Shani, Inbar et al.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Dec 1, 2020

2019004053 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 1, 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.
14/374,841 07/25/2014 Inbar Shani 83992637 2579
146568 7590 12/01/2020
MICRO FOCUS LLC
500 Westover Drive
#12603
Sanford, NC 27330
EXAMINER
SOLTANZADEH, AMIR
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2191
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/01/2020 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):
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, ILAN SHUFER, and
AMICHAI NITSAN
_____________

Appeal 2019-004053
Application 14/374,841
Technology Center 2100
______________

Before MARC S. HOFF, JOHN A. EVANS, and
JAMES W. DEJMEK, Administrative Patent Judges.

EVANS, 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 1–8, 10–12, and 14–22. Appeal Br. 1.
Claims 9 and 13 have been canceled. Appeal Br. 22. We have jurisdiction
over the pending claims under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We AFFIRM.

INVENTION
The invention is directed to a method to deploy a code change in a
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software application. Spec., Abstr. Claims 1, 6, and 10 are independent.
Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the invention.
1. A processor implemented method comprising:
prior to receipt of code changes associated with an
application, defining a plurality of deployment pipelines, the
plurality of deployment pipelines to be executed in parallel,
each deployment pipeline comprising a dedicated queue, a build
stage, at least one test stage, and at least one deploy stage,
wherein each of the plurality of dedicated queues is to store
code changes assigned to an associated deployment pipeline,
each code change to be uniquely assigned to one of the plurality
of deployment pipelines, each deployment pipeline associated
with a unique set of test criteria;
prior to receipt of code changes associated with the
application, defining a set of filtering rules using a predefined
set of business criteria, the set of filtering rules specifying
sorting of code changes to the plurality of deployment
pipelines;
after defining the plurality of deployment pipelines and
the associated set of filtering rules, receiving a first code change
to be deployed in the application;
assigning the first code change to a first deployment
pipeline of the plurality of deployment pipelines based on the
set of filtering rules;
storing the first code change in the dedicated queue of the
first deployment pipeline; and
deploying the first code change after the first code
change completes each stage included in the first deployment
pipeline.

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PRIOR ART
Name1 Reference Date
Chawla US 2005/0044531 A1 Feb. 24, 2005
Barta US 2005/0102665 A1 May 12, 2005
Fanning US 2009/0144698 A1 June 4, 2009
Robinson US 2013/0081000 A1 Mar. 28, 20132
Anderson US 2014/0189641 A1 July 3, 20143

REJECTIONS4 AT ISSUE5
1. Claims 1–4, 6–8, 10, and 14–22 stand rejected under pre-AIA
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as obvious over Fanning, Anderson, Chawla, and
Barta. Final Act. 5–37.
2. Claims 5, 11, and 12 stand rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
as obvious over Fanning, Anderson, Chawla, Barta, and Robinson.
Final Act. 38–40.

1 All citations herein to the references are by reference to the first named
inventor/author only.
2 Filed September 23, 2011.
3 Priority September 26, 2011.
4 The present application is being examined under the pre-AIA first to invent
provisions. Final Act. 2.
5 Throughout this Decision, we refer to the Appeal Brief (“Appeal Br.”) filed
November 5, 2018; the Reply Brief (“Reply Br.”) filed April 25, 2019; the
Final Office Action (“Final Act.”) mailed June 1, 2018; the Examiner’s
Answer mailed February 25, 2019; and the Specification (“Spec.”) filed June
24, 2015.
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ANALYSIS6
We have reviewed the rejections of claims 1–8, 10–12, and 14–22 in
light of Appellant’s7 arguments that the Examiner erred. We have
considered in this Decision only those arguments Appellant actually raised
in the Briefs. Any other arguments which Appellant could have made but
chose not to make in the Briefs are deemed to be waived. See 37 C.F.R.
§ 41.37(c)(1)(iv) (2018). We provide the following explanation to highlight
and address specific arguments and findings primarily for emphasis. We
consider Appellant’s arguments as they are presented in the Appeal Brief and
the Reply Brief.
CLAIMS 1–4, 18, AND 19: OBVIOUSNESS
OVER FANNING, ANDERSON, CHAWLA, AND BARTA.
Appellant argues claims 1–4, 18, and 19 in view of representative
claim 1. See Appeal Br. 7.
Independent claim 1 recites, inter alia, “prior to receipt of code
changes associated with an application, defining a plurality of deployment
pipelines.”

6 The Examiner has withdrawn the rejection of claims 1–8, 10–12, and 14–
22 under 35 U.S.C. § 101. Ans. 4.
7 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in
37 C.F.R. § 1.42(a). The Appeal Brief states the real party in interest is
“EntIT Software LLC, a limited liability company established under the laws
of the State of Delaware and having a principal place of business at
Enterprise Way, Sunnyvale, CA. EntIT is a wholly-owned affiliate of Micro
Focus International Plc, headquartered in Newbury, United Kingdom.”
Appeal Br. 2.
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The Examiner finds:
Fanning talks about a software development cycle which
includes development stage, testing stage and the release
stage, which can be interpreted to the claimed deployment
pipeline. Fanning further talks about code complexity which is
related to the amount of effort needed to understand, maintain
and modify a source code correctly. A low complexity code
signifies a lower branching code which needs less code
coverage, and high complexity code signifies higher branching
code which needs more test cases for better coverage (see
[0043]-[0048]). The system then assigns a test coverage level
based on the complexity. This means that each code has to
go through [a] different pipeline based on their complexity.
Final Act. 6 (emphasis added); see also Appeal Br. 8.
Appellant quotes Fanning as disclosing:
“a system for prioritizing quality improvements to source code
receives a plurality of modules associated with the source code
as input,” and “[t]he system determines a complexity measure
for each of the plurality of modules. The system then assigns
a test coverage level to each of the plurality of modules
based on the corresponding complexity measures and the
desired quality level for the source code.”
Appeal Br. 8–9 (quoting Fanning ¶ 9). Appellant argues:
Fanning clearly discloses that the level of test coverage applied
to a particular module (i.e., each “deployment pipeline,”
according to the rejection) is not determined until (a) the
module has been received, (b) the received module is analyzed
to determine a complexity measure, and (c) the determined
complexity measure and a desired quality level are then used to
calculate a particular level of test coverage to be used for the
module.
Appeal Br. 9. Appellant argues that Fanning discloses that the different
levels of test coverage (i.e., the “plurality of deployment pipelines,” as found
by the Examiner) are determined after multiple code modules are received
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and the complexity of each module is analyzed. Appeal Br. 9. Appellant
argues this teaching of Fanning is contrary to the claimed “prior to receipt of
code changes associated with an application, defining a plurality of
deployment pipelines.”
In the Answer, the Examiner finds that “Fanning discloses [the
claimed] ‘prior to receipt of code changes associated with an application,
defining a plurality of deployment pipelines’” because “[i]n the broadest
reasonable interpretation determining test cases means they were already
created and are just being determined based on the complexity of the code.”
Ans. 5.
Appellant contends that Fanning discloses that the different levels of
test coverage, which the Examiner equates with the claimed “plurality of
deployment pipelines,” are determined after code modules are received and
the complexity of each code module is analyzed. Reply Br. 18. Appellant
further contends that “none of the cited references describe or even
contemplate executing a ‘plurality of deployment pipelines’ as claimed.” Id.
We agree with the Examiner. The Examiner cites to Fanning to teach
the claimed “pipeline.” Final Act. 6. As set forth in the Specification,
Appellant describes a non-limiting example of a deployment pipeline as
including “building the code, executing unit tests, deploying the code,
running automated tests, staging the code, running end-to-end tests and
deploying the code to production.” Spec. ¶ 12. Although Fanning does not

8 Every page of the Reply is numbered as “i.” For purposes of this decision
we treat the pages of the Reply Brief to be consecutively numbered starting
with 1.

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recite the term “pipeline,” the Examiner finds: “Fanning talks about a
software development cycle which includes development stage, testing stage
and the release stage, which can be interpreted to the claimed deployment
pipeline.” Id. Consistent with Appellant’s Specification, we find that
Fanning receives the code, determines a complexity measure, and only then
assigns a test coverage level, i.e., the pre-defined pipeline. Appellant has
fail to persuade us of error.
In view of the foregoing, we sustain the rejection of claims 1–4, 6–8,
10, and 14–22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103.

DEPENDENT CLAIMS 5, 11, AND 12: OBVIOUSNESS OVER FANNING,
ANDERSON, CHAWLA, BARTA, AND ROBINSON.
Appellant does not separately argue dependent claims 5, 11, and 12.
See Appeal Br. 14.
In view of the foregoing, we sustain the rejection of claims 5, 11, and
12 under 35 U.S.C. § 103.

CONCLUSION
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C.
§
Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–4, 6–8,
10, 14–22
103(a) Fanning,
Anderson, Chawla,
Barta
1–4, 6–8,
10, 14–22

5, 11, 12 103(a) Fanning,
Anderson, Chawla,
Barta, Robinson
5, 11, 12
Overall
Outcome
1–8, 10–12,
14–22

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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).

AFFIRMED