Ex Parte Haeberle et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Feb 19, 2013

11322797 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 19, 2013)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________________

Ex parte TILMAN HAEBERLE, LILIA KOTCHANOVSKAIA, ZOLTAN
NAGY, BERTHOLD WOCHER and JUERGEN SUBAT
____________________

Appeal 2010-009169
Application 11/322,797
Technology Center 2100
____________________

Before ROBERT E. NAPPI, HUNG H. BUI, and LYNNE E. PETTIGREW,
Administrative Patent Judges.

BUI, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants1 seek our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the
Examiner’s final rejections of claims 1-21. We have jurisdiction under 35
U.S.C. § 6(b).
We REVERSE.2

1 Real Party in Interest is SAP AG.
2 Our decision refers to Appellants’ Appeal Brief filed January 5, 2010
(“App. Br.”); Reply Brief filed June 7, 2010 (“Reply Br.”); Examiner’s
Answer mailed April 5, 2010 (“Ans.”); Final Office Action mailed June 29,
2009 (“FOA.”); and the original Specification filed December 30, 2005
(“Spec.”).
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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants’ Invention
According to Appellants, their invention relates to generation of
contextual data in connection with a support request. Spec. ¶0001. In
response to a user-generated input, via a computing system having a multi-
layer architecture comprising a user interface layer, a services layer, a
business object layer, and an application server, context data may be
collected that is associated with one or more operational parameters from
each of at least two of the layers of the computing system. A message may
then be generated based on at least a portion of the user-generated input and
at least a portion of the collected context data. Id., ¶0003, and Abstract.
Claims on Appeal
Claims 1, 11, and 20 are independent. Claim 1 is representative of the
invention, as reproduced below with disputed limitations emphasized:

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving user-generated input to initiate a generation of
a message associated with an incident of a computing system
requiring support, the computing system having a multi-layer
architecture;

collecting context data from the computing system
requiring support associated with at least one operational
parameter from each of at least two of the layers of the
computing system, the at least one operational parameter
describing a state of the corresponding layer of the computing
system at the incident of the computing system requiring
support; and

generating the message comprising at least a portion of
the user-generated input and at least a portion of the collected
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context data, the message used to facilitate a resolution to the
particular incident of the computing system requiring support.

Evidence Considered
The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on
appeal is:
Galdes U.S. 6,177,932 B1 Jan. 23, 2001
Newman U.S. 2004/0230559 A1 Nov. 18, 2004

Examiner’s Rejection
Claims 1-21 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Galdes and Newman3. Ans. 3-18.

§103(a) Rejection of Claims 1-21 over Galdes and Newman
Regarding independent claims 1, 11, and 20, the Examiner finds that
Galdes discloses or suggests all limitations of these claims, except for a
disclosure of a multi-layer architecture. Ans. 3-5. The Examiner finds,
however, that Newman discloses an information processing system
including a multi-layer architecture. Ans. 5 (citing Newman, Abstract).
The Examiner then concludes that it would have been obvious to
incorporate the teachings of Newman into Galdes to take advantage of a
multi layer architecture. Id. The Examiner also concludes that the
modification would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the

3 Claims 1 and 20 also stand objected to as being duplicate claims. See
FOA. 3-4. We note, however, that claims 1 and 20 contain different layers
of the multi-layer architecture and are, therefore, not duplicates.
Nevertheless, we leave it to the Examiner to address this objection when the
application is returned for further examination.
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art “would use a multi layer architecture to enable concurrent processing of
data.” Id.

ISSUE
Under § 103(a), the dispositive issue on appeal is whether the
Examiner has erred in rejecting claims 1-21 as being unpatentable over
Galdes and Newman. In particular, the issue turns on:
(1) Whether the combination of Galdes and Newman discloses or
suggests “collecting context data from the computing system requiring
support associated with at least one operational parameter from each of
at least two of the layers of the computing system, the at least one
operational parameter describing a state of the corresponding layer of the
computing system at the incident of the computing system requiring
support” and “generating the message comprising at least a portion of the
user-generated input and at least a portion of the collected context data,
the message used to facilitate a resolution to the particular incident of the
computing system requiring support,” as recited in Appellants’ independent
claims 1, 11, and 20 (App. Br. 15-17) (emphasis added); and
(2) Whether the combination of Galdes and Newman discloses or
suggests features of Appellants’ claims 2, 8 and 9 (App. Br. 18-20).

ANALYSIS
Appellants contest the Examiner’s factual findings regarding Galdes
relative to two features of independent claims 1, 11, and 20, and present
arguments to explain why these factual findings are in error and the lack of a
prima facie case of obviousness. App. Br. 12-17; Reply Br. 4-9. For
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example, Appellants contend that the combination of Galdes and Newman
does not disclose two limitations: (1) “collecting context data from the
computing system requiring support associated with at least one
operational parameter from each of at least two of the layers of the
computing system, the at least one operational parameter describing a state
of the corresponding layer of the computing system at the incident of the
computing system requiring support” and (2) “generating the message
comprising at least a portion of the user-generated input and at least a
portion of the collected context data, the message used to facilitate a
resolution to the particular incident of the computing system requiring
support,” as recited in Appellants’ independent claim 1, and similarly recited
in independent claims 11 and 20. App. Br. 15-17 (emphasis added). In
particular, Appellants argue:
[T]he relied upon portions of Galdes [Column 3, lines 36-56]
teach that any collected information only includes (1) website
locations visited by a user of a computer requesting help, (2)
information about the user or user help request, and (3) the
user’s help request itself. It is readily apparent that none of
these types of information teach or suggest context data
“associated with at least one operational parameter from each of
at least two of the layers of the computing system ... describing
a state of the corresponding layer of the computing system at
the incident of the computing system requiring support.”

... FIGS. 4 and 6 of Galdes describe a workflow process
of the user’s help request, but neither figure shows “collecting
context data” in as specific of detail as required by Claim 1.

App. Br. 15 (emphasis added). Appellants also argue:

Galdes explicitly teaches that its report typically consists of
statistics, such as the “number of questions answered by an
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advisor, the number of questions asked about any one location,
the percentage of customers who asked questions, etc.”... [T]he
“report” of Galdes (1) is more properly viewed as an
aggregation of statistics showing a measure of efficiency of its
customer help system, rather than a “message used to determine
a resolution” to the customer help request; and (2) does not
even include the information – for example the web tracks and
customer personal information ....

App. Br. 17 (citation omitted).

In response thereto, the Examiner has broadly construed the claim
term “context data ... associated with at least one operational parameter from
each of at least two of the layers of the computing system ... describing a
state of the corresponding layer of the computing system” as recited in
Appellants’ claims 1, 11 and 20 as encompassing “context information from
the customer’s system, to aid the advisor in helping the customer,
[including] the web tracks of the customer, the locations he or she visited
prior to asking for help,” as described by Galdes. Ans. 25. According to the
Examiner, (1) the web tracks of the customer, and (2) the locations he or she
visited prior to asking for help, as included in the context information as
described by Galdes, can correspond to Appellants’ claimed multi layers of
the computing system. Ans. 30.
While claim terms are given their “broadest reasonable construction,”
any such construction must be “consistent with the specification, … and that
claim language should be read in light of the specification as it would be
interpreted by one of ordinary skill in the art.” In re Bond, 910 F.2d 831, 833
(Fed. Cir. 1990) (quoting In re Sneed, 710 F.2d 1544, 1548 (Fed. Cir.
1983)). The Examiner’s construction here, though certainly broad, is
unreasonably broad. The broadest-construction rubric does not give the
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Examiner a license to ignore or misinterpret claim terms, i.e., the multi
layers of a computing system having a multi-layer architecture relative to the
operational parameter that is associated with Appellants’ claimed “context
data” and describes a state of the corresponding layer of Appellants’
computing system. Rather, claims should always be read in light of the
specification and teachings in the underlying patent. See Schriber-Schroth
Co. v. Cleveland Trust Co., 311 U.S. 211, 217 (1940) (“The claims of a
patent are always to be read or interpreted in light of its specifications.”).
According to Appellants’ Specification, Appellants’ invention relates
to a method and a computing system having a multi-layer architecture,
shown in FIG. 4, for generating contextual data in connection with a support
request (user-generated input) associated with at least one operational
parameter from each of at least two of the layers of the computing system ...
describing a state of the corresponding layer of the computing system. The
layer architecture includes, for example, a user interface layer, a service
layer, a business object layer, and an application server, as described in
Appellants’ Specification, ¶[0004] - ¶[0008].
When read in the appropriate context of independent claims 1, 11, and
20 and Appellants’ Specification including FIG. 4, the broadest reasonable
construction of the disputed limitation is clear: the data collected is context
data associated with at least one operational parameter from at least two
layers of a computer system having a multi-layer architecture and the
operational parameter describes a state of the corresponding layer of the
multi-layer architecture. App. Br. 15.
In contrast to Appellants’ independent claims 1, 11, and 20, Galdes
discloses a typical client-server system coupled with a telephonic system for
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providing a menu including three levels of interaction for customers. See
Galdes at Abstract, FIG. 1. As a secondary reference, Newman only
discloses a computing system having a seven-layer software layer. See
Newman at ¶¶ [0002], [0010]-[0016].
We disagree with both the Examiner’s claim construction and the
Examiner’s factual findings that Galdes discloses the disputed limitations
Appellants’ independent claims 1, 11, and 20. As such, we agree with
Appellants that the Examiner has not established a prima facie case of
obviousness.
For the reasons set forth above and evidence of record, we cannot
sustain the Examiner’s rejection of independent claims 1, 11, and 20, as well
as their respective dependent claims under 35 U.S.C. §103(a) as being
unpatentable over Galdes and Newman. Because this issue is dispositive
with respect to claims 1, 11, and 20, we need not reach Appellants’ other
arguments directed to additional limitations as recited in dependent claims 2,
8 and 9 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a). See App. Br. 17-20.

CONCLUSION
On the record before us, we conclude that the Examiner has erred in
rejecting claims 1-21 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).

DECISION
As such, we reverse the Examiner’s final rejections of claims 1-21.

REVERSED

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