10615054 (B.P.A.I. Mar. 11, 2012)

Ex Parte Manos

Board of Patent Appeals and InterferencesMar 11, 2012

10615054 (B.P.A.I. Mar. 11, 2012)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________ BEFORE THE BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS AND INTERFERENCES ____________ Ex parte JOHN MANOS ____________ Appeal 2010-005589 Application 10/615,054 Technology Center 3600 ____________ Before MURRIEL E. CRAWFORD, HUBERT C. LORIN, and JOSEPH A. FISCHETTI, Administrative Patent Judges. CRAWFORD, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appeal 2010-005589 Application 10/615,054 2 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellant seeks our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134 of the Examiner’s final decision rejecting claims 1 to 18, 20 to 30, 32 to 35, and 38 to 41. We have jurisdiction over the appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We REVERSE. Claim 1 is illustrative: 1. A method, in a computer system, for monitoring service tickets for information technology service providers to ensure that levels of service required to be provided to a customer pursuant to a contractual agreement between the customer and a service provider, are met, the method comprising: inspecting a service ticket in a database to determine a deadline for when a problem associated with the service ticket must be resolved, with the deadline based upon a contractually determined severity of the problem and a corresponding contractually required time for resolution of the problem; displaying, on a display device at the help desk, a graphical display populated with representations of service tickets that have reached a predetermined percentage of the time before their due date; determining a deadline approaching alert time at which a help desk user must be notified that the deadline for resolving the problem must be met; and alerting the help desk user that the deadline for resolving the problem is approaching when the deadline approaching alert time is reached. Appellant appeal the following rejections: 1. Claims 1, 12, and 23 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Jones (US 6,219,648 B1, iss. Apr. 17, 2001), Robert W. Scheifler, et al., The X Window System, 5 ACM Transactions on Graphics, 79-109 (Apr. 1986) (hereinafter “Scheifler”), and Mike Tsykin, Automated Appeal 2010-005589 Application 10/615,054 3 Service Level Reporting : Experience of Implementation, 1-12 (2000) (hereinafter “Tsykin”). 2. Claims 2 to 11, 13 to 18, 20 to 22, 24 to 30, 32 to 33, 34 to 35, and 39 to 40 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Jones, Scheifler, Tsykin, and Riley (US 2002/0123983 A1, pub. Sep. 5, 2002). 3. Claims 38 and 41 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Jones, Scheifler, Riley, and Valerie Quercia, et al., The Definitive Guides to the X Window System, 5-9, 146-47 (1993) (hereinafter “Quercia”). ISSUE Did the Examiner err in rejecting the claims because Jones does not disclose determining a deadline approaching alert time at which the help desk user must be notified that the deadline for resolving the problem must be met? ANALYSIS The Appellant argues that the prior art does not disclose determining a deadline approaching alert time at which a help desk user must be notified that the deadline for resolving the problem must be met. The Examiner relies on column 1 lines 65 to 67 and column 2, lines 1 to 2 of Jones for teaching this subject matter. We find that this portion of Jones discloses providing a notification to alert key personnel or management that outages (i.e., troubles) exist that have exceeded predefined time limits or intervals. As such, we find that Jones discloses an alert that a time for repair has Appeal 2010-005589 Application 10/615,054 4 exceeded a time limit. We find that there is no disclosure of an alert that a time for repair is approaching. Claim 1 of the appealed claims recites determining a deadline for when a problem must be resolved and determining a deadline approaching alert time. As such, two time deadlines are determined in the claim. Although Jones does disclose a deadline for when the problem must be resolved and an alert system to ensure awareness that the deadline has passed, Jones does not disclose determining a deadline approaching time. Therefore, we will not sustain the rejection as it is directed to claim 1. We will also not sustain the rejection as it is directed to the remaining claims because each of these claims recites determining a deadline approaching alert or similar subject matter. DECISION The decision of the Examiner is reversed. REVERSED hh