Ex Parte Moore et al

Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences

Oct 8, 2010

09576359 (B.P.A.I. Oct. 8, 2010)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS
AND INTERFERENCES
____________

Ex parte KENNETH B. MOORE and CHRISTOPHER N. WYMAN
____________

Appeal 2009-00-4322
Application 09/576,359
Technology Center 2100
____________

Before LANCE LEONARD BARRY, ST. JOHN COURTENAY III, and
CAROLYN D. THOMAS, Administrative Patent Judges.

COURTENAY, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL1

1 The two-month time period for filing an appeal or commencing a civil
action, as recited in 37 C.F.R. § 1.304, or for filing a request for rehearing,
as recited in 37 C.F.R. § 41.52, begins to run from the “MAIL DATE”
(paper delivery mode) or the “NOTIFICATION DATE” (electronic delivery
mode) shown on the PTOL-90A cover letter attached to this decision.

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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants seek our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134 of the Examiner’s
final decision rejecting claims 14, 15, 25, 26, 28, 29, 34, 35, and 38. Claims
1-13, 16-24, 27, 30-33, and 36-37 were cancelled. We have jurisdiction over
the appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.
Claim 14 is illustrative:
14. An apparatus comprising:

a storage medium having stored thereon a plurality of programming
instructions designed to enable a media player of the apparatus to receive an
identifier of a graphical display object; receive default definition data of a
class related to the graphical display object, the class default definition data
having default values for a first plurality of elements of the graphical display
object;

retrieve custom definition data related the graphical display object, the
custom definition data having custom values for a second plurality of
elements of the graphical display object, one or more of the first and second
elements being the same elements;

build the graphical display object based first, on the custom values of
the second plurality of elements and then, on the default values of the first
plurality of elements that are not included among the second plurality of
elements; and

a processor communicatively coupled to the storage medium to
execute the programming instructions.

Swanson US 5,603,034 Feb. 11, 1997
Takahashi US 5,887,193 Mar. 23, 1999

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Appellants appeal the following rejection:
Claims 14, 15, 25, 26, 28, 29, 34, 35, and 38 stand rejected under 35
U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Takahashi and Swanson.

ISSUE
Under §103, did the Examiner err in finding that the cited references
would have taught or suggested building a graphic display object based first
on the custom values of the second plurality of elements and then on the
default values of the first plurality of elements that are not included among
the second plurality of elements, within the meaning of independent claims
14 and 15?
FACTUAL FINDINGS
1. Appellants’ Specification describes that:
[i]n state 640, the build display process 414 uses the values in
the graphical display object’s definition to create and/or
populate the display for each value in the definition and
proceeds to state 650. In state 650, the build display process
414 uses the default values to create and/or populate the display
for each value not in the graphical display object definition and
proceeds to an end state 660.
(Spec. 11. ll. 3-8)
2. The Examiner states that Takahashi “does not explicitly teach
building the graphical display object based first, on the custom values of the
second plurality of elements and then, on the default values of the first
plurality of elements that are not included among the second plurality of
elements.” (Ans. 4)
3. The Examiner relies on Swanson to teach using default files
when custom files are not available. (Ans. 5). The Examiner states that
according to Swanson “when an app-custom file does not exi[s]t, then the
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graphic resource editor will use the default app-custom . . . (col. 10, lines 13-
14) (i.e., when there is no custom value, default value will be used).”(Ans. 7)
4. Swanson discloses that during the application selection process,
the resource editor searches along predetermined search paths for the
applications app-custom file. If no app-custom file exists for the application,
a default app-custom file is used. (Col. 10, ll. 8-14)

ANALYSIS
The Appellants argue that the cited references do not teach or suggest
building a graphical display object based first, on the custom values of the
second plurality of elements and then, on the default values of the first
plurality of elements that are not included among the second plurality of
elements. (App. Br. 10, 12). We agree.
We note that each of independent claims 14 and 15 recites a graphical
display object that consists of a first and second plurality of elements that
may overlap, i.e., “one or more or more of the first and second elements
being the same elements.” (Claims 14 and 15). Consistent with Appellants’
Specification (Cf. FF 1), the plain language of independent claims 14 and 15
requires that the graphical display object is initially built based on second
custom values of the second plurality of elements of the graphical display
object and then on default values of the first plurality of elements that are
not included among the second plurality of elements. Therefore, each
independent claim on appeal requires the graphical display object to be built
using both custom values and default values that are associated with a
second and first plurality of elements, respectively, where the second and
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first plurality of elements of the graphical display object do not overlap at
the time the graphical display object is built. (Claims 14 and 15).
We note that the Examiner relied upon Swanson to disclose the
aforementioned limitations admitted to be missing from Takahashi. (FF 3).
We find, as acknowledged by the Examiner, (FF 3) that Swanson teaches
using custom values or default values and not both custom and default
values. For example, Swanson discloses that during the application
selection process, the resource editor searches along predetermined search
paths for the applications app-custom file. (FF 4) If no app-custom file
exists for the application, a default app-custom file is used. (Id.).
Thus, we find Swanson teaches using a custom file (i.e., custom
values) or a default file (i.e., default values), in the absence of the custom
file. Therefore, the Examiner has not shown that Swanson uses both custom
and default files (i.e., values) within the meaning of independent claims 14
and 15.
Based on the evidence before us, we find the Examiner erred in
rejecting independent claims 14 and 15. Accordingly, we reverse the
rejection of claims 14 and 15, as well as associated dependent claims 25, 26,
28, 29, 34, 35, and 38 for the reasons discussed above.

DECISION
We reverse the Examiner’s § 103 rejection.

REVERSED

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erc

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