Ex Parte Agrawal et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Feb 25, 2013

11246001 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 25, 2013)

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.
11/246,001 10/07/2005 Abhyudaya Agrawal 50277-2807 2881
42425 7590 02/25/2013
HICKMAN PALERMO TRUONG BECKER BINGHAM WONG/ORACLE
1 Almaden Boulevard
Floor 12
SAN JOSE, CA 95113
EXAMINER
TRAN, BAO G
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2158
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
02/25/2013 PAPER
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.
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________________

Ex parte ABHYUDAYA AGRAWAL,
RAVI MURTHY, NIPUN AGARWAL,
SIVASANKARAN CHANDRASEKAR, and ERIC SEDLAR
____________________

Appeal 2010-010759
Application 11/246,001
Technology Center 2100
____________________

Before: JOSEPH L. DIXON, ST. JOHN COURTENAY III, and
CARLA M. KRIVAK, Administrative Patent Judges.

DIXON, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

Appeal 2010-010759
Application 11/246,001

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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a final rejection of
claims 1-7, 9-11, 23-29, and 31-33. Claims 8, 12-22, and 30 have been
canceled. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm-in-part.

INVENTION
Appellants’ claimed invention is generally related to “storing XML
data in a database, and in particular, to storing XML schema instances that
contain cyclic constructs.” (Spec. ¶ [0003].)
Independent claim 1, reproduced below, is representative of the
subject matter on appeal.
1. A method, comprising

a database server registering a XML schema, wherein
registering the XML schema includes:

determining whether a declaration of a first
element in the XML schema comprises a particular
second element that belongs to a type within a hierarchy
of inheritance of a certain type of the first element; and

in response to determining that the declaration of
the first element in the XML schema comprises the
particular second element, performing:

determining that said XML schema defines a
cyclic construct;

determining a database representation capable of
storing instances of said XML schema that contain said
cyclic construct; and

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Application 11/246,001

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generating a mapping between constructs of said
XML schema and said database representation.

REFERENCE
Murthy US Pat. App. Pub. No. 2003/0140308 A1 Jul. 24, 2003

REJECTION
Claims 1-7, 9-11, 23-29, and 31-33 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 102(b) as being anticipated Murphy.

ANALYSIS
Clams 1-7, 11, 23-29, and 31-33
Appellants contend that Murthy fails to disclose “determining whether
a declaration of a first element in the XML schema comprises a particular
second element that belongs to a type within a hierarchy of inheritance of a
certain type of the first element,” as recited in claim 1 (App. Br. 4-10). We
disagree.
Appellants’ arguments focus solely on the example in Murthy’s
paragraphs [0052]-[0059] to show lack of anticipation (see App. Br. 5-6, 8-
10; Reply Br. 1-3). However, the Examiner also cites Murthy’s Figure 9 and
Appendix I in finding claim 1 anticipated (Ans. 5-6). Murthy’s Figure 9
shows an example of complexType self-referencing where a declaration of a
complexType named “SectionT” includes an element of the same
“SectionT” type (Murthy, ¶ [0028]; Fig. 9). In a similar example in
Appendix I titled “XML Schema: Cycling Between complexTypes, Self-
Referencing,” Murthy shows in more detailed fashion how a complexType
“SectionT” declaration can include an element of “SectionT” type, which is
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Application 11/246,001

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an “example of a cyclic complexType” (Murthy, Appendix I, p. 63). This
type of cycling is similar to the cycling that Appellants point to in the
Specification for descriptive support of the claim 1 limitation “a type within
a hierarchy of inheritance of a certain type” (see App. Br. 6-8; Spec. ¶¶
[0055]-[0063]). Namely, the Specification describes an example “XML
Schema A” in which a complexType “A1Type includes an element of the
type A1Type, thus defining a cyclic construct” (Spec. ¶¶ [0057], [0060]).
Murthy further discloses that “[a]ccording to one embodiment, XML
schema mapper 106 is configured to detect such cycles and break them by
using REFs while mapping to SQL object types. A detailed description of
how REFs may be used to break cycles is provided in Appendix I.”
(Murthy, ¶ [0213]). Appellants do not specifically explain why this
disclosure of detecting cycles and mapping them to SQL objects fails to
disclose “determining whether a declaration of a first element in the XML
schema comprises a particular second element that belongs to a type within a
hierarchy of inheritance of a certain type of the first element,” as recited in
claim 1.
We are therefore not persuaded that the Examiner erred in rejecting
claim 1, and claims 2-7, 11, 23-29, and 31-33, not separately argued.

Claims 9 and 10
The Examiner cites Murthy’s Figure 9 and paragraphs [0185] and
[0213] in finding that Murthy discloses the limitations of claims 9 and 10
(Ans. 7-8, 16-17). However, we agree with Appellants (App. Br. 10-11;
Reply Br. 3-5) and find that none of the cited portions of Murthy disclose
“while traversing said declarations, tracking on a stack a declaration of an
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Application 11/246,001

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element,” as recited in both claims 9 and 10. While Murthy discloses
detecting cycles in an XML schema and mapping them to SQL objects in a
database representation, as discussed above, the cited portions of Murthy do
not disclose that Murthy accomplishes this in the manner claimed, i.e.,
“tracking on a stack.”
We are therefore constrained to find that the Examiner erred in
rejecting claims 9 and 10 as anticipated.

CONCLUSION
The Examiner erred in rejecting claims 9 and 10, but did not err in
rejecting claims 1-7, 11, 23 -29, and 31- 33 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b).

DECISION
The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 9 and 10 is reversed.
The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1-7, 11, 23-29, and 31- 33 is
affirmed.
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-IN-PART

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