Ex Parte Venkatramanan et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardFeb 27, 201712547731 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 27, 2017) 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. 12/547,731 08/26/2009 Hareni K. Venkatramanan 58083-377640 (B1043) 5813 72058 7590 03/01/2017 Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton LLP Adobe Systems, Inc. 58083 Mailstop: IP Docketing - 22 1100 Peachtree Street, Suite 2800 Atlanta, GA 30309-4530 EXAMINER NUNEZ, JORDANY ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2171 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 03/01/2017 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 @ kilpatrickstockton .com jlhice@kilpatrick.foundationip.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte HARENI K. VENKATRAMANAN, M. PRABHAKAR SHENOY, SANKARAM MASB TATA, and KRISHNA REDDY P. Appeal 2016-004178 Application 12/547,7311 Technology Center 2100 Before MICHAEL J. STRAUSS, KEVIN C. TROCK, and PHILLIP A. BENNETT, Administrative Patent Judges. BENNETT, 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—12 and 14—24, which are all of the pending claims. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We REVERSE. 1 Appellants’ Brief (“Br.”) identifies the real party in interest as Adobe Systems Incorporated. Appeal 2016-004178 Application 12/547,731 CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER The claims are directed to combined management of multiple servers. Claims 1, 7, and 15 are independent. Claim 1, reproduced below with the key limitation emphasized, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter: 1. A method, comprising: accessing data identifying a plurality of instances of an application server; presenting a user interface using a display device interfaced to a computing system, the user interface comprising: a visual element corresponding to each instance of the application server; and a difference interface displaying setting values for multiple instances of the application server, wherein setting values are configurable elements for the multiple instances of the application server exposed through an Application Programming Interface and wherein the setting values are displayed for selected settings based on input selecting less than all available settings for inclusion in the difference interface, the difference interface further displaying a visual effect to indicate setting values that differ as between a first instance and a second instance of the application server; receiving a received input via the user interface, the received input changing a value of at least one setting of at least one instance of the application server; and sending an update request to the at least one application server to change the value of the setting. Br. 15 (Claims Appendix). REFERENCES The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on appeal is: Gasser US 6,966,033 B1 Nov. 15,2005 2 Appeal 2016-004178 Application 12/547,731 Hsu Karaila East Langen Quang Brownholtz US 7,703,027 B2 US 2002/0194225 US 2003/0061323 US 2005/0262507 US 2005/0268238 US 2009/0106680 Apr. 20, 2010 A1 Dec. 19, 2002 A1 Mar. 27,2003 A1 Nov. 24,2005 A1 Dec. 1,2005 A1 Apr. 23,2009 REJECTIONS Claims 1, 2, 5, 7, 8, 11, 12, 14—16, 19, and 21 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Gasser, Hsu, and East. Final Act. 2. Claims 3, 4, 6, 9, 10, 17, 18, and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Gasser, Hsu, East, and Brownholtz. Final Act. 9. Claim 22 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Gasser, Hsu, East, and Quang. Final Act. 11. Claim 23 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Gasser, Hsu, East, and Langen. Final Act. 12. Claim 24 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Gasser, Hsu, East, and Karaila. Final Act. 13. ISSUE FOR DECISION Has the Examiner erred in finding Hsu teaches the limitation of “wherein the setting values are displayed for selected settings based on input selecting less than all available settings for inclusion in the difference interface,” as recited in independent claims 1, 7, and 15? 3 Appeal 2016-004178 Application 12/547,731 ANALYSIS As set forth above, claim 1 recites “wherein the setting values are displayed for selected settings based on input selecting less than all available settings for inclusion in the difference interface.” Claims 7 and 152 recite similar limitations and are rejected for similar reasons. Final Act. 4 (claims 1 and 15), 7 (claim 7). In rejecting the independent claims, the Examiner found Hsu teaches that “setting values are displayed for selected settings based on input selecting less than all available settings for inclusion in the difference interface,” citing col. 30,11. 23—34, col. 4,11. 5—15, col. 33,11. 8—11, and col. 17,11.47—55. Final Act. 4, 7. According to the Examiner, these passages teach receiving as input two graphical programs which include a plurality of objects, the objects having attributes. Id. The Examiner finds attributes are “analogized to the claimed ‘settings.’” Ans. 5. The Examiner explains that, by receiving these graphical programs (instead of others), selected settings values are displayed based on an input selecting less than all available settings. Id. Appellants allege Examiner error in finding Hsu teaches the recited “setting values are displayed for selected settings based on input selecting less than all available settings for inclusion in the different interface.” Appellants argue Hsu merely teaches analyzing different portions of a graphical program by receiving a user input selecting two graphical 2 To ensure clarity in this record, we note the inadvertent inclusion of previously deleted language in the version of claim 7 presented in the Claims Appendix. We do not treat the words “or all” as being part of appealed claim 7, as those words were struck from the claim in the Amendment filed August 19, 2014. 4 Appeal 2016-004178 Application 12/547,731 programs. Br. 11. Appellants argue the selections made in Hsu are of selected graphical programs as a whole, and not of any subset of nodes, attributes, or settings within those programs. Appellants argue Hsu teaches objects and/or user interfaces within the selected graphical programs are compared. According to Appellants, Hsu fails to teach “selecting less than all available settings” because all objects in the selected graphical user interfaces are included. Id. We are persuaded by Appellants’ arguments that the Examiner erred. We agree with Appellants that any selections made in Hsu are of graphical programs as a whole, and not any subset of nodes, attributes, or settings within those programs. We disagree with the Examiner’s explanation that in receiving certain graphical programs (to the exclusion of others), selected settings values are displayed based on an input selecting less than all available settings. In our view, Hsu teaches selecting graphical programs for comparison, and Hsu does not teach selecting settings for comparison. Because Hsu does not teach selecting settings for comparison, it also cannot teach “setting values are displayed for selected settings based on input selecting less than all available settings for inclusion in the difference interface.” Constrained by the record before us, we do not sustain the rejection of claims 1,7, and 15. For the same reasons, we do not sustain the rejections of dependent claims 2—6, 8—12, 14, 16—24. DECISION The Examiner’s rejection of claims 1—12 and 14—24 is REVERSED. REVERSED 5 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation