Ex Parte Brunner et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Dec 5, 2014

11500154 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 5, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte RALPH BRUNNER, JOHN HARPER, and PETER
GRAFFAGNINO

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Appeal 2012-005877
Application 11/500,154
Technology Center 2600
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Before CAROLYN D. THOMAS, JASON V. MORGAN, and
JOHN P. PINKERTON, Administrative Patent Judges.

PINKERTON, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

SUMMARY
Appellants1 appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s
Final Rejection of claims 1–20. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C.
§ 6(b).
We reverse.

1 The real party in interest identified by Appellants is Apple Inc. See Appeal
Br. 4.

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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Introduction
Appellants describe the present invention as follows:
A framework for performing graphics animation and
compositing operations has a layer tree for interfacing with the
application and a render tree for interfacing with a render
engine. Layers in the layer tree can be content, windows, views,
video, images, text, media, or any other type of object for a user
interface of an application. The application commits change to
the state of the layers of the layer tree. The application does not
need to include explicit code for animating the changes to the
layers. Instead, an animation is determined for animating the
change in state. In determining the animation, the framework
can define a set of predetermined animations based on motion,
visibility, and transition. The determined animation is
explicitly applied to the affected layers in the render tree. A
render engine renders from the render tree into a frame buffer
for display on the computer system. Those portions of the
render tree that have changed relative to prior versions can be
tracked to improve resource management.

Abstract.
Rejections on Appeal2
Claims 1–5, 7, and 17–20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being obvious over Beda (US 2004/0189667 A1; published Sept.
30, 2004) in view of Berger (US 6,230,174 B1; filed Sept. 11, 1998).
Claim 8 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
obvious over Beda, Berger, and Schneider (US 2005/0243090 A1; published
Nov. 3, 2005).

2 Appellants correctly note that dependent claim 6 was indicated as rejected
in the Office Action Summary mailed on Apr. 4, 2011, but without citations
or rationale. See Appeal Br. 11. Thus, we summarily reverse the
Examiner’s rejection of claim 6.
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Claims 9–16 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103( a) as being
obvious over Beda, Berger, and Subramanian (US 2005/0140694 A1; Jun.
30, 2005).
Illustrative Claim
Claim 1 is illustrative and provides as follows:
1. A method of rendering a user interface of an application
operating on a computer system, the method comprising:

constructing a first data structure by interfacing with the
application, the first data structure having first objects
associated with the user interface of the application;

constructing a second data structure separate from the first
data structure, the second data structure having second
objects associated with the first objects of the first data
structure;

making implicit animations available for automatically
animating properties of the second objects in response to
changes received from the application;

receiving from the application a change for at least one
property of at least one of the first objects from a first
state to a second state;

changing the at least one property of the at least one first
object from the first state to the second state;

determining one of the implicit animations for animating
the change of the at least one property for at least one of
the second objects associated with the at least one first
object from the first state to the second state, the implicit
animation being automatically determined independent of
the application and being determined based on what the at
least one property is that is subject to the change, wherein
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the application does not include explicit animation code
for the automatically determined implicit animation; and

rendering from the second data structure for display with
the computer system by implementing the determined
animation on the at least one property of the at least one
second object.

Issue on Appeal
Appellants’ arguments in the Appeal Brief3 and Reply Brief present us
with the following dispositive4 issue:
Does Berger teach or suggest “wherein the application does not
include explicit animation code for the automatically determined
implicit animation,” as recited in claim 1?
ANALYSIS
The Examiner acknowledges that Beda does not teach implicit
animation, but finds that Berger does so. See Ans. 6. Specifically, the
Examiner finds “Berger teaches the user applying animation to graphical
objects by specifiying the additional states, wherein the states set by the user
correspond to a JavaScript animation” (citing column 4: 2–14) and that
“Berger teaches . . . automatically generating the JavaScript animation in the
markup language document” (citing column 7:25–26). See Ans. 6. The

3 Our Decision refers to Appellants’ Appeal Brief, filed on Nov. 14, 2011
(“Appeal Br.”), the Examiner’s Answer, mailed on Dec. 28, 2011 (“Ans.”),
Appellants’ Reply Brief, filed on Feb. 23, 2012 (“Reply Br.”), and the
original Specification, filed on Aug. 4, 2006 (“Spec.”).

4 Appellants’ arguments present us with additional issues, but we do not
reach them because the identified issue is dispositive of the appeal.

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Examiner further finds that “implicit” and “explicit” animation are not
definitively defined in Appellants’ Specification and that, based on the
broadest reasonable interpretation, “[a]n implicit animation is considered as
animation that is carried out without the user having to input the code for
said animation, as taught by Berger.” See Ans. 14–15.
Appellants agree that Berger discloses a code generation process that
automatically generates JavaScript animation code responsive to the states
set by the user. See Appeal Br. 20–22. Appellants contend, therefore,
“Berger discloses standard code generation to implement an explicit
animation as defined by the user.” Id. at 22.
Appellants note claim 1 states, in part, “wherein the application does
not include explicit animation code for the automatically determined implicit
animation.” See Reply Br. 5. Thus, Appellants contend “that in the context
of the Specification and the claims, an explicit animation petains to an
animation explicity defined in the code (i.e., application has the animation
code) . . . whereas an implicit animation is, in part, automatically determined
independent of the application and the application does not contain the
corresponding explicit code.” Id. Furthermore, Appellants assert that,
“[e]ven if one were to accept the Examiner’s position that Berger teaches
implicit animation because the user does not input the code, it is clear that in
Berger the application actually includes the code (via standard code
generation) for the animation” (see id. at 7), which is in direct contradiction
to the plain language of claim 1 stating “the application does not include
explicit animation code.”
We agree with Appellants. The Examiner focuses on whether the
animation is carried out without the user having to input the animation code,
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but we are not persuaded this is the correct analysis. The issue concerning
the animation code is whether it is present in the application, rather than how
it got there. Claim 1 includes the limitation “wherein the application does
not include explicit animation code,” which means the application does not
have to include code for animating changes such as movement and resizing.
Spec. 36. Berger merely discloses automatically generating explicit
animation code that is embedded in the application. See Berger col. 7:25–
26; Appeal Br. 22; Reply Br. 6. Thus, Berger does not teach or suggest
“wherein the application does not include explicit animation code for the
automatically determined implicit animation,” as recited in claim 1.
Furthermore, the Examiner’s findings do not show that Beda, Subramanian,
or Schneider cures the noted deficiency of Berger.
Accordingly, we do not sustain the rejection of claim 1. For the same
reasons, we do not sustain the rejections of independent claims 19–20, and
dependent claims 2–5 and 7–18, which contain similar recitations to the
disputed recitation of claim 1.

DECISION
The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1–20 is reversed.

REVERSED

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