DETAILED ACTION
This action is in response to the amendment filed 1/2/2026.
Claims 1-12 are currently pending.
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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see pages 6 and 7 of amendment, filed 1/2/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1 under 35 U.S.C. 102 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Kodali et al. (US 2017/0102833), hereinafter Kodali.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
The previous rejections of Claims 1-4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 are hereby withdrawn due to Applicant’s amendment filed 1/2/2026.
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(s) 1, 3-5, 7-9, 11, and 12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Stringham et al. (US 2022/0108276), hereinafter Stringham, in view of Kodali.
As per claim 1, Stringham teaches the following:
an information processing device comprising
a processor configured to execute processing of:
generating an object arrangement screen which is a screen shareable among a plurality of users corresponding to a plurality of accounts and on which a plurality of objects is arranged. As Stringham teaches in paragraph [0033], collaboration space 112 is hosted by server 102 and shared between client devices 104, 106, and 108. Stringham shows in Fig. 3 that a plurality of objects may be on the collaboration space;
displaying the object arrangement screen on a display screen of a display device operated by each of the plurality of users. As Stringham teaches in paragraph [0033], the server 102 hosts a collaboration space and each client device may access said space simultaneously;
detecting whether or not a first user among the plurality of users is in an editing state having an edit authority for a first object among the objects on the object arrangement screen. As Stringham teaches in paragraph [0045], a user may enable an “author ID mode”. Stringham teaches in paragraph [0174], that “breakout rooms” may be created and may only be accessible by a subset of users, i.e., the subset of users would have edit authority for a corresponding breakout; and
displaying, in response to detecting that the first user is in the editing state, the plurality of objects and the first object such that it is distinguishable that the first object is in the editing state in which the first user has the edit authority,
While, Stringham teaches in paragraph [0084], an object may be “locked” to prevent editing, Stringham does not explicitly teach of displaying objects in editing states on other user’s displays. In a similar field of endeavor, Kodali teaches of a collaborative design system (see abstract). Kodali further teaches in the abstract that upon entering an editing state of an object, a notification is sent to each collaborative system to prevent simultaneous editing (similar to the locking of Stringham) and present the object as shaded to represent the editor or changes being made.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of applicant’s claimed invention to have modified the editing state presentation of Stringham with the shading on other devices of Kodali. One of ordinary skill would have been motivated to have made such modification because as Kodali teaches in paragraph [0005], such displays benefit users where multiple users desire to change graphical displays simultaneously.
Regarding claim 3, Stringham teaches the device of claim 1 as described above. Stringham further teaches the following:
in response to detecting after an operation of grouping the plurality of objects into the same group by the first user is detected that one of the plurality of grouped objects is in the editing state, processor is configured to execute processing of distinguishably displaying that the plurality of grouped objects is in the editing state. As Stringham teaches in paragraph [0009], a user may specify an attribute value of graphical objects to gather into a container. As Stringham shows in Fig. 4A, and corresponding paragraph [0106], selection of a group for editing may highlight the group (distinguishably displayed).
Regarding claim 4, Stringham teaches the device of claim 1 as described above. Stringham further teaches the following:
the object is an electronic sticky note, and the editing state is a state where connection processing from a first electronic sticky note corresponding to the first object to a plurality of electronic sticky notes is executed. Stringham teaches of sticky not button 222 in paragraph [0063] for creating a sticky note.
As per claim 5, Stringham teaches the following:
an information processing method executed by an information processing device, (see Fig. 1), that generates an object arrangement screen which is a screen shareable among a plurality of users corresponding to a plurality of accounts and on which a plurality of objects is arranged, displays the object arrangement screen on a display screen of a display device operated by each of the plurality of users. As Stringham teaches in paragraph [0033], collaboration space 112 is hosted by server 102 and shared between client devices 104, 106, and 108. Stringham shows in Fig. 3 that a plurality of objects may be on the collaboration space, the information processing method comprising steps of:
detecting whether or not a first user among the plurality of users is in an editing state having an edit authority for a first object among the objects on the object arrangement screen. As Stringham teaches in paragraph [0045], a user may enable an “author ID mode”. Stringham teaches in paragraph [0174], that “breakout rooms” may be created and may only be accessible by a subset of users, i.e., the subset of users would have edit authority for a corresponding breakout; and
displaying, in response to detecting that the first user is in the editing state, the plurality of objects and the first object such that it is distinguishable that the first object is in the editing state in which the first user has the edit authority, on a display screen of a display device operated by a user other than the first user among the plurality of display devices. As Stringham teaches in paragraph [0056], in response to a given object being selected or is being edited, one or more contextual formatting bars may be presented which is interpreted as encompassing making the object “distinguishable” (see Fig. 2, 207). Further see paragraph [0084], where an object may be “locked” to prevent editing.
Regarding claims 7 and 8, Stringham teaches the method of claim 5 as described above. The remaining limitations of claims 7 and 8 are substantially similar to those of claims 3 and 4 respectively, and are rejected using the same reasoning.
As per claim 9, Stringham teaches the following:
a non-transitory computer-readable recording medium storing a program included in an information processing device, (see Fig. 1), that generates an object arrangement screen which is a screen shareable among a plurality of users corresponding to a plurality of accounts and on which a plurality of objects is arranged, displays the object arrangement screen on a display screen of a display device operated by each of the plurality of users. As Stringham teaches in paragraph [0033], collaboration space 112 is hosted by server 102 and shared between client devices 104, 106, and 108. Stringham shows in Fig. 3 that a plurality of objects may be on the collaboration space, the program for causing the computer to execute procedures of:
detecting whether or not a first user among the plurality of users is in an editing state having an edit authority for a first object among the objects on the object arrangement screen. As Stringham teaches in paragraph [0045], a user may enable an “author ID mode”. Stringham teaches in paragraph [0174], that “breakout rooms” may be created and may only be accessible by a subset of users, i.e., the subset of users would have edit authority for a corresponding breakout; and
displaying, in response to detecting that the first user is in the editing state, the plurality of objects and the first object such that it is distinguishable that the first object is in the editing state in which the first user has the edit authority, As Stringham teaches in paragraph [0056], in response to a given object being selected or is being edited, one or more contextual formatting bars may be presented which is interpreted as encompassing making the object “distinguishable” (see Fig. 2, 207). Further see paragraph [0084], where an object may be “locked” to prevent editing.
While, Stringham teaches in paragraph [0084], an object may be “locked” to prevent editing, Stringham does not explicitly teach of displaying objects in editing states on other user’s displays. In a similar field of endeavor, Kodali teaches of a collaborative design system (see abstract). Kodali further teaches in the abstract that upon entering an editing state of an object, a notification is sent to each collaborative system to prevent simultaneous editing (similar to the locking of Stringham) and present the object as shaded to represent the editor or changes being made.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of applicant’s claimed invention to have modified the editing state presentation of Stringham with the shading on other devices of Kodali. One of ordinary skill would have been motivated to have made such modification because as Kodali teaches in paragraph [0005], such displays benefit users where multiple users desire to change graphical displays simultaneously.
Regarding claims 11 and 12, Stringham teaches the medium of claim 9 as described above. The remaining limitations of claims 11 and 12 are substantially similar to those of claims 3 and 4 respectively, and are rejected using the same reasoning.
Claim(s) 2, 6, and 10 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Stringham in view of Kodali as applied to claims 1, 5, and 9, and further in view of Pak (US 2016/0321223).
As per claim 2, Stringham teaches the device of claim 1 as described above. While Stringham teaches of locking objects in paragraph [0084], Stringham does not explicitly teach of locking objects in response to an editing state. In a similar field of endeavor, Pak teaches of visualizations in a collaboration environment (see abstract). Pak further teaches the following:
in response to detecting that the first user is in the editing state of the first object, the control unit executes processing of limiting editing of the first object by the user other than the first user. As Pak teaches in paragraph [0066], and corresponding Fig. 5, upon a user selecting an object for editing 506, the server 113 locks the object 516 and enables editing of the object 519. Pak teaches in paragraph [0053] that locking the object “prevents the information object from being modified by other users”.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of applicant’s claimed invention to have modified the object editing of Stringham with the object locking of Pak. One of ordinary skill would have been motivated to have made such modification because the locking of Pak benefits users in avoiding conflicts of editing, e.g., when two different users may be editing a same object at a same time.
Regarding claim 6, Stringham teaches the method of claim 5 as described above. The remaining limitations of claim 6 are substantially similar to those of claim 2 and are rejected using the same reasoning.
Regarding claim 10, Stringham teaches the medium of claim 9 as described above. The remaining limitations of claim 10 are substantially similar to those of claim 2 and are rejected using the same reasoning.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to GREGORY A DISTEFANO whose telephone number is (571)270-1644. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday: 9 am - 5 pm.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, William Bashore can be reached at 5712424088. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/GREGORY A. DISTEFANO/
Examiner
Art Unit 2174
/WILLIAM L BASHORE/ Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2174