Ex Parte Adhikary et al

Patent Trial and Appeal BoardMar 10, 2016

12882662 (P.T.A.B. Mar. 10, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 12/882,662 09/15/2010 76933 7590 03/14/2016 IBM (END-KLS) c/o Kennedy Lenart Spraggins LLP 8601 Ranch Road 2222 Ste. 1-225 AUSTIN, TX 78730 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Subrata Adhikary 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. END920100114US1 3364 EXAMINER CHEN, SEN THONG ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2197 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 03/14/2016 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): office@klspatents.com kate@klspatents.com hanna@klspatents.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte SUBRATA ADHIKARY, ABDUL ALLAM, HARISH BHARTI, and WILLIAM A. BROWN Appeal2014-004050 Application 12/882,662 Technology Center 2100 Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, JOHN A. EVANS, and SCOTT E. BAIN, Administrative Patent Judges. BAIN, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellants 1 appeal under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 134(a) from the Examiner's final rejection of claims 1-21, which constitute all claims pending in the application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 6(b ). We affirm. STATEMENT OF THE CASE Introduction Appellants' invention relates to characteristics of a Service Oriented Architecture ("SOA") in a computing environment, and in particular, 1 Appellants identify International Business Machines Corporation ("IBM") as the real party in interest. App. Br. 1. Appeal2014-004050 Application 12/882,662 automating a governance process in the SOA. See Abstract; Specification at 2. Claims 1, 8, and 15 are independent. Claim 1 is exemplary, with the disputed limitations italicized below: 1. A computer-implemented method of automating a governance process of reviewing service artifacts in a governed Service Oriented Architecture ('SOA'), the method comprising: modeling the governance process of reviewing service artifacts associated with a service in the SOA, the modeled governance process compnsmg: preparing one or more service artifacts associated with the service for review, submitting the service artifacts for review, and reviewing the service artifacts; and generating, in dependence upon the modeled governance process, one or more automation modules, each automation module comprising a module of computer program instructions that, when executed by a computer processor, supports performance of one or more steps of the modeled governance process. App. Br. 11 (emphasis added). Prior Art The Examiner relies upon the following prior art in rejecting the claims: Helli er US 2005/0108703 Al May 19, 2005 Doyle US 2009/0100431 Al Apr. 16, 2009 Mannava US 2010/0049628 Al Feb.25,2010 Baartman US 7,685,604 B2 Mar. 23, 2010 2 Appeal2014-004050 Application 12/882,662 The Rejections on Appeal Claims 1, 5, 6, 8, 12, 13, 15, 19, and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 102( e) as anticipated by Mannava. Final Act. 6. Claims 2, 4, 9, 11, 16, and 18 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103(a) as unpatentable over Mannava and Hellier. Final Act. 9, 12. Claims 3, 10, and 17 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103(a) as unpatentable over Mannava, Hellier, and Doyle. Final Act. 11. Claims 7, 14, and 21 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103(a) as unpatentable over Mannava and Baartman. Final Act. 12. ANALYSIS We have reviewed the Examiner's rejections in light of Appellants' arguments presented in this appeal. On this record, we are unpersuaded of error in the Examiner's rejection of the claims on appeal. We adopt as our own the findings and reasons set forth in the rejections from which this appeal is taken and in the Examiner's Answer, and highlight the following for emphasis. 35 USCÂ§ 102(e) Rejection Appellants base their argument on a single claim limitation, contending that Mannava fails to disclose "generating, in dependence upon the modeled governance process, one or more automation modules," as required in each of the independent claims. App. Br. 5-7. Appellants characterize Mannava as "only ... specifying and monitoring various aspects of a service offering." Id. at 6. Appellants point to the absence of the term "automation module" from the Mannava disclosure, and 3 Appeal2014-004050 Application 12/882,662 specifically from paragraphs 12 and 276 (among several cited in the Examiner's rejection), which state in relevant part: [0012] ... The systems and methods described herein may in some embodiments operate to provide a service governance framework for development and hosting of virtual service offerings, and for generation of interfaces to operations of virtual service offerings dependent on configurable functional parameters and/or non-functional aspects associated therewith .... [0276] The service governance framework described herein may be provided as a computer program product, or software, that may include a computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon program instructions, which may be used to program a computer system such as computer system 2200 (or another electronic device) to perform a process according to the methods described herein. App. Br. 5-7; see also Final Act. 7. Appellants argue, "[i]n contrast to what is claimed, 1\1annava does not indicate any autornation rnodules are generated that support the performance of a modeled [governance] process." App. Br. 6 (emphasis added); see id. at 7. The Examiner responds that Mannava's disclosed "aspect enforcement methods" are "the same as the claimed automation modules," and that these aspect enforcement methods depend on activities that (though not named as such in Mannava) constitute "modeling" of a governance process. Ans. 5-6. Thus, the Examiner finds the features and functionality disclosed in Mannava to meet the claims, notwithstanding some difference in terminology. Id.; see also In re Bond, 910 F.2d 831, 832 (Fed. Cir. 1990) (anticipation "is not an 'ipsissimis verbis' test"). We agree with the Examiner's findings, and adopt them as our own. 4 Appeal2014-004050 Application 12/882,662 As the Examiner describes, Mannava teaches "[a] service governance framework [including] functionality to facilitate development, deployment, and consuming of virtual services." Mannava para. 174; see also Fig. 1; Ans. 5. "Modeling" the governance process in the framework is disclosed by, for example, Mannava's description of users and governance officers accessing the governance framework through an "administrative console," and selecting and modifying "configuration parameter values associated with the service offering." Mannava para. 13; Ans. 5. Modeling further is represented by the "ability to specify and/or modify the configuration parameters (and to modify the interface to and/or behavior of the selected operations) [which] may provide virtualization of the service offering." Id. (emphasis added). Modeling the governance process also is disclosed in Mannava's discussion of a "governance designer 120," and the process by which users (such as governance officers) define "contracts." See Ans. 5---6; Mannava Fig. 1, para. 17 4. Such contracts are "saved for use in various service offerings defined through service governance framework," and may "map[] an aspect to specified aspect value." Id. The Examiner's finding that these passages of Mannava disclose a "modeled governance process" is consistent with Appellants' own broad usage of the term. Specification at 15 (describing "model[ing] a governance process," in one embodiment, as simply consisting of "receiving" specifications of the process). For the foregoing reasons, we agree with the Examiner that Mannava discloses the "modeled governance process" portion of the disputed claim limitation. The disputed claim limitation also requires generating "automation modules," a term that does not appear in Mannava. As the Examiner notes, 5 Appeal2014-004050 Application 12/882,662 however, Mannava discloses a "government enforcement engine 130" that "may invoke various aspect enforcement methods 137 to enforce the governance aspects associated with the operations invoked by consumers." Ans. 6 (emphasis added); Mannava Fig. 1, paras. 175, 179. The "aspect enforcement methods" in Mannava are, like the "automation modules" in Appellants' claims, broadly defined computer code. See id.; see Specification at 11, 19 (defining "automation modules" as various types of "executable code" "scripts" "web services" "plug-ins and so on") And ' ' ' ' . Mannava's disclosed aspect enforcement methods are generated "in dependence upon the modeled governance process" because, as the Examiner explains, such enforcement methods depend upon "operations invoked by consumers 131 (i.e., those specified in an associated contract)." Ans. 6 (emphasis added). Appellants argue in reply that "Mannava's description of enforcing a contract using enforcement methods are not performing a step of a modeled process because enforcement of Mannava's contract is not part of a modeled process." Reply Br. 12. Absent any evidentiary support or further explanation, Appellants' conclusory assertion is not persuasive of Examiner error. We conclude, as did the Examiner, that Mannava's "enforcement methods are the same as the claimed automation modules." Ans. 6. Thus, Mannava discloses the disputed limitation "generating, in dependence upon the modeled governance process, one or more automation modules." Appellants' Reply Brief raises a new argument related to a claim limitation not presented in the Appeal Brief, specifically, that Mannava fails to disclose "service artifacts." Reply Br. 9. We consider this argument as waived because it is improperly raised for the first time on reply, 37 C.F.R. 6 Appeal2014-004050 Application 12/882,662 Â§ 41.41(b)(2). Mannava, however, discloses the limitation for the reasons explained in the Final Action. See Final Act. 6; Mannava paras. 122, 172 (disclosing the access, activation, review, and monitoring of "service offerings" in the service governance framework). For the foregoing reasons, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. Â§ 102(e) rejection of claims 1, 5, 6, 8, 12, 13, 15, 19, and 20. 35 USCÂ§ 103(a) Rejections The remaining claims stand rejected as obvious over various combinations of Mannava and additional references. Appellants argue that the additional references do not overcome the deficiencies of Mannava, specifically, the absence of "generating, in dependence upon the modeled governance process, one or more automation modules." Because we find that Mannava discloses the disputed limitation, see supra, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103(a) rejections of these claims. DECISION The Examiner's rejection of claims 1-21 is affirmed. No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. Â§ 1.136(a)(l). See 37 C.F.R. Â§ 1.136(a)(l)(iv) (2013). AFFIRMED 7