Ex Parte Belvin et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jun 30, 2014

11751513 (P.T.A.B. Jun. 30, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte MARCUS L. BELVIN, CHRISTOPHER M. BROGLIE,
MICHAEL J. FREDERICK, and DAVID J. HAWKEY
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Appeal 2012-000655
Application 11/751,513
Technology Center 2100
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Before DEMETRA J. MILLS, MELANIE L. McCOLLUM, and
JEFFREY N. FREDMAN, Administrative Patent Judges.

FREDMAN, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON REQUEST FOR REHEARING
Appellants requested rehearing of the decision entered April 10, 2014.
That decision affirmed the Examiner’s rejection of claims 12-27 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a).
Appellants’ request has been granted to the extent that the decision
has been reconsidered, but such request is denied with respect to making any
modifications to the decision affirming the Examiner’s rejection under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a).

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Application 11/751,513

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DISCUSSION
Appellants contend that “[i]ntegral to claim 12 . . . is the definition of
hover properties for a hyperlink that includes a selected subset of content
attributes” and that “this integral limitation cannot be found in Becker thus
defeating a prima facie case of anticipation under the law” (Req. Reh’g 3).
Appellants specifically contend that the “Board does not specifically address
the contention that there is a distinction between establishing attributes for
underlying content and establishing attributes for a hyperlink that points to
the content” (Req. Reh’g 5).
We remain unpersuaded. Claim 12 identifies two preliminary steps,
“receiving a selected subset . . . of selectable content attributes” and then
“defining hover properties . . . including the selected subset of content
attributes.” Becker teaches a step of identifying “characteristics of the
underlying data obtained from one or more instances where the web
browser 105 selected the current hyperlink” (Becker, col. 9, ll. 31-32; FF 6)
and a step where the user may specify “certain hyperlink characteristics that
the user is interested in” (Becker, col. 9, ll. 36-37; FF 6) where “only
download time and size may be of interest” (Becker, col. 9, ll. 39-40; FF 6).
As we discussed in the Decision, the phrase “content attributes” may
be interpreted in light of Appellants’ Specification to encompass features
such as download time and download size (Dec. 7-8), so that when Becker
teaches that a user may define “download time and size” as “hover
properties,” Becker is reasonably understood as teaching the limitations of
claim 12. This is consistent with Fig. 4 of Becker, which teaches that after
step 406b, where the underlying data is obtained (FF 3, 6), the subset of
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Application 11/751,513

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“content attributes” in which a user is interested are displayed in a report in
step 406c, which report may include download time and size (FF 6, 8; cf.
Fig. 5 of Becker).
We recognize that Becker may not refer to the selected content
attributes as “hover properties.” However, given that Becker discloses that
the selected set of content attributes are displayed when one hovers over a
hyperlink (Becker, col. 9, ll. 19-40; FF 5-6), we conclude that the selected
content attributes would be considered “hover properties,” as the term is
used in the present Specification.
SUMMARY
We have carefully reviewed the original opinion in light of
Appellants’ request, but we find no other point of law or fact which we
overlooked or misapprehended in arriving at our decision. Therefore,
Appellants’ request has been granted to the extent that the decision has been
reconsidered, but such request is denied with respect to making any
modifications to the decision affirming the Examiner’s rejections under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a).

DENIED

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