Appeal 2007-1246
Application 10/014,180
symbolic feature. Claim 1 is illustrative of the claimed invention, and it
reads as follows:
1. A method for use in a recommender for evaluating the
closeness of two items, each of said items characterized by at least one
symbolic feature, said method comprising the steps of:
computing a distance between corresponding symbolic feature values
of said two items based on an overall similarity of classification of all
instances for each possible value of said symbolic feature values; and
aggregating the distances between each of said symbolic feature
values to determine the closeness of said two items.
The prior art reference of record relied upon by the Examiner in
rejecting the appealed claims is:
Bieganski US 6,334,127 B1 Dec. 25, 2001
Claims 1 through 23 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(e) as being
anticipated by Bieganski.
We refer to the Examiner's Answer (mailed September 5, 2006) and to
Appellants' Brief (filed February 14, 2005) and Reply Brief (filed November
6, 2006) for the respective arguments.
SUMMARY OF DECISION
As a consequence of our review, we will reverse the anticipation
rejection of claims 1 through 23. We also enter a new ground of rejection of
claims 1 through 23 as being nonstatutory under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
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