The European Patent Office considered a method of performing data transfer of data in a clipboard format to have at least some technical features. Here are the practical takeaways from the decision T 0424/03 (Clipboard formats I/MICROSOFT) of February 23, 2006 of Technical Board of Appeal 3.5.01:
Key takeaways
Facilitating a data exchange across different data formats by means of a clipboard function may provide technical character, in particular when transferring non-file data.
A method implemented in a computer system represents a sequence of steps actually performed and achieving an effect. Thus, the claim category of a computer-implemented method is distinguished from that of a computer program.
The invention
This patent application relates to providing expanded clipboard formats that embellish the number of formats that may be used with a clipboard. These expanded clipboard formats enable users in applications to broaden their use of the clipboard and other data transfer mechanisms.
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Claim 1 (main request)
Is it patentable?
According to the appelant, the claimed method provides technical character:
The claimed method modifies the internal operation of a computer system and is therefore technical. Moreover, the method achieves a non-obvious improvement over the appellant’s prior operating system Windows 3.1 because the available prior art does not suggest a clipboard format which enables non-file data to be transferred for encapsulation into a file at a receiving application program (data sink) which expects to handle a file format (rather than a text format, for example).
The Board in charge generally agrees to appelant’s arguments:
Claim 1 relates to a method implemented in a computer system. T 258/03 – Auction method/Hitachi (OJ EPO 2004, 575) states that a method using technical means is an invention within the meaning of Article 52(1) EPC. A computer system including a memory (clipboard) is a technical means, and consequently the claimed method has technical character in accordance with established case law.
Moreover, the Board would like to emphasise that a method implemented in a computer system represents a sequence of steps actually performed and achieving an effect, and not a sequence of computer-executable instructions (i.e. a computer program) which just have the potential of achieving such an effect when loaded into, and run on, a computer. Thus, the Board holds that the claim category of a computer-implemented method is distinguished from that of a computer program. Even though a method, in particular a method of operating a computer, may be put into practice with the help of a computer program, a claim relating to such a method does not claim a computer program in the category of a computer program. Hence, present claim 1 cannot relate to a computer program as such.
The Board also considers the claimed method steps to contribute to the technical character of the invention:
These steps solve a technical problem by technical means in that functional data structures (clipboard formats) are used independently of any cognitive content (see T 1194/97 – Data structure product/Philips; OJ EPO 2000, 525) in order to enhance the internal operation of a computer system with a view to facilitating the exchange of data among various application programs. The claimed steps thus provide a general purpose computer with a further functionality: the computer assists the user in transferring non-file data into files.
Moreover, the Board considers that the claimed subject-matter solves a technical problem with technical means:
7.1 With respect to the closest prior art (Windows 3.1), the method of claim 1 solves the problem of how to facilitate a data exchange across different data formats, in particular when transferring non-file data.
7.2 The solution provides for a file contents clipboard format and a file group descriptor format which interact to allow data to be sent in a first format (non-file data) and processed in a second format (file encapsulation) at the receiving data sink.
As a result, the Board considered the claimed subject-matter to be non-obvious and finally granted a patent.
More information
You can read the whole decision here: T 0424/03 (Clipboard formats I/MICROSOFT) of February 23.