Ex Parte Wu et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Dec 19, 2013

11134153 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 19, 2013)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte JONATHAN WU and
SREERANGA P. RAJAN
____________

Appeal 2011-008781
Application 11/134,153
Technology Center 2100
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Before LORA M. GREEN, ULRIKE W. JENKS, and
SHERIDAN K. SNEDDEN, Administrative Patent Judges.

JENKS, Administrative Patent Judge

DECISION ON APPEAL
This is an appeal1 under 35 U.S.C. § 134 involving claims to a
software application for the presentation of summarized data. The Examiner
has rejected the claims as obvious. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C.
§ 6(b). We affirm.

1 Appellants identify Yodlee.com as the Real Party in Interest (App. Br. 3).
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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Claims 1, 3-5, and 7-10 are on appeal, and can be found in the Claims
Appendix of the Appeal Brief. Claim 1 is illustrative of the claims on
appeal, and reads as follows:
1. A software application, stored on and executing from a
computer-readable medium performing management and data
summarization of user-selected URLs on the Internet
comprising:
a client-side utility for capturing URLs displayed in a
browser window, selected and navigated to by a user during
Internet navigation;
a server-side utility for receiving the URLs captured by
the client-side utility; and
an automatic navigation and data-gathering utility for
navigating to and gathering data from a Web page destination
of the captured URLs;
characterized in that the client-side utility captures the
URLs during a user’s Web browsing session and automatically
sends the URLs to the server-side utility where it is periodically
utilized by the navigation and data gathering utility for proxy
navigation to the Web page of the URLs, parsing and gathering
data from within the WEB page and periodically returning an
HTML display of the captured URLs where upon selecting
individual ones of the URLs in the display causes only
summarized data associated with the selected URLs to be
displayed wherein the summarized data is less data than the
parsed and gathered data contained in the Web page.

The Examiner has rejected claims2,3 1 and 3-10 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Khan (US 6,546,393 B1, filed Oct. 7,

2 The Examiner has withdrawn the rejection of claims 7-10 under 35 U.S.C.
112, second paragraph (Ans. 3).
3 We note that the Claims Appendix attached to the Appeal Brief only lists
claims 1, 3-5, and 7-10 as pending (App. Br. 5), as does the Examiner’s
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1999) in further view of Inala et al. (US 6,199,077 B1, filed June 1,
1999)(“Inala”) in further view of Jameson (US 2001/0047397 A1, filed
Feb. 6, 2001, non-provisional of provisional application no. 60/183,670 filed
on Feb. 18, 2000). (Ans. 3.)

DISCUSSION
The Examiner finds that Khan teaches:
Using the browser on the user’s computer, the user can
bookmark the web page (URL) by clicking on the browser
bookmark called “Add2Clickmarks”. By using this feature, the
user requests the browser to automatically capture the
bookmark and have it automatically be sent to his online
bookmark account (i.e. server) to be stored.
(Ans. 4.) The Examiner concedes that Khan does not disclose an automatic
navigation and database gathering utility (id.), however, such a feature is
taught by Inala. Specifically, the Examiner finds that:
Inala discloses a summary agent that fetches the web page from
the URL and produces a summary of the web page to the user.
A navigation layer is provided and adapted to perform the
function of external site navigation and data gathering, wherein
then a parsing engine parses the data and creating a summary
page in HTML of the requested web page.
(Id. at 5.) However, the combination of Khan and Inala does not disclose:
[R]eturning an HTML display of the captured URLs where
upon selecting individual ones of the URLs in the display
causes only the summarized data associated with the selected
URLs to be displayed wherein the summarized data is less data
than the parsed and gathered data contained in the Web page.

Answer (Ans. 2).
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(Id.) Here, the Examiner relies on Jameson for teaching this feature. The
Examiner specifically finds that:
The “summary” page lists URLs wherein each URL is
displayed visually through its associated headline text (title) of
the page associated with the URL. When a user moves the
mouse over each title (i.e. selecting), a summary, associated
with the headline/story from the page associated with the listed
URL, pops up. Jameson discloses the “summary” page is in an
HTML format.
(Id. at 5-6.) The Examiner concludes that it would have been obvious:
[T]o have modified Khan’s ability to store URLs and Inala’s
ability to produce a summary page from a selected stored URL
with Jameson’s ability to provide summaries to each of the
collected URLs since it would have provided the benefit of
viewing headline information and summary information
without the burden by all the information provided by the
headline or news service.
(Id. at 11.)
The issue is: Does preponderance of the evidence of record support
the Examiner’s conclusion that the combination of references teaches that
“the display causes only summarized data associated with the selected URLs
to be displayed wherein the summarized data is less data than the parsed and
gathered data contained in the Web page” as claimed?

Findings of Fact
FF1. Jameson provides:
[0019] When OmniViewer retrieves a webpage (such as
the Yahoo Top Stories webpage), it typically extracts numerous
aspects of a headline, and generates other information
associated with that headline, such as a time stamp for example.
Some of the aspects extracted include:
[0020] 1) The text of the headline—this is what you see
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in a ticker;
[0021] 2) The URL associated with the headline that
leads to the full story—the content of the page associated with
that URL is retrieved when you click on the headline in the
ticker; and
[0022] 3) The summary associated with the story—this
information pops up automatically in OmniViewer as you move
your mouse over different headlines in a story. Other
information (such as a time stamp) may also be included.
(Jameson 2: ¶¶ [0019]-[0022]; Ans. 6.)
FF2. Jameson’s alternate embodiment provides using OmniViewer
on a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) using the following steps to format
the information:
[0025] 1) OmniViewer retrieves the headlines and the
summaries;
[0026] 2) It associates each summary with a newly
created URL;
[0027] 3) The headlines are accessible to the individual
user using a specific server (which is implemented in the
OmniViewer product as just another viewer);
[0028] 4) The headlines now contain links to the
summaries;
[0029] 5) The user accesses his copy of OmniViewer
remotely using his PDA or other browser;
[0030] 6) The user can optionally click on a link to read
the summary.
(Jameson 2: ¶¶ [0025]-[0030].)

Principle of Law
“In rejecting claims under 35 U.S.C. § 103, the examiner bears the
initial burden of presenting a prima facie case of obviousness. Only if that
burden is met, does the burden of coming forward with evidence or
argument shift to the applicant.” In re Rijckaert, 9 F.3d 1531, 1532 (Fed.
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Cir. 1993).
“The combination of familiar elements according to known methods
is likely to be obvious when it does no more than yield predictable results.”
KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 416 (2007).

Analysis
Appellants contend that “Jameson fails to return an HTML display of
the captured URLs where upon selecting individual ones of the URLs in the
display causes only the summarized data associated with the selected URLs
to be displayed.” (Appeal Br. 10.) Appellant “argues that Jameson fails to
teach that the URL relating to the source of the summary is listed in the
HTML and selectable by a user, as claimed . . . [and] that Jameson teaches
creating a new URL to post a summary for a single Web page.” (Id. at
10-11.)
The Examiner provides sound fact-based reasoning for combining
Khan, Inala, and Jameson. We adopt the fact finding and analysis of the
Examiner (see Ans. 3-7). The Examiner responded specifically and
persuasively to Appellants’ arguments, showing that when all the evidence is
considered, it weighs in favor of obviousness (see id. at 8-10).
Appellants’ arguments do not persuade us that the preponderance of
the evidence fails to support the Examiner’s prima facie case of obviousness.
As recognized by the Examiner, Jameson provides two different methods of
presenting summary information (Ans. 8-10; see also FFs 1-2). Appellants’
argument, however, contends that Jameson requires creating a new URL in
order to post summary information (Appeal Br. 10). This argument is not
persuasive because it is only directed at one of Jameson’s disclosed
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embodiments for presenting summary information, in this case, presenting
information to a PDA device (see FF 2). “The prior art’s mere disclosure of
more than one alternative does not constitute a teaching away from any of
these alternatives because such disclosure does not criticize, discredit, or
otherwise discourage the solution claimed.” In re Fulton, 391 F.3d 1195,
1201 (Fed. Cir. 2004).
Appellants, however, provide no arguments relating to the rejection
based on the mouse over embodiment of Jameson’s as presented by the
Examiner. Specifically, the Examiner relies on the mouse over technique
disclosed in Jameson for viewing summary information with regard to a
specific URL (Ans. 9; FF 1). What is missing from Appellants analysis is
any explanation why the mouse over technique could not have been
combined with the teachings of Inala and Khan as suggested by the
Examiner.
Based on the evidence before us, we conclude that the Examiner has
presented a prima facie case of obviousness. Appellants have not met their
burden of showing that the Examiner erred in rejecting claims, or otherwise
rebutted the Examiner’s cogent response in the Answer’s “Response to
Argument” section (Ans. 8-11) concerning the combination of Khan, Inala,
and Jameson. See In re Rijckaert, 9 F.3d at 1532. Accordingly, we affirm
the rejection of claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being obvious. As
claims 3-5 and 7-10 have not been argued separately, they fall together with
claim 1, as acknowledged by Appellants (App. Br. 8 and 12). 37 C.F.R.
§ 41.37(c)(1)(vii).

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SUMMARY
We affirm the rejection of claims 1, 3-5, and 7-10 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Khan in further in view of Inala in
further view of Jameson.

TIME PERIOD FOR RESPONSE
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a).

AFFIRMED

cdc