Ex Parte Dey et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardSep 28, 201613260344 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 28, 2016) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 13/260,344 09/25/2011 22879 7590 09/30/2016 HP Inc, 3390 E. Harmony Road Mail Stop 35 FORT COLLINS, CO 80528-9544 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Prasen jit Dey 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. 82852228 5880 EXAMINER STORK, KYLER ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2144 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 09/30/2016 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): ipa.mail@hp.com barbl@hp.com yvonne.bailey@hp.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte PRASENJIT DEY, SRIGANESH MADHVANATH, and RAMA VENNELAKANTI Appeal2015-005498 Application 13/260,344 Technology Center 2100 Before JOSEPH L. DIXON, JAMES R. HUGHES, and ERIC S. FRAHM, Administrative Patent Judges. HUGHES, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appeal2015-005498 Application 13/260,344 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a rejection of claims 1-20. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b ). We reverse. The invention relates to capturing a hand gesture and identifying a corresponding command, identifying a qualifier from a non-hand gesture, and executing the qualified command (Spec. i-fi-f 15-18). Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter: 1. A method comprising: detecting a hand gesture input, wherein the hand gesture input corresponds to one of a plurality of recognized hand gestures; identifying, based on the hand gesture input, a command of a plurality of commands, wherein each of the plurality of recognized hand gestures uniquely identifies one of the plurality of commands; detecting one or more non-hand gesture inputs; in response to identifying the command, determining, based on the one or more non-hand gesture inputs, at least one qualifier for the command; qualifying, using the at least one qualifier, the command to obtain a qualified command; and configuring a processor to execute the qualified command on a machine in response to the hand gesture input and the one or more non-hand gesture inputs. 2 Appeal2015-005498 Application 13/260,344 REFERENCES The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on appeal is: Cohen-Solal Im Stetina Hildreth US 7 ,028,269 B 1 US 2006/0136846 Al US 2006/0259345 Al US 2009/0079813 Al REJECTIONS The Examiner made the following rejections: Apr. 11, 2006 June 22, 2006 Nov. 16, 2006 Mar. 26, 2009 Claims 1, 2, 4--7, 9, 12-15, 18, and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) as being anticipated by Cohen-Solal. Claims 3 and 11 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Cohen-Solal and Im. Claims 8 and 10 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Cohen-Solal and Hildreth. Claims 16, 17, and 19 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Cohen-Solal and Stetina. ANALYSIS The Anticipation Rejection The Examiner finds Cohen-Solal discloses all the limitations of claim 1, including "identifying, based on the hand gesture input, a command of a plurality of commands, wherein each of the plurality of recognized hand gestures uniquely identifies one of the plurality of commands" (Final Act. 1 2-3). Appellants contend Cohen-Solal is silent regarding "a plurality of 1 The Final Action mailed June, 27, 2014. 3 Appeal2015-005498 Application 13/260,344 commands that are uniquely identified by a plurality of recognized hand gestures" (App. Br. 8). Further, Appellants contend: [T]he Answer failed to even address this argument, much less explain how each combination of the "pointing gesture" and a direction is asserted to uniquely identify one of a plurality of commands . ... Rather, Cohen-Solal describes something different, namely that the "pointing gesture" only corresponds to a single command to initiate or 'trigger' the object selection process (Reply Br. 5). We agree with Appellants. Cohen-Solal describes a tracking video system where a speaker's gestures and voice are used to control a camera to aim it at targets of interest (Cohen-Solal col. 6, 11. 57---65). Although the camera can be controlled by a combination of different gestures and speech, the single resulting operation is to select the intended target object, i.e., to aim the camera in a particular direction (see Cohen-Solal col. 9, 11. 10-46). The Examiner has not shown the selection of a target object is one of multiple commands that the camera can perform, based on different inputs. In contrast, claim 1 requires "identifying, based on the hand gesture input, a command of a plurality of commands." We are, therefore, constrained by the record to show the Examiner erred in rejecting independent claim 1, independent claims 7 and 12 which recite commensurate limitations, and dependent claims 2, 4---6, 9, 13-15, 18, and 20 for similar reasons. The Obviousness Rejections The Examiner has not shown the additional references Im, Stetina, and Hildreth cure the deficiency of Cohen-Solal discussed above with 4 Appeal2015-005498 Application 13/260,344 respect to independent claims 1, 7, and 12. Accordingly, we also find the Examiner erred in rejecting claims 3, 8, 10, 11, 16, 17, and 19, which depend from claims 1, 7, and 12. CONCLUSIONS Under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b), the Examiner erred in rejecting claims 1, 2, 4--7, 9, 12-15, 18, and 20. Under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a), the Examiner erred in rejecting claims 3, 8, 10, 11, 16, 17, and 19. DECISION For the above reasons, the Examiner's decision rejecting claims 1-20 is reversed. REVERSED 5 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation