Ex Parte VanDuyn et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Nov 3, 2017

13110715 (P.T.A.B. Nov. 3, 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.
13/110,715 05/18/2011 Luke VanDuyn P2010-03-04.1 (835486) 4038
100597 7590 11/07/2017
KILPATRICK TOWNSEND & STOCKTON LLP (DISH)
DISH Network L.L.C.
1100 Peachtree Street
Suite 2800
Atlanta, GA 30309
EXAMINER
CHEN, CAI Y
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2425
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
11/07/2017 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):
ipefiling@kilpatricktownsend.com
KT S Docketing2 @ kilpatrick. foundationip .com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte LUKE VANDUYN, HENRY GREGG MARTCH,
and MORGAN HADEN KIRBY
Appeal 2017-002992
Application 13/110,7151
Technology Center 2400
Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, JOHNNY A. KUMAR,
and NORMAN H. BEAMER, Administrative Patent Judges.
BEAMER, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s final
rejection of claims 1—3, 5—17, and 21—24. Claim 4 and 18—20 are cancelled.
We have jurisdiction over the pending rejected claims under 35 U.S.C.
§ 6(b).
We reverse.
1 Appellants identify EchoStar Technologies L.L.C. as the real party in
interest. (App. Br. 3.)
Appeal 2017-002992
Application 13/110,715
THE INVENTION
Appellants’ disclosed and claimed invention is directed to filtering
data items according to user input. (Abstract.) Independent claim 1,
reproduced below, is illustrative of the subject matter on appeal:
1. A method of filtering a plurality of data items according
to user input, wherein each of the data items is identified by a
multiple-character identifier, the method comprising:
presenting a collection of individual characters to a user
via a computer device, wherein any of the individual characters
may be selected by the user;
receiving to the computer device a character sequence
from the user having Y characters, wherein the character
sequence comprises at least one character selection selected
from the collection of individual characters, and wherein Y is a
number less than the multiple-character identifier for at least
one data item;
for each character selection of the sequence, associating
at the computer device more than one character from the
collection of individual characters with the character selection;
filtering the plurality of data items via the computer
device based on the associated characters corresponding to each
character selection, wherein the filtering comprises a
comparison of the associated characters of the character
sequence to every Y subset of characters within the multiple-
character identifiers of the data items; and
presenting a list of filtered data items to the user, wherein
at least one data item of the list includes associated characters
of the entire character sequence received from the user as an
internal character string of the at least one data item, and
wherein the internal character string does not include the first
character of the multiple-character identifier of the at least one
data item.
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Appeal 2017-002992
Application 13/110,715
REJECTION
The Examiner rejected claims 1—17 and 21—24 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 102(b) as being anticipated by Christie et al. (US 2008/0167858 Al, pub.
July 10, 2008).2 (Final Act. 3-8.)
ISSUE ON APPEAL
Appellants’ arguments in the Appeal Brief present the following
dispositive issue:3
Whether the Examiner erred in finding Christie discloses the
independent claim 1 limitation, “wherein the internal character string does
not include the first character of the multiple-character identifier of the at
least one data item,” and the commensurate limitations recited in
independent claims 13 and 21. (App. Br. 5—7.)
ANALYSIS
Appellants argue the Examiner errs in finding Christie discloses
searching for internal character strings — i.e., strings that do not include the
first character of the data identifier — as required by the claims. (App. Br.
6.) Appellants cite the disclosure in Christie:
2 Claim 4 is cancelled, and therefore the rejections of claims 1—3, 5—17, and
21—24 are at issue. (App. Br. 11.)
3 Rather than reiterate the arguments of Appellants and the positions of the
Examiner, we refer to the Appeal Brief (filed May 9, 2016) (herein, “App.
Br.”); the Reply Brief (filed Dec. 21, 2016) (herein, “Reply Br.”); the Final
Office Action (mailed Dec. 4, 2015) (herein, “Final Act.”); and the
Examiner’s Answer (mailed Oct. 21, 2016) (herein, “Ans.”) for the
respective details.
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Appeal 2017-002992
Application 13/110,715
The set of strings are compared against a dictionary.
Words in the dictionary that have any of the set of strings as a
prefix are identified (206). As used herein, “prefix” means that
the string is a prefix of a word in the dictionary or is itself a
word in the dictionary.
(Christie 146.) According to Appellants, this passage demonstrates that
“Christie only searches titles that begin with the received character
sequence, or associated letters.” (App. Br. 6.)
The Examiner’s finding to the contrary relies on the following
interpretation of the claim limitation at issue:
Under the broadest reasonable] interpretation, as [long]
as [the] prior art discloses a system to output a single word
character string from a user’s input word search, and the claim
limitation “the internal character string” is reasonably referring
as a whole word of the output single word character string, and
the output single word character string has the first character
that is different from the user’s input word then the claim
limitation is met, in this case, the examiner reasonably
interprets that Christie disclose a user inputs the word string
“rheatre” as illustrated in Fig. 6, and a list of filter word data
string are outputted and presented in the form of candidate
words [el. 608] (para. 44-48, para. 50-52), for example, the
candidate word: “the, theater, there, and etc,” as such the claim
limitation “internal character string” is reasonably referring as
the whole word of the candidate word [i.e., theater], thus at
least one internal character string, “theater,” includes the
associated character [i.e., letters including “hea”1 from the input
word from the user [i.e.,’’rheatre”], and the word “theater” does
not include the first character “r” of the input word string
“rheatre.” As such the above mentioned claimed limitation is
met by Christie.
(Ans. 9-10.)
We do not agree with the Examiner’s above claim interpretation. In
Christie, when a user inputs an “r”, the system searches for words that begin
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Appeal 2017-002992
Application 13/110,715
with “r” as well as “e”, “d”, “f’, and “t”, and because “t” is included in that
group, the word “theater” is among the candidate words. (Christie Fig. 6.)
In terms of claim 1, this group of letters (“r”, “e”, “d”, “f’, and “t”) are
“associated characters” which are compared to the first letter of the words in
the dictionary. (See Reply Br. 3.) In other words, Christie requires a
candidate word in which associated characters match a character string that
includes the first character of the word, contrary to the requirement of the
claims “wherein the internal character string does not include the first
character of the multiple-character identifier of the at least one data item,” as
recited in claim 1. Accordingly, we are constrained by the record to find the
Examiner errs in rejecting independent claims 1,13, and 21.
CONCLUSION
For the reasons stated above, we do not sustain the anticipation
rejections of independent claims 1,13, and 21 over Christie. We also do not
sustain the anticipation rejections of claims 2, 3, 5—12, 14—17, and 22—24
over Christie, which claims depend from claims 1, 13, or 21.
DECISION
We reverse the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1—3, 5—17, and 21—24.
REVERSED
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