Ex Parte Silberstein et al

Patent Trial and Appeal BoardMay 15, 2018

14079379 (P.T.A.B. May. 15, 2018)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 14/079,379 11/13/2013 86421 7590 05/17/2018 Cisco Systems, Inc. - Patent Team (PatCapGroup Customer Number) SJC 10/5 170 W. Tasman Drive San Jose, CA 95134-1706 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Rebecca Lynn Braynard Silberstein 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 ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. PARC-20130025-US-NP 7867 EXAMINER VO,CECILEH ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2153 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 05/17/2018 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): peggsu@cisco.com paralegal @cisco.com khallock@cisco.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte REBECCA LYNN BRA YNARD SILBERSTEIN, MICHAEL F. PLASS, and ROGER C. MEIKE Appeal2017-007642 Application 14/079,379 1 Technology Center 2100 Before ROBERT E. NAPPI, JOHN P. PINKERTON, and NORMAN H. BEAMER, Administrative Patent Judges. BEAMER, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 134(a) from the Examiner's final rejection of claims 1-25. We have jurisdiction over the pending rejected claims under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 6(b ). We reverse. 1 Appellants identify Palo Alto Research Center Incorporated as the real party in interest. (App. Br. 5.) Appeal2017-007642 Application 14/079,379 THE INVENTION Appellants' disclosed and claimed invention is directed to processing a data stream to assist other devices to pre-fetch elements of the data stream, out-of-sequence, for uninterrupted playback. (Abstract.) Independent claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the subject matter on appeal: 1. A computer-implemented method comprising: segmenting, by a computer, digital content into a sequence of content objects; determining a target content object of the sequence of content objects, wherein the target content object is to be processed out-of-sequence; determining a source content object of the sequence of content objects, wherein the target content object is to be processed after the source content object; inserting a reference into the source content object, wherein the reference indicates that the target content object is to be processed following the source content object, wherein the reference is distinct from a name for the source content object; and storing the sequence of content objects, wherein the sequence includes the reference inserted into the source content object. REJECTIONS The Examiner rejected claims 1--4, 7, 8, 14--1 7, 2 0, and 21 under 3 5 U.S.C. Â§ I03(a) as being unpatentable over Mosek et al. (US 2007 /0276989 Al, pub. Nov. 29, 2007) (hereinafter "Mosek"), Gargi et al. (US 7,747,625 B2, issued June 29, 2010) (hereinafter "Gargi"), and Lango et al. (US 7,376,790 B2, issued May 20, 2008) (hereinafter "Lango"). (Final Act. 4-- 9.) 2 Appeal2017-007642 Application 14/079,379 The Examiner rejected claims 5, 6, 9, 18, 19, and 22 under 35 U.S.C. Â§ I03(a) as being unpatentable over Mosek, Gargi, Lango, and Shteyn (US 7,529,806 Bl, issued May 5, 2009) (hereinafter "Shteyn")). (Final Act. 9- 11.) The Examiner rejected claims 10-13 and 23-25 under 35 U.S.C. Â§ I03(a) as being unpatentable over Shteyn, Gargi, and Lango. (Final Act. 11-15.) ISSUE ON APPEAL Appellants' arguments in the Appeal Brief present the following dispositive issue: 2 Whether the Examiner erred in finding the combination of Mosek, Gargi, and Lango teaches or suggests the limitations in independent claims 1 and 14, and whether the Examiner erred in finding the combination of Shteyn, Gargi, and Lango teaches or suggests the limitations in independent claims 10 and 23. (App. Br. 19-38.) ANALYSIS For the limitation of independent claims 1 and 14, "inserting a reference into the source content object, wherein the reference indicates that the target content object is to be processed following the source content 2 Rather than reiterate the arguments of Appellants and the positions of the Examiner, we refer to the Appeal Brief (filed Oct. 28, 2016) (herein, "App. Br."); the Reply Brief (filed Apr. 24, 2017) (herein, "Reply Br."); the Final Office Action (mailed May 31, 2016) (herein, "Final Act."); and the Examiner's Answer (mailed Feb. 22, 2017) (herein, "Ans.") for the respective details. 3 Appeal2017-007642 Application 14/079,379 object," the Examiner relies on the disclosure in Lango of an "object number" included in an "object name stream" associated with media storage objects. (Final Act. 5---6; Lango Fig. 4, col. 13, 11. 48-53.) However, as Appellants argue, "Lango merely discloses that an 'object is assigned an object number based on the position of the portion of the media data stored by the object within the logical data stream."' (App. Br. 27, quoting Lango col. 11, 11. 55-57.) Thus, the object number of Lango references the object that corresponds to the object name stream that contains the object number, and provides no indication that a separate "target content object" is to be processed following the object corresponding to the object number, as required by the claims. The Examiner relies on the same object number of Lango for the claim 10 and 23 limitation, "determining that the received content object includes a reference to a data item from a target content object." (Final Act. 13.) However, as Appellants argue, and as discussed above, the object numbers of Lango are not used to determine target content objects. (App. Br. 31-32.) Accordingly, we are constrained by the record to find the Examiner errs in rejecting independent claims 1, 10, 14, and 23. CONCLUSION For the reasons stated above, we do not sustain the rejections of independent claims 1 and 14 as obvious over Mosek, Gargi, and Lango, and of independent claims 10 and 23 as obvious over Shteyn, Gargi, and Lango. We also do not sustain the obviousness rejections of claims 2--4, 7, 8, 15-17, 20, and21 overMosek, Gargi, and Lango, of claims 5, 6, 9, 18, 19, 4 Appeal2017-007642 Application 14/079,379 and 22 over Mosek, Gargi, Lango, and Shteyn, and of claims 11-13, 24, and 25 over Shteyn, Gargi, and Lango, which claims depend from claims 1, 10, 14, or 23. DECISION We reverse the Examiner's rejections of claims 1-25. REVERSED 5