Lenovo (Singapore) Pte. Ltd.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Dec 13, 2021

2020005715 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 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.
14/076,798 11/11/2013 Xin Feng RPS920130110USNP(710.268) 4267
58127 7590 12/13/2021
FERENCE & ASSOCIATES LLC
409 BROAD STREET
PITTSBURGH, PA 15143
EXAMINER
LUU, DAVID V
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2171
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/13/2021 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 XIN FENG, JEFFREY E. SKINNER, and
MEI-WEN SUN
Appeal 2020-005715
Application 14/076,798
Technology Center 2100
Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, ALLEN R. MacDONALD, and
NABEEL U. KHAN, Administrative Patent Judges.
KHAN, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from the
Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1–20. We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.

1 We use the word Appellant to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.42(a). Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Lenovo
(Singapore) Pte. Ltd. Appeal Br. 3,
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CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
Appellant’s Specification explains that the claimed subject matter
relates to “[i]nformation handling devices . . . used to accept user inputs in
various formants,” including “’touch’ inputs.” Spec. ¶ 1.
Claim 1, reproduced below, with annotations indicating the disputed
limitations, illustrates the claimed subject matter:
1. A method, comprising:
accepting, at a touch input component, touch input in an
input mode, wherein the touch input comprises more than one
drawing stroke;
rendering, on a display device separate from the touch
input component, the touch input in a touch input interface;
receiving, at the touch input component separate from the
display device displaying the touch input rendering and using a
processor, multi-touch input;
switching, using the processor, to an editing mode based
on receipt of the multi-touch input and identifying that the
received multi-touch input comprises an attribute modification
input;
identifying an attribute of the touch input rendering that
is mapped to the received multi-touch input, wherein the
received multi-touch input is associated with a predetermined
modification of the identified attribute and modifies a single
overall attribute of the entire touch input rendering comprising
more than one drawing stroke, wherein the attribute is selected
from the group consisting of: size of the entire touch input
rendering and rotation of the entire touch input rendering;
modifying, within the editing mode and using the
processor, the identified attribute of the touch input rendering
according to the multi-touch input;
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accepting, at the touch input component, further touch
input comprising a single touch input; and
switching, using the processor, back into the input mode
based upon receipt of the single touch input.
REFERENCES
The prior art relied upon by the Examiner is:
Name Reference Date
Dixon et al. (“Dixon”) US 2014/0363082 A1 Dec. 11, 2014
Lang et al. (“Lang”) US 2013/0307861 A1 Nov. 21, 2013

REJECTIONS
Claims 1, 11, and 20 stand rejected on the ground of non-statutory
double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1, 10, and 19 of U.S.
Patent No. 9,965,170 B2 in view of Dixon and Lang. Final Act. 3–6.
Claims 1–20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable
over Dixon and Lang. Final Act. 6–16.
OPINION
Non-Statutory Double Patenting Rejection
The Examiner rejects claims 1, 11, and 20 on the ground of non-
statutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1, 10, and 19 of
U.S. Patent No. 9,965,170 B2 in view of Dixon and Lang. Final Act. 3.
Appellant did not appeal the double patenting rejection. See generally
Appeal Br. As a result, we summarily affirm the Examiner’s non-statutory
double patenting rejection. See Ex Parte Frye, 94 USPQ2d 1072, 1075
(BPAI 2010) (precedential) (“If an appellant fails to present arguments on a
particular issue –– or, more broadly, on a particular rejection –– the Board
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will not, as a general matter, unilaterally review those uncontested aspects of
the rejection.”).
Prior-Art Rejection
Claim 1 recites:
rendering, on a display device separate from the touch input
component, the touch input in a touch input interface;
. . .
switching, using the processor, to an editing mode based on
receipt of the multi-touch input and identifying that the received
multi-touch input comprises an attribute modification input;
[and]
identifying an attribute of the touch input rendering that is
mapped to the received multi-touch input, wherein the received
multi-touch input is associated with a predetermined
modification of the identified attribute and modifies a single
overall attribute of the entire touch input rendering comprising
more than one drawing stroke, wherein the attribute is selected
from the group consisting of: size of the entire touch input
rendering and rotation of the entire touch input rendering[.]
Appeal Br. 23.
The Examiner finds the combination of Dixon and Lang teaches or
suggests the aforementioned limitations. See Final Act. 6–10; see also
Ans. 4. More specifically, the Examiner finds Dixon discloses a
multifunction device 100 with a touch-sensitive display 112 (i.e., a touch
screen 112) and an optional touchpad that is a touch-sensitive area of the
device 100 that, unlike touch screen 112, does not display input. See Final
Act. 7 (citing Dixon ¶¶ 85, 211, Fig. 11B); see also Dixon ¶ 73. The
Examiner further finds Dixon discloses that a user enters handwritten strokes
1502 and 1510 in a handwriting input area 606 of device 100 and, in
response, the device considers the handwritten strokes 1502 and 1510 as two
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separate recognition units, where a user subsequently uses a pinch gesture
over the handwritten strokes 1502 and 1510 and, in response to the gesture,
the device merges the handwritten strokes 1502 and 1510 into a single
recognition unit, where the positions of the handwritten strokes 1502 and
1510 are modified so that the spacing between the handwritten strokes 1502
and 1510 is reduced. See Final Act. 7–8 (citing Dixon ¶¶ 254–255, 257–
258, Figs. 15A–15E).
The Examiner additionally finds Lang discloses manipulation and
editing of dry ink strokes via multi-touch gestures, including resizing a
group 510 of dry ink strokes using a two-finger pinching gesture 520, and
rotating the group 510 of dry ink strokes using a two-finger gesture 530
resulting in new grouped strokes 540. See Final Act. 9 (citing Lang ¶ 38,
Fig. 5). As further found by the Examiner, it would have been obvious to a
person of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the claimed invention to
modify Dixon’s method of accepting handwritten touch inputs and multi-
touch inputs to render handwritten text to include Lang’s multi-touch
gestures for changing a size of a touch input in order to provide a more
efficient user interface that provides an increased number of manipulation
functions mapped to multi-touch gestures for the user to choose from. See
Final Act. 10 (citing Lang ¶ 7).
Appellant argues the Examiner’s rationale for combining Dixon and
Lang is merely conclusory and does not sufficiently support the rejection.
See Appeal Br. 15. As argued by Appellant, the Examiner’s rationale for
combining Dixon and Lang “while germane to the present application, is not
actually taught in either Dixon or Lang.” Id. at 16. As further argued by
Appellant, the Examiner’s rationale also fails to show “how the combination
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of Dixon and Lang is supposed to work, and how the combination of Dixon
and Lang would result in the claimed limitations.” Id. at 17 (emphasis
omitted).
Appellant’s argument is not persuasive. We agree with the Examiner
that, contrary to Appellant’s contention, the motivation or rationale to
combine prior art references does not solely have to come from the
references themselves. See Ans. 4. The Supreme Court has rejected the
rigid requirement of demonstrating a teaching, suggestion, or motivation in
the references to show obviousness. See KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Co., 550
U.S. 398, 415–16 (2007); see also In re Ethicon, Inc., 844 F.3d 1344, 1350
(Fed. Cir. 2017) (“KSR directs that an explicit teaching, suggestion, or
motivation in the references is not necessary to support a conclusion of
obviousness.”). Further, even assuming arguendo that Appellant’s
contention was correct, we also agree with the Examiner that the motivation
to combine Dixon and Lang is present in Lang, as Lang suggests the
desirability to provide a variety of multi-touch inputs in order to initiate on-
screen object manipulations. See Ans. 3 (citing Lang ¶ 7).
Appellant further argues the combination of Dixon and Lang fails to
teach or suggest all the limitations of claim 1. See Appeal Br. 18–21. We
are not persuaded by this argument either, and we address the individual
limitations of claim 1 in turn below.
As argued by Appellant, Dixon’s modification of a position of two
separate handwritten strokes by moving the strokes closer together on the
rendering is “clearly distinguishable” from “switching, using the processor,
to an editing mode based on receipt of the multi-touch input and identifying
that the received multi-touch input comprises an attribute modification
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input,” as recited in claim 1. See Appeal Br. 18–19. However, Appellant
does not identify any intrinsic or extrinsic evidence supporting the
contention that Dixon’s modification of a position or spacing of handwritten
strokes is distinct from the claimed “attribute modification.” Thus, under the
broadest reasonable interpretation of the claimed “attribute modification,”
consistent with Appellant’s Specification which does not explicitly define
what constitutes an “attribute modification,” Dixon’s modification of a
position or spacing of two separate handwritten strokes teaches or suggests
“attribute modification input,” as recited in claim 1.2
Appellant further argues Dixon’s spacing between strokes is not an
“attribute . . . selected from the group consisting of: size of the entire touch
input rendering and rotation of the entire touch input rendering,” as recited
in claim 1. See Appeal Br. 19. Although Appellant acknowledges the
Examiner relied upon Lang for disclosing this limitation, Appellant argues
that Lang is not combinable with Dixon because Lang specifically requires
that the user enter an editing mode to resize a group of ink strokes using a
two-finger pinching gesture. See id. at 19–20. This argument is not
persuasive as it attacks the references individually rather than the
Examiner’s combination of the references. As Appellant acknowledges, the
Examiner relied upon Lang rather than Dixon for teaching or suggesting the
aforementioned limitation. Further, with respect to Appellant’s
“combinable” argument, the Examiner’s rejection is not based on a bodily

2 We further agree with the Examiner’s finding that Dixon’s identification of
the two handwritten strokes as a single handwritten stroke is also an
“attribute modification,” under its broadest reasonable interpretation,
although it is not necessary to reach this finding to affirm the rejection.
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incorporation of Lang’s user interface into Dixon’s user interface, but a
modification of Lang’s user interface to include the resize and rotation
manipulations based on the corresponding two-fingered pinching gesture
and two-fingered rotation gesture disclosed in Dixon. Thus, Appellant’s
“combinable” argument does not address the Examiner’s combination of
Dixon and Lang. See In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425 (CCPA 1981)
(citations omitted) (“The test for obviousness is not whether the features of a
secondary reference may be bodily incorporated into the structure of the
primary reference . . . . Rather, the test is what the combined teachings of
those references would have suggested to those of ordinary skill in the art.”);
see also In re Nievelt, 482 F.2d 965, 968 (CCPA 1973) (“Combining the
teachings of references does not involve an ability to combine their specific
structures.”).
Appellant additionally argues neither Dixon nor Lang teaches or
suggests “rendering, on a display device separate from the touch input
component, the touch input in a touch input interface,” as recited in claim 1.
See Appeal Br. 20. As argued by Appellant, both Dixon and Lang teach that
a character is rendered on a display device and the input that is used to
modify the character is provided over the character on the same display
device. Id. However, this is incorrect, as the Examiner correctly found that
Dixon teaches an alternate embodiment where a separate touch input
component for receiving touch inputs is used separately from a display
device. See Final Act. 7 (citing Dixon ¶ 85); see also Ans. 5 (citing Dixon
¶ 85).
Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s rejection of claim 1. The
Examiner rejects independent claims 11 and 20 on a similar basis as claim 1,
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and therefore, we also sustain the Examiner’s rejections of claims 11 and 20.
We also sustain the rejections of dependent claims 2–10 and 12–19, as they
are not separately argued by Appellant.
DECISION SUMMARY
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C.
§
Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1, 11, 20 Non-statutory
Double Patenting
9,965,170
1, 11, 20
1–20 103 Dixon, Lang 1–20
Overall
Outcome
1–20

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