Ex Parte VargaDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardMay 16, 201612850823 (P.T.A.B. May. 16, 2016) Copy Citation 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. 12/850,823 08/05/2010 John Thomas Varga 8185P094 1597 76073 7590 05/16/2016 InfoPrint Solutions/ Blakely 1279 Oakmead Parkway Sunnyvale, CA 94085-4040 EXAMINER SHIFERAW, HENOK ASRES ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2672 MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE 05/16/2016 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 JOHN THOMAS VARGA ____________ Appeal 2014-006842 Application 12/850,823 Technology Center 2600 ____________ Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, CATHERINE SHIANG, and SCOTT E. BAIN, Administrative Patent Judges. SAADAT, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellant1 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Final Rejection of claims 1–19, which are all the claims pending in this application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm. 1 According to Appellant, the real party in interest is InfoPrint Solutions Company LLC (App. Br. 3). Appeal 2014-006842 Application 12/850,823 2 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellant’s invention relates to image compression in a printing system (Spec. ¶ 1). Exemplary claim 1 under appeal reads as follows: 1. A method comprising: receiving a print job; rasterizing the print job to produce rasterized bitmap data; retrieving additional information to be encoded into the rasterized bitmap data; and compressing the rasterized bitmap data by: inserting the additional information into the rasterized bitmap data; and performing a sequence of optimal and sub-optimal compression. The Examiner rejected claims 1–19 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Ozawa (US 2008/0018933 A1; Jan. 24, 2008) and Craft (US 6,771,193 B2; Aug. 3, 2004) (see Final Act. 5–27). ANALYSIS In rejecting claim 1, the Examiner finds Ozawa discloses the recited method step of receiving and rasterizing a print job “to produce rasterized bitmap data” and “retrieving additional information to be encoded into the rasterized bitmap data,” but does not disclose the compressing step (Final Act. 5). The Examiner further finds Craft discloses compressing the rasterized bitmap data by “inserting the additional information into the rasterized bitmap data” and “performing . . . compression” (Final Act. 6–7 (citing Craft, claim 12, col. 9, ll. 52–63, col. 10, ll. 15–20, Figs. 4 and 5)). Appeal 2014-006842 Application 12/850,823 3 The Examiner states it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Ozawa and Craft in order to provide “for enabling [the] device to transmit the same amount of information using fewer data unit[s]” (Final Act. 7 (citing Craft, col. 1, ll. 19–22)). Appellant argues the proposed combination does not teach or suggest “a process of compressing rasterized bitmap data by inserting the additional information into the rasterized bitmap data and performing a sequence of optimal and sub-optimal compression” or “inserting additional information into rasterized bitmap data” (App. Br. 10; Reply Br. 2–3). In particular, Appellant argues Ozawa does not disclose a compression process, wherein additional information is inserted into the rasterized bitmap data and compression is performed (App. Br. 10 (citing Ozawa ¶¶ 42, 43)). Appellant’s contentions have not persuaded us that the Examiner erred. The Examiner relies on Ozawa as teaching rasterization of bitmap data and retrieving additional information to be encoded into the bitmap data, and further finds Craft teaches compressing the rasterized bitmap data by inserting the additional information and performing optimal and sub- optimal compression (see Ans. 3). The Examiner correctly finds Craft’s encoder 108 “fetches” or “receives” the additional data to produce the compressed data that includes the additional data (id. (citing Craft, col. 4, ll. 41–51)). Additionally, we agree with the Examiner’s findings that the “Lempel-Ziv 1 class” decompression algorithm disclosed in Craft relates to optimal and sub-optimal compression (Ans. 3–4 (citing Craft, col. 9, ll. 52– 63); see also Craft, Cl. 12). Appellant’s contentions also have not persuaded us that Craft’s use of additional information to produce compressed data does not suggest Appeal 2014-006842 Application 12/850,823 4 inserting the data into rasterized bitmap data (Reply Br. 3). As found by the Examiner (Final Act. 7 (citing Craft, col. 1, ll. 19–22)), modifying Ozawa with the data compression scheme of Craft would have provided for transmitting the same amount of information using fewer data units, which benefits data transmission in devices such as “common facsimile (fax) machines [which] translate pictures and text into bitmaps, and transmit the bitmaps . . . .” In other words, the teaching value of Craft is compression of data, including bitmap data, by inserting additional information and performing optimal and sub-optimal compression. For the above-stated reasons, Appellant’s arguments have not persuaded us that the Examiner erred in finding the combination of Ozawa and Craft teaches or suggests the disputed features of claim 1. Therefore, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) rejection of claim 1, as well as claims 2–19, which are not argued separately (see App. Br. 11). DECISION We affirm the decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1–19. 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 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation