Ex Parte ChaudhryDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardFeb 19, 201511960869 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 19, 2015) Copy Citation UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE 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 APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. 11/960,869 12/20/2007 Kapil Chaudhry PD-207126 5230 20991 7590 02/20/2015 THE DIRECTV GROUP, INC. PATENT DOCKET ADMINISTRATION CA / LA1 / A109 2230 E. IMPERIAL HIGHWAY EL SEGUNDO, CA 90245 EXAMINER THIAW, CATHERINE B ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2493 MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE 02/20/2015 PAPER 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. PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________ BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD ____________ Ex parte KAPIL CHAUDHRY ____________ Appeal 2012-011951 Application 11/960,869 Technology Center 2400 ____________ Before JOHNNY A. KUMAR, DANIEL N. FISHMAN, and JESSICA C. KAISER, Administrative Patent Judges. KAISER, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF CASE Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s final rejection of claims 1–47. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm. Exemplary Claims Exemplary claims 1 and 10 under appeal read as follows: 1. A method of configuring a port of a gateway device comprising: restarting or rebooting a user receiving device; Appeal 2012-011951 Application 11/960,869 2 communicating a multicast packet to the gateway device; communicating a port forwarding service signal to the user receiving device from the gateway device; at the user receiving device, locating an open port of the gateway device in response to the port forwarding service signal; after locating, communicating an open port signal from the gateway device to the user receiving device indicating the open port on the gateway device is available to accept connections; and listening to the open port from the user receiving device. 10. A method comprising: configuring a port of a gateway device to communicate with a user receiving device; registering the user receiving device with a user device locator module through the port, said user device locator module separated from the gateway device; determining the location of a user receiving device from a partner service provider using the user device locator module; and forming a peer-to-peer connection between the partner service provider and the user receiving device in response to determining the location. Appeal 2012-011951 Application 11/960,869 3 Rejections on Appeal The Examiner rejected claims 1–7 and 9 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Yokomitsu, 1 Selén, 2 and WANIP. 3 (Final Act. 2.) The Examiner rejected claims 10, 31, and 47 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Yokomitsu and Fiedler. 4 (Final Act. 9.) The Examiner rejected claims 8, 11–30, and 32–46 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Yokomitsu, Selén, WANIP, Fiedler, and/or additional prior art references. (Final Act. 8, 13, 19, 23–25, 27, 29.) ISSUES The issues raised by the Examiner’s rejections and Appellant’s contentions are: Did the Examiner err in finding that the combination of Yokomitsu, Selén, and WANIP teaches or suggests “communicating a port forwarding service signal to the user receiving device from the gateway device” or “at 1 Yokomitsu et al., US 2005/0152287 A1; published July 14, 2005. 2 Kristian Selén, UPnP security in Internet gateway devices, TKK T- 110.5190 Seminar on Internetworking (May 2006), available at http://www.tml.tkk.fi/Publications/C/21/Selen_ready.pdf (last visited Jan. 29, 2015). 3 Matthew Schmitz et al., WANIPConnection:1 Service Template Version 1.01 For UPnP Version 1.0 (Nov. 12, 2001), available at http://www.upnp.org/specs/gw/UPnP-gw-WANIPConnection-v1- Service.pdf (last visited Jan. 29, 2015). 4 Jens Fiedler et al., Reliable VoIP Services using a Peer-to-peer Intranet, Proceedings of the Eighth IEEE International Symposium on Multimedia (ISM'06) (2006). Appeal 2012-011951 Application 11/960,869 4 the user receiving device, locating an open port of the gateway device in response to the port forwarding service signal,” as recited in claim 1? Did the Examiner err in finding that the combination of Yokomitsu and Fiedler teaches or suggests a “partner service provider,” as recited in claim 10? Is the Examiner’s reason to combine the teachings of Yokomitsu and Fiedler supported by articulated reasoning with some rational underpinning to justify the Examiner’s obviousness conclusion as to claim 10? ANALYSIS Obviousness Rejection of Claim 1 The Examiner rejected claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) based on the combination of Yokomitsu, Selén, and WANIP. (Final Act. 2.) Appellant contends that the Examiner erred because the combination fails to teach or suggest (a) “communicating a port forwarding service signal to the user receiving device from the gateway device” (App. Br. 7), and (b) “at the user receiving device, locating an open port of the gateway device in response to the port forwarding service signal” (App. Br. 9), as those limitations are recited in claim 1. As to (a), Appellant argues that the AddPortMapping function call in Selén on which the Examiner relied is sent from the client to the gateway, and cannot be the “port forwarding service signal,” which as recited in claim 1 must be sent from the gateway to the client. (App. Br. 7–8.) We disagree because the Examiner’s rejection relies on the gateway’s response to Appeal 2012-011951 Application 11/960,869 5 AddPortMapping, not AddPortMapping itself. (Final Act. 4; Ans. 4 (citing Selén, Fig. 2).) As to (b), Appellant argues that the gateway’s response in Selén cannot teach the “port forwarding service signal” because the user receiving device would not locate an open port “in response to the port forwarding service signal,” as recited in claim 1. (Reply Br. 3–6; App. Br. 9–10.) Appellant’s argument is premised on the contention that the client’s AddPortMapping and the gateway’s response thereto will result in a port being configured such that, “the client device can begin listening on the port that was specified in the AddPortMapping command.” (Reply Br. 5.) The Examiner’s findings, however, are not so limited. The Examiner finds in Selén, a client invoking AddPortMapping suggests such an action (i.e., port forwarding) is supported by the gateway, and the gateway’s response to AddPortMapping teaches the “port forwarding service signal” of claim 1. (Ans. 3–5 (citing Selén, Fig. 2, §§ 3.1, 3.5); see also Final Act. 3– 4.) We observe that the gateway’s response to AddPortMapping may not indicate success; instead, the response may be an error. (See WANIP § 2.4.16.4.Errors (errorCode 718, “The port mapping entry specified conflicts with a mapping assigned previously to another client.”).) Because, consistent with the Examiner’s findings, a user receiving device may locate an open port in response to the “port forwarding service signal,” we find Appellant’s argument unpersuasive. Appellant also argues that GetGenericPortMappingEntry as taught in WANIP does not locate an open port of the gateway device. (App. Br. 9; Reply Br. 5.) The Examiner finds WANIP teaches a client device can use a GetGenericPortMappingEntry function call to retrieve network address Appeal 2012-011951 Application 11/960,869 6 translation (NAT) port mappings on the gateway.” (Ans. 5 (citing WANIP, § 2.4.14).) The Examiner further finds that it would have been obvious to “hav[e] the receiving device of Yokomitsu call GetGenericPortMappingEntry to locate available ports in the [gateway]” because doing so “would allow [the device] to get a list of all free port[s], and flexibly choose a port from the list.” (Final Act. 5.) An analysis of obviousness “may take into account of the inferences and creative steps that a person of ordinary skill in the art would employ.” KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007). Appellant acknowledges that GetGenericPortMappingEntry can be used to determine port mappings in a gateway (App. Br. 9) and has not suggested it would be beyond a person of ordinary skill for the device to use such information when locating an open port. See KSR, 550 U.S. at 421 (“A person of ordinary skill is also a person of ordinary creativity, not an automaton.”). Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s § 103(a) rejection of claim 1. Appellant does not argue separate patentability for claims 2–9, which depend directly or indirectly from claim 1. Thus, we sustain the Examiner’s § 103(a) rejections of claim 2–9 for the same reasons as claim 1. Obviousness Rejection of Claim 10 Appellant contends that the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 10 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) because the combination of Yokomitsu and Fiedler does not teach or suggest “determining the location of a user receiving device from a partner service provider using the user device locator module.” (App. Br. 11.) The Examiner finds Yokomitsu teaches “determining the location of a user receiving device using the user device Appeal 2012-011951 Application 11/960,869 7 locator module,” but does not teach that “a partner service provider is using the user device locator module.” (Final Act. 10 (citing Yokomitsu, ¶¶ 42– 43).) The Examiner finds in Fiedler, “[e]ach node in the overlay network can be considered as a partner service provider.” (Id. 10–11 (citing Fiedler, 2–3).) The Examiner further finds Fiedler’s nodes each act as a server and a client, and each provides an ID lookup service to other requesting nodes. (Ans. 6–7.) On the other hand, Appellant argues that “nothing in Fiedler suggests that any of the nodes may be a ‘partner service provider.’” (App. Br. 12.) Resolving Appellant’s contention requires us to construe “partner service provider,” as recited in claim 10. Appellant argues “partner service provider” should be construed as “an entity which provides service to a receiving device as part of a partnership with a ‘primary service provider.’” (Reply Br. 6–7.) 5 We give a disputed claim term its broadest reasonable interpretation during patent prosecution. In re Hyatt, 211 F.3d 1367, 1372 (Fed. Cir. 2000). A patent applicant may act as his or her own lexicographer of patent claim terms, but any definition must be set forth in the specification with reasonable clarity, deliberateness, and precision. See Renishaw PLC v. Marposs Societa' per Azioni, 158 F.3d 1243, 1249 (Fed. Cir. 1998). The Summary of Appellant’s Specification states: The present disclosure allows a user device to establish a communication port at a gateway device. By establishing a port the 5 In support, Appellant cites claim 17. (Id.) That claim, however, recites neither a “partner service provider” nor a “primary service provider.” Claim 19 is the only claim before this panel on appeal that recites a “primary service provider,” and we discuss that claim infra. Appeal 2012-011951 Application 11/960,869 8 user device may then connect to different devices or services such as a partner service provider. The partner service provider is enabled to communicate various services to users of the primary service provider. (Spec. ¶ 5 (emphasis added).) Based on this reasonably precise definition, we construe a “partner service provider” as an entity that is enabled to communicate a service to a user of the primary service provider. We note that, contrary to Appellant’s proposed construction (Reply Br. 6–7), the definition in Appellant’s Specification does not further limit a “partner service provider” to providing a service “as part of a partnership with a primary service provider”; that definition requires only that the service be communicated “to users of the primary service provider.” We further observe that claim 10 does not recite a “primary service provider.” However, claim 19, which depends indirectly from claim 10, does. As to claim 19, the Examiner finds that the internet service provider (ISP) in Fiedler teaches the “primary service provider.” (Final Act. 20.) Appellant has not challenged this finding. Under the construction we have adopted above, we agree with the Examiner that Fiedler’s nodes teach or suggest a “partner service provider.” Specifically, the nodes of Fiedler are users of an ISP (i.e., “primary service provider”), and each node is enabled to provide an ID lookup service to a requesting node. (See Fiedler, 3.) Thus, Appellant has not persuaded us of error in the Examiner’s finding that a node in Fiedler teaches a “partner service provider.” Finally, Appellant argues that a person of ordinary skill in the art would not be motivated to combine Yokomitsu and Fiedler “if attempting to enable peer-to-peer communication between a partner service provider and a Appeal 2012-011951 Application 11/960,869 9 receiving device” because Yokomitsu “does not suggest forming a peer-to- peer network.” (App. Br. 12, 13.) The Examiner finds that Yokomitsu teaches Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) devices (Final Act. 9 (citing Yokomitsu, ¶ 40)), which “can operate in a network environment described in Fiedler.” (Ans. 6.) The Examiner further identifies a reason for the combination with rational underpinnings, namely, that using a “peer-to-peer connection would decrease [the] internet traffic bottleneck seen in [a] client[]-server connection.” (Final Act. 11; see also Ans. 7.) Appellant’s argument is unpersuasive because it does not address these findings. Based on the analysis above, the Examiner’s § 103(a) rejection of claim 10 is sustained. Appellant does not argue separate patentability for independent claim 31, which recites similar subject matter, or claims 11–30 and 32–47, which depend directly or indirectly from claims 10 and 31. Accordingly, we sustain the rejections of those claims for the same reasons as claim 10. DECISION We affirm the rejections of claims 1–47. No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv). AFFIRMED ELD Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation