Ex Parte Kim

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jan 31, 2013

11583397 (P.T.A.B. Jan. 31, 2013)

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.
11/583,397 10/19/2006 Chul-Woo Kim 1235-164 3828
66547 7590 02/01/2013
THE FARRELL LAW FIRM, P.C.
290 Broadhollow Road
Suite 210E
Melville, NY 11747
EXAMINER
LIAO, HSINCHUN
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2649
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
02/01/2013 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 CHUL-WOO KIM
____________

Appeal 2011-006234
Application 11/583,397
Technology Center 2600
____________

Before JOSEPH L. DIXON, ST. JOHN COURTENAY III, and
CARLA M. KRIVAK, Administrative Patent Judges.

DIXON, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

Appeal 2011-006234
Application 11/583,397

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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a rejection of claims
8, 9, 13, and 14. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.

INVENTION
The claims are directed to connecting to a peripheral Bluetooth device
from a mobile terminal. Claim 8, reproduced below, is illustrative of the
claimed subject matter:
8. A method of automatically connecting to a
peripheral Bluetooth device and service in a mobile
communication terminal having a Bluetooth module,
comprising the steps of:

determining, upon input of a key, whether the key
includes a Bluetooth mode key;

transitioning to a Bluetooth mode if the key is the
Bluetooth mode key;

detecting a Bluetooth device or service corresponding to
the key as a short key;

connecting to the Bluetooth device or service; and

displaying a short input error message or generating an
error alarm if the Bluetooth device or service corresponding to
the short key is not detected,

wherein the inputted key sequentially includes the
Bluetooth mode key and the short key.

Appeal 2011-006234
Application 11/583,397

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REFERENCES
The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on
appeal is:
Dervarics

Jeoung

Asai
US 6,553,240 B1

US Pat. Pub. 2001/0003097 A1

US Pat. Pub. 2005/0257052 A1
Apr. 22, 2003

June 7, 2001

Nov. 17, 2005
(filed Apr. 18, 2005)

REJECTION
Claims 8, 9, 13, and 14 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over Asai, Jeoung, and Dervarics.

ANALYSIS
Regarding independent claim 8, Appellant contends that “Asai teaches
that the Bluetooth mode must first be activated, and then a connection
command must be entered, and then a selection of a device must be made.
Thus, Asai requires at least 3 input commands from a user.” (App. Br. 8).
Further, Appellant contends that “Jeoung discloses short keys. However,
even if the short keys of Jeoung were combined with the Bluetooth mode of
Asai, at least 3 short keys would be required.” (Id). In contrast, Appellant
contends, “only 2 key entries are required by independent Claim 8 to
connect to a device.” (Id). Additionally, Appellant contends that “Jeoung
teaches short keys, but none of those short keys correspond to either a
Bluetooth device or service. Thus, the short keys of Jeoung cannot be
Appeal 2011-006234
Application 11/583,397

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equated with a Bluetooth device or service corresponding to a short key as
recited in independent Claim 8.” (Id).1 We disagree.
We begin by construing the phrase “input of a key” in claim 8. As
recited in claim 8, “the inputted key sequentially includes the Bluetooth
mode key and the short key.” We look to the Specification to shed light on
the meaning of the terms “Bluetooth mode key” and “short key” in order to
determine the meaning of the “inputted key.” The Specification describes
that a “keypad 210 is provided with digit keys 0 to 9 and function keys
including Menu, Cancel (Clear), OK, Talk, End, . . .” and that the “keypad
210 provides key input data corresponding to a pressed key to the
[microprocessor unit] MPU 200.” (Spec. 6:14-17). Further, a “touch pad
may [be] use[d] as an input means. In this case the touch pad includes a
plurality of touch elements for inputting characters, numerals and directional
function. Here, each touching element is corresponding to each key of the
keypad.” (Spec. 6:19-22). The Specification then describes, with reference
to Figures 4, 5A, and 5B, invoking Bluetooth service with respect to a
particular external device as follows:
If a key is entered, the MPU 200 determines whether the
key includes a Bluetooth mode key in step 403. For example,
for the input of “#1”, the MPU 200 recognizes the Bluetooth
mode key “#”, as illustrated in FIG. 5A.
. . .
In the presence of the Bluetooth mode key, the MPU 200
transitions to the Bluetooth mode in step 405 and detects a
peripheral Bluetooth device or service corresponding to the
entered short key in the Bluetooth short key table in step 407. . .

1 Neither Appellant’s Appeal Brief nor Reply Brief contain page numbers.
Our numbering for citation purposes begins on the pages titled “Appellant’s
Brief on Appeal” and “Appellant’s Reply Brief,” respectively.
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Application 11/583,397

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In step 409, the MPU 200 connects to the peripheral
Bluetooth device or service, as illustrated in FIG. 5B. Then the
MPU 200 ends the process.

(Spec. 8:5-22). In light of the above description, we conclude the scope of
the claimed “Bluetooth mode key” and “short key” broadly encompasses
physical keys—either push buttons or touch pad elements—that, when
activated by a user in sequence, cause the mobile communication terminal to
recognize that the user commands the terminal to enter Bluetooth mode, and
that the user wishes to connect to the particular Bluetooth device indicated
by the particular “short key” activated. Thus, the claimed “inputted key” is
not itself a physical key, but refers to the result of the user having activated
the “Bluetooth mode key” and “short key” in sequence.
With this construction, we agree with the Examiner and find that the
combination of Asai, Jeoung, and Dervarics discloses the claimed “input of a
key . . . wherein the inputted key sequentially includes the Bluetooth mode
key and the short key,” as recited in claim 8. Specifically, Appellant’s
argument that the Examiner’s combination requires three keys instead of two
keys (App. Br. 8) is not persuasive because claim 8 does not preclude an
additional key. That is, claim 8 uses the open-ended language “comprising
the steps of” and “includes the Bluetooth mode key and the short key.” In
any case, Asai does not actually require three separate user inputs. Rather,
Asai discloses that a user inputs a first command to activate the Bluetooth
application, and a second command to select a particular Bluetooth device
(Ans. 8; Asai, ¶¶ [0029]-[0033]). These two commands correspond to steps
S1 and S5 in Asai’s Figure 3 (Asai, ¶¶ [0038]-[0041]). As shown in Figure
3, the connection command S2 that Appellant alleges requires a separate
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Application 11/583,397

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user input (see App. Br. 8) is in fact performed by the Bluetooth application
without further input by the user (see Asai, ¶¶ [0039], Fig. 3). Further,
Appellant’s Reply Brief argument that in claim 8 “a single key is pressed
‘the key’, and this key press acts as the Bluetooth mode key and the short
key” (Reply Br. 2) is not persuasive because as discussed above, the claimed
“inputted key” includes activation of two separate physical keys.
Additionally, Appellant’s argument that “none of [Jeoung’s] short
keys correspond to either a Bluetooth device or service” (App. Br. 8) is not
persuasive because the Examiner’s obviousness conclusion relies on the
collective teachings of the references. As Appellant admits, Asai discloses
invoking Bluetooth service with respect to an external device through user
commands (see App. Br. 7). Appellant does not provide evidence or specific
arguments showing that it would not have been obvious to implement
Jeoung’s short keys in Asai’s Bluetooth system to input the user commands.
We are therefore not persuaded that the Examiner erred in rejecting
independent claim 8. Although Appellant nominally argues independent
claim 13 (App. Br. 9) and dependent claims 9 and 14 (App. Br. 10)
separately, Appellant relies on the same arguments presented for
independent claim 8. Therefore, we also sustain the rejection of claims 9,
13, and 14 for the reasons discussed above.

Appeal 2011-006234
Application 11/583,397

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CONCLUSION OF LAW
The Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 8, 9, 13, and 14 under 35
U.S.C. § 103(a).

DECISION
For the above reasons, we affirm the rejection of claims 8, 9, 13, and
14.
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). See 37
C.F.R. § 41.50(f).

AFFIRMED

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