Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-4, 6, 7, 10, 12-18, 20 and 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Shukla et al., United States Patent Publication 2006/0074732 (hereinafter “Shukla”).
Claim 1:
Shukla discloses:
A method comprising:
receiving an indication of a user interaction with a user interface element of a user interface, wherein the user interface enables generation of a computer process flow (see paragraph [0015], [0016];
identifying a data change action associated with the user interaction (see paragraph [0085]). Shukla teaches the user may add, remove, or replace activities;
based on the data change action, updating a computer process flow state associated with the computer process flow to reflect the data change action (see paragraph [0085] and [0086]). Shukla teaches updating the state of the workflow to reflect the change; and
in response to the computer process flow state being updated to reflect the data change action, triggering one or more behaviors based on the data change action (see paragraph [0085] and [0086]). Shukla teaches triggering behaviors based on the data change such the executing or updating.
Claim 2:
Shukla discloses:
wherein the user interface element comprises one or more of the following: an activity in the computer process flow, a vertical lane that comprises a plurality of activities in a sequence, a horizontal swimlane, an undo button for undoing a previous user interaction with a previous user interface element, or a redo button for repeating a previous user interaction with a previous user interface element (see paragraph [0085]). Shukla teaches the element being an activity in the process flow.
Claim 3:
Shukla discloses:
wherein the user interface is one of a plurality of user interfaces to build the computer process flow, wherein the plurality of user interfaces corresponds to a plurality of views of the computer process flow (see paragraph [0051]). Shukla teaches user interfaces to receiving selection and hierarchical organization of activities.
Claim 4:
Shukla discloses:
wherein the plurality of views of the computer process flow comprises one or more of the following: a board view, a diagram view, a side panel, or an error tray (see paragraphs [0067]-[0070], [0099] and [0109]-[0111]). Shukla teaches the plurality of views of compute process flow.
Claim 6:
Shukla discloses:
validating the data change action (see paragraph [0012] and [0043]). Shukla teaches validating the data change; and
based on the validating of the data change action, updating the computer process flow state associated with the computer process flow to reflect the data change action (see paragraph [0012] and [0043]). Shukla teaches validating and based on the validating, updating the process flow to reflect the change data.
Claim 7:
Shukla discloses:
providing an interface for a plurality of behavior handlers to subscribe to update notifications of the computer process flow state (see paragraph [0199]). Shukla teaches an interface for behavior handlers can subscribe to data changes; and
triggering the one or more behaviors based on the data change action via the plurality of behavior handlers (see paragraph [0212]). Shukla teaches triggering the behavior based on the data change.
Claim 10:
Shukla discloses:
wherein one of the plurality of behavior handlers comprises a diagram view behavior handler corresponding to a diagram view of the computer process flow, wherein the diagram view behavior handler is configured to perform incremental updates to the diagram view based on the data change action (see paragraph [0057] and figure 5). Shukla teaches a diagram view of the behavior handlers in a WYSIWYG fashion to make changes incrementally as changes are happening and see results.
Claim 12:
Shukla discloses:
wherein one of the plurality of behavior handlers comprises an undo-redo behavior handler for undoing a previous user interaction with a previous user interface element or redoing the previous user interaction with the previous user interface element (see paragraph [0057]). Shukla teaches having undo-redo actions taken towards the workflow.
Claim 13:
Shukla discloses:
wherein the validating of the data change action comprises:
determining whether the data change action should be blocked; and
in response to determining that the data change action should be blocked, blocking the data change action and providing a blocking modal (see paragraphs [0227] and [0252]). Shukla teaches determining if the action should be blocked and block the action.
Claim 14:
Shukla discloses:
wherein the validating of the data change action comprises one or more of the following: validating that a mandatory field has an assigned value, validating that a reference in the computer process flow is valid, validating that the computer process flow does not include a start rule loop, validating that there are no redundant edges or paths in the computer process flow, validating that a start rule is not empty, or validating that an outgoing connection is valid (see paragraph [0012] and [0043]). Shukla teaches validating the semantic data and making sure the required fields are valid;
Claim 15:
Shukla discloses:
wherein the validating of the data change action comprises:
identifying a portion of the computer process flow that is affected by the data change action and selectively validating the identified portion of the computer process flow (see paragraph [0042] and [0043]). Shukla teaches identifying the portion of workflow associated with the data change.
Claims 16-18, 20:
Although Claims 16-18 and 20 are system claims, they are interpreted and rejected for the same reasons as the method of Claims 1, 5, 7, 13, respectively.
Claim 21:
Although Claim 21 is a computer program product claim, it is interpreted and rejected for the same reasons as the method of Claim 1.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Shukla, in view of Damonharan et al., United States Patent Publication 20210271459 (hereinafter “Damonharan”.
Claim 5:
Shukla fails to expressly disclose a board view with real time updates.
Damonharan discloses:
wherein the computer process flow state corresponds to a centralized single source of truth of the computer process flow, wherein the computer process flow state is stored in a local memory (see paragraph [0050]). Damonharan teaches a localized source for the work.
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was filed to modify the method disclosed by Shukla to include a single source for the workflow for the purpose of efficiently having centralized data for local retrieval, as taught by Damonharan.
Claims 8, 9 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Shukla, in view of Clements et al., United States Patent Publication 20140208281.
Claim 8:
Shukla fails to expressly disclose a persist behavior handler in a database server.
Clements discloses:
wherein one of the plurality of behavior handlers comprises a database persist behavior handler for persisting the computer process flow state in a database server (see page 3-4). Clements teaches workflow modeling systems tend to be modeled either around the data that is used to represent the workflow, that is typically stored in some permanent storage.
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was filed to modify the method disclosed by Shukla to include a persist behavior handler for persisting the process flow in a database server for the purpose of efficiently updating behavior locally and at permanent storage, as taught by Clements.
Claim 9:
Shukla discloses:
validating the second data change action (see paragraph [0012] and [0043]). Shukla teaches validating the data change;
based on the validating of the second data change action, updating a second computer process flow state associated with the computer process flow to reflect the second data change action (see paragraph [0012] and [0043]). Shukla teaches validating and based on the validating, updating the process flow to reflect the change data; and
in response to the second computer process flow state being updated to reflect the second data change action, triggering one or more behaviors based on the second data change action (see paragraph [0085] and [0086]). Shukla teaches triggering behaviors based on the data change such the executing or updating.
Shukla fails to expressly disclose a persist behavior handler in a database server.
Clements discloses:
determining whether the database server has initiated a second data change action in response to the persisted computer process flow state in the database server (see pages 3-4). Clements teaches changes to the business workflow often require changes also to the underlying access and retrieval of the information stored in the database or to the graphical user interface (GUI) of the system;
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was filed to modify the method disclosed by Shukla to include a persist behavior handler for persisting the process flow in a database server for the purpose of efficiently updating behavior locally and at permanent storage, as taught by Clements
Claim 19:
Although Claim 19 is a system claim, it is interpreted and rejected for the same reasons as the method of Claim 8.
Claim 11 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Shukla, in view of Ming, United States Patent Publication 20140208281.
Claim 11:
Shukla fails to expressly disclose a board view with real time updates.
Ming discloses:
wherein one of the plurality of behavior handlers comprises a diagram view behavior handler corresponding to a diagram view of the computer process flow, wherein the diagram view behavior handler is configured to perform incremental updates to the diagram view based on the data change action (see Claim 1). Ming teaches real time updating of the board view with updates as changes are happening.
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was filed to modify the method disclosed by Shukla to include real time updating of the board view for the purpose of efficiently visualize the physical board virtually to see changes, as taught by Ming.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to TIONNA M BURKE whose telephone number is (571)270-7259. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8a-4p.
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/TIONNA M BURKE/Examiner, Art Unit 2178 5/29/26
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