Ex Parte Schmeink et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardJan 19, 201813132945 (P.T.A.B. Jan. 19, 2018) Copy Citation 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. 13/132,945 10/06/2011 Anke Schmeink 2008P01422WOUS 9216 24737 7590 01/23/2018 PTTTT TPS TNTFT T FfTTTAT PROPFRTY fr STANDARDS EXAMINER 465 Columbus Avenue CHOI, YUK TING Suite 340 Valhalla, NY 10595 ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2153 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 01/23/2018 ELECTRONIC 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. Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the following e-mail address(es): patti. demichele @ Philips, com marianne. fox @ philips, com katelyn.mulroy @philips .com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte ANKE SCHMEINK, SANDRA GEISLER, ANDREAS BRAUERS, and CHRISTOPH JOSEF QUIX Appeal 2016-000428 Application 13/132,9451 Technology Center 2100 Before THU A. DANG, LARRY J. HUME, and JAMES W. DEJMEK, Administrative Patent Judges. DEJMEK, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Final Rejection of claims 1—20. We have jurisdiction over the pending claims under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm. 1 Appellants identify Koninklijke Philips N.V. as the real party in interest. App. Br. 2. Appeal 2016-000428 Application 13/132,945 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Introduction Appellants’ disclosed and claimed invention is directed to a method for “linking data of a data source to a target database.” Spec. 1:2—3. Claim 1 is representative of the subject matter on appeal and is reproduced below with the disputed limitation emphasized in italics'. 1. A method comprising: accessing a target database comprising at least one table associated with a first concept or property of a reference ontology; defining a data source ontology for a data source comprising a dataset, said data source ontology comprising a second concept or property, wherein said second concept or property is different from said first concept or property, wherein the reference ontology is different than the data source ontology; and creating a link between said second concept or property of the data source ontology and said first concept or property of the reference ontology, said link defining to which table of said target database data of said dataset, associated with said second concept or property of the data source ontology, is related. The Examiner’s Rejections 1. Claims 1—8 and 10—19 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Fox et al. (US 2005/0149484 Al; July 7, 2005) (“Fox”) and Dheap et al. (US 2007/0226246 Al; Sept. 27, 2007) (“Dheap”). Final Act. 4—9. 2. Claims 9 and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Fox, Dheap, and Kamran Munir, Mohammed Odeh, and Richard McClatchey, Ontology Assisted Query Reformulation Using the 2 Appeal 2016-000428 Application 13/132,945 Semantic and Assertion Capabilities of OWL-DL Ontologies, IDEAS08 (ACM 978-1-60558-188) 81-90 (2008) (“Munir”). Final Act. 9-10. ANALYSIS2 In relevant part, claim 1 recites “creating a link between said second concept or property of the data source ontology and said first concept or property of the reference ontology.” Independent claim 11 recites a similar limitation. Appellants argue Fox, as relied on by the Examiner, does not disclose or suggest a link between properties, but rather “a link between classes.” App. Br. 3^4 (emphasis omitted); Reply Br. 2—3. As an initial matter, we note the claim language is not limited to creating a link between properties, but may create a link between concepts of the data source ontology and reference ontology. Additionally, the claim may be interpreted to create a link between a concept of the data source ontology and a property of the reference ontology. Still further, the claim may also be interpreted to create a link between a property of the data source ontology and a concept of the reference ontology. Figure 6 of Fox, as relied upon by the Examiner is illustrative and is reproduced below: 2 Throughout this Decision, we have considered the Appeal Brief, filed March 10, 2015 (“App. Br.”); the Reply Brief, filed October 5, 2015 (“Reply Br.”); the Examiner’s Answer, mailed August 14, 2015 (“Ans.”); and the Final Office Action, mailed September 15, 2014 (“Final Act.”), from which this Appeal is taken. 3 Appeal 2016-000428 Application 13/132,945 SQQ TABLE Ti Cl C2 j C3 04 m ~*v 600 TABLE T2 Dl D2 j . D3 D4 m ... Q3~ PloS FIG. 6 Figure 6 of Fox illustrates a mapping from an RDBS (Relational Database Schema) into an ontology model. Fox | 80. As shown, Table T1 is mapped to Class Kl, wherein Columns Cl, C2, C3, and C4 are mapped to properties PI, P2, P3, and P4, respectively. Fox 1138. Similarly, Table T2 is mapped to Class K2, wherein Columns Dl, D2, and D4 are mapped to properties Ql, Q2, and Q4, respectively. Fox 1139; see also Fox 155 (representing table columns of the source and target RDBS in terms of properties of the ontology model). Fox describes Column Cl of Table T1 as a key for identifying a row in which an entry is situated and Column D3 of Table T2 refers to Table T1 by use of the key. Fox 1139. “That is, each entry of column D3 refers to a row within table Tl, and specifies such row by use of 4 Appeal 2016-000428 Application 13/132,945 the key from Cl for the row.” Fox 1139. Additionally, as shown in Figure 6, “Property S has as its source class K1 and as its target class K2.” Fox 1140. Column D3 corresponds to a composite property PIoS, where o denotes a function composition. Fox 1141; see also Fox, Fig. 6 (“Q3 = PloS”). Fox recites “column D3 corresponds to property PI of S(K2).” Fox 1141. Fox also discloses “[b]y mapping the source and target RDBS into a common ontology model, the present invention derives interrelationships among their tables and fields.” Fox 1128. Appellants assert “S is [a] property and not a link . . . [and] the composite property PloS is [a] property and not a link” but fail to provide sufficient persuasive argument or evidence in support of their position that S or PloS is not a link within the meaning of Appellants’ claim. Reply Br. 2— 3; see also In re Geisler, 116 F.3d 1465, 1470 (Fed. Cir. 1997) (explaining that mere attorney arguments and conclusory statements, which are unsupported by factual evidence, are entitled to little probative value). As recited in the claim language, as well as Appellants’ Specification, a “link defm[es] to which table of said target database data of said dataset, associated with said second concept or property of the data source ontology, is related.” See claim 1; see also Spec. 3:26—27. The Examiner finds, and we agree, Fox teaches the property (S) creates a link between a concept or property of a data source ontology and a concept or property of a data target ontology (i.e., reference ontology). See Final Act. 5 (citing Fox || 139-141, 145, 146, Figs. 5, 6); Ans. 4—5. In particular, the Examiner finds Fox’s classes K1 and K2, correspond to the claimed second and first concepts, respectively, and that S acts as a link between the two concepts. Final Act. 5. Further, the composite property Q3 (PloS) defines a relationship between the data source and data target. 5 Appeal 2016-000428 Application 13/132,945 Additionally, Appellants belatedly assert for the first time in the Reply Brief that “[i]t would not have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of invention to modify Fox et al. to disclose a link between properties of different ontologies merely because Dheap maps databases of two different financial institutions.” Reply Br. 3. This argument was not made in the Appeal Brief, but could have been, and is not responsive to any new evidence or finding set forth by the Examiner in the Answer. In the absence of a showing of good cause by Appellants, this argument is untimely and deemed waived. Any argument raised in the reply brief which was not raised in the appeal brief, or is not responsive to an argument raised in the [Ejxaminer’s answer, including any designated new ground of rejection, will not be considered by the Board for purposes of the present appeal, unless good cause is shown. 37 C.F.R. § 41.41(b)(2) (2014); see also Ex parte Nakashima, 93 USPQ2d 1834, 1837 (BPAI2010) (informative) (explaining that arguments and evidence not presented timely in the principal brief, will not be considered when filed in a Reply Brief, absent a showing of good cause explaining why the argument could not have been presented in the principal brief); Ex parte Borden, 93 USPQ2d 1473, 1474 (BPAI 2010) (informative) (“[T]he reply brief [is not] an opportunity to make arguments that could have been made in the principal brief on appeal to rebut the Examiner’s rejections, but were not.”). Nonetheless, Appellants’ argument is unpersuasive because the Examiner sets forth articulated reasoning with rational underpinning—i.e., “in order to retrieve data sets that are stored in different organizations operating within the same domain having different ontologies efficiently.” Final Act. 6 (citing Dheap 11); see also In re Kahn, 441 F.3d 977, 988 (Fed. 6 Appeal 2016-000428 Application 13/132,945 Cir. 2006) (holding the relevant inquiry in an obviousness analysis is whether the Examiner has set forth “some articulated reasoning with some rational underpinning to support the legal conclusion of obviousness”) (cited with approval in KSRInt’l Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007)). For the reasons discussed supra, we are unpersuaded of Examiner error. Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s rejection of independent claim 1. For similar reasons, we also sustain the Examiner’s rejection of independent claim 11, which recites similar limitations and was not argued separately. See App. Br. 4. Further, we sustain the Examiner’s rejections of claims 2—10 and 12—20, which depend therefrom and were not argued separately. See App. Br. 4. DECISION We affirm the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1—20. No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l)(iv). See 37C.F.R. §41.50(f)(2014). AFFIRMED 7 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation