Ex Parte Maresca et al - Page 9



                Appeal 2007-0223                                                                                  
                Application 09/752,090                                                                            
                                                       (3)                                                        
                       Appellants acknowledge that the Examiner has combined Gervais                              
                with Aycock for its teaching the Web-based user interface and shared data                         
                repository (Br. 12).  It is argued that "[b]ecause Aycock does not disclose                       
                the limitations indicated above with respect to claims 44, 66, and 77-79,                         
                Gervais can not cure the deficiencies therein" (Br. 12).  Thus, Appellants do                     
                not contest the combination with Gervais.                                                         
                       It is noted that Aycock discloses a network based system in Figure 2,                      
                but does not disclose that the network is the "Web."  We agree with the                           
                Examiner that one of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to                       
                use a "Web" based system even without a reference because it was                                  
                notoriously well-known to conduct business and communication on the                               
                World Wide Web of the Internet.  Both the supplier and the buyer have user                        
                interfaces (Figure 6 for supplier; col. 10, ll. 23-25 for the buyer).                             
                Nevertheless, Gervais expressly discloses a Web-based user interface and                          
                one skilled in the art would have been motivated to use a Web-based                               
                interface as taught by Gervais for the network-based interface in Aycock                          
                because of the widespread usage of the Internet and World Wide Web.                               
                       As noted in section (2), since the suppliers and the buyer have access                     
                to the evaluation system databases (col. 9, ll. 13-17; col. 10, ll. 62-67), the                   
                databases can be considered a "shared data repository" for the collaboration                      
                system.                                                                                           



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