Ex Parte Hall

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Mar 26, 2014

10981064 (P.T.A.B. Mar. 26, 2014)

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.
10/981,064 11/04/2004 William E. Hall ROC920040050US1 8099
46797 7590 03/26/2014
IBM CORPORATION, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY LAW
DEPT 917, BLDG. 006-1
3605 HIGHWAY 52 NORTH
ROCHESTER, MN 55901-7829
EXAMINER
ARMOUCHE, HADI S
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2497
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
03/26/2014 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 WILLIAM E. HALL
____________

Appeal 2011-012871
Application 10/981,064
Technology Center 2400
____________

Before JOSEPH L. DIXON, JAMES R. HUGHES, and
ERIC S. FRAHM, Administrative Patent Judges.

HUGHES, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

Appeal 2011-012871
Application 10/981,064

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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant seeks our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the
Examiner’s final decision rejecting claims 1-11 and 23-33. Claims 12-22
have been canceled. (Br. 5.) We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.
Appellant’s Invention
The invention at issue on appeal concerns a system, system on chip,
and method of securely accessing data including retrieving security
parameters from a security parameter table utilizing an index from a
translation look aside buffer and a translated real (physical) address from the
same entry in the translation look aside buffer. (Spec. ¶¶ [0002], [0008]-
[0011]; Abstract.)
Representative Claim
Independent claim 1, reproduced below with the key disputed
limitations emphasized, further illustrates the invention:
1. A method of securely accessing data, comprising:
receiving a memory access request;
retrieving a translated real address, from a first entry in
a translation look aside buffer (TLB), for data targeted by the
request;
retrieving, from a security parameters table, security
parameters using an index contained in the first entry in the
TLB, wherein the security parameters contain information
regarding how the targeted data should be encrypted,
decrypted, or both; and
accessing the targeted data using the retrieved translated
real address and the security parameters.

Appeal 2011-012871
Application 10/981,064

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Rejections on Appeal1
1. The Examiner rejects claims 1-6, 8-11, 23-25, 28, and 30 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over U.S. Patent App. Pub. No.
2004/0255145 A1, published Dec. 16, 2004 (filed Mar. 31, 2004) (“Chow”)
and US Patent No. 7,383,587 B2, issued Jun. 3, 2008 (filed Nov. 17, 2003)
(“Watt”).
2. The Examiner rejects claims 7, 27, 29, 31, and 32 under 35
U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Chow, Watt, and US Patent App.
Pub. No. 2006/0015754 A1, published Jan. 19, 2006 (filed Jul. 15, 2004)
(“Drehmel”).
3. The Examiner rejects claims 26 and 33 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Chow, Watt, and US Patent No.
6,715,085 B2, issued Mar. 30, 2004 (“Foster”).

ISSUE
Based upon our review of the administrative record, Appellant’s
contentions, and the Examiner’s findings and conclusions, the pivotal issue
before us follows:
Does the Examiner err in concluding that the combination of Chow
and Watt collectively teaches or would have suggested “retrieving a
translated real address, from a first entry in a translation look aside buffer
(TLB)” and “retrieving, from a security parameters table, security
parameters using an index contained in the first entry in the TLB” within the

1 The Examiner has withdrawn the rejection of claim 1 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 112, first paragraph (Ans. 4). Therefore, we do not address Appellant’s
arguments made with respect to the withdrawn written description rejection
(Br. 10-11).
Appeal 2011-012871
Application 10/981,064

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meaning of Appellant’s claim 1 and the commensurate limitations of claims
23 and 30?

ANALYSIS
The Examiner rejects independent claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
as being obvious over Chow and Watt. (Ans. 5-6, 10-14.) Appellant
contends that the combination does not teach the disputed features of claim 1
– specifically, retrieving security parameters from a security parameter table
utilizing an index from a first entry in a translation look aside buffer (TLB)
and a translated real address from the same entry in the TLB. (Br. 12-15.)
We agree with Appellant that the portions of Chow and Watt
identified by the Examiner do not disclose the disputed features of
independent claim 1. (Id.) Specifically, Chow describes a key store (Chow,
¶¶ [0033]-[0034]; Fig. 1, element 18) that the Examiner equates (Ans. 5-6)
to Appellant’s recited “security parameter table” (claim 1). Watt, as
explained by the Examiner (Ans. 5-6) describes translation look aside
buffers and retrieving physical addresses therefrom (Watt, col. 35, ll. 27-38,
53-65; col. 36, ll. 44-67), which the Examiner equates to Appellant’s recited
“retrieving a translated real address, from a first entry in a translation look
aside buffer (TLB)” (claim 1). The Examiner, however, does not explain
how the combination of Chow and Watt teaches an index for accessing a
security table and a translated real address in the same entry in the TLB as
required by the disputed limitations of claim 1 – i.e., “retrieving a translated
real address, from a first entry in a translation look aside buffer (TLB)” and
“retrieving, from a security parameters table, security parameters using an
index contained in the first entry in the TLB.”
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Application 10/981,064

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While the Examiner is correct in that Chow describes a key store that
might at least suggest a security parameter table containing security
parameter data (Ans. 5-6, 10-14), and Watt describes retrieving a physical
address (translated real address) from a translation look aside buffer (id.), the
Examiner entirely omitted any explanation of the recited index, the index
being contained in the TLB (in the first entry of the TLB with the translated
real address), or using the index to retrieve the security parameters from the
security parameters table (i.e., the key from the key store).
Appellant’s contentions (Br. 12-15) are convoluted and confusing, and
in some cases appear to be factually incorrect – e.g., arguing that the
Examiner somehow asserts that Chow’s key store is a translation look aside
buffer (TLB), and that the key store cannot be a TLB (Br. 14).
Notwithstanding these issues, we interpret Appellant to argue that “the
combination [of] Chow [and] Watt does not [teach or suggest] a translation
look aside buffer with ‘TLB entries’ that include both a ‘translated real
address’ and the corresponding ‘security parameters’” (Br. 15) “which
provide an index into a security table” (Br. 14), i.e., a “translated real
address” and an “index contained in the first entry in the TLB” for
“retrieving, from a security parameters table, security parameters . . . ”
(claim 1).
Consequently, we are constrained by the record before us to find that
the Examiner erred in concluding that Chow and Watt teach or suggest the
recited features of Appellant’s claim 1, and the rejection of claim 1 fails to
establish a prima facie case of obviousness. Appellant’s independent claims
23 and 30 include limitations of commensurate scope. Appellant’s
dependent claims 2-6, 8-11, 24, 25, and 28 depend on and stand with claims
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Application 10/981,064

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1 and 23 respectively. Accordingly, we reverse the Examiner’s obviousness
rejection of claims 1-6, 8-11, 23-25, 28, and 30.
With respect to the obviousness rejections of claims 7, 26, 27, 29, and
31-33, the Examiner does not suggest, and we do not find, that the additional
references – Drehmel and Foster – cure the deficiencies of the Chow and
Watt combination discussed supra. Claims 7, 26, 27, 29, and 31-33 depend
on claims 1, 23, and 30, respectively. Thus, for the reasons set forth with
respect to claim 1 (supra), we reverse the Examiner’s obviousness rejections
of claims 7, 26, 27, 29, and 31-33.

CONCLUSION
Appellant has shown that the Examiner erred in rejecting claims 1-11
and 23-33 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).

DECISION
We reverse the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1-11 and 23-33.

REVERSED

ke