Details
Claims 1-2, 4-8, 10-16 and 18-23 are pending.
Claims 1-2, 4-8, 10-16 and 18-23 are rejected.
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.
Claims 1, 4-5, 7-8, 12-16 and 19-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Trese et al (Pub. No.: US 2023/0359809 A1) in view of Oh et al (Pub. No.: US 2022/0086238 A1).
As per claim 1, Trese discloses a method, comprising: - receiving, by a server that executes (Trese, Fig 1 item 103, “server system”), an indication of collaborative editing of a document by (Trese, paragraph 0014, wherein “More specifically, systems and methods provided herein may be configured to provide a controlled, collaborative environment for creating, modifying, and reviewing informational documents. According to some embodiments, systems, methods, and media provided herein may be adapted to control the modification of documents within a collaborative review environment”; paragraph 0021, wherein “For example, one or more client nodes may critique the modifications proposed by other client nodes before the modifications are incorporated into the source content of the informational document”; paragraph 0026-0027, wherein “The cloud may be formed, for example, by a network of web servers 110a-n with each server (or at least a plurality thereof) providing processor and/or storage resources. These servers may manage workloads provided by multiple users (e.g., cloud resource customers or other users). … In some embodiments, the cloud 105 may be configured to provide centralized and controlled environments for creating, modifying, and reviewing informational documents”; paragraph 0060-0062, wherein “The method 300 may begin with a step 305 of a document author creating a document that is saved within a storage media. It will be understood that the document may be saved having a read-only file access permission to prevent unwanted changes to the document… The method may include the step 310 of receiving a request to review a document from a client node via the web-based interface… Next, responsive to the request, the method may include the step 315 of retrieving the document from the storage media. It is noteworthy that the storage media may be communicatively coupled with (or reside within) a cloud-based computing system”; Thus, the creating of the document, the receiving of the request to review the document, and/or the retrieving of the document which is done within a cloud-based computing system (server) providing collaborative environment for creating, modifying, and reviewing informational documents can be the indication of collaborative editing of a document as claimed); wherein the document is stored at a document service that is external to the server (Trese, Fig 2 item 230, paragraph 0030, wherein “As such, the authoring platform 200 may be communicatively coupled with a storage media 230 that receives and retains informational documents created by document authors”; paragraph 0062, wherein “It is noteworthy that the storage media may be communicatively coupled with (or reside within) a cloud-based computing system”). - transmitting, by the server and prior to initiation of the collaborative editing, a first request to the document service to obtain an original permission associated with at least one of the (Trese, Fig 3, paragraph 0060-0062, wherein “The method 300 may begin with a step 305 of a document author creating a document that is saved within a storage media. It will be understood that the document may be saved having a read-only file access permission to prevent unwanted changes to the document… The method may include the step 310 of receiving a request to review a document from a client node via the web-based interface… Next, responsive to the request, the method may include the step 315 of retrieving the document from the storage media. It is noteworthy that the storage media may be communicatively coupled with (or reside within) a cloud-based computing system”; thus the retrieving of the document which retrieves the document having the read-only permission (original permission) can include the transmitting of a first request to obtain an original permission as claimed.); - transmitting, by the server, a request to the document service to grant an editing permission to the at least one of the conference participants (Trese, Fig 3 step 320, paragraph 0063, wherein “After retrieval, the method may include the step 320 of converting the document to read-write access file permission such that the source content is modifiable, along with a step 325 of providing the document in a displayable format via a web-based interface”);- receiving, by the server, an indication to terminate the collaborative editing (Trese, paragraph 0067, wherein “According to some embodiments, the method 300 may include a step 345 of reviewing modifications before the modified or reviewed document is converted back to read-only file access permission. The step 345 of reviewing modifications may be performed by the original document author, the document reviewer, a plurality of document reviewers, or via crowdsourcing. Reviewing modifications may include approving or rejecting modifications to the document, in whole or in part. It will be understood that the step 345 of reviewing modifications may occur before the step 335 of incorporating the modification of the source content into the document to create a modified document”; Wherein, the approving or rejecting modifications can be an indication of ending the reviewing performed by the reviewer (indication to terminate the collaborative editing)); and - in response to the indication to terminate the collaborative editing, transmitting, by the server, a second request to the document service to reset a permission of the at least one of the (Trese, Fig 3, paragraph 0068, wherein “Once the modified document has been reviewed the method 300 may include a step 350 of converting the modified document back to read-only file access permission. The modified document may again be stored in the storage media associated with the cloud-based computing system”).Trese does not explicitly disclose that the participants are conference participants of a conference. However, Oh discloses that the participants are conference participants of a conference (Oh, paragraph 0031, wherein “A collaboration regime can be established based on the drag-and-drop action from a particular web conferencing system. For example, a particular content object corresponding to a particular drag-and-drop action from a particular web conferencing system can be stored in the content management system with a set of permissions that are, at least in part, based on the particular web conferencing system and/or based on a particular session of the web conferencing system. In some embodiments, in addition to, or as an alternative, the context or contexts of a particular session of the web conference (e.g., channels, shares, breakouts, etc.) can be retrieved from or derived from information of the web conferencing system, and then stored in the content management system”).
Therefore, it would have it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate Oh teachings into Trese to achieve the claimed limitations because this would have provided a way to integrate a content management system with any arbitrary messaging facility which improves system useability (see Oh, paragraph 0004).
As per claim 4, claim 1 is incorporated and Oh further discloses transmitting, by the server to a client device associated with the at least one of the conference participants, a link to the document (Oh, paragraph 0114, wherein “Create shared links (e.g., unique URLs) to access corresponding content facility of the proxy widget of the content management system”);
As per claim 5, claim 1 is incorporated and Oh further discloses obtaining, by the server, a list of available documents from the document service; and transmitting the list of the available documents to a client device (Oh, paragraph 0114, wherein “Enable a file content viewer or folder content viewer for easy access filtering facility of the (e.g., a listing or “pin” of file icons) that appear at top a of page for easy proxy widget access/viewing Enable clickable dropdowns to create filtered views of folder based on system- or user-specified metadata filters”);
As per claim 7, claim 1 is incorporated and Trese further discloses wherein the document service is a cloud-based platform (Trese, paragraph 0026-0027, wherein “The cloud may be formed, for example, by a network of web servers 110a-n with each server (or at least a plurality thereof) providing processor and/or storage resources. These servers may manage workloads provided by multiple users (e.g., cloud resource customers or other users). … In some embodiments, the cloud 105 may be configured to provide centralized and controlled environments for creating, modifying, and reviewing informational documents”);
Claims 8, 12, and 15-16 are rejected under the same rationale as claims 1, 3-5 and 7.
As per claim 13, claim 8 is incorporated and Trese further discloses wherein the document service is one of Google Docs, Microsoft Office Online, or Dropbox Paper (Trese, paragraph 0025, wherein “In general, a cloud-based computing environment is a resource that typically combines the computational power of a large grouping of processors (such as within servers 110a-n) and/or that combines the storage capacity of a large grouping of computer memories or storage devices. For example, systems that provide a cloud resource may be utilized exclusively by their owners, such as Google® or Yahoo!®; or such systems may be accessible to outside users who deploy applications within the computing infrastructure to obtain the benefit of large computational or storage resources”);
As per claim 14, claim 8 is incorporated and Oh further discloses wherein the one or more processors are configured to execute instructions stored in the one or more memories to: transmit a request to the document service to trigger a display of a file selector of the document service (Oh, paragraph 0114, wherein “Enable a file content viewer or folder content viewer for easy access filtering facility of the (e.g., a listing or “pin” of file icons) that appear at top a of page for easy proxy widget access/viewing Enable clickable dropdowns to create filtered views of folder based on system- or user-specified metadata filters”);
As per claim 19, claim 15 is incorporated and Oh further discloses wherein the one or more processors are configured to execute instructions stored in the one or more memories to: transmit a request to the document service to trigger a display of a file selector of the document service (Oh, paragraph 0098, 0114, wherein “Enable a file content viewer or folder content viewer for easy access filtering facility of the (e.g., a listing or “pin” of file icons) that appear at top a of page for easy proxy widget access/viewing Enable clickable dropdowns to create filtered views of folder based on system- or user-specified metadata filters”);
As per claim 20, claim 15 is incorporated and Oh further discloses wherein the server maintains a list of document services usable by the server for the collaborative editing (Oh, paragraph 0048, wherein “The figure shows how a computing element of a first entity (e.g., a vendor of a content management system) can integrate with a computing element of a second entity (e.g., a vendor of a web conferencing system) through application programming interfaces (APIs) and/or by operation of integration code. More specifically, the figure shows how a first pair of APIs (e.g., API1.sub.CMS and API1.sub.WCS) can be used by the content management system 120 and a particular web conferencing system (e.g., web conferencing system 102.sub.1) to activate a one or more areas of a display area of the web conferencing system. In this specific embodiment, the content management system provides activation instructions (e.g., in inter-vendor communication 132) to the web conferencing system. The web conferencing system in turn will activate a display area such that a drop event that involves the activated area will raise a notification of the event to the content management system. Strictly as one example, and as shown, the web conferencing system can process the received activation instructions (e.g., in operation 134) such that the activated display area is responsive to user events. In some situations, the web conferencing system can itself determine characteristics of an activated display area. Furthermore, the web conferencing system can itself manage any number of activated display areas. In some situations, API1.sub.CMS and API1.sub.WCS or alternative APIs can be used to advise the content management system of the characteristics of any one or more activated display areas. Still further, in some situations, when a web conferencing system notifies the content management system of an occurrence of a drop event, that notification may include information pertaining to the specific activated display area (e.g., was the specific activated display area a “chat” area, or was the specific activated display area a “navigation panel” area, etc.)”);
Claims 21-22 are rejected under the same rationale as claims 14 and 19.
Claims 2, 11 and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Trese et al (Pub. No.: US 2023/0359809 A1) in view of Oh et al (Pub. No.: US 2022/0086238 A1) and Ansel et al (Pub. No.: US 2015/0081773 A1).
As per claim 2, claim 1 is incorporated and Trese and Oh do not explicitly further discloses transmitting a backup request of the document to the document service. However, requesting a backup of a document is well known in the art. For example, Ansel discloses transmitting a backup request of the document to the document service (Ansel, abstract, wherein “The disclosed technology relates to an active data center which includes multiple document server instances that handle user requests for concurrently accessing documents. Multiple document server instances are implemented on a single physical server. This architecture uses an instance assignment manager to assign documents to the document server instances, a primary repository to store backup snapshots of the documents, and a datastore to store all changes made to the documents. The disclosed technology also involves a backup data center that can be swapped with the active data center automatically”).
Therefore, it would have it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate Ansel teachings into Trese and Oh to achieve the claimed limitations because this would have provided concurrent collaborative access to that information, and provide concurrent updates to that data in real-time, various factors need to be accounted for in order to prevent data loss, maintain accessibility, prevent overloading of system resources, maintain storage, and maintain privacy (see Ansel, paragraph 0004).
Claim 11 is rejected under the same rationale as claim 2.
As per claim 18, claim 15 is incorporated and Trese and Oh do not explicitly further discloses wherein the operations further comprise: transmitting, by the server to the document service, a request to generate a new version of the document. However, requesting to generate a new version of a document is well known in the art. For example, Ansel discloses transmitting, by the server to the document service, a request to generate a new version of the document (Ansel, paragraph 0057, 0067, wherein “The primary repository 310 may be more reliable than the datastore since less data is exchanged. In addition to full text versions of Notes, the primary repository 310 can store versions of notebooks in which a Note being modified is located as well as indices and other related data to a particular Note”).
Therefore, it would have it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate Ansel teachings into Trese and Oh to achieve the claimed limitations because this would have provided concurrent collaborative access to that information, and provide concurrent updates to that data in real-time, various factors need to be accounted for in order to prevent data loss, maintain accessibility, prevent overloading of system resources, maintain storage, and maintain privacy (see Ansel, paragraph 0004).
Claims 6 and 10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Trese et al (Pub. No.: US 2021/0234908 A1) in view of Oh et al (Pub. No.: US 2022/0086238 A1) and Weiss et al (Patent No.: US 7,945,589 B1).
As per claim 6, claim 1 is incorporated and Trese and Oh do not explicitly disclose transmitting, by the server to a client device, a command to display a confirmation prompt indicating the termination of the collaborative editing. However, transmitting a command to display a confirmation prompt indicating the termination of a session is well known in the art. For example, Weiss discloses transmitting, by the server to a client device, a command to display a confirmation prompt indicating the termination of the collaborative editing (Weiss, Fig 28, col 33 lines 24-27, wherein “FIG. 28 depicts an exemplary dialog window 308 designed to confirm that the author wishes to close the authoring session after the implementation of a Check-In operation”).
Therefore, it would have it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate Weiss teachings into Trese and Oh to achieve the claimed limitations because this would have provided a way to prevent unwanted/accidental session closing which improves the system useability.
Claim 10 is rejected under the same rationale as claim 6.
Claim 23 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Trese et al (Pub. No.: US 2021/0234908 A1) in view of Oh et al (Pub. No.: US 2022/0086238 A1) and Dowling et al (Pub. No.: US 2019/0362002 A1).
As per claim 23, claim 1 is incorporated and Trese and Oh do not explicitly disclose wherein transmitting the request to the document service to grant the editing permission comprises: transmitting the request on behalf of a presenting participant of the conference using credentials of the presenting participant. However, Dowling discloses wherein transmitting the request to the document service to grant the editing permission comprises: transmitting the request on behalf of a presenting participant of the conference using credentials of the presenting participant (Dowling, paragraph 0042, wherein “At operation 402 a first instance of a shared document is displayed. The first instance of the shared document is associated with a first user that is currently accessing the shared document. The shared document may be accessed by the first user via a cloud-based or local area network based shared document service that hosts documents for review and/or editing by a plurality of users. The shared document service may only grant the first user access to the shared document upon verifying credentials of the user and/or the user's device that the user is utilizing to access the shared document. In some examples, the shared document service may authenticate the first user for review permissions, edit permissions, and/or share permissions based on the first user's credentials”).
Therefore, it would have it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate Dowling teachings into Trese and Oh to achieve the claimed limitations because this would have provided a way to prevent unauthorized access to the document which improves the system security.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments filed on 12/29/2025 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
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/HAMZA N ALGIBHAH/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2441