Invalidity dossier
US 7500198
Added 9/23/2026, 10:25:04 PM
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Patent summary
Title, assignee, inventors, filing/issue dates, abstract, and a plain-language overview of the claims.
Patent Overview — US 7,500,198 B2
Title: Method and apparatus for modifying skin and theme screens on a communication product
Patent number: US 7,500,198 B2 (application US10/424,121)
Inventors: Ajit Mathews, Brian M. Elwell, Douglas E. Ross, Ketan M. Shah
Original assignee: Motorola, Inc. Current assignee listed as Google Technology Holdings LLC.
Key dates: Priority/filing date 2003-04-25; published as US2004/0216054 A1 on 2004-10-28; granted 2009-03-03. Status listed as "Expired – Fee Related," with adjusted expiration 2025-10-27.
Purpose: The patent addresses a limitation in mobile handsets: while end users could customize ring tones and wallpapers, they could not customize device behaviors or interfaces based on who is contacting them, how, or where, or on particular events. Call interfaces and helper functionality looked the same for a business associate as for a family member. The invention provides dynamically configurable skins and themes so users (and carriers) can tailor the look and feel of screens on a portable communication product.
Plain-language scope (from the excerpt): A portable communication device includes a transceiver, a display, memory storing at least two skin/theme types and encapsulated data entries associated with each, and a processor programmed to dynamically update the display based on a selected skin/theme type and its associated encapsulated data. A system stores a "theme pack" with multiple theme types, maintains a theme property table for rendering screens, and uses a theme manager to extract theme information and update the table. A resource editor generates theme packs; a pack manager loads them at power-up; a theme formatter (with an image manager invoking appropriate decoders) updates the display. Methods cover updating the display when an event with an associated skin/theme occurs, and rendering with a selected theme when the theme property table has sufficient information, otherwise a default theme. A machine-readable storage aspect covers specifying screen-element layouts via XML and auto-generating binary theme files.
Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US7500198/en
What the excerpt does not establish: It is an incomplete excerpt; the full claims, detailed description, and figures (FIG. 1–6) are omitted, so exact claim scope is unverified. The legal status, expiration, and assignee listings are the source's assumptions, not legal conclusions. No litigation, validity, or prior-art analysis is included or made here.
Generated 10/1/2026, 9:33:25 PM
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Litigation summary
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PTAB challenges
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Assignment history
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Prior art
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Obviousness
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Extensions
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Derivative works
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