Ex Parte Imhof

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Feb 11, 2013

10463818 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 11, 2013)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARKOFFICE
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.
10/463,818 06/17/2003 Raphael Imhof 2002 P 09664 US 01 9384
7590 02/12/2013
Siemens Corporation
170 Wood Avenue South
Iselin, NJ 08830
EXAMINER
PHANTANA ANGKOOL, DAVID
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2175
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
02/12/2013 PAPER
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.
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte RAPHAEL IMHOF
____________

Appeal 2010-010502
Application 10/463,818
Technology Center 2100
____________

Before SALLY C. MEDLEY, JOSIAH C. COCKS,
and DAVID C. McKONE, Administrative Patent Judges.

McKONE, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a Final Rejection of
claims 1-18 and 22-25, which constitute all the claims pending in this
application. See App. Br. 2. Claims 19-21 are cancelled. See id. We have
jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm-in-part.

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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant’s invention relates to monitoring building control systems
over the Internet. See, e.g., Spec. 1:6-8. Claim 1, which is illustrative of the
invention, reads as follows:
1. A method, comprising:
a) receiving at least one interpreted program over
the Internet using a web-browser, and receiving at least
first data defining a graphical element;
b) executing at least one interpreted software
program to display at least a first graphical element, the
first graphical element having a fixed element and a
variable element, the fixed element derived from the first
data defining a graphical element, the variable element
representative of a first value, the first value
representative of first data from a building control
system;
c) executing, subsequent to steps a) and b) at least
one interpreted software program to receive at least a
second value over the Internet, the second value
comprising nongraphical information representative of
second data from a building control system;
d) executing at least one interpreted software
program to display the first graphical element such that
the variable element is representative of the second value,
and displaying the fixed element using the first graphical
data received in step a).

THE REJECTIONS
The Examiner relies on the following prior art in rejecting the claims:
Sharood US 6,453,687 B2 Sept. 24, 2002
Ram US 2003/0004853 Al Jan. 2, 2003
Humpleman US 6,546,419 B1 Apr. 8, 2003
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Claims 1, 2, 9-13, 16-18, and 23-25 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Sharood and Ram. See Ans. 3-10.
Claims 3-8, 14, 15, and 22 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over Sharood, Ram, and Humpleman. See Ans. 10-12.

ISSUES
Appellant presents his arguments for independent claim 1. See App.
Br. 7-14. Appellant only nominally argues claims 2-18 and 22-25
separately. See App. Br. 14-15.
The Examiner finds that Sharood teaches or suggests each limitation
of claim 1 except for “executing, subsequent to steps a) and b) at least one
interpreted software program to receive at least a second value over the
Internet.” See Ans. 4. The Examiner finds that Ram discloses this limitation
and concludes that a person of ordinary skill in the art would have modified
Sharood with the teachings of Ram to “allow[] a component to communicate
with [an]other system independently and allow the system to provide a
dynamic, graphically intuitive, fast graphical user interface to the user.”
Ans. 4-5.
The issues are whether Sharood and Ram teach or suggest:
“c) executing, subsequent to steps a) and b) at least one interpreted
software program to receive at least a second value over the Internet, the
second value comprising nongraphical information representative of second
data from a building control system.” See App. Br. 9-12; and
“d) executing at least one interpreted software program to display the
first graphical element such that the variable element is representative of the
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second value, and displaying the fixed element using the first graphical data
received in step a).” See App. Br. 12-14.

ANALYSIS
REJECTION OF CLAIMS 1, 2, 9-13, 16-18, AND 23-25 UNDER 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
Claims 1, 2, and 9-11
Sharood is directed to a system for monitoring appliances such as
refrigerators and HVAC systems. See Sharood, Abstract. In one
embodiment, a user can view information about an HVAC system (e.g., the
temperature and humidity of the home) over an Internet connection using
“home manager software,” which can be delivered as a java file that is
displayed as a graphical user interface (“GUI”) using an Internet browser.
See Sharood, col. 24, ll. 49-58, Fig. 23. The Examiner finds that this
constitutes “receiving at least one interpreted program over the Internet
using a web-browser, and receiving at least first data defining a graphical
element,” as recited in claim 1. Ans. 3.
The Examiner also finds that the “Hours” units and the “Temperature”
units corresponding to the graph shown in Figure 23 are “fixed element[s]”
of a first graphical element, while the graph itself is a “variable element”
representative of a “first value.” Ans. 3-4. The Examiner identifies the
“Temperature: 84ºF” shown in Figure 23 as a “second value comprising
non-graphical information representative of second data from a building
control system.” Ans. 4. According to the Examiner, Figure 23 shows that
the 84ºF “correlates to” the temperature graph, thus showing step d’s
“executing at least one interpreted software program to display the first
graphical element such that the variable element is representative of the
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second value, and to display the fixed element using the first graphical data
received in step a).” Id.
The Examiner acknowledges that Sharood does not teach “executing,
subsequent to steps a) and b) at least one interpreted software program to
receive at least a second value over the Internet,” but finds that this is shown
in Ram. Id. Ram teaches an interactive graphical front end system,
including a GUI, for trading securities. See Ram, Abstract. According to
the Examiner, Ram’s system includes a logical architecture with a plurality
of layers, including a user interface layer, and object layer, and a
communication layer. See Ans. 4. The Examiner finds that these layers
communicate with each other, for example, communicating between the
front end and a back end trading system, using clearly defined interfaces,
presenting the user with a clean and organized structure. See id. The
Examiner finds that Ram “teaches components that may independent[ly]
communicate with other servers and/or systems.” Id.
Appellant argues that the steps of claim 1 require a specific order in
which the first graphical element displayed in step “d” is displayed based on
a “newly received (non-graphical) value combined with previously received
and previously displayed graphical data.” App. Br. 8. According to
Appellant, the fixed element of the graphical data previously displayed in
step “b” is displayed again in step “d” “without requiring the retransmission
of static graphical data.” Id.; see also id. at 9 (step “d” “effectively requires
a second or updated display of a graphical element, using a newly received
second value to generate the variable element, and previously received
graphical data to generate the fixed element.”). Appellant argues that
Sharood does not teach re-displaying a fixed element of a first graphical
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element after a second value is received over the Internet. See App. Br. 9-
10. Instead, Appellant contends, “Sharood teaches that an updated display
contains all newly received graphical data, and not a mix of previously
received data and newly received data.” Reply Br. 3; see also App. Br. 10
(Sharood teaches generating a graphic display that includes a representation
of values, but “does not state when fixed element data and variable element
data is received.”). Thus, Appellant contends, “the Examiner has not
established that . . . Sharood teaches generating an updated display using a
new value for a variable element, and previously received graphical data for
the fixed element.” Id.
The Examiner responds that Appellant is relying on features not
recited in claim 1 to distinguish Sharood. See Ans. 13. In particular, the
Examiner concludes that claim 1 does not preclude “retransmission” of the
fixed element received in step “a” or require “using a newly received second
value to generate the variable element” displayed in step “d.” Ans. 13-14.
The Examiner also concludes that step “d” does not require “generating an
updated display using a new value for a variable element,” and that to
conclude otherwise would be to impermissibly read limitations from the
Specification into the claims. Ans. 15.
Step “d” of claim 1 specifies that the interpreted software program
displays the first graphical element such that the variable element is
“representative of the second value.” According to step “c,” the interpreted
software program receives this second value “subsequent to steps a) and b).”
In step “b,” the first graphical element is displayed with the variable element
“representative of a first value.” According to the language of claim 1, then,
the second value is received “subsequent to” displaying the first graphical
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element with the variable element representing the first value. Since the
second value is received after the first value is displayed, it is in that sense
“newly received.” See Reply Br. 4. Thus, we agree with the Appellant that
step “d” does require the generation of an updated display using a new
(“second”) value for the variable element of the first graphical element.
We also agree with Appellant that claim 1 requires that while the
variable element is displayed with the new value, the fixed element is
displayed using the first graphical data already received; thus the first
graphical data is not re-transmitted. In particular, step “d” of claim 1 recites
“displaying the fixed element using the first graphical data received in step
a).” The first graphical data received in step “a” is displayed in step “b”
(“display at least a first graphical element . . . having a fixed element . . ., the
fixed element derived from the first data defining a graphical element”).
Thus, it is received and displayed before the second value is received in step
“c” and displayed in step “d.” We conclude that reading step “d” to cover
displaying a re-transmitted version of the first graphical data received in step
“a” (e.g., in the case where the entire display of Sharood’s Figure 23 is re-
transmitted and refreshed) is unreasonably broad in light of the language of
claim 1 and the description in the Specification. See, e.g., Spec. 11:21-12:
[W]hile the initial transmission of the executable program and
fixed graphical data over the network 106 requires more
substantial bandwidth, such transmission need not be repeated
for each update to the graphics page. Thus, multiple
subsequent updates to the graphic page displayed at the web
client 108 may occur using little bandwidth, and requiring
relatively short download time. By contrast, prior art devices
transferring completed web pages with significant amounts of
graphical image information with each update require relatively
far more download time.
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Thus, even if a skilled artisan were to conclude that Sharood teaches re-
transmission of Figure 23 with updated values (Appellant admits as much at
Reply Br. 6), the Examiner has not shown that Sharood teaches or suggests
displaying a variable element representing a newly received value and a
fixed element using previously received data.
The Examiner does not contend that Ram teaches the limitations of
step “d” that we find to be missing from Sharood. See Ans. 3-5.
Accordingly, we do not sustain the rejection of: (1) claim 1; and (2)
claims 2 and 9-11, which depend on claim 1.

Claims 12, 13, 16-18, and 23-25
While independent claims 12 and 23 require the display of a variable
element representative of a newly received second value, neither precludes
the re-transmission of a fixed element of a first graphical element. As
Appellant admits, it is “fair to infer that Sharood allows for the update of the
entire display of Fig. 23, for example, when a web page is refreshed.” Reply
Br. 6. Sharood at least suggests that this would include a subsequently
received second value, e.g., a new value for the temperature should the
temperature change. See Ans. 6; see also Sharood, col. 24, ll. 49-50 (“The
universal controller 110 has a monitor function that allows current status of
all connected devices to be viewed.”). Thus, Appellant’s arguments, while
persuasive as to claim 1, are not persuasive as to claims 12 and 23.
Accordingly, we sustain the rejection of: (1) claims 12 and 23; (2)
claims 13 and 16-18, which depend on claim 12; and (3) claims 24 and 25,
which depend on claim 23.
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REJECTION OF CLAIMS 3-8, 14, 15, AND 22 UNDER 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
Claims 3-8 depend on claim 1. Thus, each includes a recitation of the
subject matter that we find has not been taught or suggested by the cited
prior art. The Examiner does not rely on Humpleman to cure the above-
noted deficiency. See Ans. 10-12. Accordingly, we do not sustain the
rejection of claims 3-8.
Claims 14 and 15 depend on claim 12. Claim 22 depends on claim
23. Appellant does not separately argue claims 14, 15, and 22. See App. Br.
14-15. Accordingly, we sustain the rejection of claims 14, 15, and 22 for the
reasons stated above for claims 12 and 23.

ORDER
The decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1-11 is reversed. The
decision to reject claims 12-18 and 22-25 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)(1). See 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.136(a)(1)(iv) (2010).

AFFIRMED-IN-PART

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