONE MICROSOFT WAY
REDMOND, WA 98052
UNITED ST A TES OF AMERICA
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Michael C. Fanning
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.
331809.01 7583
EXAMINER
JOSEPH, SHAWN S
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2176
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/10/2018 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):
usdocket@microsoft.com
chriochs@microsoft.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte MICHAEL C. FANNING, MATTHEW HALL,
GARY LINSCOTT, FELIX GTI ANDREW, KENNETH A. SHOWMAN,
and EVGENY TVORUN 1
Appeal2018-003461
Application 13/167,229
Technology Center 2100
Before ROBERT E. NAPPI, LARRY J. HUME, and
JASON M. REPKO, Administrative Patent Judges.
NAPPI, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
This is a decision on appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the
Examiner's Final Rejection of claims 1 through 8, and 10 through 21, which
constitute all the claims pending in this application. We have jurisdiction
under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.
1 According to Appellants, the real party in interest is Microsoft Technology
Licensing, LLC. App. Br. 3.
Appeal2018-003461
Application 13/167,229
INVENTION
The invention is directed to a web development tool which enables
developers to diagnose problems. The tool allows developers to modify the
Document Object Model (DOM) and see the changes in a running page in a
browser. A representation of the DOM and the text source document are
linked such that by selecting an element in the DOM, the corresponding
element in the text source document representation is also selected. Spec.,
paras. 2, 4, and 19.
Claim 1 is illustrative of the invention and is reproduced below.
1. A method comprising:
selecting, within a web development tool, a browser
from a plurality of browsers on which to base the
construction of a Document Object Model (DOM);
opening a text source document comprising original
source code prior to being parsed in a source code editor;
parsing the text source document to construct a
document node tree such that the document node tree
includes a text offset for each node of the document node
tree, each text offset for each node indicating a location
of associated original source code within the text source
document corresponding to the node of the document
node tree;
constructing, from the document node tree, a DOM
based on the selected browser and a view node tree that
represents the DOM, the constructing of the view node
tree including mapping the view node tree to the
document node tree; and
providing a running representation of the DOM such
that each DOM element is linked to the associated
original source code corresponding to the DOM element,
the link provided via the view node tree and the text
offsets in the document node tree,
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Application 13/167,229
wherein the text offset for each node of the document
node tree includes a line number and position within the
line or a character number that indicates the position of a
character relative to the beginning of the text source
document, and
wherein by selecting a DOM element within the
running representation of the DOM, the original source
code of the text source document associated with the
selected DOM element is selected within the source code
editor.
REJECTION AT ISSUE2
The Examiner has rejected claims 1 through 8 and 10 through 21
under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over Scott Hanselman,
MultiBrowser or CrossBrowser Testing and deconstructing Microsoft
Expression Web SuperPreview (Sept. 23, 2009), http://www.hanselman.com/
blog/MultiBrowserOrCrossBrowserTestingAndDeconstructingMicrosoftExp
ressionWebSuperPreview.aspx_(last visited Sept. 14, 2013), Kaandorp (US
2007/0266050 Al, published Nov. 15, 2007), Chandan Luthra & Deepak
Mittal, Firebug 1.5: Editing, Debugging, and Monitoring Web Pages (Packt
Publishing 2010) (hereinafter "Firebug"), Barlow et al. (US 2008/0270345
Al, published Oct. 30, 2008) (hereinafter "Barlow") and Dulepet (US
7,316,003 B 1, issued Jan. 1, 2008) (hereinafter "Dulepet"). Final Act. 2-30.
The Examiner has rejected claim 1 through 8 and 10 through 21 under
35 U.S.C. § 103 (a) as being unpatentable over Hanselman, Dulepet,
Firebug, and Barlow. Final Act. 30-35.
2 Throughout this Decision, we refer to the Appeal Brief ("App. Br.") filed
August 7, 2017, the Reply Brief ("Reply Br.") filed February 13, 2018, the
Final Office Action ("Final Act.") mailed February 23, 2017, and the
Examiner's Answer ("Ans.") mailed December 14, 2017.
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Appeal2018-003461
Application 13/167,229
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed Appellants' arguments in the Briefs, the
Examiner's rejection, and the Examiner's response to Appellants'
arguments. Appellants' arguments have persuaded us of error in the
Examiner's obviousness rejections.
Appellants argue the Examiner's rejection of independent claims 1,
13, and 17 is in error for several reasons. App. Br. 8-10. The dispositive
issue presented by these arguments is, did the Examiner err in finding that
the combination of the references teaches, by selecting a DOM within a
running representation of the DOM, the source code of the text document
associated with the selected DOM element is selected within the source code
editor?
Each of independent claims 1, 13, and 1 7 recites that by selecting ( or
highlighting) a DOM element in the running representation of the DOM, the
original source code of the text source document associated with the DOM
element is selected ( or highlighted) in the source code editor. The
Examiner, in both obviousness rejections of the independent claims, finds
that Dulepet teaches opening a text source document of original source code
in an editor. Ans. 6. Further, the Examiner finds that Firebug teaches when
selecting a DOM element, a running representation the source code of the
text associated with the DOM element is selected in the source code editor.
Final Act. 5 (citing pages 43, 44).
We disagree with the Examiner and do not find that the cited
teachings of Firebug when combined with Dulepet teaches, by selecting an
element in the DOM, the associated element in the text source document is
also selected. The cited teachings discuss highlighting changes and
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Application 13/167,229
identifying that when the cursor is over a table, the background color of the
rows interchange. These passages present insufficient evidence to support a
finding that Firebug teaches that selecting an item in DOM will also select
the associated item in another representation, such as the source code editor.
See Firebug pages 43 and 44. The evidence does not show the table
discussed in these passages is a DOM. Further, there are no teachings that
selecting a specific element in the HTML tab (which is similar to a
representation of the DOM) results in the associated element in the text
source document also being selected. As discussed above, both of the
Examiner's obviousness rejections rely upon similar findings. Accordingly,
we do not find that the Examiner has identified sufficient evidence in either
of the obviousness rejections and we do not sustain the Examiner's
rejections of claims 1 through 21.
DECISION
We reverse the decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1 through 8,
and 10 through 21 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).
The Examiner is encouraged to re-consider the provisional
obviousness-type double patenting rejection over various claims of co-
pending application 13/167,325 which was made earlier in prosecution of
this application.
REVERSED
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