Ex Parte Andrews et al

Patent Trial and Appeal BoardNov 30, 2012

10186039 (P.T.A.B. Nov. 30, 2012)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARKOFFICE 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. 10/186,039 06/28/2002 Donna B. Andrews MFCP.97269 5264 45809 7590 12/03/2012 SHOOK, HARDY & BACON L.L.P. (MICROSOFT CORPORATION) INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY DEPARTMENT 2555 GRAND BOULEVARD KANSAS CITY, MO 64108-2613 EXAMINER ADESANYA, OLUJIMI A ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2658 MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE 12/03/2012 PAPER 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. PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE _____________ BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD _____________ Ex parte DONNA B. ANDREWS, DAVID S. KOON, GERARD NEUFELD-KAISER, CHRISTINA STORM, SUSAN E. DZIADOSZ, JENNY T. LAM, DAVID R. PARKER, JOHN M. TIPPETT, TJEERD HOEK, MARK R. LIGAMERI, CHRISPTOPHER T. SAGER, KANWAL VEDBRATZAR, GERALD PAUL JOYCE, MARC M. MILLER, TONY E. SCHREINER, ERIC B. WATSON, ADRIAN C. KLEIN, VIDYA R. NALLATHIMMAYYAGARI, and BEVERLY H. SOBELMAN _____________ Appeal 2010-005267 Application 10/186,039 Technology Center 2600 ______________ Before KAYLAN K. DESHPANDE, BRYAN F. MOORE, and MICHAEL J. STRAUSS, Administrative Patent Judges. MOORE, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appeal 2010-005267 Application 10/186,039 2 This is a decision on appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the final rejection of claims 1-4, 6-20, 22, 23, 25-48, and 81-98. Br. 2. Claims 5, 21, 24, 49-80 are cancelled. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). Id. We AFFIRM the Examiner’s rejection of these claims. INVENTION The invention is directed to a system and method for enabling a computer to more effectively perform an action in response to natural language input from a user. See Spec. [0003]. Claim 1 is representative of the invention and is reproduced below: 1. A method for directing a computer including at least one text processor to perform an action in response to natural language user input, comprising: receiving into an address control interface of an Internet browser application the user input from a user; parsing the user input to determine for the user input an input type, wherein said input type is at least one of a keyword type or a content identifier type, wherein said keyword type is utilized when said user input includes at least one of a plurality of commands to be performed by said computer, wherein said content identifier type is utilized when said user input references an item of content; determining whether the input type corresponds to a single recognized action performable by the computer and, if so, directing the computer to perform the action, wherein said determining for said keyword type includes accessing a client keyword cross-reference to determine whether the user input contains a word in the client keyword cross-reference, and wherein said determining for said content identifier type includes identifying content and directing the computer to access said content; submitting, if the user input type does not correspond to a single recognized action, the user input to the at least one natural Appeal 2010-005267 Application 10/186,039 3 language text processor to obtain at least one interpretation corresponding to an action performable by the computer and, if the at least one interpretation is obtained, returning the at least one interpretation to the user, wherein said returning the at least one interpretation includes: merging the at least one interpretation into a single list of selectable interpretations; and displaying in said Internet browser application the single list of selectable interpretations to the user; and submitting, if the at least one interpretation is not obtained and if the user input type does not correspond to a single recognized action, the user input over the Internet to an Internet web search engine to obtain from said Internet web search engine a listing of one or more web pages and displaying in said Internet browser application said listing to the user in an ordering determined by the relevancy of said one or more web pages to said user input. REFERENCES Luciw US 5,608,624 Mar. 4, 1997 Bauer US 5,877,759 Mar. 2, 1999 Liddy US 5,963,940 Oct. 5, 1999 Kennewick US 2004/0044516 A1 Mar. 3, 2004 Elworthy US 6,937,975 B1 Aug. 30, 2005 REJECTIONS AT ISSUE Claims 1-4, 6-13, 15-20, 22, 23, 25-29, 31-45, 47, 48, and 81-93, 95- 97 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Elworthy, Kennewick, Liddy, and Bauer. Ans. 3-17. Claims 14, 30, 46, 94 and 98 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Elworthy, Kennewick, Liddy, Bauer and Luciw. Ans. 17-19. Appeal 2010-005267 Application 10/186,039 4 ISSUE Did the Examiner err in combining Elworthy, Kennewick, Liddy, and Bauer? ANALYSIS We discern no error in the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1-4, 6-20, 22, 23, 25-48, and 81-98. Appellants argue all claims together based on asserting that the references were improperly combined, rather than arguing specific claim limitation, therefore all of the rejected claims fall together. Appellants argue that “[t]he present rejection impermissibly relies on hindsight reasoning that discounts the novel combination of processing steps recited by the Appellants' claims.” App. Br. 11. Appellants also argue “Final Office Action provides no explanation how the prior art as a whole contains some implicit or explicit reason, suggestion or motivation for a person of ordinary skill to combine or modify the references in the proposed way.” Id (emphasis omitted). Finally, Appellants argue the “cited references are not within the field of Appellants’ endeavor and are not reasonably pertinent to the problem with which Appellants were concerned.” Id. In other words, Appellants argue that the cited references are not analogous art. We are not persuaded by these arguments. As to hindsight, it must be recognized that any judgment on obviousness is in a sense necessarily a reconstruction based upon hindsight reasoning. But so long as it takes into account only knowledge which was within the level of ordinary skill at the time the claimed invention was made, and does not include knowledge gleaned only from the applicant’s Appeal 2010-005267 Application 10/186,039 5 disclosure, such a reconstruction is proper. In re McLaughlin, 443 F.2d 1392, 1395 (CCPA 1971). Upon reviewing the record before us, we find that the Examiner’s stated suggestions for modifying Elworthy, Kennewick, Liddy, and Bauer come from within the references themselves and the knowledge of one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the claimed invention. That is, we find that an ordinarily skilled artisan in the art, at the time of the claimed invention, would have combined Elworthy, Kennewick, Liddy, and Bauer because the proffered combination would “speed[] up processing time and/or accuracy” Ans. 4-5 (citing Kennewick, [0107]) and would “display the results in a more compact manner, allowing the user to view the results all at once rather than looking through numerous lists, and assisting the user in making a quicker decision on which interpretation to select” Ans. 6 (citing Liddy, Fig. 19, element 420a, col. 34, line 67 - col. 35, lines 1-2) (“permitting the system to adjust to changing ambient light patterns.”) and one would be motivated to consult the Internet web search engine only when necessary, such as when the user input type does not correspond to a single recognized action. Ans 7. (citing Bauer col. 12, line 53 - col. 13, line 8). We note that Appellants admit that Elworthy, Kennewick, and Liddy relate to processing natural language input and Bauer relates to the submission of an input to a search engine. Br. 11-12. We also find that Elworthy, Kennewick, Liddy, and Bauer are analogous art. “Two separate tests define the scope of analogous prior art: (1) whether the art is from the same field of endeavor, regardless of the problem addressed and, (2) if the reference is not within the field of the Appeal 2010-005267 Application 10/186,039 6 inventor's endeavor, whether the reference still is reasonably pertinent to the particular problem with which the inventor is involved.” In re Klein, 647 F.3d 1343, 1348 (Fed. Cir. 2011). Appellants assert the prior art does not relate to the field of endeavor of the invention, i.e. universal user input processing. Br. 12. Because Appellants admit that Elworthy, Kennewick, and Liddy relate to processing natural language input and Bauer relates to the submission of an input to a search engine (Br. 11-12), those references are within the Appellants’ stated field of endeavor, universal user input processing, because Elworthy, Kennewick, and Liddy relate to natural language inputs and natural language inputs are a type of input that a universal input processor would handle. Additionally, Bauer is concerned with managing multiple inputs, such as voice, pen, or keyboard input (Bauer, col. 12:35-51), to a search engine, thus Bauer deals with a universal input. See Comaper Corp. v. Antec, Inc., 596 F.3d 1343, 1351 (Fed. Cir. 2010) (quoting In re Clay, 966 F.2d 656, 658-59 (Fed. Cir. 1992)). Therefore, we find that the cited references are analogous prior art. For the reason stated above, we find no error in the Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1-4, 6-20, 22, 23, 25-48, 51, 65-68, and 70-98 under 35 U.S.C. 103(a). DECISION The Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1-4, 6-20, 22, 23, 25-48, and 81-98 is affirmed. 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)(2011). Appeal 2010-005267 Application 10/186,039 7 AFFIRMED tj