Ex Parte Corman et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardApr 29, 201411235626 (P.T.A.B. Apr. 29, 2014) Copy Citation UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________________ BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD ____________________ Ex parte DAVID E. CORMAN, THOMAS S. HERM, STEVEN A. DORRIS, ERIC J. MARTENS, and JAMES L. PAUNICKA ____________________ Appeal 2011-010884 Application 11/235,626 Technology Center 2400 ____________________ Before: JENNIFER D. BAHR, PATRICK R. SCANLON, and JILL D. HILL, Administrative Patent Judges. BAHR, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appeal 2011-010884 Application 11/235,626 2 STATEMENT OF THE CASE David E. Corman et al. (Appellants) appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134 from the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1, 3, 4, 6-12, and 14-22. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We REVERSE. The Claimed Subject Matter Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter. 1. A method for communicating with a plurality of mobile platforms having different communication languages, comprising: using a control device to receive a command and data from a user; using the control device to generate a first packet of common language information relating to the command; sending said first packet of common language information to a translating subsystem; said first packet of common language information including a common language command and common language data; and using said translating subsystem to convert said first packet of said common language command and said common language data to a first packet of mobile platform specific information, said first packet of mobile platform specific information being understandable by at least one of the plurality of mobile platforms. Appeal 2011-010884 Application 11/235,626 3 Rejections Claims 1, 3, 12, 14-16, 18, 20 and 21 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Caruso1 and Jha2. Claims 4, 6-10, and 22 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Caruso, Jha, and Brown3. Claim 11 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Caruso, Jha, Brown, and Voelling4. Claim 17 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Caruso, Jha, and Duggan5. Claim 19 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Caruso, Jha, and Voelling. OPINION Obviousness based on Caruso and Jha Independent claims 1, 4, and 12 are method claims requiring, in relevant part, steps of using a control device to receive a command from a user; using the control device to generate a packet of common language information relating to the command; and using a translating subsystem to 1 Amy Houle Caruso, Tactical control system (TCS) for unmanned air vehicles (UAVs), Airborne Reconnaissance XXVI, Proceedings of SPIE Vol. 4824 (2002), retrieved from http://scitation.aip.org/getpdf/servlet/GetP DFServlet?filetype=pdf &id=PSISDGO04 824000001000118000001 &idtype=cvips&prog=normal (last visited Dec. 1, 2008). 2 US 2005/0131933 A1, pub. Jun. 16, 2005. 3 US 7,408,898 B1, iss. Aug. 5, 2008. 4 Voelling and Caruso, US GOVERNMENT TACTICAL UAV’S and COMMON SYSTEMS AN APPROACH TO INTEROPERABILITY, Proceedings of RPV/UAV Systems, pp. 1.1-1.10 (1988). 5 US 2005/0004723 A1, pub. Jan. 6, 2005. Appeal 2011-010884 Application 11/235,626 4 convert the packet of common language information to a packet of mobile platform specific information. Independent claim 20 is a system claim requiring, in relevant part, a control device adapted to receive from a user a command and data that is intended for use with a specific mobile platform and to generate a packet of common language information relating to the command and data; and a translating subsystem adapted for translating the packet of common language information into a packet of mobile platform specific information understandable by said specific mobile platform. Further, claims 1, 12, and 20 additionally require that the common language information include a common language command and common language data. The Examiner acknowledges that Caruso does not explicitly disclose a common language. Ans. 8. The Examiner equates the common data schema of Jha with a common language, and determines it would have been obvious to “utilize the teaching of Jha to the system of Caruso in order to integrate various IERs used for data communications into a common schema.” Id. Appellants argue that Jha does not address converting information concerning commands into common language. App. Br. 11. Rather, according to Appellants, Jha is concerned with analyzing data submitted in accordance with different information exchange requirements (IERs), “analyzing the meta data associated with the data, and then creating a ‘data- schema’ that is ‘context-neutral’ (i.e., not tied to a specific IER).” Id. at 11- 12 (citing Jha, para. [0014]). Appellants’ arguments are convincing. We agree with Appellants that Jha does not disclose generating a packet of common language information related to a received command. Rather, the common data schema described Appeal 2011-010884 Application 11/235,626 5 by Jha concerns storage of data in a data structure including a data field for storing digital data and a number of attribute fields for storing metadata about the content stored in the data field. Jha, para. [0022]. Jha gives no indication that the data stored in the data field is in a common language that would need to be translated into platform- (or node-) specific language understandable by a particular platform or node. See Jha, paras. [0006], [0017], [0018] (discussing various communications nodes). Rather, Jha’s common data structure “is capable of supporting numerous types and formats of data . . . across a wide range of communications contexts by simply adjusting the metadata values stored in the various attribute fields.” Id. at para. [0026]. In responding to Appellants’ arguments, the Examiner asserts an alternative position that Caruso’s system “must translate the commands understood by the user (high level programming language) into a common language (binary) which is then sent to the UAVs at which point the UAVs control systems must translate that binary code into code usable and understood by its various subsystems (mobile platform specific format).” Ans. 42. However, the Examiner does not provide any evidence to show that Caruso’s system must work in this manner, much less establish a sound basis that a person of ordinary skill in the art would understand the binary code to be a “common language” as that terminology is used by Appellants. Thus, the Examiner fails to establish a prima facie case that Caruso and Jha render obvious the subject matter of independent claims 1, 4, 12, and 20. Further, the Examiner does not rely on Brown, Duggan, or Voelling to make up for the deficiency in the combination of Caruso and Jha. We Appeal 2011-010884 Application 11/235,626 6 therefore reverse the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1, 3, 4, 6-12, and 14- 22. DECISION The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1, 3, 4, 6-12, and 14-22 is reversed. REVERSED mls Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation