Ex Parte Garst et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Apr 17, 2014

11760580 (P.T.A.B. Apr. 17, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte BLAINE GARST and BERTRAND PHILIPPE SERLET
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Appeal 2011-006233
Application 11/760,580
Technology Center 2100
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Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, ALLEN R. MacDONALD,
and ROBERT E. NAPPI, Administrative Patent Judges.

Per Curiam

DECISION ON APPEAL

Appeal 2011-006233
Application 11/760,580

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Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Final Rejection
of claims 1-22. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.

STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Introduction
Appellants’ invention relates to a mechanism that supports both
reference count and garbage collected memory management operations
(Spec. ¶¶ [0004] - [0006]).
Independent claim 1 is illustrative of the invention and reads as
follows:
1. A dual-use library method, comprising:
receiving a first instruction to invoke a first routine;
determining a memory management scheme required by
the first instruction;
executing one or more reference-count specific
instructions in the first
routine if the first instruction requires a reference count
memory management scheme; and
executing one or more garbage collector specific memory
management instructions in the first routine if the first
instruction requires garbage collector memory management.

The Examiner’s Rejections
Claims 1-3, 9, 12, 14-18, 21, and 22 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 102(b) as anticipated by Detlefs (US 6,993,770 B1). (See Ans. 3-8).
Claims 4-8, 10, 11, and 13 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over Detlefs and Bernabeu-Auban (US 2006/0259489
A1). (See Ans. 8-11).
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Application 11/760,580

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Claims 19 and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Detlefs and Bird (US 2007/0106981 A1). (See Ans. 11-
12).
Appellants’ Contentions
1. Appellants contend that the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1
because
The Examiner does not appear to take into account the
distinction between reference counting memory management
(explained at ¶ 4 of Appellant’s Specification) and garbage
collection memory management (explained at ¶ 5 of
Appellant’s Specification). Appellant clearly distinguishes that
reference counting memory management is [“]based on [ ]
counting . . . of references . . . [and] [w]hen the number of
references . . . is zero [reclamation may be performed].”
Specification at ¶ [4]. In contrast, garbage collection memory
management “uses a garbage collected heap.”
(App. Br. 10). Appellants argue that Detlefs does not anticipate claim 1
because Detlefs’ library does not make a determination of what type of
memory management scheme to use (App. Br. 12-13). Additionally,
Appellants assert garbage collection and reference counting constitute
different implementation types for memory management (App. Br. 14).
2. Appellants rely on the same reasoning in support of the
patentability of independent claim 14 and dependent claim 18 (App. Br. 15),
allowing these claims to fall with claim 1.
3. Regarding the remaining dependent claims, Appellants argue
that those claims are patentable because of their dependency from the claims
discussed above and the failure of the other references to cure the
deficiencies of Detlefs (App. Br. 15-16).
Appeal 2011-006233
Application 11/760,580

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Issue on Appeal
Based on Appellants’ arguments in the briefs, the principal and
dispositive issue presented in this appeal is as follows:
Did the Examiner err in rejecting the claims as being anticipated
by Detlefs because the reference does not teach all the recited features of
claim 1?

ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner’s rejections in light of Appellants’
arguments that the Examiner has erred.
We disagree with Appellants’ conclusion. The Examiner has
provided a comprehensive response, supported by sufficient evidence based
on the teachings of Detlefs to each of the above-noted contentions raised by
Appellants. We adopt as our own (1) the findings and reasons set forth by
the Examiner in the action from which this appeal is taken and (2) the
reasons set forth by the Examiner in the Examiner’s Answer in response to
Appellants’ Appeal Brief (see Ans. 12-20). We concur with the conclusion
reached by the Examiner.
We observe that the conditional limitation recited in claim 1 only
requires executing reference count specific instructions if the first instruction
requires a reference count memory management scheme, without requiring
garbage collector specific memory management instructions to be executed.
It is well settled that during examination of a patent application, pending
claims are given their broadest reasonable construction consistent with the
specification. In re Prater, 415 F.2d 1393, 1404-05 (CCPA 1969); In re Am.
Acad. of Sci. Tech Ctr., 367 F.3d 1359, 1364 (Fed. Cir. 2004). Therefore,
Appeal 2011-006233
Application 11/760,580

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Detlefs reference counting memory management meets the recited features
of claim 1.
Additionally, as further indicated by the Examiner (Ans. 17), the same
set of instructions used for reference counting invokes garbage collection.
In other words, although Appellants’ Specification mentions using a
“garbage collected heap” including node allocation “performed by runtime
code rather than explicitly by program code” (Spec. ¶ [0005]) (see also
Reply Br. 5-6), claim 1 merely recites “garbage collector” which could be
based on reference counting. That is, without reading limitations from the
Specification into the claims, the Examiner’s broad, but reasonable,
interpretation of reference counting as the basis for garbage collection is not
precluded by claim 1.
Based on the claim interpretation described above, we specifically
agree with the Examiner’s analysis of the cited portions of Detlefs with
respect to implementing lock-free reference counting and garbage collection
(see Ans. 12-14). We also agree with the Examiner (Ans. 15-16) that the
reference counting is one type of garbage collection technique used for
freeing memory or allocated objects. As such, we agree with the Examiner
that “the same set of instructions implements reference counting and
reclamation or garbage collection memory management” (Ans. 17 (citing
Detlefs, claims 22 and 25)). Further, contrary to Appellants’ arguments
(Reply Br. 9-10), the Examiner correctly concluded Detlefs’ Figure 4B
provides for evaluating a set of instructions (i.e., value of the reference
counting as the number of pointers to an object) in order to invoke a memory
management scheme (Ans. 18-19).

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Application 11/760,580

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CONCLUSIONS
1. The Examiner did not err in rejecting claim 1 as anticipated by
Detlefs.
2. Claims 1-22 are not patentable.

DECISION
The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1-22 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)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED

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