Ex Parte Hartwich

Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences

May 23, 2011

10489524 (B.P.A.I. May. 23, 2011)

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.
10/489,524 10/21/2004 Florian Hartwich 10191/3560 2307
26646 7590 05/23/2011
KENYON & KENYON LLP
ONE BROADWAY
NEW YORK, NY 10004
EXAMINER
LEE, CHUN KUAN
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2181
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
05/23/2011 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 BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS
AND INTERFERENCES
____________________

Ex parte FLORIAN HARTWICH
____________________

Appeal 2009-0103221
Application 10/489,524
Technology Center 2100
____________________

Before JEAN R. HOMERE, ST JOHN COURTENAY III, and
THU ANN DANG, Administrative Patent Judges.

HOMERE, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

1 The real party in interest is Robert Bosch GmbH. (App. Br. 2.)
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I. STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the final rejection of
claims 14, 15 and 17-27. Claims 1-13 and 16 have been canceled. (App. Br.
2.) We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
Appellant’s Invention
Appellant invented a method and system for providing a uniform
system time in an entire bus system wherein a first user transmits in a
reference message to another user its local time, which serves as base time
for the whole bus system. (Spec. 4, 19-34, spec. 7, ll. 8-19.)
Illustrative Claim
Independent claim 14 further illustrates the invention. It reads as
follows:
14. A method for implementing a stop-watch function for
determining time in a bus system including at least two users
which are connected via a communication link, comprising:

detecting an event whose time of occurrence is to be
determined, wherein the event occurs one of on the
communication link and at a trigger input of at least one user;
triggering, when the event occurs, a signal change at an
interface to the communication link of the at least one user;

storing, in at least one memory of the at least one user, a
specified base time when the signal change occurs; and

performing time measurement in the bus system using
the base time, the base time corresponding to a bus system time
such that measured times are measured in a unit of the
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bus system time, wherein the bus system time is uniform for the
entire bus system including the at least two users;

wherein the base time is determined by one of the at least
two users, each of the at least two users having a respective
local time, and wherein the one user determining the base
time is a user that has been designated as a master timer, and
wherein the one user transmits in a reference message the local
time of the one user to the other of the at least two users, and
wherein the local time of the one user transmitted in the
reference message is used as the base time.

Prior Art Relied Upon
Lever US 5,944,840 Aug. 31, 1999

Green US 6,111,888 Aug. 29, 2000

Rejection on Appeal
Claims 14, 15 and 17-27 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over the combination of Green and Lever.
Appellant’s Contentions
Appellant contends that the combination of Green and Lever does not
teach or fairly suggest measuring system bus time using the base time of a
user wherein the system bus time is uniform for the entire bus system, as
recited in independent claim 14. (App. Br. 7-11.) According to Appellant,
Green discloses determining the timing in a bus system using periodic
synchronization of signals, which do not contain any clock time information.
Further, Appellant submits that each disclosed sync signal is only a trigger
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pulse for starting a time frame. (Id.) Additionally, Appellant argues that
Lever does not cure the noted deficiencies of Green since Lever is only
concerned with latency times and data associated with each interrupt. (Id. at
10.) In particular, Appellant submits the following regarding the proffered
combination:
The overall teachings of Green and Lever merely suggest a bus
system utilizing sync pulses for starting time frames, with a stop
watch functionality in the individual users of the bus system, whereby
each user implementing the stop watch functionality is only able to
measure an event occurrence in its local time. Even if the “master”
unit in Green measures an event occurrence in his local time, no other
user in the bus system will have the same time base for this event
because of differences between local timers. Accordingly, the overall
teachings of Green and Lever would suggest, at best, that every node
in the bus system could say in which time frame/division an event
occurs, but not the global time of an event that is uniform for the
entire bus system. (Id. at 11.) (Emphasis omitted.)

Examiner’s Findings
In response, the Examiner finds that Green’s sync signals do contain
timing information associated with each cycle frame indicating the start of
each cycle and the timing between two sync signals in the cycle. Therefore,
the Examiner finds that the associated timing for the cycle teaches the base
time for a local user. (Ans. 16-17.) Further, the Examiner finds that Green’s
transmission of the sync signal from one user to another teaches globalizing
the timing information as buttressed by Lever’s teaching of measuring
global timing information. (Id. 19-20.)
Therefore, the pivotal issue before us is as follows:
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II. ISSUE
Has Appellant shown that the Examiner erred in finding that the
combination of Green and Lever teaches or fairly suggests measuring system
bus time using the base time of a user wherein the system bus time is
uniform for the entire bus system as recited in independent claim 14?

III. FINDINGS OF FACT
The following Findings of Fact (FF) are shown by a preponderance of
the evidence.
Green
1. Green discloses a communications system having a plurality of nodes
connected together via a serial bus wherein one of the nodes,
designated as a master node, issues a periodic sync signal to the other
nodes. (Green, Abstr.) In particular, the issued sync signal defines the
start of a time division for each of the nodes connected to the bus
thereby imposing producing equal time divisions for each of the
nodes, and providing them a common sense of time. (Green, col. 3,
ll.43-49, col. 7, ll. 29-32, col. 9, ll. 29-32, col. 13, ll. 30-37.)

IV. ANALYSIS
Independent claim 14 recites, inter alia, measuring time in a bus
system using the base time of a first user wherein the system bus time is
uniform for the entire bus system upon the user being designated as a master
timer transmits its base time to another user via the bus.
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First, we consider the scope and meaning of the claim recitation,
“time,” which must be given the broadest reasonable interpretation
consistent with Appellant’s disclosure. In re Am. Acad. of Sci. Tech Ctr.,
367 F.3d 1359, 1364 (Fed. Cir. 2004); In re Morris, 127 F.3d 1048, 1054
(Fed. Cir. 1997). We must, however, avoid importing limitations from
Appellant’s Specification. SuperGuide Corp. v. DirecTV Enterprises, Inc.,
358 F.3d 870, 875 (Fed. Cir. 2004) (“Though understanding the claim
language may be aided by the explanations contained in the written
description, it is important not to import into a claim limitations that are not
part of the claim.”). We note that both the Examiner and Appellant appear
to agree that the Specification does not provide an express definition for the
claim recitation “time.” (Ans. 7.) We thus construe “time” according to its
ordinary meaning, and consistent with Appellant’s Specification, as clock
time. Consequently, we construe the disputed limitations set forth above in
light of Appellant’s Specification as requiring the clock time for a system
bus time to be uniform for the entire system when a user designated as a
master timer transmits its base clock time to another user via the bus. Given
this backdrop, we find no error in the Examiner’s finding that the
combination of Green and Lever teaches or suggests the disputed limitations.
In particular, we find that Green’s disclosure of a master node providing a
common sense of time to other nodes by issuing a sync signal to them
indicating the start of a time division (FF1 ) teaches or suggests that the
nodes need to simultaneously start the data transmission process at a
particular time. While Green does explicitly indicate that the start time is
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the base time of the master node, one of ordinary skill would find it
reasonable that, by virtue of its leadership function on the communication
network, the master node would be the best suited for providing to the other
the start time for the data transfer. Consequently, we find that Green’s
disclosure teaches or at least suggests that, along with the sync signal, the
master node also transfers its base time to the other nodes to start the time
division process. We therefore find that, upon transferring its base time to
the other nodes via the bus to perform the time division, the master node’s
transferred time is uniform in the entire bus system.
Further, Appellant’s argument that Lever fails to cure the deficiencies
of Green is unavailing since we find no such deficiencies in Green. It
therefore follows that Appellant has not shown error in the Examiner’s
obviousness rejection of claim 14.2
Since Appellant argue claims 14, 15, and 17-27 as a single group,
claims 15 and 17-27 fall together with claim 1 for the same reasons set forth
above. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(vii).

2 See In re Jung, No. 2010-1019, 2011 WL 1235093, at *7 (Fed. Cir. Mar.
28, 2011) (“Jung argues that the Board gave improper deference to the
examiner’s rejection by requiring Jung to ‘identif[y] a reversible error’ by
the examiner, which improperly shifted the burden of proving patentability
onto Jung. Decision at 11. This is a hollow argument, because, as discussed
above, the examiner established a prima facie case of anticipation and the
burden was properly shifted to Jung to rebut it. . . . ‘[R]eversible error’
means that the applicant must identify to the Board what the examiner did
wrong . . . .”).

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VI. DECISION
We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 14, 15, and 17-27.
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

Vsh