Ex Parte Schwartz et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jan 24, 2017

12910025 (P.T.A.B. Jan. 24, 2017)

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.
12/910,025 10/22/2010 DROR SCHWARTZ 82264352 7172
56436 7590 01/26/2017
Hewlett Packard Enterprise
3404 E. Harmony Road
Mail Stop 79
Fort Collins, CO 80528
EXAMINER
PAULINO, LENIN
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2197
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
01/26/2017 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):
hpe.ip.mail@hpe.com
chris. mania @ hpe. com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte DROR SCHWARTZ, MOSHE ERAN KRAUS,
AMIR KESSNER, SAGI MONZA, and ARNON MATHIAS1
Appeal 2016-001095
Application 12/910,025
Technology Center 2100
Before MICHAEL J. STRAUSS, AMBER L. HAGY, and
DAVID J. CUTITTAII, Administrative Patent Judges.
CUTITTA, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
This is an appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Final Rejection of
claims 1, 3, 6—8, 11—14, 16, 17, and 19-24.2 We have jurisdiction over this
appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We REVERSE.
1 According to Appellants, the real party in interest is Hewlett-Packard
Development Company, LP. See Appeal Brief 1.
2 Claims 2, 4, 5, 9, 10, 15, and 18 have been cancelled. See Appeal Brief
Claims Appx. i.
Appeal 2016-001095
Application 12/910,025
BACKGROUND
The claimed invention relates to assisting with the reliable
identification of objects in a software application or document, such as a
web application or web page. Spec. 1 8.3 Claims 1, 8, and 14 are
independent. Claims 1 and 8 are illustrative and are reproduced below with
disputed limitations emphasized:
1. A method, comprising:
detecting, by a system having a processor, an operation of
a software application performed at a first time on a target object;
generating, by the system, an automation script containing
the operation;
identifying, by the system prior to execution of the
automation script, relations between the target object and other
objects within the software application;
ranking, by the system, the identified relations in
accordance with usefulness of each relation with respect to
identifying the target object at a later time, wherein the ranking
is based on different types of the identified relations;
eliminating, based on the ranking, at least one of the
identified relations to form a subset of the identified relations that
excludes the eliminated at least one identified relation;
testing, by the system, the identified relations in the subset
to determine which of the identified relations in the subset are
useful for identifying the target object so that the operation can
be performed on the target object;
3 Throughout this Opinion, we refer to: (1) Appellants’ Specification filed
Oct. 22, 2010 (“Spec.”); (2) the Final Office Action (“Final Act.”) mailed
Dec. 5, 2014; (3) the Appeal Brief (“Appeal Br.”) filed Apr. 9, 2015; (4) the
Examiner’s Answer (“Ans.”) mailed Aug. 28, 2015; and (5) the Reply Brief
(“Reply Br.”) filed Oct. 27, 2015.
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Appeal 2016-001095
Application 12/910,025
based on the testing, generating, by the system, a set of the
useful relations corresponding to the target object;
after generating the set of the useful relations, executing
the automation script to replay the operation; and
attempting, by the system, identification of the target
object during the replay using the set of the useful relations.
8. An article comprising at least one non-transitory
computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that
upon execution cause a system having a processor to:
receive an automation script containing a representation of
an operation performed at a first time on a target object within a
software application;
prior to executing the automation script to replay the
operation on the target object,
generate a set of relationships between the target object
and other objects within the software application;
receive attributes of the target object that the target object
had at the first time; and
first attempt to identify the target object using the
attributes without using any of the relationships;
second attempt to identify the target object using the
relationships;
compare results of the first attempt with results of the
second attempt;
refine the set of relationships based on the compared
results; and
after refining the set of relationships, execute the
automation script to replay the operation on the target object
using the refined set of relationships to identify the target object
during the replay.
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Appeal 2016-001095
Application 12/910,025
REFERENCES
The art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on appeal:
McGrath et al. (“McGrath”)
Patterson
Boulineau et al. (“Boulineau”)
Bixon et al. (“Bixon”)
US 2004/0194054 Al
US 7,165,240 B2
US 2008/0313595 Al
US 2009/0125876 Al
Sept. 30, 2004
Jan. 16, 2007
Dec. 18, 2008
May 14, 2009
REJECTIONS
Claims 1,3, 6—8, 11—17, 19, and 21—23 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Patterson, McGrath, and Bixon. Final
Act. 6-21.
Claims 20 and 24 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Patterson, McGrath, Bixon, and Boulineau. Final Act.
21-24.
Our review in this appeal is limited only to the above rejections and
issues raised by Appellants. We have not considered other possible issues
that have not been raised by Appellants and are, therefore, not before us.
See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(l)(iv) (2014).
ISSUES
1. Based on Appellants’ arguments, the dispositive issue presented
on appeal for claim 1 is whether the Examiner errs in finding that the cited
combination of references teaches or suggests “ranking, by the system, the
identified relations in accordance with usefulness of each relation with
respect to identifying the target object at a later time, wherein the ranking is
based on different types of the identified relations,” as recited in claim 1.
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Appeal 2016-001095
Application 12/910,025
2. Based on Appellants’ arguments, the dispositive issue presented
on appeal for claim 8 is whether the Examiner errs in finding that the cited
combination of references teaches or suggests “first attempt to identify the
target object using the attributes without using any of the relationships;
second attempt to identify the target object using the relationships,” as
recited in claim 8.
ANALYSIS
Claim 1
The Examiner finds Bixon teaches or suggests the disputed features of
independent claim 1. Final Act. 3—4, 6—9; Ans. 2-4 (citing Bixon || 8, 19,
20, 24).
Appellants note Bixon refers to relations but argue Bixon “does not
provide any teaching or hint that such relations are ranked in accordance
with usefulness of each relation with respect to identifying the target object
at a later time.” Appeal Br. 9 (citing Bixon 119).
We agree with Appellants the Examiner has not demonstrated that
these findings are supported by the teachings or suggestions of Bixon.
Bixon seeks to identify objects to be tested after a change is made to a
particular object. Bixon | 6. The Examiner finds the particular object or
objects that are changed correspond to the claimed target object. Ans. 2.
Bixon ranks objects based on the likelihood objects will need to be tested
due to the change in the target object based on relationships the objects have
to each other and to the target object and based on human rules. Bixon
H 10—12, 19. The Examiner relies on Bixon’s ranking of objects to suggest
“ranking,” as claimed. Ans. 2. Specifically, the Examiner finds “Bixon
teaches (‘[t]he logic determination 201 sorts (i.e., ranks) the other objects
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Appeal 2016-001095
Application 12/910,025
that directly use the one or more changed objects (i.e., target object) into
types (i.e., relations).” Ans. 2. We agree, however, that Bixon does not
suggest ranking the identified relations in accordance with usefulness of
each relation in identifying the target object but instead ranks based on the
likelihood objects will need to be tested due to changes in the target object.
For example Bixon discloses,
[a] subset of the objects 208, 210, 212, 214 is collected as more
useful than other objects of the plurality of available objects for
notification to a user 110 of the application 206 in view of the
changed object. . . The output 216 comprises an indication of
thee [sic] subset of objects 208, 210, 212, 214 that are to be
tested due to the changed object on the application 206.
Bixon 119 (emphasis added).
Accordingly, we concur with Appellants that the Examiner has failed
to establish Bixon teaches, suggests, or renders obvious “ranking, by the
system, the identified relations in accordance with usefulness of each
relation with respect to identifying the target object at a later time,” as
recited in claim 1.
Because we agree with at least one of the dispositive arguments
advanced by Appellants for claim 1, we need not reach the merits of
Appellants’ other contentions.
We therefore reverse the Examiner’s 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) rejection of
claim 1. We also reverse the rejection of independent claim 14, which
recites commensurate limitations, and of dependent claims 3, 6, 7, 16, 17,
19, 20, 21, 22, and 24, which stand with their respective independent claims.
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Appeal 2016-001095
Application 12/910,025
Claim 8
In the Final Action, the Examiner finds the first and second iterations
of Bixon’s first algorithm 201 teach or suggest a “first attempt” and “second
attempt,” as recited in claim 8. Final Act. 4—5. In the Answer, however, the
Examiner changes the basis of this rejection by instead finding Bixon’s
second algorithm 204 teaches or suggests a “first attempt” and Bixon’s first
algorithm 201 teaches or suggests a “second attempt,” as recited in claim 8.
Ans. 5 (citing Bixon H 21, 29).
In the Reply Brief, Appellants rebut these new findings. More
specifically, Appellants argue the Examiner errs in rejecting claim 8 because
the second algorithm of Bixon does use a relationship between objects and
therefore the second algorithm cannot be equated with the first attempt of
claim 8, which identifies the target object without using any of the
relationships between the target object and other objects. Reply Br. 9.
More specifically, Appellants argue,
[t]he Examiner equated the second algorithm of Bixon with this
first attempt. The second algorithm of Bixon “tells whether or
not the dependency between that table 218 and that function 308
is significant for testing.” For the second algorithm to tell
whether or not the dependency between the table and the function
is significant for testing requires the second algorithm to use the
dependency between the table and the function. The fact that the
second algorithm uses rules (Bixon, | [0021]), does not change
the fact that Bixon also uses the dependency between the table
and the function. In contrast, according to claim 8, the first
attempt is to identify the target object using the attributes
without using any of the relationships between the target
object and other objects within the software application.
Reply Br. 9.
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Appeal 2016-001095
Application 12/910,025
We find Appellants’ arguments persuasive because we agree the
Examiner fails to establish Bixon suggests attempting to identify the target
object using the attributes without using any of the relationships between
objects. Bixon indicates that “application 206 may comprise a plurality of
types of objects, for example, tables 218, [and] functions 308.” Bixon 112.
Bixon also indicates the first algorithm 202 finds dependencies between
tables 218 and functions 308 and the second algorithm 204 indicates whether
or not the dependency is significant for testing. Bixon 129. Because we
agree that a dependency between objects suggests a relationship between the
objects, we agree that Bixon’s second algorithm 204 uses the relationship
between the table and the function to indicate whether the relationship is
significant for testing. Accordingly, we agree the Examiner fails to establish
Bixon teaches or suggests “first attempt to identify the target object using
the attributes without using any of the relationships [between objects],” as
recited in claim 8.
Because we agree with at least one of the dispositive arguments
advanced by Appellants for claim 8, we need not reach the merits of
Appellants’ other contentions. We also reverse the rejection of dependent
claims 11, 12, 13, and 23, which stand with independent claim 8.
DECISION
We reverse the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1, 3, 6—8, 11—14,
16, 17, and 19-24 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).
REVERSED
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