Ex Parte Carney

Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences

Oct 23, 2007

09712101 (B.P.A.I. Oct. 23, 2007)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS
AND INTERFERENCES
____________

Ex parte STEPHEN CARNEY
____________

Appeal 2007-2468
Application 09/712,101
Technology Center 2100
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Decided: October 23, 2007
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Before LANCE LEONARD BARRY, HOWARD B. BLANKENSHIP,
and STEPHEN C. SIU, Administrative Patent Judges.

SIU, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

I. STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134 from the Examiner’s Final
Rejection of claims 2, 4-12, and 21-33. We have jurisdiction under 35
U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm in part.

A. INVENTION
The invention at issue on appeal involves file transfer between
computer systems. Computer files, including video files have been stored on
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Application 09/712,101

servers and streamed to requesting computer systems. As such video or
media files grow in size, bandwidth limitations of a particular server storing
the video or media file may become problematic. This has been particularly
true when multiple requesting computer systems request the same video or
media file (Specification 3).
In contrast, the Appellant’s invention permits streaming video or
media from servers that store a selection of video or media files. (Id. 6).
Particularly, a master streaming media server locates an acceptable
streaming media server containing a requested media file. The streaming
media client receives setup information regarding the requested multimedia
file such that a requesting client may directly access the multimedia file
from the media server. (Id. 4). A streaming media connection is established
between a requesting streaming media client and the streaming media server
(Id. 11).

B. ILLUSTRATIVE CLAIMS
Claims 4 and 8, which further illustrate the invention, follow.
4. A distributed streaming media server system, comprising:
a plurality of streaming media servers that each store a selection of
multimedia files;
a master streaming media server communicatively coupled to the
plurality of streaming media servers and that compiles mapping information
regarding a location of each of the multimedia files that are stored on each of
the plurality of streaming media servers; and
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at least one streaming media client that requests access to a
multimedia file through the master streaming media server and receives
setup information regarding the requested multimedia file such that the at
least one streaming media client may directly access the multimedia file
from one of the plurality of streaming media servers,
wherein the at least one streaming media client receives the setup
information from one of the plurality of streaming media servers.

8. The distributed streaming media server system of claim 4
wherein the master streaming media server includes a load poll thread, a
load average queue, and load average threads to determine the load
balancing among the plurality of streaming media servers.

C. REJECTION
Claims 2, 4-12, and 21-33 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
obvious over U.S. Patent No. 6,412,004 B1 ("Chen") and U.S. Patent No.
6,360,262 B1 ("Guenthner").

II. CLAIM GROUPING
Claims 2, 4-7, 9-12, and 21-33 are subject to the same ground of
rejection as a group. (Br. 4-11). Appellant separately argues patentability of
claim 8. We select claim 4 as the sole claim on which to decide the appeal
of the claims of the group. We separately decide the appeal of claim 8.

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III. CLAIMS 2, 4-7, 9-12, AND 21-33
“Rather than reiterate the positions of parties in toto, we focus on the
issues therebetween.” Ex Parte Filatov, No. 2006-1160, 2007 WL 1317144,
at *2 (BPAI 2007). The Examiner asserts that Chen discloses each of the
features of claim 4 but “does not explicitly teach [that] … at least one
streaming media client receives the set up information from one of the
plurality of streaming media servers.” (Answer1 4). The Appellant does not
traverse this finding (Br. 5). The Examiner further argues that Guenthner
discloses a system and method of routing in which a server “sends its
response (i.e., sending setup information) directly to the client (step 3) and
the client dialogs with the server for subsequent access to the requested
multimedia file (step 4) (Guenthner, Fig. 4B, col. 4, line 64 – col. 5, line
12).” (Id. 5). Also, the Examiner finds that combining Chen and Guenthner
would have been obvious to “select the best provider (i.e., the most
appropriate server) and redirect or forward the request to the selected server
… in handoff mode.” (Id. 11).
The Appellant argues there would have been no motivation or
suggestion to combine the teachings of Chen and Guenthner because “there
simply did not exist any desirability to incorporate the teachings of
Guenthner into the system of Chen.” (Br. 8). Also, the Appellant asserts that
combining the Chen and Guenthner references would “change the principle
of operation of the Chen system and would also render the Chen system
unsatisfactory for its intended purpose for enabling the client to select a

1 We rely on and refer to the revised Examiner’s Answer, in lieu of the
original Examiner’s Answer, because the latter was defective. We will not
consider the original in deciding this appeal.
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multimedia server from a list of multimedia servers provided by a
metaserver.” (Id. 6).
Therefore, the issue before us is whether Appellant has shown that the
Examiner erred in rejecting claims 2, 4-7, 9-12, and 21-33 as unpatentable
over Chen and Guenthner.

ANALYSIS
Claim 4 requires a master streaming media server coupled to a
plurality of streaming media servers and a streaming media client that
requests access to a multimedia file through the master streaming media
server. The streaming media client receives setup information from the
streaming media server (Br. Claims Appendix).
The Appellant’s argument that there “did not exist any desirability to
incorporate the teachings of Guenthner into the system of Chen” (Br. 8)
ignores the Examiner’s asserted desirability of “select[ing] the ‘best
provider’ and redirect[ing] … the request to the selected server as operating
in ‘handoff’ mode …” as provided by the Examiner. Based on the record
before us, the Appellant has failed to show that there would have been no
desirability for one of ordinary skill in the art to “select the ‘best provider’
and redirect … the request to the selected server as operating in ‘handoff’
mode …”, for example.
Regarding Appellant’s assertion that Guenthner would “change the
principle of operation of the Chen system and render the Chen system
unsatisfactory for its intended purpose for enabling the client to select a
multimedia server from a list of multimedia servers provided by a
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metaserver,” (Id. 6) we disagree with the Appellant that the intended
purpose of Chen is to send a list of servers to the client or that modifying
Chen with Guenthner would render the Chen system unsatisfactory for its
intended purpose.
Chen discloses a distributed streaming media server system (Col. 5, ll.
45-51). As one example of an implementation of the system, a metaserver
supplies a client computer with a list of multimedia servers and the client
computer connects to a server including the particular multimedia content
(Col. 6, ll. 41-47.) The metaserver contains an algorithm that allows “the
metaserver to balance the load (a particular multimedia content) across all
available multimedia servers by dynamically assigning clients to different
multimedia servers each time a client requests a particular multimedia
content.” (Chen, col. 7, ll. 4-8). Hence, the intended purpose of the Chen
system is to balance multimedia content delivery from servers to requesting
clients.
The question remains whether modifying the Chen reference with
Guenthner would have rendered the Chen system unsatisfactory for its
intended purpose of balancing multimedia content delivery from servers to
requesting clients. We find, based on the record before us, that the
Appellant has made no showing that whether a client receives data from a
metaserver or from a media server would have any bearing on Chen’s
intended purpose of balancing multimedia content delivery from the server
to the client. Therefore, we cannot conclude that modifying Chen with the
teachings of Guenthner would be unsatisfactory for Chen’s intended purpose
of balancing multimedia content delivery.
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It follows that the Appellant has not shown that the Examiner erred in
rejecting claim 4 as being obvious over the combination of Chen and
Guenthner.

IV. CLAIM 8
Claim 8 recites that the master streaming media server includes a load
poll thread, a load average queue, and load average threads. (Br. 11). The
Examiner contends that Chen discloses that a metaserver “selects the
proper algorithm to balance the load such as by measuring how busy
each multimedia server is (i.e., load poll thread) and how close a particular
client is to each multimedia server with the proper content” and that “the
metaserver 350 periodically communicates with each multimedia server
to receive its status information … .” (Answer, 12).

ANALYSIS
Here, Chen describes an algorithm to balance the load based on
multimedia servers. As Chen states, “[t]he selection of the proper algorithm
allows the metaserver to balance the load (a particular multimedia content)
across all available multimedia servers by dynamically assigning clients to
different multimedia servers each time a client requests a particular
multimedia content.” (Col. 7, ll. 4-8.) “If some multimedia servers are busy,
then clients will be sent to a multimedia server that can service new clients.
The total capacity of the system is the sum of capacities of all multimedia
servers in the system.” (Col. 7, ll. 8-12.)
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The primary passage of Chen relied on by the Examiner explains “to
distribute the work, the metaserver should have a measure of how busy each
multimedia server is, and how close a particular client is to each multimedia
server with the proper content. To measure how busy a server is, the
metaserver periodically communicates with each multimedia server to
receive from each multimedia server its status information …” (Col. 7, ll.
19-25.)
We find insufficient support in the record before us for the
Examiner’s conclusion of obviousness of claim 8. We agree with the
Examiner that Chen discloses selecting an algorithm to balance the load
based on multimedia servers or how close a particular client is to each
multimedia server with content and periodically communicating with each
multimedia server to receive status information. We disagree with the
Examiner that this disclosure demonstrates equivalency with the recited
features of “a load poll thread, a load average queue, and load average
threads.”
It follows that the Examiner erred in rejecting dependent claim 8 over
Chen in view of Guenthner.

CONCLUSION OF LAW
On the record before us, Appellant has not shown that the Examiner
erred in rejecting claims 2, 4-7, 9-12, and 21-33 over the prior art. The
Examiner has failed to establish that the combination of Chen and Guenthner
renders claim 8 unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).

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DECISION
We affirm the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 2, 4-7, 9-12, and
21-33. We reverse the Examiner’s decision rejecting claim 8.
No time for taking any action connected with this appeal may be
extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED-IN-PART

KIS

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