Ex Parte Fowler

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jul 29, 2016

13186256 (P.T.A.B. Jul. 29, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
13/186,256 07/19/2011
25310 7590 08/02/2016
VOLPE AND KOENIG, P,C
DEPT. AMD
UNITED PLAZA
30 SOUTH 17TH STREET
PHILADELPHIA, PA 19103
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Mark FOWLER
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.
AMD-090202-US-NP 3956
EXAMINER
LEE,KWANGB
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2617
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
08/02/2016 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):
eoffice@volpe-koenig.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte MARK FOWLER
Appeal2014-008781
Application No. 13/186,2561
Technology Center 2600
Before ST. JOHN COURTENAY III, MARC S. HOFF, and
MELISSA A HAAPALA, Administrative Patent Judges.
HOFF, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134 from a Final Rejection of
claims 1-26. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
Appellant's invention is a system and method to render a pixel from
an anti-aliased image. The invention includes storing a first set and a second
set of a plurality of anti-aliased samples of the pixel respectively in a first
memory and a second memory, and rendering a determined number of said
1 The real party in interest is ATI Technologies Unlimited Liability
Corporation.
Appeal2014-008781
Application No. 13/186,256
samples from the first set or the first and second sets. Spec. if 6. The
samples in the first and second sets are different. Spec. if 29, 30.
Claim 1 is exemplary of the claims on appeal:
1. A method of rendering a pixel from an anti-aliased image,
compnsmg:
splitting anti-aliased samples of the pixel into first and second sets,
samples in the first and second sets being different;
storing the first set and the second set of anti-aliased samples of the
pixel respectively in a first memory and a second memory; and
rendering a determined number of said samples from the first set or
the first and second sets.
The Examiner relies upon the following prior art in rejecting the
claims on appeal:
Morein
Lindholm
US 6,429,876 Bl
US 7 ,564,456 B 1
Aug. 6, 2002
Jul. 21, 2009
Claims 1-9, 11-16, 18-21, and 23-26 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 102(b) as being anticipated by Morein.
Claims 10, 17, and 22 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over Morein and Lindholm.
Throughout this decision, we make reference to the Appeal Brief
("App. Br.," filed March 14, 2014), the Final Rejection ("Final Rej.," filed
September 23, 2013), and the Examiner's Answer ("Ans.," mailed June 11,
2014) for their respective details.
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Application No. 13/186,256
ISSUE
Appellant argues that Morein fails to disclose "splitting anti-aliased
samples of the pixel into first and second sets, samples in the first and
second sets being different." App. Br. 10. Appellant contends that while
Morein discloses two memory structures (frame buffer and sample memory),
Morein discloses that samples are either (a) "stored in the 'frame buffer' in a
compressed format" or (b) "the 'complete sample set' is stored in the
'sample memory' and a pointer is stored in the 'frame buffer' that 'points to
... sample memory at which the complete sample set for the pixel is
stored.'" App. Br. 10-11. Appellant asserts that Morein thus does not
disclose splitting anti-aliased samples of the pixel into first and second sets,
because a pointer to a sample of a pixel is not the same as a "sample of the
pixel." App. Br. 11. Appellant further argues that Morein does not disclose
that the "samples in the first and second sets [are] different." App. Br. 11-
12.
Appellant's contentions present us with the following issue:
Does Morein disclose splitting anti-aliased samples of the pixel into
first and second sets, samples in the first and second sets being different?
PRINCIPLES OF LAW
"[T]his court has repeatedly emphasized that an indefinite article 'a'
or 'an' in patent parlance carries the meaning of 'one or more' in open-
ended claims containing the transitional phrase 'comprising.' That 'a' or 'an'
can mean 'one or more' is best described as a rule, rather than merely as a
presumption or even a convention. The exceptions to this rule are extremely
limited: a patentee must 'evince[] a clear intent' to limit 'a' or 'an' to 'one.'
The subsequent use of definite articles 'the' or 'said' in a claim to refer back
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Appeal2014-008781
Application No. 13/186,256
to the same claim term does not change the general plural rule, but simply
reinvokes that non-singular meaning. See SanDisk Corp. v. Kingston
Technology Co., Inc., 695 F.3d 1348, 1360 (Fed. Cir. 2012) (citing Baldwin
Graphic Systems, Inc. v. Siebert, 512 F.3d 1338, 1342 (Fed. Cir. 2008)).
ANALYSIS
CLAIM CONSTRUCTION
Independent claim 1 recites, inter alia, "[a] method of rendering a
pixel from an anti-aliased image," comprising "splitting anti-aliased samples
of the pixel into first and second sets, samples in the first and second sets
being different," and storing the first and second set "of anti-aliased samples
of the pixel respectively in the first memory and a second memory."
(Emphasis added.) Independent claim 13 recites a system including the
same limitations. Independent claim 20 recites a non-transitory computer
readable medium storing executable instructions, including the "splitting"
and "storing" limitations of claim 1.
Applying SanDisk, supra, we conclude that the broadest reasonable
interpretations of "a pixel" and "the pixel," respectively, are "one or more
pixels" and "the one or more pixels." Appellant has not evinced a clear
intent to limit interpretation of the claim to a single pixel. First, a full-frame
image requires many thousands of pixels, not merely a single pixel. Second,
the Specification expressly states that "the breadth and scope of the present
invention should not be limited by any of the above-described exemplary
embodiments, but should be defined only in accordance with the following
claims and their equivalents." Spec. i-f 47. Third, the Specification discloses
an alternative embodiment in which plural pixels are processed:
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Application No. 13/186,256
In another embodiment, for each pixel, the number of
samples stored in GPU memory can be the same as or different
than the ratio determined in step 302 based on characteristics of
that particular pixel. For example, an application can determine
that specific parts and/or pixels of the image to be displayed are
to be subjected to several passes of rendering and/or texturing,
and therefore the samples of those pixels are to be stored in
GPU memory. In an embodiment in which different numbers
of samples can be stored for respective pixels, the storage of the
samples and access to the stored samples can get more
complex, but performance efficiencies may be gained. In yet
another embodiment, one or more of the samples that are stored
in system memory can also be stored in GPU memory for
selected pixels. One or more surfaces comprising such
selectively stored samples can be maintained in GPU memory,
and a memory mapping function can be implemented to access
such selectively stored samples as appropriate.
Spec. ,-r 34.
In our analysis of the Examiner's rejections ir/ra, \'l.;e apply this broad,
but reasonable, construction of "a pixel" and "the pixel" as reading on one or
more pixels. See SanDisk, 695 F.3d at 1360.
CLAIMS 1-9, 11-16, 18-21, AND 23
In light of our broad, but reasonable, construction of "a pixel" and
"the pixel" supra, we are not persuaded by Appellant's argument that
Morein fails to disclose splitting anti-aliased samples of the pixel into first
and second sets, samples in the first and second sets being different. The
Examiner finds, and we agree, that Morein discloses frame buffer 36 and
sample memory 38, which are assigned to store sets that are different. See
Ans. 2-3. "The sample memory 38 stores a plurality of pixel entries, and
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Appeal2014-008781
Application No. 13/186,256
each of the pixel entries stores the plurality of pixel samples that result from
oversampling a pixel of the display." Morein col. 8:1-4. "The frame buffer
36 stores a pixel array, where each element of the pixel array describes a
particular pixel of the display." Morein col. 8:8-10. "When the data, or
samples, for a particular pixel can be reduced to a compressed sample set,
the compressed sample set is stored in the frame buffer 36 .... When the
pixel data corresponding to the pixel cannot be reduced to a compressed
sample set, the pixel data is stored at a pixel entry of the sample memory 38,
and a pointer to the pixel entry is stored in the frame buffer 36." Morein col.
8: 15-22.
We find that Morein' s teachings correspond to the claim requirement
that "samples in the first and second sets ... [are] different." The claim
does not define in what way the first and second [data] sets are different. In
Morein, the first set is compressed and the second set is not compressed.
See Ans. 3. Appellant's argument that Morein does not disclose "rendering
a determined number of said samples from the first set or the first and
second sets" relies on the previous argument that Morein does not disclose
the claimed "first and second sets." See App. Br. 12. Appellant's argument
regarding "rendering" is therefore also unpersuasive to show Examiner
error.
Accordingly, we find that Morein discloses all the limitations of the
claimed invention. We sustain the Examiner's§ 102 rejection of claims 1-
9, 11-16, 18-21, and 23.
CLAIMS 24-26
We are not persuaded by Appellant's contention that Morein does not
disclose samples in the first and second sets that are mutually exclusive.
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Application No. 13/186,256
App. Br. 13. We agree with the Examiner that, depending on a sample set's
compressibility, the set is either stored in frame buffer 36, or sample
memory 38 (including the use of a pointer). Ans. 5.
We find that the Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 24--26 as
being anticipated by Morein. We sustain the § 102 rejection.
CLAIMS 10, 17, AND 22
Appellant's sole argument concerning these claims is that Lindholm
does not cure the deficiencies of Morein. App. Br. 14. Because we find
supra that Morein discloses all the limitations of claims 1, 13, and 20, from
which claims 10, 17, and 22 depend, we sustain the Examiner's rejection of
claims 10, 17, and 22 over Morein and Lindholm, for the same reasons.
CONCLUSIONS
Morein discloses splitting anti-aliased samples of the pixel into first
and second sets, samples in the first and second sets being different.
DECISION
The Examiner's decision to reject claims 1-26 is affirmed.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a).
AFFIRMED
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