Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Sep 13, 2021

2020002160 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 13, 2021)

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.
14/106,499 12/13/2013 Yong Zhang 4657-69400 7116
97698 7590 09/13/2021
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.
c/o Conley Rose, P.C.
4965 Preston Park Blvd, Suite 195E
Plano, TX 75093
EXAMINER
MUNDUR, PADMAVATHI V
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2441
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/13/2021 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):
aipatent@huawei.com
dallaspatents@dfw.conleyrose.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte YONG ZHANG
Appeal 2020-002160
Application 14/106,499
Technology Center 2400
Before JASON V. MORGAN, MICHAEL J. STRAUSS, and
JEREMY J. CURCURI, Administrative Patent Judges.
STRAUSS, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL1
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant2 appeals from the
Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1–4, 6, 7, 19, 22–24, and 27. See Final
Act. 1. Claims 1, 19, and 27 are independent. Appeal Br. 29, 31–32, 34–35

1 We refer to the Specification, filed December 13, 2013 (“Spec.”); Final
Office Action, mailed October 11, 2018 (“Final Act.”); Appeal Brief, filed
June 24, 2019 (“Appeal Br.”) and Supplemental Appeal Brief, filed August
6, 2019 (Supp. Appeal Br.); Examiner’s Answer, mailed November 22, 2019
(“Ans.”); and Reply Brief, filed January 22, 2020 (“Reply Br.”).
2 Appellant refers to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42. Appellant
identifies the real party in interest as Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. Appeal
Br. 3.
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(Claims App.). Claims 5, 8–18, 20, 21, 25, and 26 are canceled. Id. at 30–
33. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
Appellant describes the background problem of prior art client/server
systems (e.g., as might be used in accessing a web page over the Internet)
and the solution implemented by the claimed invention as follows:
In a communication model with client/server architecture,
when a client requests an object from a server, the object
requested by the client generally has a lot of associated objects.
When the client requests an object, the number of requests and
responses between the client and the server also increases, which
also increases the burden on the network and leads to a network
communication delay. Previous solutions to this problem use a
client caching technology, by which requested objects can be
acquired directly from a cache. However, before the client
directly uses an object in the cache, the client still needs to query
the server to determine whether the object expires before
determining whether to directly use the object in the cache.
Therefore, several request response processes are still needed
between the client and the server before using an object in the
cache, which leads to a significant network delay.
The embodiments disclosed by the present application reduce
network traffic and network communication delay in a
client/server architecture. In some embodiments, when
determining that the object requested by the client has one or
more associated objects, the server adds association indication
information to the object sent to the client to indicate to the client
that the object requested by the client has one or more associated
objects. Therefore, different from the prior art where the client
needs to request associated objects from the server one by one,
the embodiments disclosed herein enable the client to receive
additional associated objects without having to explicitly request
the server for the additional associated objects.
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Appeal Br. 4–5 (citation omitted). Claim 1, reproduced below with claim
element labels added, is illustrative:
1. A method for acquiring an object, the method comprising:
[i] receiving, by a server, a request message from a client,
wherein the request message comprises identifier information of
a target object requested by the client;
[ii] determining one or more associated objects of the
target object requested by the client;
[iii] sending, in response to the request message, the target
object and association indication information to the client,
wherein the association indication information indicates that the
server has the one or more associated objects available for
pushing to the client, and [(a)] the association indication
information being located in a frame of the target object, [(b)]
enabling the client to wait for next data sent by the server instead
of sending a new request message when the client receives the
target object;
[iv] generating, by the server, verification information
comprising identifier information of the one or more associated
objects;
[v] sending, by the server, the verification information to
the client for the client to verify a need for the one or more
associated objects;
[vi] receiving verification result information from the
client, wherein the verification result information comprises a
verification result with respect to at least one target associated
object selected from the one or more associated objects;
[vii] identifying, by the server, according to the
verification result information, the at least one target associated
object; and
[viii] sending, by the server, the at least one target
associated object to the client without receiving a request
message from the client for requesting the at least one target
associated object.
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REFERENCES
The Examiner relies on the following references:
Name Reference Date
Beard US 2003/0163371 Al Aug. 28, 2003
Watson US 2011/0222404 Al Sept. 15, 2011
Shmulevich US 8,156,141,B1 Apr. 10, 2012
Ruellan US 2013/0339472 Al Dec. 19, 2013
REJECTIONS
The Examiner rejects claims 1–4, 6, 7, 19, 22–24, and 27 under 35
U.S.C. § 112(b) as being indefinite. Final Act. 2–3.
The Examiner rejects claims 1, 2, 4, 6, 7, 19, 23, 24 and 27 under 35
U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over the combined teachings of Watson, Ruellan,
and Beard. Final Act. 3–20.
The Examiner rejects claims 3 and 22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as
obvious over the combined teachings of Watson, Ruellan, Beard and
Shmulevich. Final Act. 20–21.
STANDARD OF REVIEW
We review the appealed rejections for error based upon the issues
identified by Appellant, and in light of the arguments and evidence produced
thereon. Ex parte Frye, 94 USPQ2d 1072, 1075 (BPAI 2010) (precedential).
OPINION
We have considered in this Decision only those arguments Appellant
actually raised in the Briefs. Arguments not made are forfeited. See 37
C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv) (2018).
Except to the extent inconsistent with our analysis herein, we adopt as
our own the findings set forth by the Examiner in (1) the action from which
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this appeal is taken and (2) the Examiner’s Answer in response to
Appellant’s Appeal Brief, and concur with the conclusions reached by the
Examiner. We highlight the following for emphasis.

Rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b) for Indefiniteness
The Examiner finds claim 1’s recitation of “‘the client to wait for next
data sent by the server instead of sending a new request message when the
client receives the target object . . . ’ [(claim element iii(b)] is ambiguous
and unclear to what this limitation is referring in terms of protocol or other
behavior.” Final Act. 3. The Examiner finds the questioned recitation
“appears to be more descriptive of the operation of the client than any
protocol behavior that may be attributed to the implementation in the
claimed invention.” Id. According to the Examiner, the “[a]bsence of such
details [of enabling the client to wait instead of sending a new request
message] is the reason for the claims being rejected.” Id.
Appellant contends the claim language is definite and supported by
the Specification, citing to paragraphs 41 and 44 which read as follows:
[0041] Step 13: When the target object has one or more
associated objects, the server adds association indication
information to the target object, and sends the target object to the
client, so that the client continues to wait for receiving data after
receiving the target object.
[0044] If the target object carries the association indication
information, the client continues to wait for next data sent by the
server rather than sends another request to the server in the prior
art.
We apply the indefiniteness test approved by In re Packard, 751 F.3d
1307 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (per curiam): “A claim is indefinite when it contains
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words or phrases whose meaning is unclear,” and “claims are required to be
cast in clear-as opposed to ambiguous, vague, indefinite-terms.” See
Packard, 751 F.3d at 1310, 1313; Ex parte McAward, Appeal No. 2015-
006416 (PTAB Aug. 25, 2017) (precedential) at *8–11 (explaining because
of different approaches to indefiniteness before the PTAB and the courts, the
PTAB continues to follow Packard after the Supreme Court’s Nautilus, Inc.
v. Biosig Instruments, Inc., 572 U.S. 898 (2014) decision). In assessing
whether a claim is indefinite, we determine whether those skilled in the art
would understand what is claimed when the claim is read in light of the
Specification. Orthokinetics, Inc. v. Safety Travel Chairs, Inc., 806 F.2d
1565, 1576 (Fed. Cir. 1986).
The Examiner’s rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b) is erroneous
because we determine the meaning of the claim language is clear in light of
the Specification. Spec. ¶¶ 41, 44. Accordingly, the Examiner has not
established those skilled in the art would not understand what is claimed
pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 112(b), and we, therefore, do not sustain the
Examiner’s rejection of claim 1 and of claims 2–4, 6, 7, 19, 22–24, and 27,
for similar reasons.

Rejection of Independent Claims 1, 19, and 27 under 35 U.S.C. § 103
The Examiner finds Watson’s disclosure of establishing packet data
communications including a “server [that] return[s] resources to the client
that the client has not requested in those instances that the server is aware
that this resource will be required” (Watson ¶ 133) teaches or suggests
substantially all of elements i through v, except for element iii(a) requiring
association indication information be located in a frame of the target object.
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Final Act. 4–7 (citing Watson ¶¶ 9, 85, 107, 133, 135, 143; Fig. 1).
Addressing how the association information is transmitted, the Examiner
finds Beard’s disclosure of an advertising system in which a control program
is placed in a first frame of advertisement information teaches or suggests
the requirements of element iii(a). Id. at 8 (citing Beard ¶¶ 73–76; Fig. 2).
According to the Examiner, the reasons “to send server-identified resource
information as the last frame using request prioritization” is “to enforce a
priority order such that higher priority objects such as the main resource
object are delivered before lower priority ones.” Id. at 8 (citing Watson
¶ 137, Beard, Abstract). The Examiner finds the limitations of claim
elements vi–viii are taught or suggested by Ruellan’s disclosure of a client
device C that parses a main resource received from a server and, after any
suitable delay, “requests the server device S for any secondary resource
referenced in the main resource[] that is missing, i.e.[,] that the client device
does not yet hold in its cache memories and that is not being pushed by the
server device S.” Id. at 6–7 (citing Ruellan ¶¶ 34–35, 215–22, Abstract,
Figs. 5, 9). The Examiner reasons
it would have been obvious . . . to modify and augment the client
in Watson reference to send verification results information,
(Cache content of available resources) to the server and the
server using that information determining which target
associated objects to PUSH to the client and then sending those
objects [as taught by Rullen].
Id. at 7 (emphasis omitted). The Examiner supports the combination as
follows:
The motivation/suggestion would have been to obtain a plurality
of resources available in the client device and notifying the server
device with data structures representing the filtered or sub-lists
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of resource. The benefit would have been to prevent sending
redundant objects to the client when it has cached the same
information thereby saving network bandwidth and loading the
and rendering web pages on the client faster and the additional
benefit with the server PUSHING the objects would have been a
reduction in the number of requests that the client sent.
Id. (citing Ruellan: ¶¶ 34–35, 219, Abstract).
Appellant presents several contentions of error in the Examiner’s
rejection of claim 1, as follows (we adopt Appellant’s numbering scheme for
ease of reference):
B.1. Watson fails to teach the limitations of claim element iii
because, according to Appellant, (I) “Watson is silent regarding
sending anything to instruct the client to refrain from sending requests
for resources associated with a requested resource, ” (Appeal Br. 16)
and (II) “nowhere in Watson is there any mention of details regarding
when and how to send the response header, and nothing in Watson
discloses or suggests that the response header would cause the client
to wait for next data sent by the server instead of sending a new
request message” (id.).
B.2. “Beard fails to disclose that the association indication
information is located in a frame of a target object, and that the
association indication information enables the client to wait for next
data sent by the server instead of sending a new request message when
receiving the target object.” Id. at 18.
B.3. Watson’s cache-related information sent to a client by a server
fails to teach or suggest verification information for the client to
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verify a need for the one or more associated objects as recited by
claim element v. Id. at 21–22.
We address Appellant’s contentions of error in connection with the
rejection of claim 1, as follow.
B.1 Instructing Client to Refrain From Sending Requests for Resources
Appellant argues the Examiner errs in finding “that the ‘association
indication information’ recited in the independent claims is the same as
Watson’s suggestions of resources or a response header for a server-
identified resource.” Id. at 14. According to Appellant, although “Watson
discloses that the suggested resources identify a selection of resources that
the client may wish to request, . . . nowhere in Watson is there any mention
about the timing of sending the suggested resources to the client.” Id. at 16.
In response, the Examiner finds “there is nothing in the claim or the
specification that makes a mention of the timing of sending the suggested
resources, or that the association indication information includes any
instructions for the client to wait for next data.” Ans. 8. The Examiner
explains as follows:
In the absence of details unique to the implementation of the
claimed invention, Examiner interprets the claim limitation for
examining purposes as standard operation of the HTTP protocol
where the exchange between the client and the server is governed
by request and response over persistent (or other) connection.
Watson uses the HTTP protocol and persistent connection where
the client waits to receive all of the response, Par. [0107], [0143].
As recited in the claim and supported by Watson, in response to
a request message from a client, Watson’s server sends as
response: 1) the target object, 2) association indication
information, and 3) verification information for the associated
objects indicated in the association indication information. Until
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the client receives all of the HTTP response to the original
request, it is not expected to make any new request. As indicated
in previous office actions and here, the claims and the
specification lack subject matter to interpret the claims in any
other way.
Ans. at 9–10.
Appellant’s contention in unpersuasive of reversible Examiner error.
During examination, “claims . . . are to be given their broadest reasonable
interpretation consistent with the specification, and . . . claim language
should be read in light of the specification as it would be interpreted by one
of ordinary skill in the art.” In re Bond, 910 F.2d 831, 833 (Fed. Cir. 1990);
In re Bass, 314 F.3d 575, 577 (Fed. Cir. 2002) (“[T]he PTO must apply the
broadest reasonable meaning to the claim language, taking into account any
definitions presented in the specification.”); In re Cortright, 165 F.3d 1353,
1358 (Fed. Cir. 1999) (“Although the PTO must give claims their broadest
reasonable interpretation, this interpretation must be consistent with the one
that those skilled in the art would reach.”). However, although we interpret
claim limitations consistent with the specification, we do not import
limitations from the specification into the claims. In re Van Geuns, 988 F.2d
1181, 1184 (Fed. Cir. 1993) (citing In re Zletz, 893 F.2d 319, 321 (Fed. Cir.
1989)).
In support of claim element iii(b) reciting that the association
indication information enables the client to wait for next data sent by the
server instead of sending a new request message when the client receives the
target object, Appellant directs attention to paragraphs 43 and 44 of the
Specification. Supp. Appeal Br. 3. Paragraph 44 reads as follows:
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If the target object carries the association indication information,
the client continues to wait for next data sent by the server rather
than sends another request to the server in the prior art.
As found by the Examiner, we also find little detail in the Specification
concerning limitations as to how the client wait is accomplished or
implemented. Ans. 9. Furthermore, rather than requiring the client wait
only if the association information indicates that the server has an object
available for pushing and not waiting otherwise, claim element iii(b) merely
recites enabling the client to wait [at least] when the client receives the client
receives the target object. Therefore, under a broad but reasonable
interpretation of the argued claim element, we agree with the Examiner that
disputed claim element iii(b) is taught or suggested by the combination of
(1) Watson’s disclosure of the use of the HTTP protocol and a persistent
connection wherein a client waits for the entirety of an HTTP response to be
received, in combination with (2) Beard’s disclosure of placing a control
program in a first frame of advertisement information. Final Act. 4–5, 7;
Ans. 9–10.
B.2 Association Indication Information Located in Frame of Target Object
Appellant argues Beard fails to teach claim element iii(a) because
Beard discloses presentation and control information, not the recited
association indication information. Appeal Br. 17–18. Appellant further
argues “Beard’s advertisement information is distributed to a user’s
computer in accordance with scheduling information that is derived from
payments and advertising contracts, and thus, is not the same as a target
object requested by a client, as recited by the independent claims.” Id. at 18.
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The Examiner responds, finding “Appellant appears to be arguing
over references individually which is improper when the rejection is based
on a combination of references.” Ans. 10. The Examiner further explains
claim element iii(a) is taught by the combination of Beard’s “frame that
contains both data and control information” and Watson’s use of an “HTTP
connection which operates on the principle of request/response in a packet-
based network” to send “1) [a] requested resource (corresponds to target
object); [and] 2) suggestions of other resources (corresponds to association
indication information).” Id.at 11.
Appellant’s contention is unpersuasive of Examiner error because it
fails to address the Examiner’s findings. In particular, the Examiner finds
Watson, not the argued Beard reference, teaches sending a target object and
association indication information to a client. Final Act. 4, Ans. 10–11.
Thus, as found by the Examiner (Ans. 11), Appellant’s argument is an
improper attack on the Beard reference individually when the rejection is
based on the combination of Watson and Beard in addition to Ruellan.
“Non-obviousness cannot be established by attacking references individually
where the rejection is based upon the teachings of a combination of
references.” In re Merck & Co., Inc., 800 F.2d 1091, 1097 (Fed. Cir. 1986)
(citing In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425 (CCPA 1981)).
B.3 Verification by Client of Need for Associated Object(s)
Appellant contends Watson fails to teach claim element v, arguing as
follows:
Watson discloses that a server sends a response header to a client,
in which the response header includes cache related information.
See [Watson ¶ 135]. Waton’s client uses the cache related
information to consult the cache at the client and determine
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whether to request the object. See id. In Watson, the cache-
related information is described as being a date, ETags, or cache-
control directives. See id. However, Watson does not disclose
sending, by the server, the verification information comprising
identifier information of the one or more associated objects to the
client for the client to verify a need for the one or more associated
objects, as recited by the independent claims.
Appeal Br. 21–22.
The Examiner responds, finding as follows:
Watson in Par. [0133] describes the server identifying resources
that will be required by the client in addition to the main resource
and all resources are identified by their URLs, Par. [0085]
(identifier information of the associated objects); Par. [0135] also
describes the server sending cache-related information (Date,
ETags, cache-control directives) to be included in the server
response so that the client can consult its cache and determine
whether to request the object. The term ‘verification
information’ is a non-standard term but interpreted based on the
context as relating to cache validation. Sending verification
information recited in the claim is interpreted as sending cache
related information of the server identified resources and the
client using that information including the identifier URL
information and other to perform a cache validation (client
verifies).
Ans. 11–12.
Appellant’s argument is unpersuasive of reversible error because it
fails to address the Examiner’s findings. In particular, Appellant’s argument
is, in essence, a general denial that the applied reference teaches or suggests
the disputed claim element without sufficient explanation or supporting
evidence. In contrast, we find the Examiner’s findings to be reasonable and
supported by the evidence of record.
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For the reasons discussed above, Appellant’s contentions in
connection with the rejection of independent method claim 1 and
corresponding independent apparatus claims 19 and 27 are unpersuasive of
reversible Examiner error. Accordingly we sustain the rejection of
independent claims 1, 19, and 27 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over the
combined teachings of Watson, Ruellan, and Beard together with the
rejection of dependent claims 4–7, 23, and 24, which are not argued
separately with particularity.
Rejection of Dependent Claim 2 under 35 U.S.C. § 103
Claim 2 reads as follows:
2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the method further
comprises:
transferring the request message to an upper layer
application, so that the upper layer application determines,
according to the identifier information of the target object,
whether to invoke a predetermined interface; and
determining, according to an invocation situation of the
predetermined interface, whether the target object has one or
more associated objects.
Supp. Appeal Br. 8 (Claims App.).
The Examiner finds the steps of claim 2 are taught by Watson’s
description of “an upper layer application like SPDY inserting a
multiplexing feature for the HTTP request so that multiple transactions can
take place in parallel with assigned priorities over a single TCP connection.”
Final Act. 8 (citing Watson ¶¶ 107, 133).
Appellant argues, as follows:
[Although] Watson discloses a server that provides suggestions
of resources that the client may request, . . . nowhere does
Watson disclose or suggest transferring a request message to an
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upper layer application or determining, according to an
invocation situation of the predetermined interface, whether the
target object has one or more associated objects, as recited in
claim 2.
Appeal Br. 24. Appellant further argues “Watson is silent regarding an
upper layer application and an invocation situation of the predetermined
interface, as recited in claim 2.” Id.
The Examiner responds, explaining as follows:
While the claim limitation does not identify an upper layer
application by name, it appears that the reference is to an
optimizing layer such as SPDY which operates as an upper layer
application. SPDY is also the protocol that would identify other
objects related to the target object (Server Hint method as noted
before). Watson in Par. [0107] describes an upper layer
application like SPDY inserting a multiplexing feature for the
HTTP request (target object request) so that multiple transactions
can take place in parallel with assigned priorities over a single
TCP connection; note that setting up multiple streams (if there
are one or more associated objects related to the target object) in
a single connection is equivalent invoking a predetermined
interface and the implementation described must be viewed in
the context of the server method described as before in Par.
[0133].
Ans. 12–13.
Appellant’s argument is unpersuasive of reversible error because it
fails to address the Examiner’s findings. Appellant’s argument is essentially
a general denial that the applied reference teaches or suggests the disputed
claim element without sufficient explanation or supporting evidence. For
example, Appellant fails to explain why the Examiner errs in finding
Google’s SPDY communication protocol for transporting web content
operates as an upper layer application and identifies objects related to a
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target object. In contrast, we find the Examiner’s findings to be reasonable
and supported by the evidence of record. Accordingly, we sustain the
rejection of claim 2 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over the combined
teachings of Watson, Ruellan, and Beard.
Rejection of Dependent Claims 3 and 22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103
Claim 3 reads as follows:
3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the method further
comprises:
querying, according to the identifier information of the
target object, for an association table used to store information of
associated objects of the target object, and determining,
according to the query result, whether the target object has one
or more associated objects.
Supp. Appeal Br. 8 (Claims App.).
The Examiner finds Shmulevich’s disclosure of a “repository that is
used to track objects incorporated into web pages” and “use of an
association table that shows all objects and their URLs that are incorporated
into a parent web page” teaches or suggests the additional subject matter
recited by claims 3 and 22. Final Act. 20–22.
Appellant contends the rejection is improper because, although
“Shmulevich discloses that in the event [an] object [incorporated into a web
page] is changed, the table is used to automatically update the web page with
the new object content,” Shmulevich nonetheless fails to teach or suggest the
subject matter of claim 3. Appeal Br. 26–27.
The Examiner responds, finding Appellant’s argument is an improper
attack on Shmulevich individually when the rejection is based on the
combination with Watson, explaining as follows:
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[While] Watson’s server provides suggested resources to the
client in addition to the requested resource . . . and implicit in that
feature is querying/retrieving stored information (such as a table
in a database) about other resources related to the main resource
requested by the client. As made clear in the Final rejection,
Shmulevich reference is solely used to indicate the use of an
association table to query and find associated objects of the target
object. Figure 1 shows the system used in Shmulevich reference,
in particular the repository that is used to track objects
incorporated into web pages and Col. 2, lines 37–51 describe the
use of an association table that shows all objects and their URLs
that are incorporated into a parent web page.
Ans. 12–13.
Appellant’s argument is unpersuasive of reversible error because it
fails to address the Examiner’s findings that the subject matter of claim 3 is
taught or suggested by the combined teachings of Watson and Shmulevich,
not Shmulevich individually as argued. Accordingly, we sustain the
rejection of claims 3 and 22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over the
combined teachings of Watson, Ruellan, Beard and Shmulevich.
CONCLUSION
We reverse the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1–4, 6, 7, 19, 22–24,
and 27 under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b) as being indefinite.
We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1, 2, 4, 6, 7, 19, 23, 24
and 27 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being obvious over the combined teachings
Watson, Ruellan, and Beard.
We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 3 and 22 under 35
U.S.C. § 103 as being obvious over the combined teachings Watson,
Ruellan, Beard and Shmulevich.
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DECISION SUMMARY
Claim(s)
Rejected
35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–4, 6, 7, 19,
22–24, 27
112(b) Indefiniteness 1–4, 6, 7,
19, 22–
24, 27
1, 2, 4, 6, 7,
19, 23, 24, 27
103 Watson, Ruellan,
Beard
1, 2, 4, 6, 7,
19, 23, 24, 27

3, 22 103 Watson, Ruellan,
Beard, Shmulevich
3, 22
Overall
Outcome
1–4, 6, 7, 19,
22–24, 27

TIME PERIOD FOR RESPONSE
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.136(a)(1)(iv).
AFFIRMED