Ex Parte Johnson et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

May 7, 2015

11827964 (P.T.A.B. May. 7, 2015)

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.
11/827,964 07/13/2007 Jerry Johnson 500-1-009DIV 2481
33942 7590 05/07/2015
Cha & Reiter, LLC
17 Arcadian Avenue
Suite 208
Paramus, NJ 07652
EXAMINER
WILLOUGHBY, ALICIA M
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2167
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
05/07/2015 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 JERRY JOHNSON, CHRIS KLUCZYK, and RAUL ROM
____________________

Appeal 2013-0027301
Application 11/827,964
Technology Center 2100
____________________

Before JEAN R. HOMERE, CARLA M. KRIVAK, and
DANIEL N. FISHMAN, Administrative Patent Judges.

HOMERE, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s
Final Rejection of claims 76–81. Claims 1–75 have been canceled. App.
Br. 3. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.

1 Appellants identify the real party in interest as ePlus Inc. App. Br. 3.
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Appellants’ Invention
Appellants invented a method for automatically cataloguing non-
electronic content structured into a rich content repository. Spec. 6:4–7. In
particular, upon receiving (at a graphical user interface under the supervision
of authorized personnel) a raw content file containing at least an update
action, the repository references a schema file that utilizes a Common
Language Generator (CLG) to classify the content file by using patterns to
automatically analyze and modify a product item data contained in the file to
thereby assign the modified item data to a corresponding class in the
repository. Spec. 4:8–18, Fig. 1.

Representative Claim
Independent claim 76 is representative, and reads as follows:
76. A method for supplying at least one content input to a
rich-content repository under a user direction, comprising the
steps of:
for said at least one content input performing the steps
of:
providing a graphical user interface for the user to direct
the method;
creating, in a sequence of a plurality of stages under the
user direction, a candidate update file to a rich-content
repository comprising:
i. a raw content file having at least one content
update action, and
ii. a corresponding referencing schema file for
classifying the raw content file via a Common
Language Generator (CLG) using patterns to
automatically analyze and modify product item
data, and assign the modified item to a class;
determining whether to optionally revert back to a
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previous stage of said plurality said at least one
content update action; aggregating in a single
candidate update file said created candidate update
file for each said at least one content input; and
supplying to a rich-content publisher one of an
aggregated content input file or a set comprising
the candidate update file for each said at least one
content input.

Prior Art Relied Upon

Lin et al. US 2003/0005406 A1 Jan. 2, 2003
Bernardo et al. US 6,684,369 B1 Jan. 27, 2004
Daniel et al. US 6,785,689 B1 Aug. 31, 2004
Hare et al. US 6,850,900 B1 Feb. 1, 2005
Blinn et al. US 7,321,901 B1 Jan. 22, 2008
Swanson US 2008/0126221 A1 May 29, 2008
Bargeron et al. US 2010/0017701 A1 Jan. 21, 2010

Rejections on Appeal
The Examiner rejects the claims on appeal as follows:
Claims 76 and 78 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over the combination of Swanson and Blinn.
Claim 77 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over the combination of Swanson, Blinn, and Bargeron.
Claims 79 and 80 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over the combination of Swanson, Blinn, and Daniel.
Claim 81 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over the combination of Swanson, Blinn, Bernardo, Hare, and
Lin.

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ANALYSIS
We consider Appellants’ arguments seriatim as they are presented in
the Appeal Brief, pages 5–19.2

Dispositive Issue: Under 35 U.S.C. § 103, did the Examiner err in finding
the combination of Swanson and Blinn teaches or suggests classifying a raw
content file via a CLG using patterns to modify a product item data and to
assign the modified item data to a class in a rich content repository, as
recited in independent claim 76?
Appellants argue the proffered combination does not teach or suggest
the disputed limitations emphasized above. App. Br. 5–18. We have
reviewed the Examiner’s rejection in light of Appellants’ arguments. We
are unpersuaded by Appellants’ contentions. We adopt as our own the
findings and reasons set forth in the Examiner’s Answer in response to
Appellants’ Appeal Brief. See Ans. 3–11, Final Act. 4-12. However, we
highlight and address specific arguments and findings for emphasis as
follows.
First, Appellants argue the Examiner erred in finding Swanson’s
disclosure of a Content Translation System (CTS) teaches the CLG. App.
Br. 6. According to Appellants, the CTS merely serves as a tool to convert
unstructured content (paper-based) into XML-based structured content for
an intelligent multimedia e-catalog, whereas the CLG uses patterns to

2 Rather than reiterate the arguments of Appellants and the Examiner, we
refer to the Appeal Brief (filed July 6, 2012), and the Answer (mailed Sept.
25, 2012) for their respective details. 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 deemed to be waived. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(vii).
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classify a modified item data. Id. at 8. This argument is not persuasive. As
noted by the Examiner, although Appellants’ Specification discusses the
CLG as a tool that utilizes patterns to translate legacy product descriptions
into easily understood formats, it does not provide a specific definition for
the cited tool. Ans. 3–4 (citing Spec. ¶¶ 19–20). Thus, we agree with the
Examiner that because Swanson’s CTS utilizes a scheme (180) that
generates transformation files by extracting patterns from various sources
(documents, rules, illustrations) to translate legacy documents into XML
documents, it reasonably teaches the CLG. Id. (citing Swanson ¶¶ 55, 59,
86, 97), Fig. 4.
Second, Appellants argue the combination of Swanson and Blinn is
further deficient because it requires user intervention. App. Br. 6–8 (see
e.g., App. Br. 7 “The assignment of a product to a class is performed by the
user.”). This argument is also unpersuasive. As noted by the Examiner, the
claim similarly requires user intervention because the item data classification
operation recited therein is performed with the assistance of a graphical user
interface and under the direction of a user. Ans. 5–6. Therefore, the user
intervention as taught by Swanson and Blinn does not vitiate the disputed
claim language. Further, regarding Appellants’ argument that the
classification method is automated (App. Br. 12–14), we agree with the
Examiner that Blinn’s disclosure of a Manufacturer Administration Tool
(MAT) disclosed by Blinn to add and modify specification data in a product
class would predictably facilitate the automatic classification of received
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legacy data into corresponding XML data in the database.3 Ans. 4–6 (citing
to Blinn 9:13–43). Therefore, we concur with the Examiner’s finding that,
similarly to the disputed limitations, the Swanson-Blinn combination teaches
a user-assisted mechanism receiving raw data, and an automated mechanism
for processing the entered data into rich content data subsequently classified
in a repository. Id. at 6.
Hence, we agree that the cumulative weight and the totality of the
evidence on this record reasonably support the Examiner’s finding that the
combined disclosures of Swanson and Blinn would have taught or suggested
the disputed limitations. Accordingly, Appellants have not shown the
Examiner erred in finding that the cited combination of references renders
claim 76 unpatentable.
Regarding the rejections of claims 77–81 to the extent Appellants
either do not present separate patentability arguments or reiterate
substantially the same arguments as those previously discussed for
patentability of claim 76 above, claims 77–81 fall therewith. See 37 C.F.R.
§ 41.37(c)(1)(vii). Further, to the extent Appellants raise additional
arguments for patentability of these claims (App. Br. 14–16), we find the
Examiner has rebutted, in the Answer, each and every one of those
arguments by a preponderance of the evidence. Ans. 11–12; Final Act. 6–
14. We, therefore, adopt the Examiner’s findings and underlying reasoning,
which we incorporate herein by reference. Because Appellants fail to
persuasively rebut the Examiner’s findings regarding the rejections of claims

3 KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 416 (2007). “The combination
of familiar elements according to known methods is likely to be obvious
when it does no more than yield predictable results.”
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77–81, Appellants fail to show error in the Examiner’s rejections of these
claims.

DECISION
We affirm the Examiner’s rejections of claims 76–81 as set forth
above. 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)(iv).

AFFIRMED

ACP