Patent decision

BL number

O/146/17

Concerning rights in

GB1015891.3

Hearing Officer

Mr H Jones

Decision date

27 March 2017

Person(s) or Company(s) involved

Fisher-Rosemount Systems, Inc.

Provisions discussed

Sections 1(2)(c), 1(2)(d)

Keywords

Excluded fields (refused)

Related Decisions

None

Summary

The application relates to displaying additional information on a terminal of a process control system for a process plant. The terminal may be used by a plant operator, who can control aspects of the plant operation via the terminal, or it may be used by a maintenance or other engineer who cannot control the plant but is nevertheless interested in information relating to the operation and configuration of the plant. The additional information is displayed in the form of an electronic sticky note alongside a particular process control object and includes dynamic hyperlinks to ensure information is replicated automatically across similar objects in the control system. A database of dynamic hyperlinks is defined, linking process control objects to textual message content. Data relating to the process control objects are stored in a "configuration" database and the text message content is stored in a different "centralised" database, such that in total three databases are provided.

The Hearing Officer found that the contribution fell within the excluded categories of computer program and presentation of information and refused the application under section 18(3).

Full decision O/146/17 233Kb