Ex Parte Gupta et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Dec 15, 2015

13285785 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 15, 2015)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
13/285,785 10/31/2011 Chetan Kumar Gupta
56436 7590 12/17/2015
Hewlett Packard Enterprise
3404 E. Harmony Road
Mail Stop 79
Fort Collins, CO 80528
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.
82775188 7643
EXAMINER
VO,TRUONGV
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2156
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/17/2015 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):
hpe.ip.mail@hpe.com
mkraft@hpe.com
chris.mania@hpe.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte CHET AN KUMAR GUPTA, SONG WANG, ABRA Y MEHTA,
MO LIU, and ELKE A. RUNDENSTEINER
Appeal2014-002227
Application 13/285,785 1
Technology Center 2100
Before ROBERT E. NAPPI, LARRY J. HUME, and
JOHN D. HAMANN, Administrative Patent Judges.
HAMANN, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's final
rejection of claims 1-20. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b ).
We reverse.
1 According to Appellants, the real party in interest is Hewlett-Packard
Development Company, LP. App. Br. 2.
Appeal2014-002227
Application 13/285,785
THE CLAIMED fNVENTION
Appellants' claimed invention relates to determining an execution
ordering of a hierarchy of pattern queries by, inter alia, determining a
minimum spanning tree of a directed graph of the hierarchy. See Abstract.
Of the claims on appeal, claim 1 is illustrative of the subject matter of the
appeal and is reproduced below, with emphasis added to highlight the
relevant issue.
1. A computer-implemented method of determining an
execution ordering, comprising:
generating a directed graph based on a hierarchy
comprising a plurality of pattern queries;
determining a minimum spanning tree of the directed
graph; and
determining an execution order of the pattern queries
based on the minimum spanning tree.
REJECTION ON APPEAL
The Examiner rejected claims 1-20 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as being
anticipated by Demers et al. (US 6,105,018; Aug. 15, 2000) (hereinafter
"Demers"). Final Act. 5.
ISSUE ON APPEAL
The dispositive issue for this appeal is whether Demers discloses
"determining an execution order of the pattern queries based on the
minimum spanning tree," as recited in claim 1, and similarly recited in
claims 9 and 16.
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Appeal2014-002227
Application 13/285,785
ANALYSIS
Appellants argue Demers discloses "determining a minimal set of
indexes (i.e. plurality of columns)," rather than "determining an ... order of
... queries." App. Br. 8 (emphasis added) (citing Demers, 10:42--45 and
11:32-35).
Specifically, Appellants argue "Demers clearly discloses that it is the
combination columns of an index that are provided in an ordered manner
... [and] nothing in Demers discloses an ordering of the query types." App.
Br. 9 (citing Demers 7 :45--48). Appellants also argue:
[I]t is well known in the art that a query is a request for
information from a database that may be executed upon and that
a column [for indexing] is a set of data values of a particular
type. Therefore, the term "query" and the term "column
combination" cannot be used interchangeably.
App. Br. 10; see also Reply Br. 3. Furthermore, Appellants contend Demers
discloses using a minimum spanning tree to determine which indexes should
be built - indexes are used by queries when executed and are built
beforehand - rather than in which order queries should be executed. App.
Br. 9 (citing Demers 7:31-33 ("The relationships between the column
combinations referenced by anticipated query types can be expressed in the
form of a directed acyclic graph (DAG).")); see also Demers 7:61---65
(identifying nodes 210, 220, 230, 240, and 250 of Figure 2, as corresponding
to column combinations {a}, {c}, {b, c}, {a, b, c}, and {a, b, c, d},
respectively).
The Examiner finds Demers discloses "an execution order of the
pattern queries based on the minimum spanning tree." See Ans. 3; see also
Demers, Fig. 9, 5:4--5 ("FIG. 9 depicts a minimum leaf spanning tree for the
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Appeal2014-002227
Application 13/285,785
graph shown in FIG. 2."). Specifically, the Examiner finds that each of the
nodes "#200, #210, #220, #230, #240 and #250 is representative of a
plurality [of] pattern queries" and Figure 9 provides "an execution order" via
finding "the shortest path (e.g., minimum spanning tree) to go from #200 to
#240," for example. Ans. 3.
We find Appellants' arguments persuasive. Simply put, Demers'
disclosure of a minimum spanning tree relates to determining what indexes
to build rather than to ordering queries for later execution. See, e.g., Demers
5:4--5 (identifying Figure 9 as showing a minimum spanning tree for Figure
2), 7:61---65 (identifying the nodes of Figure 2 as corresponding to column
combinations for indexing), and 17 :23--48 (describing "Building the
Indexes from the Minimum Leaf Spanning Tree"). We agree with
Appellants that (i) indexes of column combinations and (ii) queries are not
interchangeable terms or concepts.
Accordingly, we reverse the Examiner's rejection of independent
claim 1, as well as claims 9 and 16, which also include this disputed
limitation in similar form. Furthermore, we reverse the Examiner's rejection
of the claims that depend from claims 1, 9, and 16, which are 2-8, 10-15,
and 17-20, respectively, because these dependent claims incorporate the
contested limitation.
DECISION
The Examiner's rejection of claims 1-20 is reversed.
REVERSED
ACP
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