INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Aug 14, 2020

2019003327 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 14, 2020)

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.
15/088,466 04/01/2016 SHAHROKH DAIJAVAD YOR920151435US1 7764
48915 7590 08/14/2020
CANTOR COLBURN LLP-IBM YORKTOWN
20 Church Street
22nd Floor
Hartford, CT 06103
EXAMINER
PATEL, HIREN P
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2196
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
08/14/2020 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):
usptopatentmail@cantorcolburn.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte SHAHROKH DAIJAVAD, NIRMIT V. DESAI,
SONGCHUN FAN, MARTIN G. KIENZLE,
THEODOROS SALONIDIS, RAHUL URGAONKAR,
and DINESH C. VERMA
____________

Appeal 2019-003327
Application 15/088,466
Technology Center 2100
____________

Before KALYAN K. DESHPANDE, CHARLES J. BOUDREAU,
and SHARON FENICK, Administrative Patent Judges.

BOUDREAU, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from the
Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1–20. We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b)(1).
We AFFIRM.

1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in
37 C.F.R. § 1.42. Appellant identifies International Business Machines
Corporation as the real party in interest. Appeal Br. 2.
Appeal 2019-003327
Application 15/088,466

2
CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
Appellant’s invention relates to “deployment and execution of sensing
and computation tasks in a network of computing devices.” Spec. ¶ 1.
Claims 1, 10, and 19 are independent. Claim 1, reproduced below, is
illustrative of the subject matter on appeal (emphasis added):
1. A computer implemented method for deployment and
execution of tasks in a network of computing devices, the
computer implemented method comprises:
creating by a requester device of a task for deployment and
execution in the network wherein the task is composed of a set
of computing and sensing programs and a task representation that
includes at least one of computing requirements, data
requirements, and context requirements;
transmitting the task representation to at least one member
of the network of computing devices;
selecting a plurality of computing devices in the network
that match at least one of the computing requirements, the data
requirements, and the context requirements in the task
representation;
deploying each of the set of computing and sensing
programs of the task to the selected computing devices; and
identifying one of the plurality of computing devices in the
network other than the requester device as a coordinator device,
wherein the coordinator device is configured to coordinate an
execution of the set of computing and sensing programs by the
selected computing devices and wherein the one of the plurality
of computing devices is identified as the coordinator device
based on determining which of the plurality of computing
devices has been a member of the network of computing devices
a longest period of time.
Appeal Br. 9 (Claims App.).
Appeal 2019-003327
Application 15/088,466

3
REJECTIONS
The Examiner rejects claims 1–6, 10–15, 19, and 20 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103 as being unpatentable over Nochta,2 Rosenberry,3 and Girault.4 Final
Act. 3–11.
The Examiner rejects claims 7 and 16 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being
unpatentable over Nochta, Rosenberry, Girault, and Ligman.5 Final
Act. 11–13.
The Examiner rejects claims 8 and 17 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being
unpatentable over Nochta, Rosenberry, Girault, and Chai.6 Final
Act. 13–15.
The Examiner rejects claims 9 and 18 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being
unpatentable over Nochta, Rosenberry, Girault, and Miluzzo.7 Final
Act. 15–17.
OPINION
The Examiner relies on Girault for the limitation “the one of the
plurality of computing devices is identified as the coordinator device based
on determining which of the plurality of computing devices has been a
member of the network of computing devices a longest period of time,” as
recited in independent claims 1, 10, and 19. Final Act. 7 (citing Girault

2 Nochta et al., US 2007/0233881 A1 (pub. Oct. 4, 2007).
3 Rosenberry, US 5,349,682 (iss. Sept. 20, 1994).
4 Girault, US 2016/0183054 A1 (pub. June 23, 2016).
5 Ligman et al., US 2014/0349571 A1 (pub. Nov. 27, 2014).
6 Chai et al., US 2015/0006735 A1 (pub. Jan. 1, 2015).
7 Miluzzo et al., US 2014/0141744 A1 (pub. May 22, 2014).
Appeal 2019-003327
Application 15/088,466

4
¶¶ 14, 39). Specifically, the Examiner cites Girault’s disclosure of causing
“the device in the network with the longest elapsed time since startup” to
function as a master device. Girault ¶ 14; see Final Act. 7. The Examiner
finds that “the measured elapsed [time since startup] of the device that is in
the network (part of network) as taught by Girault represents the duration of
time the device has been a member of the network.” Ans. 7.
Appellant argues that Girault fails to teach or suggest the above
limitation because “the time since a device was started up, as taught by
Girault, is not the same as, or equivalent to, the time since a device joined a
network, as claimed.” Appeal Br. 7. According to Appellant, “[t]his is
particularly true in ad hoc networks where devices may join and leave the
network much more frequently than the devices are restarted.” Id.
We are not persuaded by Appellant. A person with ordinary skill in
the art would have understood Girault’s “startup” to be essentially
concurrent with joining the network because Girault is concerned with
selecting a master device from “a plurality of plotter devices belonging to
the same network” in a way that “prevents the master from being switched
frequently.” Girault ¶¶ 6, 15; see id. ¶ 10, Abstr. Otherwise put, we find
that Girault’s very purpose of “comparing the elapsed time after startup” is
to designate the device that has been a member of the network for the
longest period of time as the master device, in order to prevent frequent
switching of the master device. See id. ¶ 15.
Although Appellant argues that startup and joining a network are not
the same with respect to ad hoc networks (Appeal Br. 7) and presents a
hypothetical example of a device that is the first to start up but the last to
join the network (Reply Br. 2), Appellant does not point to any portion of
Appeal 2019-003327
Application 15/088,466

5
Girault indicating that the devices start up without joining the network or
that they might leave the network other than by shutting down. On the
contrary, Girault describes the plotter devices as “belonging to the same
network” (Girault ¶ 10) and discloses that each one notifies the other devices
in the network of its presence “[o]nce the startup of the plotter device . . . is
complete and it has been connected to the marine network” (id. ¶¶ 52–53).
This strongly suggests that the devices join the network at startup.8
Accordingly, we agree with the Examiner that the elapsed time since startup
of a device in Girault’s network represents the period of time the device has
been a member of the network (see Ans. 7), and, thus, that Girault teaches or
suggests identifying a device as the coordinator device based on which
device has been a member of the network for the longest period of time (see
Final Act. 7).
Appellant further argues that it would not have been obvious to one of
ordinary skill in the art to combine Nochta and Girault because “[t]he fields
of art of Girault and Nochta are wholly unrelated to one another.” Appeal
Br. 8. Appellant acknowledges that Nochta is in the same field of endeavor
as the claimed invention (“assigning a computing task or service to smart
devices in a network”), but argues that “Girault is directed to a system for
monitoring and plotting the physical distance between electronic devices.”
Id.

8 Likewise, the drawings and corresponding description in Girault reflecting
the master role being handed off when “the operation of the plotter device
[then serving as the master] ends” (see, e.g., Girault Figs. 3, 4, ¶¶ 54, 55, 57)
suggest that devices remain in the network until shut down.
Appeal 2019-003327
Application 15/088,466

6
A reference is analogous art to the claimed invention if: (1) the
reference is from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention,
regardless of the problem addressed, or (2) the reference is reasonably
pertinent to the problem faced by the inventor (even if it is not in the same
field of endeavor as the claimed invention). See In re Bigio, 381 F.3d 1320,
1325 (Fed. Cir. 2004). Appellant’s argument is unpersuasive because
Appellant only asserts that Girault is from a different field of endeavor than
Nochta and a different field of endeavor than the claimed invention, and
does not address Girault’s pertinence to the problem faced by the inventors.
We find that Girault’s disclosure of choosing a master device based on
elapsed time after startup to “prevent[] the master from being switched
frequently” is reasonably pertinent to the problem addressed in the
Specification of choosing a coordinator device in a network of computing
devices. Girault ¶¶ 14–15; see Spec. ¶ 23. Furthermore, we agree with the
Examiner that both Nochta and Girault are analogous art because they are in
the same general field of endeavor as the claimed invention, i.e., “managing
devices belonging to [the] same network.” Ans. 7. We also agree with the
Examiner that one of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to
combine the references in order to prevent frequent switching of the master
or coordinator device. See Final Act. 7; Ans. 7–8 (citing Girault ¶ 15).
For the foregoing reasons, we sustain the Examiner’s § 103 rejection
of independent claims 1, 10, and 19, as well as the Examiner’s § 103
rejections of dependent claims 2–9, 11–18, and 20 not separately argued by
Appellant.
Appeal 2019-003327
Application 15/088,466

7
CONCLUSION
We affirm the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1–20 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103.
DECISION SUMMARY
In summary:

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)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED

Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C.
§
References/
Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–6, 10–15,
19, 20
103 Nochta, Rosenberry,
Girault
1–6, 10–15,
19, 20

7, 16 103 Nochta, Rosenberry,
Girault, Ligman
7, 16
8, 17 103 Nochta, Rosenberry,
Girault, Chai
8, 17
9, 18 103 Nochta, Rosenberry,
Girault, Miluzzo
9, 18
Overall
Outcome
1–20