10458449 (B.P.A.I. Sep. 28, 2009)

Ex Parte Obert

Board of Patent Appeals and InterferencesSep 28, 2009

10458449 (B.P.A.I. Sep. 28, 2009)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________ BEFORE THE BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS AND INTERFERENCES ____________ Ex parte JAMES E. OBERT ____________ Appeal 2009-004263 Application 10/458,449 Technology Center 2600 ____________ Decided: September 28, 2009 ____________ Before JOSEPH F. RUGGIERO, MAHSHID D. SAADAT, and MARC S. HOFF, Administrative Patent Judges. SAADAT, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a Final Rejection of claims 1-25, which constitute all the claims pending in the application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We reverse. Appeal 2009-004263 Application 10/458,449 2 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellant’s invention relates to a system and method for asynchronous reporting of printer maintenance data in a printer by setting a hardware trap for a printer power-on event which reports to a harvesting server the printer maintenance data (Spec. 3:5-13). Claim 1, which is illustrative of the invention, reads as follows: 1. A method for asynchronous reporting of printer maintenance data in a printer, comprising the steps of: setting a hardware trap for a printer power-on event in the printer; configuring the hardware trap to report to a harvesting server in response to generation of the hardware trap; generating the printer power-on event using the hardware trap when the printer is powered-on; collecting printer maintenance data in response to the printer power-on event; and sending the printer maintenance data that has been collected, to the harvesting server in order to update the printer maintenance data stored by the harvesting server. The Examiner relies on the following prior art in rejecting the claims: Schlener US 6,182,157 B1 Jan. 30, 2001 Arima US 6,714,744 B2 Mar. 30, 2004 (filed Dec. 26, 2000) Claims 1-3, 9, 10, 12, 14-16, 19-21, 23, and 25 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as being anticipated by Schlener. Appeal 2009-004263 Application 10/458,449 3 Claims 4-8, 11, 13, 17, 18, 22, and 24 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Schlener and Arima. Rather than repeat the arguments here, we make reference to the Briefs and the Answer for the respective positions of Appellant and the Examiner. ISSUE With respect to the anticipation rejection, the Examiner characterizes the teaching of Schlener indicating that “a trap defined by an alarm threshold record can persist over a restart of the network device,” in column 3, lines 8- 11, as the claimed “setting a hardware trap for a printer power-on event” (Ans. 5, 19-20). The Examiner specifically equates the claim term “power- on” with the term “restart” in Schlener (Ans. 20). Appellant contends that, while the terms “trap” and “event” are mentioned in Schlener, the claimed step of “setting a hardware trap for a device power-on event” is not disclosed in the referenced portion in column 3 of Schlener (App. Br. 18-19, 21-22; Reply Br. 5-6). Appellant specifically asserts that Schlener generates a trap after the sample data has crossed a threshold value (App. Br. 20-22). Appellant further argues that the disclosed trap is actually external to the network device since it is disclosed to persist over a restart of the monitored device, indicating that the threshold value in the processor assembly or the memory used for trapping is retained during the restart (Reply Br. 5-6). Therefore, the issue specifically turns on whether Appellant has shown that the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1 as anticipated by Schlener by characterizing the cited “trap defined by an alarm threshold record can persist over a restart of the network device” as the claimed “setting a hardware trap for a printer power-on event.” Appeal 2009-004263 Application 10/458,449 4 FINDINGS OF FACT The following findings of fact (FF) are relevant to the issue involved in the appeal. 1. Schlener describes Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) which defines a trap command by which an agent asynchronously sends information triggered by an event to a manager. (Col. 1, ll. 51-53.) 2. Schlener relates to a mechanism for allowing a user of a management station to dynamically create and flexibly configure a trap based on any Management Information Base (MIB) variable without having to define an exhaustive set of trap definitions in the MIB. (Col. 2, ll. 48-52). 3. Schlener provides for an alarm threshold or trap that can be set for any MIB variable using a table mechanism as a record or an instance in an alarm threshold table. (Col. 3, ll. 7-10.) 4. Schlener further provides for a trap that is defined by an alarm threshold record and can persist over a restart of the network device or agent. (Col. 3, ll. 11-13.) PRINCIPLES OF LAW A rejection for anticipation requires that the four corners of a single prior art document describe every element of the claimed invention, either expressly or inherently, such that a person of ordinary skill in the art could practice the invention without undue experimentation. See Atlas Powder Co. v. IRECO, Inc., 190 F.3d 1342, 1347 (Fed. Cir. 1999); In re Paulsen, 30 F.3d 1475, 1478-79 (Fed. Cir. 1994). Appeal 2009-004263 Application 10/458,449 5 ANALYSIS We disagree with the Examiner’s position reading the claim term “setting a hardware trap for a printer power-on event” on the disclosure of Schlener related to “a trap that is defined by an alarm threshold record and can persist over a restart of the network device.” While Schlener uses a trap command to asynchronously provide information triggered by an event (FF 1), the reference does not specify that the event is a power-on event and the trap is triggered to collect data when the printer is powered on. Actually, Schlener is concerned with providing for flexibly configuring a trap by a user to avoid defining an exhaustive set of trap definitions based on any MIB variable (FF 2). Contrary to the Examiner’s interpretation of the reference teachings (Ans. 19-20), the only mention of anything similar to “power-on” in Schlener is with respect to the restart of the network device (FF 4). However, the disclosed “restart” does not trigger a trap configured to report to a harvesting server when the device is powered on. In fact such reference to the restart of the device relates to a trap that is defined by an alarm threshold record having values set for any MIB variable using a table (FF 3). In view of our analysis of Schlener, we agree with Appellant that the purpose of the reference to dynamically create and flexibly configure a trap (FF 1-2) and the disclosure of a trap defined by an alarm threshold record that can persist over a restart of the network (FF 3-4) is not related to the method recited in claim 1. In that regard, as argued by Appellant (Reply Br. 5), the trap persists over the restart of the network device and remains unaffected by the restart because the trap is not set in the device and is not used to generate a power-on event when the printer is powered on. Appeal 2009-004263 Application 10/458,449 6 CONCLUSION On the record before us and in view of the analysis above, we find that Appellant has shown that the Examiner erred in characterizing the cited “trap defined by an alarm threshold record can persist over a restart of the network device” as the claimed “setting a hardware trap for a printer power- on event,” recited in claim 1 and the other independent claims. Therefore, the 35 U.S.C. § 102 rejection of claims 1-3, 9, 10, 12, 14-16, 19-21, 23, and 25 as anticipated by Schlener cannot be sustained. Additionally, we do not sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103 rejection of the remaining claims over Schlener and Arima since the Examiner has not identified any teachings in Arima that would have overcome the deficiencies discussed above. ORDER The decision of the Examiner rejecting claims 1-25 is reversed. REVERSED Appeal 2009-004263 Application 10/458,449 7 tkl HEWLETT-PACKARD COMPANY Intellectual Property Administration 3404 E. 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