Ex Parte Behrendt et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jul 22, 2014

11421804 (P.T.A.B. Jul. 22, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte MICHAEL M. BEHRENDT,
JOCHEN BREH,
GERD BREITER,
GEORG OCHS,
and
ANDREA SCHMIDT
____________

Appeal 2012-001443
Application 11/421,804
Technology Center 3600
____________

Before MURRIEL E. CRAWFORD, HUBERT C. LORIN, and BIBHU R.
MOHANTY, Administrative Patent Judges.

CRAWFORD, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants seek our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134 of the Examiner’s
final decision rejecting claims 1–9. We have jurisdiction over the appeal
under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We REVERSE.

Appeal 2012-001443
Application 11/421,804

2
Claim 1 is illustrative:
1. A method for dynamically modeling a workflow for
interacting stateful resources, wherein said workflow is
described by an activity sequence description (ASD), wherein
said activity sequence description consists of a sequence of
activities, wherein each activity describes an interaction with at
least one stateful resource, comprising the step of:
modeling an activity by using a keyword identifying a
type of interaction with at least one stateful resource, its
parameters, and its semantics, wherein each described activity
is concurrently provided during its modeling as input to an
activity sequence description processor which performs the
following steps:
identifying said keyword of said described activity;
updating a current resource type model and a current
resource instance model based on the semantics of the currently
processed keyword and the semantics of a relationship
stereotype definition;
wherein said current resource type model and said
current resource instance model are predefined models provided
by a user or resulting from the current ASD modeling process;
wherein a successful updating of said resource type
model and said resource instance model automatically indicates
consistency of said described activity with a preceding modeled
sequence of activities of an ASD; and
in the case of inconsistency, automatically providing
support to the user for resolving said inconsistency.

Appellants appeal the following rejections:
1. Claims 1–5 and 7–9 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as anticipated by Leymann
(US 2003/0144891 A1; pub. July 31, 2003).
2. Claim 6 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Leymann.

Appeal 2012-001443
Application 11/421,804

3
ISSUE
Did the Examiner err in rejecting the claims because Leymann does
not disclose each activity being concurrently provided during its modeling as
input to an activity sequence description processor?

FACTUAL FINDINGS
Leymann discloses a method for supervising the processing status of
process activities within a workflow-management system (Abstr.). A
process activity has a program assigned to perform it, and this program is
invoked when the activity is started (para. 45). The activities are executed in
accordance with a control flow (para. 46).
Process definitions include modeling of process activities (para. 48).
These models are used as input to the program (para. 30).
Leymann discloses that a program activity keyword is used to define
activities that are implemented via a program (para. 64). The program
activity keyword associates the activity to a particular program.
Leymann also discloses that an activity may be associated with one or
more check activity implementations so as to determine at any time whether
the activity is processing correctly (para. 86). If an irregularity is detected,
the check activity is able to return the output to the form and contents that
would have been made available had the irregularity not occurred (para. 87).

Appeal 2012-001443
Application 11/421,804

4
ANALYSIS
The Appellants argue that Leymann does not disclose that each
activity is concurrently provided during its modeling as input to an activity
sequence description processor. We agree. While Leymann does disclose
that the activities are modeled, Leymann does not disclose that the activities
are provided as input to the processor during the modeling of the activities.
We agree with the Appellants that Leymann discloses that the activity model
is first created and then used as input to a software program but these two
activities do not take place concurrently as required by claim 1. We find the
disclosure in Leymann at paragraph 30 that the model is provided as input to
the process to be a clear disclosure that the model is first created and then
provided to the processor which subsequently executes the program.
We likewise agree with the Appellants that the disclosure in Leymann
of a check activity process is not a disclosure of providing the activity
concurrently with modeling the activity. Rather, this disclosure in Leymann
is related to checking the running of a process and correcting errors in the
process. This disclosure of Leymann does not disclose that an activity is
executed and modeled concurrently.
In view of the foregoing, we will not sustain the Examiner’s rejection
of claim 1 and claims 2–5 and 7 dependent thereon.
We will also not sustain this rejection as it is directed to claims 8 and
9 because both of these claims require providing the activity concurrently
during its modeling.

Appeal 2012-001443
Application 11/421,804

5
We will also not sustain the rejection of claim 6 under 35 U.S.C. §
103(a) over Leymann because claim 6 is dependent on claim 1 and thus also
requires providing the activity concurrently during its modeling.

DECISION
The decision of the Examiner is reversed.

REVERSED

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