Francisco Alvarez Cavazos et al.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Dec 26, 2019

13716212 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Dec. 26, 2019)

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.
13/716,212 12/17/2012 Francisco Alvarez Cavazos 337995-US-NP 1036
69316 7590 12/26/2019
MICROSOFT CORPORATION
ONE MICROSOFT WAY
REDMOND, WA 98052
EXAMINER
HENSON, MISCHITA L
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2865
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/26/2019 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):
chriochs@microsoft.com
usdocket@microsoft.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte FRANCISCO ALVAREZ CAVAZOS, JONATHAN M. CLASS,
JERRY JOYCE, JORDI MOLA, GUILLERMO ORTIZ PENA, and BEN
TRUELOVE
Appeal 2019-001724
Application 13/716,212
Technology Center 2800
Before LINDA M. GAUDETTE, JEFFREY B. ROBERTSON, and
DEBRA L. DENNETT, Administrative Patent Judges.
GAUDETTE, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL1
The Appellant2 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s
decision finally rejecting claims 1–20 under 35 U.S.C. § 101.3

1 This Decision includes citations to the following documents: Specification
filed Dec. 17, 2012 (“Spec.”); Final Office Action dated Dec. 13, 2017
(“Final”); Advisory Action dated Feb. 27, 2018 (“Advisory”); Appeal Brief
filed May 21, 2018 (“Appeal Br.”); Examiner’s Answer dated Oct. 19, 2018
(“Ans.”); and Reply Brief filed Dec. 19, 2018 (“Reply Br.”).
2 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37
C.F.R. § 1.42. The Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Microsoft
Technology Licensing, LLC. Appeal Br. 4.
3 We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
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We AFFIRM.
CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
The invention relates to “a performance metric tracker that shows
an operation performance metric in context with an operation performance
history to a user.” Spec. ¶ 3. For example, the progress of an operation that
transfers or modifies a data resource may be tracked and presented to a user
so that the user is aware of operation efficiency. Id. ¶ 1. Claim 1, reproduced
below, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter:
1. A machine-implemented method, comprising:
tracking a current operation performance metric of a
data resource operation by an operating system of a computing
device, wherein the data resource operation includes altering a
data file on the computing device;
maintaining an operation performance history as a
record of previous operation performance metrics for the data
resource operation;
presenting, via an input/output device, the operation
performance history as a line graph linked to a percentage
completion point in a fill frame, wherein the percentage
completion point is related to the data resource operation; and
presenting, via the input/output device, in realtime the
current operation performance metric as a dynamic level line
in relation to the line graph to show the current operation
performance metric in context with the operation
performance history,
wherein the fill frame is filled by a loading bar when
the data resource operation is completed.
Appeal Br. 14 (Claims Appendix) (emphasis added).
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OPINION
The Examiner rejected claims 1–20 under 35 U.S.C. § 101 as directed
to patent ineligible subject matter. See Final Act. 2–7. An invention is
patent-eligible if it claims a “new and useful process, machine, manufacture,
or composition of matter.” 35 U.S.C. § 101. The Supreme Court, however,
has long interpreted 35 U.S.C. § 101 to include implicit exceptions: “[l]aws
of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas” are not patentable. Alice
Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l, 573 U.S. 208, 216 (2014). In determining whether a
claim falls within an excepted category, we are guided by the Supreme
Court’s two-step framework, described in Alice (see id. at 217–18), and
Mayo Collaborative Services v. Prometheus Laboratories, Inc., 566 U.S. 66,
75–77 (2012). In accordance with that framework, we first determine what
concept the claim is “directed to.” See Alice, 573 U.S. at 219.
Concepts determined to be abstract ideas, and thus patent ineligible,
include certain methods of organizing human activity, such as fundamental
economic practices (id. at 219–20; Bilski v. Kappos, 561 U.S. 593, 611
(2010)); mathematical formulas (Parker v. Flook, 437 U.S. 584, 594–95
(1978)); and mental processes (Gottschalk v. Benson, 409 U.S. 63, 69
(1972)). Concepts determined to be patent eligible include physical and
chemical processes, such as “molding rubber products” (Diamond v. Diehr,
450 U.S. 175, 191 (1981)); “tanning, dyeing, making water-proof cloth,
vulcanizing India rubber, smelting ores” (id. at 182 n.7 (quoting Corning v.
Burden, 56 U.S. 252, 267–68 (1854))); and manufacturing flour (Benson,
409 U.S. at 69 (citing Cochrane v. Deener, 94 U.S. 780, 785 (1876))).
If a claim is “directed to” an abstract idea, we turn to the second step
of the Alice and Mayo framework, where “we must examine the elements of
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the claim to determine whether it contains an ‘inventive concept’ sufficient
to ‘transform’ the claimed abstract idea into a patent-eligible application.”
Alice, 573 U.S. at 221. “A claim that recites an abstract idea must include
‘additional features’ to ensure ‘that the [claim] is more than a drafting effort
designed to monopolize the [abstract idea].’” Id. (quoting Mayo, 566 U.S. at
77).
In January 2019, the PTO published revised guidance on the
application of Section 101. USPTO, 2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter
Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 50 (Jan. 7, 2019) (“Guidance”). Under the
Guidance, we first look to whether a claim recites (1) any judicial
exceptions, including certain groupings of abstract ideas (i.e., mathematical
concepts, certain methods of organizing human activity such as a
fundamental economic practice, or mental processes) (“Guidance Step 2A,
Prong One”), and (2) additional elements that integrate the judicial exception
into a practical application (see MPEP § 2106.05(a)–(c), (e)–(h)) (“Guidance
Step 2A, Prong Two”). Only if a claim (1) recites a judicial exception and
(2) does not integrate that exception into a practical application, do we then
look to whether the claim (3) adds a specific limitation beyond the judicial
exception that is not “well-understood, routine, conventional” in the field
(see MPEP § 2106.05(d)), or (4) simply appends well-understood, routine,
conventional activities previously known to the industry, specified at a high
level of generality, to the judicial exception (“Guidance Step 2B”).
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Judicial Exception — Guidance Step 2A, Prong One
The Appellant argues the claims as a group. See generally Appeal Br.
8–13. Accordingly, we focus our discussion on independent claim 1.
As indicated above, under Guidance Step 2A, Prong One, we consider
whether claim 1 recites a judicial exception to the statutory categories of
patent-eligible subject matter, including one of the following groupings of
abstract ideas: (1) mathematical concepts, e.g., mathematical relationships,
mathematical formulas or equations, and mathematical calculations; (2)
mental processes, e.g., concepts performed in the human mind, including
observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions; and (3) certain methods
of organizing human activity. See Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 52.
The Examiner determined that the claim 1 steps of “tracking a current
operation performance metric of a data resource operation,” “altering a data
file,” “maintaining an operation performance history as a record,”
“presenting . . . the operation performance history as a line graph,” and
“presenting . . . in realtime the current operation performance metric as a
dynamic level line in relation to the line graph” (see bolded, italicized claim
1 language supra p. 2) are directed to an abstract idea of “collecting,
displaying, and manipulating data” using a generic, computerized system.
Final 2–3; see also Advisory 4.
The Specification discloses that “a data resource operation” refers to a
user-executed copy, move, or delete operation, a data property change, or a
file or folder alteration. Spec. ¶ 15. The Specification discloses that “[a]
performance metric tracker of the operating system may track an operation
performance metric of the data resource operation.” Id. “An operation
performance metric is a value that describes the manner that the operating
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system is performing the data resource operation, such as operation speed, as
opposed to whether the operating system has completed the data resource
operation.” Id. The operating system may track the performance of each data
resource operations and display a metric of the performance on a user
interface. Id. ¶ 23. “For example, if 2.52 MB of a 5.6 MB data file 202 has
been copied to a data target 208, . . . [a] simple percentage tracking dialogue
box 302 may visually represent this data resource operation by expanding a
loading bar 306 to . . . fill 45% of the fill frame 308.” Id. ¶ 23, Fig. 3. The
loading bar continues to fill the frame proportionately as the data resource
operation is completed. Id. ¶ 24. “The performance metric tracker may
maintain an operation performance history for the data resource operation.”
Id. ¶ 17. Operation performance history may be based on a previous average
or on an intra-operation performance. Id. ¶¶ 32–33. “The performance
metric tracker may present in realtime the current operation performance
metric in relation to the operation performance history to a user.” Id. ¶ 17.
For example, operation performance history may be displayed as a line
graph and present the current operation performance metric as a dynamic
level line. Id. ¶ 25.
The Specification discloses that “an exemplary computing device 100
which may act as performance metric tracker . . . may include a bus 110, a
processor 120, a memory 130, a data storage 140, an input/output device
150, and a communication interface 160” (id. ¶ 18), each of which is
described further as conventional in the art (see id. ¶¶ 19–20). For example,
the Specification discloses that “input/output device 150 may include one or
more conventional mechanisms that permit a user to input information to the
computing device 100, such as a keyboard, a mouse, . . . etc.[, and] . . . [to]
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output information to the user, including a display, a printer, [etc.]” Id. ¶ 20.
The Specification discloses that “[e]mbodiments within the scope of the
present invention may also include . . . any available [computer-readable
storage] media that can be accessed by a general purpose or special purpose
computer.” Id. ¶ 35. “[C]omputer-readable storage media can comprise . . .
any . . . medium which can be used to carry or store desired program code
means in the form of computer-executable instructions or data structures.”
Id. “Computer-executable instructions include, for example, instructions and
data which cause a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, or
special purpose processing device to perform a certain function or group of
functions.” Id. ¶ 37.
Based on the above and other descriptions in the Specification, we
determine that the claimed method steps recite collecting, manipulating, and
presenting data using a generic computer system. See Ans. 4. These steps
involve observations, evaluations, and judgments, i.e., steps that people can
perform in their minds or using pen and paper. For example, an individual
can obtain performance data by looking at a data base, and can chart the data
in a desired format—e.g., line or bar graph—using pen and paper. Thus,
claim 1 recites a mental process—an abstract idea. See Guidance, 854 Fed.
Reg. at 52 (“If a claim, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers
performance in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer
components, then it is still in the mental processes category unless the claim
cannot practically be performed in the mind.”); see also CyberSource Corp.
v. Retail Decisions, Inc., 654 F.3d 1366, 1375 (Fed. Cir. 2011) (“That purely
mental processes can be unpatentable, even when performed by a computer,
was precisely the holding of the Supreme Court in Gottschalk v. Benson.”).
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Integration into a Practical Application — Guidance Step 2A, Prong Two
According to the Guidance, even if a claim recites any one of the three
groupings of abstract ideas, the claim is still not “directed to” a judicial
exception (abstract idea), and thus is patent eligible, if “the claim as a whole
integrates the recited judicial exception into a practical application of that
exception.” Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 53. Limitations that are indicative of
“integration into a practical application” include: (1) improvements to the
functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field (see
MPEP § 2106.05(a)); (2) applying the judicial exception with, or by use of, a
particular machine (see id. § 2106.05(b)); (3) effecting a transformation or
reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing (see id.
§ 2106.05(c)); and (4) applying or using the judicial exception in some other
meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to
a particular technological environment, such that the claim as a whole is
more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the exception (see id.
§ 2106.05(e)). See Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 54–55 (“Prong Two”). In
contrast, limitations that are not indicative of “integration into a practical
application” include: (1) adding the words “apply it” (or an equivalent) with
the judicial exception, merely including instructions to implement an
abstract idea on a computer, or merely using a computer as a tool to perform
an abstract idea (see MPEP § 2106.05(f)); (2) adding insignificant
extra-solution activity to the judicial exception (see id. § 2106.05(g); and
(3) generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular
technological environment or field of use (see id. § 2106.05(h)).
See Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 54–55 (“Prong Two”).
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The Appellant argues that the claims include limitations that are
indicative of integration into a practical application. The Appellant argues
that “the claims recite an improved [user] interface,” in particular,
an improved representation in the form of “the operation
performance history as a line graph linked to a percentage
completion point in a fill frame,” and “in realtime the current
operation performance metric as a dynamic level line in relation
to the line graph to show the current operation performance
metric in context with the operation performance history.”
Appeal Br. 9–10. In support of its argument, the Appellant cites Core
Wireless Licensing S.A.R.L. v. LG Electronics, Inc., 880 F.3d 1356 (Fed. Cir.
2018). Appeal Br. 9.
In Core Wireless, the court determined that the involved claims were
patent eligible because they were “directed to an improved user interface for
computing devices, not to the abstract idea of an index.” 880 F.3d at 1362.
The court reasoned that
[a]lthough the generic idea of summarizing information
certainly existed prior to the invention, these claims are directed
to a particular manner of summarizing and presenting
information in electronic devices. Claim 1 of the ’476 patent
requires “an application summary that can be reached directly
from the menu,” specifying a particular manner by which the
summary window must be accessed. The claim further requires
the application summary window list a limited set of data,
“each of the data in the list being selectable to launch the
respective application and enable the selected data to be seen
within the respective application.” This claim limitation
restrains the type of data that can be displayed in the summary
window. Finally, the claim recites that the summary window “is
displayed while the one or more applications are in an un-
launched state,” a requirement that the device applications exist
in a particular state. These limitations disclose a specific
manner of displaying a limited set of information to the user,
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rather than using conventional user interface methods to display
a generic index on a computer.
Id. at 1362–63. The court concluded that the claims were patent eligible
because they “recite[d] a specific improvement over prior systems, resulting
in an improved user interface for electronic devices,” and, therefore, were
directed to “an improvement in the functioning of computers.” Id. at 1363.
The Appellant argues that, like the Core Wireless claims, the present
claims “are not simply directed to displaying data, but are directed to a
particular manner of ‘summarizing and presenting information.’” Reply Br.
5. The Appellant contends that, similar to the Core Wireless claims, the
present claims include steps—tracking and presenting—requiring that the
device application exist in a specific state, i.e., “the state of performing the
data resource operation.” Id. The Appellant asserts that like the Core
Wireless claims, “the claims of the subject application provide . . . a
structured graphical user interface and prescribed functionality.” Id. (quoting
Spec. ¶ 24 (“The operating system may provide a more data-rich user
experience by presenting the current operation performance metric in
relation to the operation performance history.”)).
The Examiner argues that the present claims are directed to “[a]n
improvement to the representation in the format of the data presented to a
user,” and are distinguishable from the Core Wireless claims, directed to “an
improvement to the interface.” Ans. 6 (emphasis added). The Examiner
explains that the claims are “directed to an improvement of the visual
representation of the operation data (i.e. collecting, manipulating and
displaying data) so that a user can be made aware of operation efficiency.
That is, the claims amount to no more than customizing information and
presenting it to users based on particular characteristics.” Ans. 4. The
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Examiner contends that “the concept described in claim 1 is not
meaningfully different from those concepts found by the courts to be an
abstract idea.” Final 3 (citing Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Capital One
Bank (USA), 792 F.3d 1363 (Fed. Cir. 2015)).
For the reasons discussed below, we agree with the Examiner that
claim 1, as a whole, does not integrate the recited mental process into a
practical application.
In Data Engine Technologies LLC v. Google LLC, 906 F.3d 999 (Fed.
Cir. 2018), the court considered whether claims were akin to the patent-
eligible Core Wireless claims, or were directed to patent-ineligible methods
of organizing and presenting information such as the claims in Affinity Labs
of Texas, LLC v. DirecTV, LLC, 838 F.3d 1253 (Fed. Cir. 2016) and
Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Erie Indemnity Co., 850 F.3d 1315 (Fed. Cir.
2017). See Data Engine, 906 F.3d at 1010–11. In Affinity Labs, the court
determined that claims directed to “streaming regional broadcast signals to
cellular telephones located outside the region” were “entirely functional in
nature,” and there was nothing in the claims “directed to how to implement
out-of-region broadcasting.” Data Engine, 906 F.3d at 1010 (quoting Affinity
Labs, 838 F.3d at 1258). “Although the representative claim also recited ‘a
graphical user interface’ for displaying a menu of available media options
from which a user could select, the limitation was . . . insignificant extra-
solution activity and thus insufficient to confer patent eligibility.” Id.
(quoting Affinity Labs, 838 F.3d at 1261). Similarly, in Erie Indemnity, the
court held that claims reciting a method for searching a database using an
index of descriptive terms associated with “category” and “domain” tags
were patent ineligible, noting that the claims failed to recite any specific
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structure or improvement of computer functionality sufficient to render them
not abstract. Id. (citing Erie Indemnity, 850 F.3d at 1326–29). In Data
Engine, the court determined that “[i]n contrast to Affinity Labs . . . and Erie
Indemnity,” the involved claim was “not simply directed to displaying a
graphical user interface or collecting, manipulating, or organizing
information to improve navigation through three-dimensional spreadsheets[,
but] . . . recite[d] a specific structure (i.e., notebook tabs) within a particular
spreadsheet display that performs a specific function (i.e., navigating within
a three-dimensional spreadsheet).” Id. at 1010–11. The court determined
that, like the “claims in Core Wireless, [the] claim . . . recite[d] a ‘specific’
and ‘particular’ manner of navigating a three-dimensional spreadsheet that
improve[d] the efficient functioning of computers,” i.e., the claimed method
“provide[s] for rapidly accessing and processing information in three-
dimensional spreadsheets.” Id. at 1009 (alteration in original) (internal
quotation marks and citation omitted). As to the claims in a different patent,
however, the court in Data Engine determined that the claim limitations of
“tracking changes in a spreadsheet by: (1) creating a base version of a
spreadsheet, (2) creating a new version of the spreadsheet, and (3)
determining which cells of data have changed by comparing the new and
base versions” was “an abstract idea,” and that “[t]he mere automation of
this process [did] not negate its abstraction.” Id. at 1013. The court
determined that the claims were akin to those held patent-ineligible in
Content Extraction & Transmission LLC v. Wells Fargo Bank, Nat’l Ass’n,
776 F.3d 1343 (Fed. Cir. 2014): “There, the claims were directed to methods
of extracting data from hard-copy documents using an automated scanner,
recognizing information from the extracted data, and storing that data in
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memory.” Data Engine, 906 F.3d at 1013; see also Content Extraction, 776
F.3d at 1347 (finding that “1) collecting data, 2) recognizing certain data
within the collected data set, and 3) storing that recognized data in a
memory” was an abstract idea because “data collection, recognition, and
storage is undisputedly well-known” and “humans have always performed
these functions”).
Like the patent-ineligible claims in the cases discussed above, claim 1
fails to recite limitations related to an improvement in the functioning of a
user interface. The potential improvement to user experience provided by the
claimed invention relates solely to the format or content of the displayed
data, not to the functioning of the user interface itself. See Spec. ¶ 24 (“may
provide a more data-rich user experience by presenting the current operation
performance metric in relation to the operation performance history”
(emphasis added)); claim 1 (“presenting . . . the current operation
performance metric as a dynamic level line in relation to the line graph” of
the operation performance history). There are no claim limitations that relate
to a specific structure or an improvement to interface functionality—e.g.,
increased speed or accuracy. See Data Engine, 906 F.3d at 1010–11. Nor do
we find any disclosure in the Specification that the claimed method solves a
problem relating to prior graphical user interface devices. See id. Rather,
similar to the patent-ineligible claims in the cases discussed above, the focus
of the claims “is on collecting [data], analyzing it, and displaying certain
results of the collection and analysis,” Electric Power Group, LLC v. Alstom
S.A., 830 F.3d 1350, 1353 (Fed. Cir. 2016). “[M]erely presenting the results
of abstract processes of collecting and analyzing information, without more
(such as identifying a particular tool for presentation), is abstract as an
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ancillary part of such collection and analysis.” Id. at 1354; see also id. at
1353 (“[W]e have treated collecting information, including when limited to
particular content (which does not change its character as information), as
within the realm of abstract ideas.”).
In sum, we determine that claim 1 as a whole does not integrate the
judicial exception—a mental process— into a practical application of that
exception.
Inventive Concept — Guidance Step 2B
Under Guidance Step 2B, we determine whether the claim provides an
“inventive concept,” i.e., whether the additional elements beyond the judicial
exception, individually and in combination, amount to “significantly more”
than the judicial exception itself. Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 56. According to
the Guidance, “simply append[ing] well-understood, routine, conventional
activities previously known to the industry, specified at a high level of
generality,” is indicative that an inventive concept is absent. Id.
The Appellant argues that “by displaying the performance history of
the operation that is actually occurring on the computer, in context with the
current realtime operation performance,” the claims recite significantly more
than “collecting and manipulating data into a format that conveys desired
information to a user.” Appeal Br. 11. The Appellant argues that “[t]his
function was not achievable before, as evidenced by the fact that the claims
are indicated as novel over the prior art.” Id.
The Appellant’s argument is not persuasive because, as explained by
the court in Data Engine, novelty and patent eligibility under 35 U.S.C.
§ 101 are distinct issues. Data Engine, 906 F.3d at 1011 (“The eligibility
question is not whether anyone has ever used tabs to organize information.
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That question is reserved for §§ 102 and 103. The question of abstraction is
whether the claim is ‘directed to’ the abstract idea itself.” (citing Alice, 573
U.S. at 218 n.3)). Moreover, upon review of the claim 1 elements both
individually and as an ordered combination, we do not find anything that
amounts to significantly more than the judicial exception itself.
Turning first to the individual claim 1 elements, as noted above, the
Specification describes the “operating system of a computing device” and
the “input/output device” used in the claimed method as well-known,
generic, computer components. See Spec. ¶¶ 19–20, 35, 37 supra p. 6. The
Specification indicates that the use of these devices to perform each of the
individual claim 1 steps—tracking and maintaining (collecting data),
altering (manipulating data), and presenting (displaying data)—was well-
understood, routine, and conventional. See, e.g., Spec. ¶ 35 (“[C]omputer-
readable storage media for carrying or having computer-executable
instructions or data structures stored thereon . . . may be any available media
that can be accessed by a general purpose or special purpose computer.”),
¶ 19 (“The data storage 140 may include a conventional ROM device or
another type of static data storage that stores static information and
instructions for the processor 120.”), ¶ 37 (“Computer-executable
instructions, associated data structures, and program modules represent
examples of the program code means for executing steps of the methods
disclosed.”), ¶ 20 (“The input/output device 150 may include one or more
conventional mechanisms that output information to the user, including a
display.”). “For the role of a computer in a computer-implemented invention
to be deemed meaningful in the context of this analysis, it must involve
more than performance of ‘well-understood, routine, [and] conventional
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activities previously known to the industry.’” Data Engine, 906 F.3d at 1012
(quoting Content Extraction, 776 F.3d at 1347–48); see Electric Power
Group, 830 F.3d at 1355 (“Nothing in the claims, understood in light of the
specification, requires anything other than off-the-shelf, conventional
computer, network, and display technology for gathering, sending, and
presenting the desired information. That is so even as to the claim
requirement of “displaying concurrent visualization” of two or more types of
information, . . . even if understood to require time-synchronized display:
nothing in the patent contains any suggestion that the displays needed for
that purpose are anything but readily available.”). The Specification
discloses that tracking the progress of an operation that transfers or modifies
a data resource (“altering a data file” (claim 1 (emphasis added))) and
presenting the progress to a user so that the user may be aware of operation
efficiency, were well-known, routine, and conventional. See Spec. ¶ 1
(background of the invention). The Specification also discloses that
presenting the progress to a user in the form of a loading bar within a fill
frame was well-known, routine, and conventional. See id.
We determine, therefore, that an inventive concept does not arise in
the claim limitations, taken individually, as they recite the use of generic
computer components to perform only the well-known, routine, and
conventional activities of data collection, manipulation, and display.
We next consider whether an inventive concept arises in the ordered
combination of claim elements. The Appellant argues that the inventive
concept lies in a method that provides an improved representation of an
operating performance metric, i.e., by providing a comparison of the current
operation performance metric as a dynamic level line in relation to operation
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performance history, the user is provided with a more data-rich experience.
See Appeal Br. 11–12. We are not persuaded that an improved
representation of an operating performance metric amounts to an inventive
concept because claim 1 is not limited to a specific technical solution of the
abstract idea of collecting, manipulating, and displaying data. There is no
indication that the claimed method overcomes a problem that existed in the
display of operation performance metrics or improves the performance of
the user interface itself. See Bascom Global Internet Serv.’s, Inc. v. AT&T
Mobility LLC, 827 F.3d 1341, 1351–52 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (discussing prior
cases involving the issue of inventive concept). In other words, claim 1 does
not recite a technology-based solution that addresses an existing problem in
the performance of an operating system used to track, alter, or maintain a
record of an operating performance metric, or an existing problem in the
performance of the input/output device used to display this information.
Accordingly, we determine that an inventive concept does not arise in
the ordered combination of claim 1 elements, because claim 1 simply
requires the performance of the abstract idea of collecting, manipulating, and
displaying data on generic computer components using conventional
computer activities.
In conclusion, for the reasons stated above and in the Final Office
Action, the Advisory Action, and the Answer, we sustain the rejection of
claims 1–20 under 35 U.S.C. § 101.

CONCLUSION
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–20 101 Eligibility 1–20
Appeal 2019-001724
Application 13/716,212

18

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).
AFFIRMED