Palo Alto Research Center Incorporated

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Jan 6, 2022

2020004552 (P.T.A.B. Jan. 6, 2022)

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. 15/159,048 05/19/2016 John T. Maxwell III XRX-3010US 5751 182639 7590 01/06/2022 Burns & Levinson LLP/Xerox Corporation 125 High Street BOSTON, MA 02110 EXAMINER HWA, SHYUE JIUNN ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2156 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 01/06/2022 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): DOCKETING@BURNSLEV.COM PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________ BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD ____________ Ex parte JOHN T. MAXWELL III, KYLE D. DENT, and DANIEL G. BOBROW _____________ Appeal 2020-004552 Application 15/159,048 Technology Center 2100 ____________ Before ELENI MANTIS MERCADER, JOHHNY A. KUMAR, and JASON J. CHUNG, Administrative Patent Judges. KUMAR, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellant1 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a Final rejection of claims 1-16, and 18-21. Claim 17 has been canceled. We have jurisdiction over the pending claims under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm. 1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42(a) (2018). According to Appellant, the real party in interest is Palo Alto Research Center Incorporated. See Appeal Br. 1. Appeal 2020-004552 Application 15/159,048 2 STATEMENT OF THE CASE 2 Introduction Appellant’s claimed invention relates generally to a natural language web browsing system. Spec., ¶ 3. Representative Independent Claim 1 1. A natural language web browsing method comprising: accepting by a web browser a natural language input, the web browser configured to browse a computer network including a plurality of websites having web pages; parsing the natural language input into at least one of a question, a statement, and a command; operating the web browser in accordance with the parsed natural language input, wherein the natural language input that the web browser is operated in accordance with includes one of a navigation command, a read command, a summarize command, a describe command, a click command, and a type command; and returning results of the natural language web browsing, wherein the web browsing is accomplished by use of at least a digital processing device. Appeal Br. 15, Claims App. 2 We herein refer to the Final Office Action, mailed July 30, 2019 (“Final Act.”); Appeal Brief, filed Dec. 9, 2019 (“Appeal Br.”); and the Examiner’s Answer, mailed Apr. 1, 2020 (“Ans.”). Appeal 2020-004552 Application 15/159,048 3 Rejections and References3 The prior art relied upon by the Examiner is: Name Reference Date Gao et al. US 2008/0133444 A1 June 5, 2008 Soubbotin US 2012/0278300 A1 Nov. 1, 2012 Tunstall-Pedoe US 2013/0253913 A1 Sept. 26, 2013 Claims 1-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor, or for pre-AIA the applicant regards as the invention. Final Act. 4. Claims 1-16 and 18-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Gao et al., in view of Tunstall-Pedoe. Ans. 3. Claims 21 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Gao et al. in view of Tunstall-Pedoe and Soubbotin. Ans. 3. ANALYSIS4 Based on Appellant’s arguments in the Brief, the principal and dispositive issue of whether the Examiner erred in rejecting exemplary claim 1 turns on whether the combination of Gao and Tunstall-Pedoe teaches the claim limitations “operating the web browser in accordance with the parsed natural language input, wherein the natural language input that the web 3 The Examiner has withdrawn the claim objection to claims 16 and 19. Ans. 3. 4 We pro forma affirm the rejections of claims 1-21 under 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph (see Final Act. 4-5), which was not contested by Appellant. See Appeal Br. 7-14. Appeal 2020-004552 Application 15/159,048 4 browser is operated in accordance with includes one of a navigation command, a read command, a summarize command, a describe command, a click command, and a type command” (hereinafter “the disputed click limitation”). Appeal Br. 7-10 (emphasis added). Independent claim 18 recites similar subject matter.4 We adopt the findings of facts made by the Examiner in the Final Office Action and Examiner’s Answer as our own. We concur with the decision reached by the Examiner in the Examiner’s Answer for the specific reasons discussed below. We highlight the following for emphasis. Appellant contends Tunstall-Pedoe does not teach or suggest the “click command.” Appeal Br. 8-10. In particular, Appellant contends: this “clicking” referred to in Tunstall-Pedoe cannot be fairly equated to the claimed “click command” at least insomuch as the clicking referred to by Tunstall-Pedoe and cited in the Office Action is NOT included in a natural language input that was accepted and parsed. Rather, the referenced clicking of Tunstall-Pedoe is a mouse click that is entered and/or input separate and distinct from any natural language input that is accepted and parsed. Appeal Br. 8. (emphasis added) The Examiner has identified the relevant portions of Tunstall-Pedoe and has provided sufficient explanation with corresponding citations to various parts of the reference for disclosing the disputed automatically positioning limitation (Ans. 4, 5). Appellant did not provide separate, substantive arguments with respect to the patentability of claims 2-8, 10-15, 19, and 20. Except for our ultimate decision, these rejections of these claims is not discussed further herein. Appeal 2020-004552 Application 15/159,048 5 In particular, the Examiner finds that Tunstall-Pedoe teaches clicking in natural language translation: Tunstall-Pedoe teaches the response to an ambiguous question where the natural language question can mean a number of different things. It also shows the result after the human operator selected the intended question by clicking on a link encoding the true question in internal format (paragraphs 0025- 0027; see also figures 4-5). Ans. 6. Natural Language Translation Fall-Back Strategy: As a result the system instantly answers the question and displays the result. Clicking on any of the strings that were recognized gives a profile screen for the string object. This profile screen includes any objects that are denoted by the string. Clicking on those gives a profile screen for the object. It is possible that a standard profile for a recognized object will answer the question that the user asked even though the question was not fully understood (paragraphs 0292-0294). Ans. 7. Based on above examples, the process that the web browser uses to route commands from the user is the action of taking the text that the user as entered from the URL line. This text is then analyzed to place it into categories using syntactic features of the string. If the text is determined to be a URL or an equivalent it is used to retrieve the corresponding web page. The web page is then displayed in the browser window. If the text is categorized as something other than a URL it is passed to the natural language subsystem for processing, this involves translating the text into a query, resolving ambiguity and then executing the query. The results of execution of this query are then displayed in the browser window (paragraphs 0477-0478; see also figures 19 and 21). Ans. 11-12. (emphases added) In other words, Tunstall-Pedoe teaches that a natural language input is parsed when translated. Appeal 2020-004552 Application 15/159,048 6 As an initial matter of claim construction, we turn to the Specification for context, and find no explicit definition for the claim term “clicking command.” Claim 1 (emphasis added). The Specification discloses: [0020] The method further including wherein the click command further includes, directing the web browser to click on a web element; performing a navigation operation if the web element is a link; and otherwise explaining how the web page changed. Spec. ¶ 20. Given the absence of a limiting definition in the claim or Specification regarding the disputed clicking limitation, on this record, we are not persuaded the Examiner’s reading is overly broad, unreasonable, or inconsistent with the Specification.5 Based on our review of Tunstall-Pedoe and consistent with the Examiner’s stated position (Ans. 5-12), we interpret the disputed clicking limitation using the broadest reasonable interpretation consistent with Appellant’s disclosure - to be met by Tunstall-Pedoe’s natural language translation of text obtained by clicking on the links feature. See In re Morris, 127 F.3d 1048, 1054 (Fed. Cir. 1997). Regarding dependent claims 9, 16, and 21 while Appellant raises additional arguments for patentability of the cited claims (App. Br. 10-12), we find that the Examiner has responded in the Answer with sufficient evidence. Ans. 12-14. Therefore, we adopt the Examiner’s findings and underlying reasoning, which are incorporated herein by reference. 5 We emphasize that, because “applicants may amend claims to narrow their scope, a broad construction during prosecution creates no unfairness to the applicant or patentee.” In re ICON Health and Fitness, Inc., 496 F.3d 1374, 1379 (Fed. Cir. 2007). Appeal 2020-004552 Application 15/159,048 7 We note that no Reply Brief is of record to rebut the Examiner’s responses to Appellant’s arguments. Therefore, in the absence of persuasive rebuttal evidence or argument to persuade us otherwise, we adopt the Examiner’s findings and underlying reasoning, which are incorporated herein by reference. On this record, and based upon a preponderance of the evidence, we are not persuaded of error regarding the Examiner’s finding of obviousness regarding the rejection of independent representative claim 1. Therefore, we sustain the Examiner’s obviousness rejection of representative independent claim 1 and the rejection of grouped independent claim 18, which recites similar limitations of commensurate scope. The remaining grouped dependent claims also rejected (and not argued separately) fall with their respective independent claim. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv). CONCLUSIONS We pro forma affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1-16, 18-21 under 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph, for being indefinite. We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1-16, 18-21 as being obvious under 35 U.S.C. § 103. Appeal 2020-004552 Application 15/159,048 8 DECISION SUMMARY In summary: Claims Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed 1-16, 18- 21 112, ¶ 2 Indefiniteness 1-16, 18-21 1-16, 18- 20 103 Gao, Tunstall- Pedoe 1-16, 18-20 21 103 Gao, Tunstall- Pedoe, Soubbotin 21 Overall Outcome 1-16, 18-21 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). See 37 C.F.R. § 41.50(f). AFFIRMED