Ex Parte Abdo et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 23, 2016

12330330 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 23, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
12/330,330 12/08/2008 Nadim Y. Abdo
41505 7590 09/27/2016
Baker & Hostetler LLP (MICROSOFT CORPORATION)
CIRA CENTRE, 12TH FLOOR
2929 ARCH STREET
PHILADELPHIA, PA 19104-2891
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www .uspto.gov
ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
325339.01/104709.000338 1601
EXAMINER
BUKHARI, SIBTE H
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2449
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/27/2016 ELECTRONIC
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the
following e-mail address( es):
usdocket@microsoft.com
eofficemonitor@bakerlaw.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte NADIM Y. ABDO, ONUR FILIZ, DANIEL N. WOOD, and
MAX ALAN MCMULLEN
Appeal2015-001801
Application 12/330,330
Technology Center 2400
Before BRUCE R. WINSOR, JOHN F. HORVATH, and
MICHAEL J. ENGLE, Administrative Patent Judges.
WINSOR, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants 1 appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the final rejection
of claims 1and3-20. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). Claim 2
is objected to but is indicated to be directed to allowable subject matter.
Final Act. 18.
We REVERSE.
1 The real party in interest identified by Appellants is Microsoft Corporation.
Br. 1.
Appeal2015-001801
Application 12/330,330
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants' disclosed invention relates to "remot[ing] graphics"
(Spec. i-f 1 ), and in particular to "command level remoting" (Spec. Abstract).
In distinction to bitmap level remoting, "[ c ]ommand level remoting ...
offloads ... graphics processing to [a] client. Primitives, e.g., vertices that
can be processed by a driver and executed by a graphics processor, ... [are]
captured and sent to the client." Spec. i-f 3. Claim 1, which is illustrative,
reads as follows:
1. A method, comprising:
generating a second plurality of vertices for a plurality of
primitives, the second plurality of vertices being associated
with a second bitmap image;
sending at least part of the second plurality of vertices to
a client computer across a communications network;
after sending at least part of the second plurality of
vertices, generating a first plurality of vertices for a plurality of
primitives, the first plurality of vertices being associated with a
bitmap image generated at a time subsequent to a time when the
second bitmap image was generated;
storing the first plurality of vertices in a memory;
determining that a first vertex of the first plurality of
vertices has not been sent to a client as part of the second
plurality of vertices;
in response to determining that the first vertex has not
been sent to the client as part of the second plurality of vertices
because the first vertex is used to create the bitmap image but is
not used to create the second bitmap image, sending the first
vertex to the client; and
in response to determining that a second vertex of the
first plurality of vertices has already been sent to the client as
part of the second plurality of vertices because the second
vertex is used to create the bitmap image and is used to create
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Application 12/330,330
the second bitmap image, determining not to send the second
vertex to the client as part of the first plurality of vertices.
The Examiner relies on the following prior art in rejecting the claims:
Dalal et al. US 6,271,858 Bl Aug. 7, 2001
("Dalal")
Long et al. US 2005/0052455 Al Mar. 10, 2005
("Long")
Yeager et al. US 2005/0086300 Al Apr. 21, 2005
("Yeager")
Aharon US 2005/0243087 Al Nov. 3, 2005
Salomie US 2006/0290695 Al Dec. 28, 2006
Arturo San Emeterio Campos, "Move to front",
http://www.arturocampos.com/ ac_mtf.html, avail ab le at
http://archive.is/http://www.arturocampos.com/ac_mtf.html (July 24,
1999) ("Campos").
Claims 1, 3-5, and, 10-12 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over Salomie and Long. See Final Act. 4--9.
Claims 6, 13, 14, 16, 18, and 19 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Salomie, Long, and Dalal. See Final
Act. 9-13.
Claims 7, 8, 9, and 15 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over Salomie, Long, Dalal, and Aharon. See Final Act.
13-15.
Claim 17 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Salomie, Long, Dalal, and Campos. See Final Act. 16-17.
Claim 20 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Salomie, Long, Dalal, and Yeager. See Final Act. 17-18.
Rather than repeat the arguments here, we refer to the Appeal Brief
("Br." filed Aug. 4, 2014) and the Specification ("Spec." filed Dec. 8, 2008)
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Application 12/330,330
for the positions of Appellants and the Final Otlice Action ("Final Act."
mailed Oct. 4, 2013) and Examiner's Answer ("Ans." mailed Sept. 12, 2014)
for the reasoning, findings, and conclusions of the Examiner.
ISSUE
The dispositive issue presented by Appellants' contentions is whether
the Examiner errs in finding the combination of Salomie and Long teaches
or suggests "after sending at least part of the second plurality of vertices,
generating a first plurality of vertices for a plurality of primitives, the first
plurality of vertices being associated with a bitmap image generated at a
time subsequent to a time when the second bitmap image was generated"
(the "disputed limitation"), as recited in claim 1.2
ANALYSIS
The Examiner finds that Salomie teaches all of the disputed limitation
except Salomie does not teach that the images are bitmap images. See Final
Act.4---6 (citing Salomie i-fi-16, 25, 109, 111, 296, 329). The Examiner relies
on Long to teach the use of bitmap images. See Final Act. 6-7 (citing Long
i-fi-153, 128, 148). The Examiner explains as follows:
Part of the code stream reads on a second image,
remaining data in the stream reads on an image generated at a
time subsequent to a time when the second image was generated.
Sending only remaining data without duplication reads on a data
that is used to create one image but not the other. Determining
what to send also reads on determining what not to send.
2 Appellants' contentions present additional issues. However, because the
identified issue is dispositive of the appeal, we do not reach the additional
issues.
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Application 12/330,330
Final Act. 6; see also Ans. 3--4.
Appellants contend as follows:
Salomie [at paragraph 6] appears to disclose that a data stream is
generated for one image ("an embedded stream that supports
progressive refinement of the decompressed image" - that is
one image, not a plurality of images). Furthermore, it appears
that the one image is generated and then it is progressively
streamed.
That is different from the claimed subject matter, which
involves the vertices of two different images (that may share
some rendered object - e.g., subsequent frames of a generated 3D
animation). Instead of generating the vertices for one image and
then progressively streaming them, the claimed subject matter
requires that the first plurality of vertices for one bitmap image
is generated after the second plurality of vertices for another
bitmap image.
App. Br. 11 (emphasis added).
We are persuaded of error. We accept, arguendo, the Examiner's
position that Salomie' s progressive refinement of images teaches both the
claimed "second" image (which is actually earlier in time) and the first
recited image (which is actually later in time). See Ans. 5---6. We also
accept, arguendo, that Salomie teaches sending only those vertices of the
first image (i.e., later in time) that were not sent as vertices of the second
image (i.e., earlier in time). However, we find nothing in the cited passages
of Salomie (or Long) that teaches the vertices of the first image (i.e., later in
time) are generated after sending at least part of the vertices of the second
image (i.e., earlier in time), as recited in claim 1. See Ans. 3-5; Final Act.
4--7.
For the foregoing reasons, we do not sustain the rejection of
(1) independent claim 1; (2) independent claims 11 and 16, which include
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limitations substantially the same as the disputed limitation (see App. Br. 24,
26-27) and were rejected relying on substantially the same teachings of
Salomie (see Final Act. 8-9, 11-12); and (3) dependent claims 3-10, 12-15,
and 17-20, which depend from claims 1, 11, and 16 respectively.
DECISION
The decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1 and 3-20 is reversed.
REVERSED
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