Ex Parte Vion-DuryDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardMar 21, 201612754812 (P.T.A.B. Mar. 21, 2016) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 121754,812 04/06/2010 62095 7590 03/21/2016 FAY SHARPE I XEROX - ROCHESTER 1228 EUCLID A VENUE, 5TH FLOOR THE HALLE BUILDING CLEVELAND, OH 44115 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Jean-Yves Vion-Dury 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 ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. 20091625USNP-XER2412US01 7417 EXAMINER BLOOMQUIST, KEITH D ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2178 MAILDATE DELIVERY MODE 03/21/2016 PAPER 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. PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte JEAN-YVES VION-DURY Appeal2014-003441 Application 12/754,812 1 Technology Center 2100 Before JOHNNY A. KUMAR, JOHN A. HUDALLA, and MONICA S. ULLAGADDI, Administrative Patent Judges. HUDALLA, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a Final Rejection of claims 1, 2, 4, 6-9, 11-17, and 19-24. Claims 3, 5, 10, and 18 have been canceled. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm-in-part. THE INVENTION Appellant's invention is directed to encoding and handling self- contained and incremental document history for documents encoded in a 1 According to Appellant, the real party in interest is Xerox Corporation. App. Br. 1. Appeal2014-003441 Application 12/754,812 markup language such as Extensible Markup Language (XML). Spec. i-f 1. Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter: 1. A computer-implemented method for processing a markup language document, comprising: receiving a first version of a target document into computer memory; receiving a second version of the target document into computer memory; using a computer memory, encapsulating one of the first and second versions of the target document within an encapsulating document, the encapsulated document being represented in the encapsulating document as a tree of interconnected nodes encoding the entire one of the first and second versions of the document; encoding a change history corresponding to a difference between the first version and second version of the target document, wherein the change history contains a versioning point for each of a plurality of versions of the target document and a respective version identifier; wherein in the encoding of the change history, a diff engine compares the two versions of the target document and outputs the differences between the two versions in a change description language; and wherein at least one of the versioning points contains a version difference derived from the diff engine output; encapsulating the change history within the encapsulating document; providing for receiving a version identifier into computer memory corresponding to one of the versions encapsulated in the encapsulating document; 2 Appeal2014-003441 Application 12/754,812 applying version differences contained within the change history to the version of the target document within the encapsulating document such that, after the version differences are applied, the encapsulated version of the target document represents the versioning point corresponding to the received version identifier; re-encoding the versioning points, which are contained within the change history of the encapsulating document, relative to the focused target document; and outputting the encapsulating document. Reply Br. 25-262 (Claims App.). THE EXAMINER'S REJECTIONS Claims 1, 2, 4, 6-9, 11-13, 16, 17, and 19-21 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Roberts (US 2008/0077848 Al, Mar. 27, 2008), Tsao (US 2003/0149699 Al, Aug. 7, 2003), Aridor (US 7,454,745 R2, Nov. 18, 2008), and Hamburg (US 2001/0049704 Al, nee. 6, 2001). Ans. 2-12. Claims 14 and 15 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Roberts and Hamburg. Ans. 12-14. Claim 22 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Roberts, Hamburg, and Aridor. Ans. 14--15. 2 Throughout this Decision, we make reference exclusively to Appellant's Reply Brief, which Appellant states "may be treated as a substitute for the Appeal Brief filed on August 13, 2013." Reply Br. 8. The Reply Brief appears to include the entirety of Appellant's opening Appeal Brief plus responses to the Examiner's Answer. 3 Appeal2014-003441 Application 12/754,812 Claims 23 and 24 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Roberts, Tsao, Aridor, Hamburg, and Baer (US 2008/0172607 Al, July 17, 2008). Ans. 15-17. ISSUES Does the Examiner err in finding the combination of Roberts, Tsao, Aridor, and Hamburg teaches or suggests "re-encoding the versioning points ... relative to the focused target document," as recited in claim 1? Does the Examiner err in finding the combination of Roberts and Hamburg teaches or suggests "the encoded change history" limitations in claim 14? Does the Examiner err in finding the combination of Roberts and Hamburg teaches or suggests "each version difference of the encoded change history has a link direction which is one of forward and backward," as recited in claim 15? ANALYSIS A. Claims 1, 2, 4, 6--9, 11-13, 16, 17, 19-21, 23, and 24 In the obviousness rejection of claim 1, the Examiner finds Hamburg teaches "re-encoding the versioning points, which are contained within the change history of the encapsulating document, relative to the focused target document."3 Ans. 6-7. Specifically, the Examiner finds this limitation reads on Hamburg's purported re-encoding of changes "from an undo to a 3 The phrase "the focused target document" in claim 1 lacks antecedent basis. In the event of further prosecution, the Examiner should consider rejecting claim 1under35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph, as indefinite. 4 Appeal2014-003441 Application 12/754,812 redo operation" when a user utilizes "commands for stepping through various changes in a document." Id. (citing Hamburg i-fi-135-36). The Examiner also finds "Appellant offers no explanation in the appeal brief of what is meant by 're-encoding versioning points,' nor is there any description of what this operation is in the claim itself." Id. at 18. Appellant argues "Hamburg does not disclose re-encoding versioning points." Reply Br. 10. Specifically, Appellant argues "Hamburg works by deleting the subsequent history from a selected prior state." Id. Appellant further argues Hamburg merely "stores a set of states the state history" and "does not encode the changes between states." Reply Br. 13 (citing Hamburg i129). Contrary to the Examiner's findings, re-encoding versioning points is described in Appellant's Specification. Specifically, "versioning points" are "one or more significant states ... [that] a document adopted during its existence,'' Spec. ,-r 25 (cited at Reply Br. 11 ), and at least one of the versioning points in claim 1 "contains a version difference derived from the diff engine output." Also in claim 1, after "the encapsulated version of the target document" is changed to correspond with "the received version identifier," the versioning points are "re-encode[ d]" relative to the changed version of the target document, i.e., "the focused target document." This is described in paragraph 69 of Appellant's Specification: "The focusing module 116 then re-encodes the focused encapsulating document 20 such that the target XML document and history contained within the encapsulating document reflect the version state indicated by the input version number 106." Spec. i169 (quoted at Reply Br. 11). For example, when a new versioning point is created, re-encoding can include changing 5 Appeal2014-003441 Application 12/754,812 "the previous versioning points ... [to] include new deltas which will allow transformation from the previous versioning points ... to the new versioning point 26." Id. i-f 97 (quoted at Reply Br. 11). In general, "delta elements ... capture the transition from the focused versioning point ... to another versioning point," such as "[a] forward link [that] links a prior version to a later version, and a backward link [that] links a later version to a prior version." Spec. i-f 41; see also id. at Fig. 4 B ("bwd" delta element 54 and "fwd" delta element 56). As summarized by Appellant, re-encoding therefore "entails encoding [the] delta encodings again so that the backward (and/or forward) transitions from the currently focused version of the document to the other versioning points is available." Reply Br. 12. Hamburg teaches "[t]he state of the document is recorded in the state history after the user makes a change to the document that changes the state of the document." Hamburg i-f 29 (cited at Ans. 5). Moreover, "[ w ]hen a document state is recorded, it is appended as an item at the end of the history list portion 206." Id. i-f 30 (cited at Ans. 5). The Examiner characterizes these states as "undo or redo operations relative to a currently active version of a target document." Ans. 18. Yet the Examiner has not cited to any portion of Hamburg in which undo or redo operations are encoded or re- encoded "relative to the focused target document," as recited in claim 1. In fact, Hamburg teaches that a state history "provides a way to implement multiple undo efficiently while avoiding operation sequence dependencies." Hamburg i-f 15 (emphasis added). Avoiding operating sequence dependencies is contrary to the recited versioning points, which are re- encoded "relative to the focused target document." We therefore agree with Appellant that Hamburg does not teach "encod[ing] the changes between 6 Appeal2014-003441 Application 12/754,812 states," Reply Br. 13, so the Examiner errs in applying Hamburg for teaching "re-encoding the versioning points ... relative to the focused target document," as recited in claim 1. Under these circumstances, the Examiner's rejection of claim 1 cannot stand. For these reasons, we are persuaded of error in the Examiner's rejection of claim 1, so we do not sustain the rejection. Independent claim 16 recites a similar limitation ("re-encode the versioning points contained within the change history relative to the second focused version of the target document"), and is rejected on a basis similar to that of claim 1, so we likewise do not sustain the rejection of claim 16. We additionally do not sustain the rejection of claims 2, 4, 6-9, 11-13, 17, 19-21, 23, and 24, which depend from claim 1 or 16. B. Claims 14 and 22 Claim 14 recites, inter alia: the encoded change history comprises a plurality of versioning points, each including a respective version identifier, the plurality of versioning points including a prior versioning point and a subsequent version point, and the encoded change history further comprises at least two version differences: one which is a link pointing backward to the prior versioning point and one which is a link pointing forward to the subsequent versioning point .... Reply Br. 28-29. The Examiner again cites Hamburg for teaching "versioning points" that "contain links to both an 'undo' and 'redo' point that steps backward and forward to a different document state." Ans. 23 (citing Hamburg i-fi-135-36); see also id. at 13 (citing Hamburg i-fi-129-30, 32),. The Examiner also cites Roberts for teaching "version differences." 7 Appeal2014-003441 Application 12/754,812 Id. at 13 (citing Roberts i-f 61, Fig. 3), 23 (citing Roberts i-f 64). The Examiner explains "Roberts describes that documents may contain both starting and ending document states which would then allow for stepping both forward and backward through document histories." Id. at 23 (citing Roberts ,-r 64). Appellant argues "Hamburg ... does not suggest version differences pointing both forward and backward, as Hamburg describes a user interface, not a document having an encapsulated history." Reply Br. 19. We are not persuaded by this argument, however, because we agree with the Examiner that Hamburg's "step forward and step backward commands" in paragraph 36 are at least suggestive of "a link pointing backward to the prior versioning point and one which is a link pointing forward to the subsequent versioning point." Hamburg i-f 36 (cited at Ans. 23). We are not persuaded that the association between this teaching and a user interface in Hamburg undermines the Examiner;s finding. Appellant also argues Hamburg "does not disclose that [Hamburg's] history [list] is part of an encapsulated document." Reply Br. 19-20. This argument is also not persuasive, because the Examiner relies on Roberts, not Hamburg, for teaching an encapsulated document. See Ans. 13 (citing Roberts ,-r 61, Fig. 3). Furthermore, Appellant argues "Roberts does not disclose a forward and backward link in the same document." Reply Br. 20. We are not persuaded by Appellant's argument. The Examiner establishes Roberts teaches "a 'two-sided' delta document that references both a start and an end document." Roberts i-f 64 (cited at Ans. 23). We agree with the Examiner 8 Appeal2014-003441 Application 12/754,812 that this reference to various document states "would then allow for stepping both forward and backward through document histories." Ans. 23. Finally, referring to Roberts's teaching on delta documents, Appellant argues "Roberts ... uses a separate document" to track changes. Reply Br. 20 (citing Roberts, Abstract). Nevertheless, we are not persuaded of error in the Examiner's rejection, because Appellant's argument attacks Roberts individually, rather than the combination of Roberts and Hamburg posited by the Examiner. See In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 426 (CCPA 1981). In this case, the Examiner proposes combining Hamburg's document histories with Roberts's "facilities for universal, portable document histories" to obtain "the benefits of a simple interface for manipulating a document with those of creating the version history." Ans. 14. Appellant has not persuasively shown error in this rationale for the combination, which we find to be supported by adequate reasoning, including a rational underpinning drawn from the cited references. See KS'R Int? Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007). For these reasons, we are not persuaded of Examiner error in the Examiner's rejection of claim 14. We therefore sustain the rejection of claim 14. Appellant relies on the same argument for claim 22, see Reply Br. 22, so we likewise sustain the rejection of that claim. C. Claim 15 Claim 15 depends from claim 14 and recites "each version difference of the encoded change history has a link direction which is one of forward and backward .... " The Examiner cites Hamburg paragraphs 29, 31-32, and 35 and Appellant's purported admission relative to Roberts paragraph 9 Appeal2014-003441 Application 12/754,812 64 for teaching this limitation. See Ans. 14, 24. Although Appellant contends "Hamburg does not suggest that there are version differences with a direction associated with these earlier or later documents," Reply Br. 21, Hamburg teaches "earlier and later document states," which are at least suggestive of directionality. Hamburg i-f 32 (cited at Ans. 24). In addition, Roberts' s teachings in paragraph 64 on forward or backwards deltas further supports the Examiner's findings. Ans. 24 (citing App. Br. 17). Specifically, Roberts's "'two-sided' delta document" teaches references in two directions: toward a start document state and toward an end document state. Roberts i-f 64. For these reasons, we are not persuaded of error in the Examiner's rejection of claim 15. We therefore sustain the Examiner's rejection of claim 15. DECISION The Examiner;s rejections of claims 1, 2, 4, 6-9, 11-13, 16, 17, 19- 21, 23, and 24 are reversed. The Examiner's rejections of claims 14, 15, and 22 are affirmed. 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). AFFIRMED-IN-PART 10 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation