12334283 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 15, 2016)

Ex Parte Bruce et al

Patent Trial and Appeal BoardDec 15, 2016

12334283 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 15, 2016)

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. 12/334,283 12/12/2008 EDWIN J. BRUCE CHA920080026US1 7929 138439 7590 Quarles & Brady LLP One South Church Avenue Suite 1700 Tucson, AZ 85701-1621 12/19/2016 EXAMINER MCCORMICK, GABRIELLE A ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 3629 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 12/19/2016 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): pat-dept@quarles.com yakov. sidorin@ quarles.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte EDWIN J. BRUCE and ROMELIA H. FLORES Appeal 2014-0076631 Application 12/334,283 Technology Center 3600 Before MURRIEL E. CRAWFORD, JOSEPH A. FISCHETTI, and MICHAEL W. KIM, Administrative Patent Judges. KIM, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF CASE This is an appeal from the final rejection of claims 1—20. We have jurisdiction to review the case under 35 U.S.C. §§ 134 and 6. The invention relates generally to mentoring. Spec., para. 1. We AFFIRM. 1 The Appellants identify International Business Machines, Inc. as the real party in interest. Br. 3. Appeal 2014-007663 Application 12/334,283 Claim 1 is illustrative: 1. A method for implementing mentoring in conformance with a mentoring framework comprising: establishing a plurality of mentoring relationships between mentors and proteges within mentoring data maintained in a database structure that is digitally encoded in a storage medium; for each mentoring relationship establishing a mentoring path, each mentoring path comprising a plurality of defined phases, each phase having a bounded beginning and ending, each phase further comprising at least one goal, at least one activity completion of which marks a progression towards achieving an associated goal, and timelines associated with at least one of the activities; presenting interactive user interfaces upon network attached client devices to users assigned a mentoring role who participate in at least one mentoring relationship for which the mentoring data is maintained in the storage medium, wherein mentoring roles comprise at least a mentor role and a protege role; extracting content related to the mentoring path from a plurality of sources, wherein the content is associated with programmatic triggers configured to selectively fire depending upon the content, wherein firing results in an execution of a previously configured programmatic rule, which causes the mentoring data maintained in the storage medium to be automatically updated; and changing a progression along the mentoring path based upon the updated mentoring data. Claims 1, 4—6, and 8—10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Beard (US 2008/0091686 Al, pub. Apr. 17, 2008), Cunningham (US 2007/0129953 Al, pub. June 7, 2007), and Moore (US 2007/0061487 Al, pub. Mar. 15, 2007). 2 Appeal 2014-007663 Application 12/334,283 Claims 2 and 3 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Beard, Cunningham, Moore, and Chen (US 2005/0021502 Al, pub. Jan. 27, 2005). Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Beard, Cunningham, Moore, and Gomez (US 2006/0253572 Al, pub. Nov. 9, 2006). Claims 11 and 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Beard, Cunningham, Moore, and Post (US 2008/0124687 Al, pub. May 29, 2008). Claims 13—15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Beard and Boettcher (US 2006/0230007 Al, pub. Oct. 12, 2006), Claim 16 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Beard, Boettcher, and Gomez. Claim 17 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Beard, Boettcher, Gomez, and Chen. Claim 18 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Beard and Cunningham. Claim 19 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Beard, Cunningham, Chen, and Moore. Claim 20 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Beard, Cunningham, and Gomez. 3 Appeal 2014-007663 Application 12/334,283 ANALYSIS Claims 1, 3, 4, 7—9, and 11 We are not persuaded by Appellants’ argument that the combination of Beard, Cunningham, and Moore fails to disclose extracting content “with programmatic triggers configured to selectively fire depending upon the content, wherein firing results in an execution of a previously configured programmatic rule, which causes the mentoring data maintained in the storage medium to be automatically updated,” as recited in independent claim 1. This, according to Appellants, is because in Moore files are not updated depending upon content of the modified information, but instead are updated whenever a file is modified irrespective of content of the modified information. Br. 27—29. Moore discloses a content distribution system where “triggers may be utilized to automatically update OPML 616 files when information in the database that is associated with the OPML 616 file is modified.” Moore, para. 672. Moore further discloses that “the OPML router may be configured to route data in response to or in correspondence with the structure or the content of an OPML document.” Id. at para. 201. Moore, thus, meets the claim language. In addition, Beard discloses a user interface for use in a mentoring system that provides alerts to a user, at element 706 of Figure 7, shown below: 4 Appeal 2014-007663 Application 12/334,283 700 :: WeFcoro... Peter Mine :: Yaiiarehsfe » Horae 702 710 Search: Title i / Content Type Status. 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