Ex Parte WuDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardAug 30, 201614374273 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 30, 2016) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR 14/374,273 07/24/2014 QiangWu 56436 7590 09/01/2016 Hewlett Packard Enterprise 3404 E. Harmony Road Mail Stop 79 Fort Collins, CO 80528 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. 83995247 1466 EXAMINER LAMONT, BENJAMIN S ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2461 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 09/01/2016 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 mkraft@hpe.com chris.mania@hpe.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Exparte QIANG WU1 Appeal2016-005631 Application 14/374,273 Technology Center 2400 Before ST. JOHN COURTENAY III, WSTIN BUSCH, and SCOTT E. BAIN, Administrative Patent Judges. BUSCH, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellant seeks our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134 of the Examiner's final decision rejecting claims 1-5, 9-13, 17, and 18.2 We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b ). We AFFIRM. CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER Claims 1, 9, and 18 are independent claims. The claims generally relate to processing Virtual Station Interface (VSI) Discovery and 1 According to Appellant, the real party in interest is Hangzhou H3C Technologies Co., Ltd. App. Br. 3. 2 Claims 6-8, 14--16, 19, and 20 also are pending in the application and are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim. Final Act. 3. 1 Appeal2016-005631 Application 14/374,273 Configuration Protocol (VDP) request packets containing a notification for a change in traffic features, determining filter information to be changed, and processing "a VSI configuration and strategy according to the filter information to be changed." Spec. Abstract; see App. Br. 23-28. Claim 1 is representative and reproduced below with formatting added: 1. A method for processing a Virtual Station Interface Discovery and Configuration Protocol (VDP) request packet at an edge switch, the method comprising: receiving a VDP request packet from a data server; determining whether filter information is to be unchanged or changed from filter information status information in the VDP request packet; determining filter information to be changed according to filter information in the VDP request packet in response to determining the filter information is to be changed from the filter information status information; requesting a Virtual Station Interface (VSI) management server to process a VSI configuration and strategy according to the filter information to be changed; and rece1vmg a response from the VSI management server, and processing the VSI configuration and strategy according to the filter information to be changed; and processing the VDP packet request without sending a request to the VSI management server to process a VSI configuration and strategy in response to determining the filter information is to be unchanged. REJECTION Claims 1-5, 9-13, 17, and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as obvious over the combination of Li (US 2012/0063363 Al; Mar. 15, 2012), and IEEE Standard for Local and Metropolitan Area Networks-Media 2 Appeal2016-005631 Application 14/374,273 Access Control (MAC) Bridges and Virtual Bridged Local Area Networks- Amendment 21: Edge Virtual Bridging IEEE (2012) (hereinafter, "IEEE"). Final Act. 4. OPINION Obviousness of Claims 1, 3, 4, 9, 11, 12, 17, and 18 over Li and IEEE Appellant argues claims 1, 3, 4, 9, 11, 12, 17, and 18 as a group. App. Br. 15-17. We select claim 1 as representative of that group. Claims 3, 4, 9, 11, 12, 17, and 18 stand or fall with claim 1. Claim 1 is directed to receiving a VDP request packet, determining whether filter information is to be changed from the filter information status information, and processing the VDP request packet based on that determination. The Examiner finds Li teaches each recited step of claim 13 except "processing the VDP packet request without sending a request to the VSI management server to process a VSI configuration and strategy in response to determmmg the filter information is to be unchanged." Fin. Act. 4---6. The Examiner finds IEEE teaches that limitation, and provides a rationale for modifying Li with the teachings of IEEE. Id. at 6. The Examiner explains that Li's updates to the VLAN associations are mapped to the recited changes in filter information. Ans. 2. In particular, 3 Although the rejection apparently relies on Li alone for teaching "determining whether filter information is to be unchanged or changed from filter information status information in the VDP request packet," the Response to Arguments in the Examiner's Answer clarifies that it is Li's server 520 that makes the determination based on whether the Associate request is a "regular" Associate request, as taught in Li, or a "keep-alive" Associate request, as taught in IEEE. Fin. Act. 2-3; See Ans. 3-7. 3 Appeal2016-005631 Application 14/374,273 the Examiner refers to details in Li regarding Associate Request messages and the content therein, which Li uses to obtain and assign VLAN IDs (VIDs) for each Virtual Station Interface (VSI) of an associated Virtual Machine (VM). Ans. 2-3 (citing Li i-fi-136-37). The Examiner further explains that, in one example, Li sends an Associate Request with a VID "set to about zero," and Li's bridge 530 obtains a VID corresponding to the Group ID in the Associate Request, resulting in the VID changing from 0 to 8. Id. at 4 (quoting Li i136). The Examiner points to Li's disclosure that the VID, which the Examiner finds teaches the recited "filter information to be changed," is transmitted in the VDP request packets in a "Filter Info field." Id. at 4--5 (citing Li Fig. 2, i-fi-127-28, 36). Finally, the Examiner explains that the combination of Li and IEEE teaches processing both Associate Requests to create new associations (as described in Li), which require querying the network, and "keep-alive" Associate Requests "to maintain current associations" (as described in IEEE), which do not include querying the network. Id. at 5-7. Appellant argues the combination of Li and IEEE fails to teach or suggest "determining whether filter information is to be unchanged or changed from filter information status information in the VDP request packet" (the "first determining step"), "determining filter information to be changed according to filter information in the VDP request packet in response to determining the filter information is to be changed from the filter information status information" (the "second determining step"), and "processing the VDP packet request without sending a request to the VSI management server to process a VSI configuration and strategy in response 4 Appeal2016-005631 Application 14/374,273 to determining the filter information is to be unchanged" (the "processing step"). App. Br. 8-15. Appellant does not challenge the Examiner's rationale for combining Li and IEEE. Appellant argues the first determining step and the second determining step separately, but the same argument-that neither Li nor IEEE relate to filter information-underlies each of these arguments. Specifically, with respect to the first determining step, Appellant quotes language from the portions of Li and IEEE that the Examiner cites, and argues none of the cited portions "teach or suggest any aspects related to filter information, much less change in filter information, and particularly any type of associate request that is related to change in filter information." Id. at 10; see id. at 10-11, 12. Regarding the second determining step, Appellant also quotes language from the portions of Li cited by the Examiner, and concludes "Li does not teach or suggest that the Group ID is located in any type of filter information field in the Associate request, or that the Group ID represents filter information that is changed." Id. at 12-13. Similarly, with respect to the processing step, Appellant quotes language from the portions of IEEE cited by the Examiner, argues the cited disclosure "describe[ s] how the 'TRANSMIT_KEEP ALIVE' Associate request with S- bit = 1 can be sent when the VSI user is suspended," and asserts the cited disclosures do not teach or suggest "processing of a VDP packet request without sending a request to a VSI management server." Id. at 14--15. Appellant's arguments, however, fail to substantively explain why the cited portions of Li and IEEE do not teach or suggest the recited limitations or what the recited claim terms mean, such that the disclosures in Li and 5 Appeal2016-005631 Application 14/374,273 IEEE are inapposite. App. Br. 10-15; Reply Br. 6-10. For example, Appellant argues the combination of Li and IEEE does not teach "filter information," yet provides no explanation-let alone a definition----of what "filter information" is. Appellant's mere assertion that the prior art does not teach a particular element with no meaningful explanation is unpersuasive. In re Jung, 637 F.3d 1356, 1365 (Fed. Cir. 2011); see also In re Lovin, 652 F.3d 1349, 1357 (Fed. Cir. 2011) ("the Board reasonably interpreted Rule 41.37 to require more substantive arguments in an appeal brief than a mere recitation of the claim elements and a naked assertion that the corresponding elements were not found in the prior art"); 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(l)(iv) ("A statement which merely points out what a claim recites will not be considered an argument for separate patentability of the claim."). The Examiner has pointed to aspects of Li that disclose information (e.g., VID) that is a part of a "Filter Info" field and transmission of messages that change the value of that information. Appellant has not sufficiently argued or pointed to anything in the Specification explaining why the cited portions of Li and IEEE do not teach or suggest the disputed limitations. Specifically, Appellant fails to explain why data in a "filter info" field would not be considered filter information or provide any insight into what constitutes filter information. Accordingly, on the record before us, we are not persuaded of any error in the Examiner's finding that Li's VID teaches or suggests the recited filter information. Similarly, Appellant provides no persuasive reasoning why the processing a "keep-alive" Associate Request in the proposed combined system of Li and IEEE fails to teach the recited "processing the VDP packet request without sending a request .... " 6 Appeal2016-005631 Application 14/374,273 Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner's rejection of claim 1, and claims 3, 4, 9, 11, 12, 17, and 18, which Appellant argues are patentable for similar reasons. See App. Br. 15-17; 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(l)(iv). Obviousness of Claims 2, 5, 10, and 13 over Li and IEEE In addition to asserting claims 2, 5, 10, and 13 are allowable for the same reason asserted with respect to independent claims 1 and 9, Appellant argues the additional limitations recited in these dependent claims provide further bases for finding the claims allowable over the cited prior art. Id. at 17-21. Claim 2 depends from claim 1 and recites the further limitation of "determining the filter information is to be increased according to the filter information in the VDP request packet, wherein the VSI configuration and strategy is requested according to the filter information to be increased." Claim 10 depends from claim 9 and recites a limitation similar to the additional limitation recited in claim 2. Claim 5, which depends from claim 1, and claim 13, which depends from claim 9, further define the notification recited in claims 1 and 9, respectively. The Examiner finds the same disclosures relied on for teaching changing a VID in response to an Associate Request in Li teaches or suggests the recited limitation in claim 2 of "determining the filter information is to be increased." Ans. 7. Specifically, the Examiner explains that Li's bridge 530 "determines filter information is to be increased" when it receives an Associate Request by determining that the VID in the request packet "is set to 'about zero,"' which causes the system bridge 530 to query the network to determine a VID that corresponds with a received Group ID. 7 Appeal2016-005631 Application 14/374,273 Subsequently, the null or zero YID is replaced with a valid YID, for example 8. Id. (quoting Li i-fi-121, 25, 36, 37). The Examiner concludes that the new association (storing the assigned value of 8 for the VID) constitutes an increase in filter information. Similar to Appellant's arguments with respect to claim 1, Appellant quotes portions of the paragraphs of Li cited by the Examiner as teaching or suggesting the additional limitations of claims 2 and 10, and concludes that "Li does not teach or suggest any aspects related to change of filter information" or "that a change in the VLAN ID associated with the Group ID constitutes an increase in the VLAN ID." App. Br. 18; Reply Br. 13. Appellant's argument with respect to claims 5 and 13 turns on the same issue as claims 2 and 10. Reply Br. 14--15; App. Br. 19.4 Specifically, Appellant argues Li's disclosure of changing the VID does not "constitute[] an increase in any type of traffic features." Reply Br. 14--15. Appellant does not point to anything in the Specification to add clarity regarding what is meant by the recited term "traffic feature," and we find nothing in the Specification to provide a meaning that would exclude Li's VID from the broadest reasonable interpretation of "traffic feature."5 As discussed above, Appellant's mere assertion that the prior art does not teach a particular element is not, without more, persuasive of error. In re 4 We also note that we agree with the Examiner that claims 5 and 13 require only one of the three limitations further defining the notification-i.e., one of increasing, decreasing, or not changing the traffic features. 5 Paragraphs 22 through 24 of the Specification of the present application appear to indicate that notifications to increase or decrease traffic features result in a determination of filter information to be increased or deleted. 8 Appeal2016-005631 Application 14/374,273 Jung, 637 F.3d at 1365. The Examiner explained the finding that the YID, which is a piece of information transmitted in the "Filter Info" field in the Associate Request VDP packets in Li, is considered to be filter information and Li discloses changing that from a near zero value to a value of eight, resulting in an increase. Therefore, on the record before us, we are unpersuaded the Examiner erred in finding that increasing the value of the VID teaches or suggests the recited "increasing the traffic features." As with Appellant's arguments regarding claim 1, we find no persuasive argument from Appellant regarding what filter information is, why the VID is not filter information, or why increasing the value of the VID does not teach or suggest the recited language. Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner's rejection of claims 2 and 10, and claims 5 and 13 for the reasons discussed herein. DECISION For the reasons above, we affirm the Examiner's decision rejecting claims 1-5, 9-13, 17, and 18. TIME TO RESPOND No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R. § 41.50(±). AFFIRMED 9 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation