Ex Parte Cortright

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Nov 13, 2017

12505460 (P.T.A.B. Nov. 13, 2017)

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.
12/505,460 07/17/2009 David Stanning Cortright 14917.1469USC1 2226
27488 7590 11/15/2017
MERCHANT & GOULD (MICROSOFT)
P.O. BOX 2903
MINNEAPOLIS, MN 55402-0903
EXAMINER
HO, RUAY L
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2175
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
11/15/2017 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):
US PT027488 @ merchantgould .com
u sdocket @ micro soft .com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte DAVID STANNING CORTRIGHT
Appeal 2015-000402
Application 12/505,460
Technology Center 2100
Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, JOHN A. EVANS, and
JASON M. REPKO, Administrative Patent Judges.
SAADAT, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant1 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Final Rejection
of claims 1—3, 6—13, 15—17, 19, and 20.2 We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
1 According to Appellant, the real party in interest is Microsoft Corporation
(App. Br. 2).
2 Claims 4, 5, 14, and 18 were objected to as being dependent upon a
rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form
including all limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims {see
Ans. 6).
Appeal 2015-000402
Application 12/505,460
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant’s invention is directed to a system and process for
graphically representing sequential time-dependent information or data
objects on a display device (Spec. 27—29).
Exemplary claim 1 under appeal reads as follows:
1. A computer-readable storage device encoding
computer executable instructions which, when executed by at
least one processor, performs a method for displaying time-
dependent data objects on a display device, the method
comprising:
providing a dynamic display area represented by a
dynamic time strip, the dynamic time strip including a plurality
of indications of different times of a given day and an indicator
associated with a current time of the given day, wherein the
plurality of indications of the different times of the given day
are displayed along a length of the dynamic time strip, and
wherein a position of the indicator is automatically updated
based on a current time of the given day;
populating the dynamic time strip with one or more
graphically represented data objects, wherein each of the one or
more graphically represented data objects is positioned along
the dynamic time strip relative to at least one associated time;
and
updating the position of at least one of the one or more
graphically represented data objects within the dynamic time
strip based on received input that corresponds to a received
period of time of the given day.
Claims 1—3, 6—13, 15—17, 19, and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as unpatentable over Crow (US 6,262,724 Bl; July 17, 2001) and
Mansour (US 6,034,683; Mar. 7, 2000) (see Ans. 2—6).
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Appeal 2015-000402
Application 12/505,460
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner’s rejections in light of Appellant’s
contentions that the Examiner has erred. We disagree with Appellant’s
conclusions as highlighted below.
Claim 1
In rejecting claim 1, the Examiner relies on Crow as disclosing all the
recited elements except for “a plurality of indications of different times of a
given day and an indicator associated with a current time of the given day,”
for which the Examiner relies on Mansour (Ans. 2-4). The Examiner finds
Figure 5B and the disclosure of Crow in columns 12 and 13 provides a
dynamic time strip, and the disclosure of Mansour in columns 3 and 6
provides a moving timeline including a plurality of indications of different
times and the current time (Ans. 2—3). The Examiner finds it would have
been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of
Crow with Mansour in order to enhance the time display functions of Crow
(Ans. 4).
Appellant contends Crow does not disclose “an indicator associated
with the current time of day” or “updating the position of any indicator
based on the current time a given day” (App. Br. 9). Appellant argues Crow
shows the remaining play time of the media being played without updating
anything based on the current time of a given day (App. Br. 10-12). With
respect to Mansour, Appellant contends the disclosed “updating” takes place
with respect to “the position of the time line and not the indicator” (App. Br.
12), and thus, teaches away from the disputed claim limitation which allows
the user to “review or preview the state of the time strip either in the past or
future” (App. Br. 13). Appellant further argues modifying Mansour with
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Appeal 2015-000402
Application 12/505,460
Crow’s drawer or timeline would render the combination inoperable (App.
Br. 13-14).
We are not persuaded by Appellant’s arguments that the Examiner
erred. Appellant’s contentions focus on the references separately, whereas
the proposed rejection is based on the combination of Crow and Mansour.
See In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425 (CCPA 1981); In re Merck & Co. Inc.,
800 F.2d 1091, 1097 (Fed. Cir. 1986). As found by the Examiner (Ans. 7),
Mansour discloses “an indicator associated with a current time of the [given]
day,” which would have suggested providing the claimed representation for
different times of a given day (Ans. 7 (citing Mansour col. 3,11. 61—62; col.
6,11. 30-34)). The Examiner specifically explains Mansour, and not Crow,
was cited for disclosing “[the] position of the indicator is automatically
updated” (Ans. 7—8). According to the Examiner, Crow was cited for
disclosing “an automatic update function for the time-based media items
display” (Ans. 8).
Consistent with the guidelines stated in KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc.,
550 U.S. 398 (2007), we agree with the Examiner’s findings and conclusion
because the Examiner has identified (Ans. 7—8) improvements made by the
combination to the user interface for controlling of time-based media files of
Crow where the time strip includes an indicator associated with a current
time of the given day. Indeed, the Supreme Court has indicated that:
[It is error to] assum[e] that a person of ordinary skill attempting
to solve a problem will be led only to those elements of prior art
designed to solve the same problem. . . . Common sense teaches
. . . that familiar items may have obvious uses beyond their
primary purposes, and in many cases a person of ordinary skill
will be able to fit the teachings of multiple patents together like
pieces of a puzzle.
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Application 12/505,460
KSR, 550 U.S. at 420 (citation omitted). Therefore, we find that the
Examiner has articulated how the claimed features are met by the proposed
combination of the reference teachings with some rational underpinning.
See id. at 418.
We are also unpersuaded by Appellant’s contention that “Mansour
teaches away from automatically ‘updating the position of the indicator
based on a current time of day’ because Mansour teaches moving the time
line and keeping a time pointer stationary” (App. Br. 13). We agree with the
Examiner that a discussion of the added features of play, stop, and pause,
which do not constitute any of the recited features, is not sufficient to
support that Mansour teaches away (see Ans. 9). A teaching away requires a
reference to actually criticize, discredit, or otherwise discourage the claimed
solution. See In re Fulton, 391 F.3d 1195, 1201 (Fed. Cir. 2004). Here,
Mansour teaches it was known in the art for displaying schedule
representation that include a display of current day as well as other days (see
col. 3,11. 61—62; col. 6,11. 30-34; Fig. 2,), which enhances the time display
functions of Crow. Appellant does not identify any disclosure in Mansour
that discredits the enhanced interface or otherwise would discourage an
ordinarily skilled artisan from considering and adapting its teachings for use
with prior art directed to user interface for processing time-based media
files, such as Crow. Additionally, Appellant provides no persuasive
argument or evidence that modifying Crow with automatically updating the
position of the indicator, as taught by Mansour, was “uniquely challenging
or difficult for one of ordinary skill in the art.” Leapfrog Enters., Inc. v.
Fisher-Price, Inc., 485 F.3d 1157, 1162 (Fed. Cir. 2007) (citing KSR, 550
U.S. at 419).
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With respect to Appellant’s contention that the combination results in
an inoperable device or method (App. Br. 13), we are similarly unpersuaded.
“The test for obviousness is not whether the features of a secondary
reference may be bodily incorporated into the structure of the primary
reference. . . . Rather, the test is what the combined teachings of those
references would have suggested to those of ordinary skill in the art.”
Keller, 642 F.2d at 425. Here, the Examiner has set forth “some articulated
reasoning with some rational underpinning to support the legal conclusion of
obviousness.” In re Kahn, 441 F.3d 977, 988 (Fed. Cir. 2006).
For the above-stated reasons, we are not persuaded by Appellant’s
arguments that the Examiner erred in finding the combination of Crow with
Mansour teaches or suggests the disputed features of claim 1. Therefore, we
sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) rejection of claim 1, independent claims 10
and 16, and dependent claims 6—9, 11, 12, 15, 17, 19, and 20, which are
argued based on the same reasons stated in arguing the patentability of claim
1 (see App. Br. 15).
Claim 2
Appellants contend the combination of Crow and Mansour is silent as
to the recited limitation of “a time strip that automatically generates an alert”
recited in claim 2 (App. Br. 15). The Examiner correctly found this
limitation is disclosed by Crow’s displaying the information in the drawer as
an “alert” which may include data information and warning (Ans. 4 (citing
Crow col. 14,1. 66-col. 15,1. 19)). For the same reasons stated for claim 1
and based on the Examiner’s findings and conclusion (see Ans. 4), we are
unpersuaded of Examiner error, and sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) rejection
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Application 12/505,460
of claim 2, as well as claims 3 and 13 not argued separately, over the
combination of Crow and Mansour.
DECISION
The decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1—3, 6—13, 15—17, 19,
and 20 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)(l)(iv).
AFFIRMED
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