GUPTA, Akhil et al.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Sep 28, 2020

2019002512 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 28, 2020)

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.
12/508,994 07/24/2009 Akhil GUPTA 2011-0190US01 9072
74739 7590 09/28/2020
Potomac Law Group, PLLC (Oracle International)
8229 Boone Boulevard
Suite 430
Vienna, VA 22182
EXAMINER
HIGGS, STELLA EUN
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2179
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/28/2020 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):
bgoldsmith@potomaclaw.com
eofficeaction@appcoll.com
patents@potomaclaw.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte AKHIL GUPTA and SWAMINATHAN SEKAR
Appeal 2019-002512
Application 12/508,994
Technology Center 2100
Before JOSEPH L. DIXON, ERIC S. FRAHM, and
SCOTT E. BAIN, Administrative Patent Judges.
DIXON, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from the
Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1–6 and 8–21. Claim 7 has been
canceled. 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(a) (2018). Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Oracle
International Corporation. Appeal Br. 2.
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Application 12/508,994
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CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
The claims are directed to interactive store design interface based
system to configure an online shopping portal that includes a plurality of
sites. Abstract. Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the claimed
subject matter:
1. A non-transitory computer readable medium
having instructions stored thereon to configure an online
shopping portal comprising a plurality of sites that, when
executed by a processor, cause the processor to configure the
online shopping portal, the configuring comprising:
storing, in a memory, an online shopping portal
including at least three hierarchical web sites, each web site
having a plurality of pages, the plurality of pages including
at least one catalog page and at least one product details
page for a product, the product details page including a
product description and a product price for a single product,
wherein,
a first of the hierarchical websites comprises a
parent configuration inherited at least in part by a
second and third of the hierarchical websites, and
the second hierarchical website comprises a
parent of the third hierarchical website, wherein
configurations specific to the second hierarchical
website are inherited at least in part by the third
hierarchical website;
receiving a request to configure a site of the online
shopping portal; providing a user interface (UI) shell that
corresponds to the site, the UI shell including a component
palette and a working area;
receiving a selection of a page from the plurality of
pages of the site to configure;
providing UI content, based on a set of rules that
determine business or functional relevance of UI content
with respect to the selected page, within a plurality of UI
content widgets in the component palette, the plurality of UI
content widgets including one or more of:
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Application 12/508,994
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a my profile UI content widget that includes at
least one of a user name, address, and phone number,
a compare UI content widget that includes
information for a user to compare two or more
products listed on a catalog page,
a promotions UI content widget that includes hot
offers related to a currently illustrated product on a
product details page, and
a shopping cart UI content widget that includes
one or more products to be purchased by the user, a
quantity of each product, a price of each product, and a
total cost of the products;

providing a plurality of placeholders in the working
area, the placeholders configured to hold UI content in
certain areas of the selected page;
receiving a drag-and-drop selection of one of the
plurality of UI content widgets from the component palette
to a placeholder from the working area;
displaying the selected UI content widget in the
selected placeholder;
receiving a first modification for the first hierarchical
website that is reflected in the second and third hierarchical
websites and a second modification for the second
hierarchical website that is reflected in the third hierarchical
website.

REFERENCES
The prior art relied upon by the Examiner is:
Wong US 6,343,275 B1 Jan. 29, 2002
Lee et al. US 6,611,814 B1 Aug. 26, 2003
Sayed US 2005/0246627 A1 Nov. 03, 2005
Matveyenko et al. US 7,000,184 B2 Feb. 14, 2006
Facemire et al. US 2006/0212822 A1 Sept. 21, 2006
Xie et al. US 2007/0074108 A1 Mar. 29, 2007
Bennett et al. US 7,366,721 B1 Apr. 29, 2008
Minsky et al. US 2009/0043674 A1 Feb. 12, 2009
Appeal 2019-002512
Application 12/508,994
4
Chakrabarti et al. US 2009/0177959 A1 July 09, 2009

J. Pyles et al. (“SharePoint 2007: The Definitive Guide”; hereinafter
SharePoint) pp. 1–794, Sept. 2007; cited on PTO-892, mailed 3/30/2016.

REJECTIONS2
Claims 1, 2, 7, 8, 10, 12–18, 20, and 21 stand rejected 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Pyles et al. (“SharePoint 2007: The
Definitive Guide”; hereinafter SharePoint) in further view of Facemire,
Minsky et al., and Lee et al.
Claims 3 and 9 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Share Point, Facemire, Minsky, and Lee as applied to
claim 1 above, and in further view of Sayed.
Claim 4 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Share Point, Facemire, Minsky, and Lee as applied to
claim 1 above, and in further view of Wong.
Claim 5 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Share Point, Facemire, Minsky, and Lee as applied to
claim 1 above, and in further view Bennett.
Claim 6 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Share Point, Facemire, Minsky, and Lee as applied to
claim 1 above, and in further view of Chakrabarti.
Claim 11 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Share Point, Facemire, and Minsky, as applied to claim 8
above, and in further view of Xie.

2 The Examiner has withdrawn the patent eligibility rejection of the claims
1–6, 8–13, 20 and 21. Ans. 3.
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Claim 19 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over SharePoint, Facemire, Minsky, and Lee as applied to
claim 17 above, and in further view of Matveyenko.
OPINION
35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
With respect to independent claims 1, 14, and 17, Appellant presents
arguments to the claims as a group. Because independent claims 14 and 17
contain similar limitations to independent claim 1, we select independent
claim 1 as the illustrative claim for the group and will address Appellant’s
arguments thereto.
With respect to illustrative independent claim 1, the Examiner relies
upon the SharePoint reference to teach and suggest claimed structure of the
hierarchy and inheritance of the Web pages/site and relies upon the other
prior art references to teach and suggest the online shopping aspects of the
claimed user interface. Final Act. 11–17. The Examiner finds that the
permissions are inherited from the parent site, and the Examiner maintains
that each of the subsites is a parent to its underlying child subsites from that
subsite. Ans. 21. The Examiner provides no express support for this
finding except “Table 5-1 and page 550.” Ans. 21; Final Act. 12. As a
result, the Examiner concludes that the SharePoint reference teaches the
claimed “a first of the hierarchical websites comprises a parent configuration
inherited at least in part by a second and third of the hierarchical websites,
and the second hierarchical website comprises a parent of the third
hierarchical website, wherein configurations specific to the second
hierarchical website are inherited at least in part by the third hierarchical
website.” Ans. 22.
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Additionally, the Examiner finds that:
SharePoint teaches that any changes applied to a parent site are
reflected in the corresponding child site. Specifically, SharePoint
states “The child list content type can be customized for its
specific container (i.e., list or library) without affecting the parent
content type. If the parent content type is changed, the child can
inherit these changes if desired. If there are any attributes that
the child list content type shares with the parent, these changes
can be inherited, which will override all child attributes”
(emphasis added). Accordingly, SharePoint having taught
perpetuating changes applied to a parent site to be applied to a
child site and further teaches that child sites can have multiple
subsites, it would have been obvious that any modifications
applied to a child site can be applied to the child’s corresponding
subsite in a similar manner.
Ans. 22–23.
Appellant argues that the Examiner’s finding that “each child site can
have additional child sites underneath it, thus making them a ‘parent’ to their
underlying child sites, and further teaches passing permissions/master page
(i.e., configurations) from a parent website to be inherited by its
corresponding child site” is contrary to the explicit disclosure in SharePoint.
Reply Br. 7. Appellant further argues that this stems from a use of
terminology that is inconsistent the reference where the Examiner’s
distortion of this clear disclosure from SharePoint is a product of
impermissible hindsight bias. Reply Br. 7.
The Examiner identifies “content types” in the Final Action
addressing the “receiving a first modification for the first hierarchical
website . . .” step. Ans. 13–14; see also Ans. 22–23.
Appellant argues that the portion of page 210 of Share Point refers to
content types, not parent sites and subsites where SharePoint discloses:
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[c]ontent types can be defined in a list or library and can consist
of multiple item types or document types. This is very useful
because document libraries and lists can now contain multiple
document and item types. For example, your HR department
has multiple documents that they would like to make available
so that users can come and create a new document from these
document type templates. When users navigate to the document
library, they can use the New command within the toolbar of the
document library and create a new document from the chosen
document type. The major advantage of using document types
is that they may contain unique document properties and policies
that are specific to this document. Content types such as this can,
for example, be associated with a workflow so when a user
creates a new document from this content type, a workflow can
be initiated.

See SharePoint 210.
Appellant argues that
If the Examiner is alleging that the inheritance of content types
is somehow affiliated with the inheritance of subsites from their
parent site, this analysis has not been made explicit in the Answer
or Office Action. Indeed, it is not clear how the inheritance of
content types could be affiliated with the inheritance of a one-top
level site collection to arrive at the above-noted functionality of
claim 1.
Reply Br. 8–9 (emphasis added).
“On appeal to the Board, an applicant can overcome a rejection by
showing insufficient evidence of prima facie obviousness or by rebutting the
prima facie case with evidence of secondary indicia of nonobviousness.” In
re Kahn, 441 F.3d 977, 985–86 (Fed. Cir. 2006) (quoting In re Rouffet, 149
F.3d 1350, 1355 (Fed. Cir. 1998)).
[T]he examiner bears the initial burden, on review of the prior
art or on any other ground, of presenting a prima facie case of
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Application 12/508,994
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unpatentability. If that burden is met, the burden of coming
forward with evidence or argument shifts to the applicant.
After evidence or argument is submitted by the applicant
in response, patentability is determined on the totality of the
record, by a preponderance of evidence with due consideration
to persuasiveness of argument.
In re Oetiker, 977 F.2d 1443, 1445 (Fed. Cir. 1992).
“A rejection based on section 103 clearly must rest on a factual basis.
. . .” In re Warner, 379 F.2d 1011, 1017 (CCPA 1967). “The Patent Office
has the initial duty of supplying the factual basis for its rejection. It may not
. . . resort to speculation, unfounded assumptions or hindsight reconstruction
to supply deficiencies in its factual basis.” Id.
“Obviousness may not be established using hindsight or in view of the
teachings or suggestions of the inventor.” Para-Ordnance Mfg. v. SGS
Importers Int’l, 73 F.3d 1085, 1087 (Fed. Cir. 1995) (citing W.L. Gore &
Assocs., Inc. v. Garlock, Inc., 721 F.2d 1540, 1551, 1553 (Fed. Cir. 1983)).
“The mere fact that the prior art may be modified in the manner suggested
by the Examiner does not make the modification obvious unless the prior art
suggested the desirability of the modification.” In re Fritch, 972 F.2d 1260,
1266 (Fed. Cir. 1992) (citing In re Gordon, 733 F.2d 900, 902 (Fed. Cir.
1984)). “It is impermissible to use the claimed invention as an instruction
manual or ‘template’ to piece together the teachings of the prior art so that
the claimed invention is rendered obvious.” Fritch, 972 F.2 at 1266 (citing
In re Gorman, 933 F.2d 982, 987 (Fed. Cir. 1991)).
Here, we cannot agree with the Examiner that a preponderance of the
evidence supports the Examiner’s factual findings and conclusion of
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9
obviousness.3 Rather, we agree with the Appellant that the Examiner’s
rejection is based upon hindsight with an attempt to reconstruct Appellant’s
claimed invention from the broad disclosure of the Sharepoint reference in
combination with the secondary prior art references. Therefore, we do not
sustain the Examiner’s obviousness rejection of illustrative independent
claim 1 and independent claims 14 and 17 which contain similar limitations
along with their respective dependent claims.

CONCLUSION
The Examiner’s obviousness rejections are reversed.
DECISION SUMMARY
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C.
§
Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1, 2, 8, 10,
12–18, 20,
21
103(a) Share Point,
Facemire, Minsky,
Lee
1, 2, 8, 10,
12–18, 20,
21
3, 9 103(a) Share Point,
Facemire, Minsky,
Lee, Sayed
3, 9
4 103(a) Share Point,
Facemire, Minsky,
Lee, Wong
4
5 103(a) Share Point,
Facemire, Minsky,
Lee, Bennett
5

3 We note that the Sayed reference discusses “parent-child relationships may
involve the presumption of inheritance wherein properties belonging to the
‘parent element’ can also be presumed to belong to the ‘child element.’” See
Sayed ¶¶ 71–72. We leave it to the Examiner to further consider this
reference which addresses creating and maintaining a website.
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Application 12/508,994
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6 103(a) Share Point,
Facemire, Minsky,
Lee, Chakrabarti
6
11 103(a) Share Point,
Facemire, Minsky,
Lee, Xie
11
19 103(a) Share Point,
Facemire, Minsky,
Lee, Matveyenko
19
Overall
Outcome
1–6 and 8–
21

REVERSED