Ex Parte Wyatt et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardDec 21, 201613745705 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 21, 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. 13/745,705 01/18/2013 David Wyatt NVIDP716/SC-12-0194-US1 2745 75359 7590 12/23/2016 ZILKA-KOTAB, PC- NVID 1155 N. 1st St. Suite 105 SAN JOSE, CA 95112 EXAMINER PERROMAT, CARLOS ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2611 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 12/23/2016 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): zk-uspto@zilkakotab.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte DAVID WYATT, TOBY BUTZON, HARISH CHANDER RAO VUTUKURU, and DAVID MATTHEW STEARS Appeal 2016-004365 Application 13/745,705 Technology Center 2600 Before JOSEPH L. DIXON, THU A. DANG, and JOHN P. PINKERTON, Administrative Patent Judges. DANG, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL I. STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s Final Rejection of claims 1—3, 10, 12—17, and 21—23, which are all of the pending claims. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm. A. INVENTION According to Appellants, the invention relates to “processing pixels a distributed processing environment” (Spec. 11). Appeal 2016-004365 Application 13/745,705 B. ILLUSTRATIVE CLAIM Claim 1 is exemplary: 1. A method, comprising: identifying a plurality of pixels to be processed utilizing a plurality of display processing modules; apportioning the pixels into a plurality of portions of the pixels in accordance with a number of the display processing modules, wherein each portion of the pixels includes pixels that overlap with pixels in at least one other portion of the pixels; processing the portions of the pixels by the plurality of display processing modules; and transmitting the plurality of portions of the pixels to one or more display devices, wherein each display device in the one or more display devices includes a timing controller configured to identify and discard overlapping pixels in the plurality of portions of the pixels. C. REJECTIONS The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on appeal is: Morris Nally Stanich Yan Biermann US 6,425,026 B1 US 2003/0184550 A1 US 2007/0236743 A1 US 2010/0026691 A1 US 7,969,444 B1 July 23,2002 Oct. 2, 2003 Oct. 11,2007 Feb. 4, 2010 June 28, 2011 Podlozhnyuk, V., “Image Convolution with Cuda,” NVIDIA, June 2007. Claims 1—3, 12, 13, 16, 21, and 22 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over the teachings of Biermann, Morris, and Nally. Claims 10, and 17 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over the teachings of Biermann, Morris, Nally, and Podlozhnyuk. 2 Appeal 2016-004365 Application 13/745,705 Claim 14 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over the teachings of Biermann, Morris, Nally, and Stanich. Claims 15, and 23 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over the teachings of Biermann, Morris, Nally, and Yan. II. ISSUES The principal issues before us are whether the Examiner erred in finding that the combination of Biermann, Morris, and Nally teaches or suggests “a timing controller” configured to “identify and discard overlapping pixels” (claim 1). III. FINDINGS OF FACT The following Findings of Fact (FF) are shown by a preponderance of the evidence. Biermann 1. In Biermann, the term “texel,” or texture element, generally refers to the fundamental unit of a texture map, analogous to a pixel within a displayed image (col. 4,11. 5—8). Biermann discloses defining overlaps that provide for data dependencies between the texels and pixels at the border between adjacent texture map sections (col. 5,11. 13—19). Graphics processing units (GPUs) perform post processing (e.g., filtering and interpolation) to resolve pixels at the edge of the split between adjacent parts (col. 5,11. 19-23). Morris 2. Morris discloses dividing a frame segment into overlapping “subframes” (col. 10,11. 1—3), wherein “edge effects” (pixels on the 3 Appeal 2016-004365 Application 13/745,705 periphery of a frame segment that are corrupted during processing due to interaction with “off-array” pixels) are eliminated to avoid visible artifacts in the processed video image (col. 11,11. 52—62). Nally 3. Nally discloses using a timing controller in a clipping controller (| 4), wherein the clipping controller identifies image data and transfer only the portions of the data associated with a virtual frame buffer into the display memory such that the timing controller operates to drive only a portion of a display panel (claim 1). IV. ANALYSIS In reaching this decision, we consider all evidence presented and all arguments actually made by Appellants. We do not consider arguments that Appellants could have made but chose not to make in the Appeal Brief, and we deem any such arguments waived. 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(l)(iv). Although Appellants contend “Biermann does not disclose that there is an overlap between the different portions of the frame buffer,” Appellants concede “Morris discloses that multiple processor boards may be utilized to process portions of a frame (i.e., frame segments), which may include overlapping regions” (App. Br. 12). In particular, Appellants concede “Morris teaches and suggests that the frame segments generated by the processor boards may contain overlapping regions that are discarded during reconstruction of the processed frame” {id. at 12—13). Thus, Appellants do not contest the Examiner’s reliance on “the combination of Biermann and Morris for teaching or suggesting the discarding of overlapping pixel data” {id. at 13). 4 Appeal 2016-004365 Application 13/745,705 Instead, Appellants merely contend, in Nally, “discarding or clipping of image data is performed based on the virtual pixel address associated with the write operation” and thus, “the timing controller of Nally cannot be obviously modified to perform the operations of identifying and discarding overlapping pixels as suggested by the Examiner” {id. at 13—14). According to Appellants, “such algorithms cannot simply be executed by a timing controller chip as disclosed in Nally"1 because “Nally is explicitly clear that even implementing simple software operations, such as a software implemented clipping window, utilizing the timing controller chip is extremely difficult to achieve” (id. ). Based on the record before us, we disagree with Appellants’ contentions regarding the Examiner’s rejections of the claims. We agree with the Examiner’s findings, and are unpersuaded of error with the Examiner’s conclusion that the claims would have been obvious over the combined teachings. In particular, we are unpersuaded of Examiner error in concluding that it would have been obvious to combine Nally with Biermann and Morris “to perform the clipping and display of the overlapping frame portions,” thereby “allowing the portions of image data generated in Biermann and Morris to be separately processed and stored . . .” (Final Act. 5). Although Appellants contend, “the timing controller of Nally cannot be obviously modified to perform the operations of identifying and discarding overlapping pixels as suggested by the Examiner” (App. Br. 14), Appellants appear to view the combination in a different perspective than that of the Examiner. The issue here is not whether one of ordinarily skill in the art would have bodily incorporated the entire system of Nally to perform 5 Appeal 2016-004365 Application 13/745,705 the operations of Biermann and Morris. Instead, the issue here is whether the ordinarily skilled artisan, upon reading Nally’s teaching and suggestion of a timing controller for controlling clipping/discarding (FF 3), would have found it obvious to apply a timing controller to the process of discarding of overlapping pixel data in Biermann and Morris (FF 1—2). As the Examiner points out, “[w]hat is relevant is that Nally teaches a way by which a timing controller can be used to select portions of image data that are to be kept and used in forming an image in a display panel and portions which are not used and therefore discarded” (Ans. 10). Here, we agree with the Examiner’s finding that “Biermann and Morris teach using overlapping portions between frame buffer sections in order to appropriately process edge pixels” wherein “these overlapping portions are not for display and are discarded in Biermann and Morris” {id.; FF 1—2). Thus, we find no error with the Examiner’s conclusion that “one of ordinary skill would have found obvious performing such discarding using timing controllers as taught by Nally” (Ans. 11; FF 3). The Supreme Court guides that the conclusion of obviousness can be based on the background knowledge possessed by a person having ordinary skill in the art. KSR Inti Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007). The skilled artisan is “[a] person of ordinary creativity, not an automaton.” Id. at 421. We agree with the Examiner that it would have been well within the skill of one skilled in the art to combine Biermann and Morris with Nally. That is, we agree Appellants’ invention is simply a modification of familiar prior art teachings (as taught or suggested by the cited references) that would have realized a predictable result. See id. 6 Appeal 2016-004365 Application 13/745,705 Further, although Appellants contend “Nally is explicitly clear that even implementing simple software operations, such as a software implemented clipping window, utilizing the timing controller chips is extremely difficult to achieve” (App. Br. 14), we agree with the Examiner that “Nally is not stating that it is problematic to clip image data in a timing controller” (Ans. 7). Instead, as the Examiner finds, “Nally is stating . . . that it is difficult to route to each timing controller in a cascaded timing controller solution the appropriate clipping windows” (id.), whereby Nally “is describing this difficulty in the art” and “provides the solution for this ‘difficulty’ in the prior art” (id. at 8). We agree with the Examiner that Nally does not preclude providing a timing controller to clip/discard data. We note that Appellants introduce new arguments in the Reply Brief (Reply Br. 5—11). However, it is inappropriate for Appellants to discuss for the first time in a Reply Brief matters that could have been raised in the Appeal Brief. Because Appellants advance new arguments in the Reply Brief without showing good cause, Appellants have waived such arguments. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.41(b)(2). Accordingly, Appellants have not shown the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1 and independent claims 21 and 22 falling therewith, and claims 1—3, 12, 13, and 16 depending from claim 1 (App. Br. 15) over Biermann, Morris and Nally. As for claims 10, 14, 15, 17, and 23, Appellants merely contend each of Podlozhnyuk, Stanich, and Yan “does not cure the deficiencies of Biermann, Morris, and Nally with respect to the limitations of each of the independent claims” (App. Br. 15—16). As discussed above, we find no deficiencies with respect to the Examiner’s reliance on Biermann, Morris, 7 Appeal 2016-004365 Application 13/745,705 and Nally. Accordingly, we also affirm the Examiner’s rejections of claims 10 and 17 over Biermann, Morris, and Nally, in further view of Podlozhnyuk; claim 14 over Biermann, Morris, and Nally, in further view of Stanich; and claims 15 and 23 over Biermann, Morris, and Nally, in further view of Yan. V. CONCLUSION AND DECISION We affirm the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1—3, 10, 12—17, and 21-23 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a). No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l)(iv). AFFIRMED 8 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation