Ex Parte Huang et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardAug 31, 201813017335 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 31, 2018) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 13/017,335 01/31/2011 144365 7590 09/05/2018 Schwegman Lundberg & Woessner, P.A. P.O. Box 2938 Minneapolis, MN 55402 UNITED ST A TES OF AMERICA FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Xuedong David Huang 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 ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. MS1-5092US 6465 EXAMINER PENG, HUAWEN A ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2158 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 09/05/2018 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): uspto@slwip.com SLW@blackhillsip.com usdocket@microsoft.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte XUEDONG DAVID HUANG, QING (ALEX) LU, ZHAOWEI (CHARLIE) JIANG, and VIKAS RAJV ANSHY Appeal2017-004392 Application 13/017,335 Technology Center 2100 Before KRISTEN L. DROESCH, DENISE M. POTHIER, and JOYCE CRAIG, Administrative Patent Judges. CRAIG, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellants 1 appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's Final Rejection of claims 1, 2, 6, 8-17, 19, 20, 23-29, 35, 37--41, and 43--48, which are all of the claims pending in this application. 2 We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm. 1 According to Appellants, the real party in interest is Microsoft Corporation. App. Br. 4. 2 Claims 3-5, 7, 18, 21, 22, 30--34, 36, and 42 have been canceled. Final Act. 2. Appeal2017-004392 Application 13/017,335 INVENTION Appellants' invention relates to a gesture-based search. Abstract. Claim 1 is illustrative and reads as follows: 1. A method of conducting a search, the method comprising: under control of one or more processors configured with computer- executable instructions: detecting a search gesture which defines a region of displayed content; formulating one or more search queries based at least in part on the region of displayed content defined by the search gesture and context information providing signals usable to improve relevance of one or more search results; presenting the one or more search queries to enable a selection of a search query from the one or more search queries to conduct a search; and automatically causing the search to be performed using the search query in response to the selection of the search query from the one or more search queries. REJECTIONS Claims 1, 2, 6, 8-12, 14--17, 19, 20, 23-29, 35, 37--41, 43, and 48 stand rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as unpatentable over the combination of Hinckley et al. (US 2008/0250012 Al; published Oct. 9, 2008) ("Hinckley") and Zhai et al. (US 2006/0253793 Al; published Nov. 9, 2006) ("Zhai"). Final Act. 3-27. Claim 13 stands rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as unpatentable over the combination of Hinckley, Zhai, and Churchill et al. (US 2009/0307205 Al; Dec. 10, 2009) ("Churchill"). Final Act. 27-28. Claims 44--46 stand rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as unpatentable over the combination of Hinckley and Churchill. Final Act. 28-31. 2 Appeal2017-004392 Application 13/017,335 Claim 47 stands rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over the combination of Hinckley, Churchill, and Zhai. Final Act. 32-33. ANALYSIS We have reviewed the rejections of claims 1, 2, 6, 8-17, 19, 20, 23- 29, 35, 37--41, and 43--48 in light of Appellants' arguments that the Examiner erred. We have considered in this decision only those arguments Appellants actually raised in the Briefs. Any other arguments Appellants could have made, but chose not to make, in the Briefs are waived. See 37 C.F.R. § 4I.37(c)(l)(iv). Appellants' arguments are not persuasive of error. We agree with and adopt as our own the Examiner's findings of facts and conclusions as set forth in the Answer and in the Action from which this appeal was taken. We provide the following explanation for emphasis. In rejecting claim 1 for obviousness, the Examiner found Hinckley teaches all of the recited limitations, except "formulating one or more search queries based at least in part on ... context information providing signals usable to improve relevance of one or more search results." Final Act. 5 bracket omitted. The Examiner relied on Zhai as teaching that limitation. Id. Appellants contend the Examiner erred because the cited portions of Zhai do not disclose "formulating one or more search queries based at least in part on ... context information providing signals usable to improve relevance of one or more search results," as claim 1 requires. App. Br. 18. Appellants argue the "context clues" Zhai describes do not teach the "context information" that claim 1 recites. Id. According to Appellants, 3 Appeal2017-004392 Application 13/017,335 Zhai uses "context clues" to determine what command a user intended, and does not teach using "context information" to formulate search queries by "providing signals usable to improve relevance of one or more search results," as claim 1 requires. Id. at 18-19. We are not persuaded the Examiner erred because Appellants' arguments do not address the findings actually made by the Examiner. The Examiner relied on paragraphs 48, 99, and 100 of Zhai. Final Act. 5---6. Of these, Appellants' arguments address only paragraph 48. The Examiner's findings based on Zhai's paragraphs 99 and 100 stand unrebutted. See App. Br. 18-19; Reply Br. 4---6. The Examiner found Zhai' s context clues serve as context information to enhance the search in the command gesture database 220 to produce a command output 235. Ans. 3 (citing Zhai Fig. 1). The Examiner found Zhai teaches providing context information to improve relevance of one or more search results because context model channel 23 0 provides context clues to integrator 225 based on one or more previous commands gestured by the user. Id. at 4 (citing Zhai ,r 48). The Examiner further relied on Zhai's teaching that integrator 225 analyzes the potential command with context clues from the context model channel 230 to produce a command output 235. Id. ( citing Zhai ,r 99). We agree with the Examiner that the context model channel 230 in Zhai provides recent commands and language rules to assist integrator 225 in the selection of the best matched command from a database. See id. at 4 ( citing Zhai ,r 100). Thus, the cited teachings in Zhai at least suggest formulating one or more search queries based at least in part on context 4 Appeal2017-004392 Application 13/017,335 information providing signals usable to improve relevance of one or more search results, as claim 1 requires. For these reasons, we are not persuaded the Examiner erred in finding the combination of Hinckley and Zhai teaches or suggests the disputed limitation of claim 1. Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner's§ 103(a) rejection of independent claim 1, as well as the Examiner's§ 103(a) rejection of independent claims 25 and 35, which Appellants argue are patentable for similar reasons. App. Br. 20-22. We also sustain the Examiner's rejections of dependent claims 2, 6, 8-17, 19, 20, 23, 24, 26-29, 37--41, 43, and 48, not argued separately with particularity. Id. at 22-24. With regard to independent claim 44, Appellants contend the Examiner erred because Churchill fails to teach the limitation "motion of the client device," as recited in claim 44. App. Br. 25. Specifically, Appellants contend Churchill does not teach "motion of the client device" as something that, when detected, "cause[ s] a search for information of at least a part of content that is presented by the display of the client device," as claim 44 requires. Id. at 26. Appellants' arguments are not persuasive because Appellants attack Churchill individually, even though the Examiner relied on the combination of Hinckley and Churchill in rejecting claim 1. In re Mouttet, 686 F .3d 1322, 1332 (Fed. Cir. 2012) (citing In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425 (CCPA 1981)) ("The test for obviousness is what the combined teachings of the references would have suggested to those having ordinary skill in the art."). Nonobviousness cannot be established by attacking the references individually when the rejection is predicated upon a combination of prior art 5 Appeal2017-004392 Application 13/017,335 disclosures. See In re Merck & Co., 800 F.2d 1091, 1097 (Fed. Cir. 1986). The test for obviousness is not whether the claimed invention is expressly suggested in any one or all of the references, but whether the claimed subject matter would have been obvious to those of ordinary skill in the art in light of the combined teachings of those references. See Keller, 642 F.2d at 425. Because Appellants' arguments do not address the rejection actually made by the Examiner and, thus, do not persuasively rebut the Examiner's findings, we sustain the Examiner's§ 103(a) rejections of independent claim 44, as well as dependent claims 45--4 7, not argued separately with particularity. See App. Br. 27-29. DECISION We affirm the decision of the Examiner rejecting claims 1, 2, 6, 8-17, 19, 20, 23-29, 35, 37--41, and 43--48. 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). See 37 C.F.R. § 41.50(±). AFFIRMED 6 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation