Ex Parte Venetianer et al

Patent Trial and Appeal BoardAug 17, 2017

11167218 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 17, 2017)

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. 11/167,218 06/28/2005 Peter L. Venetianer OV-104 7700 74712 7590 08/2] Muir Patent Law, PLLC P.O. Box 1213 9913 Georgetown Pike, Suite 200 Great Falls, VA 22066 EXAMINER VO, TUNG T ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2486 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 08/21/2017 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): eofficeaction @ appcoll.com pto@muirpatentlaw.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte PETER L. VENETIANER, ALAN J. LIPTON, ANDREW J. CHOSAK, MATTHEW F. FRAZIER, NIELS HAERING, GARY W. MYERS, WEIHONG YIN, ZHONG ZHANG, and ROBERT CUTTING Appeal 2015-005661 Application 11/167,218 Technology Center 2400 Before KRISTEN L. DROESCH, JUSTIN BUSCH, and LINZY T. McCARTNEY, Administrative Patent Judges. BUSCH, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL This is a decision on appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the rejection of claims 25—59. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We reverse. Appeal 2015-005661 Application 11/167,218 CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER Claims 26 and 43 are independent claims. The claims relate generally to video surveillance, including an event detection system and an application programming interface (API). Spec. 79-81, 108, 116, 123. The API provides access to rule language and primitives, allowing users to create new rules for the event detection system. Id. Claim 26 is reproduced below: 26. A method comprising: first, providing a video processing apparatus comprising: an event detection system, including an input to receive input video information, and an event detection device including hardware, the event detection device configured to analyze the input video information and to detect an event based on one or more rules applied to the analyzed video information; and an application programming interface framework coupled to the event detection device to permit a separately generated program to interact with the event detection device to define the one or more rules for the event detection device; and then, separately providing a user interface configured to permit access by a user to rule language or primitive definitions to create new rules for the event detection device, and configured to provide to the event detection device via the application programming interface the new rules as the one or more rules, wherein the user interface is configured to provide new rules that do not previously exist within the event detection system and thereby provide new functionality to the event detection system. 2 Appeal 2015-005661 Application 11/167,218 REJECTIONS Claims 26 and 43 stand rejected under 35U.S.C. § 112 | l1 for insufficient written description support of what is claimed. Final Act. 2. Claims 26, 33—38, 43, and 52—59 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(e) as anticipated by Bolle (US 2003/0231769 Al; Dec. 18, 2003). Final Act. 3—5. Claims 26—59 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(e) as anticipated by Buehler (US 2004/0130620 Al; July 8, 2004). Final Act. 5—9. OPINION Appellants argue the Specification supports independent claims 26 and 43 and that neither Bolle nor Buehler discloses the recited API framework. App. Br. 16—19, 21—23, 25—26. We address each of these contentions below. Appellants also contend certain limitations of various dependent claims are not addressed in the rejection of the claims. Although the Examiner provided further explanation for at least the majority of the identified deficiencies, we need not address those additional arguments because we agree with Appellants that neither Bolle nor Buehler discloses an API framework, as recited in independent claims 26 and 43. 1 The Examiner states the rejection as under “35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which . . . the applicant regards as the invention.” Final Act. 2. However, the Examiner then states “[t]he specification does not clearly disclose” certain recited limitations. Id. In the Answer, the Examiner continues to find the deficiencies are with respect to support in the Specification for what is claimed. Ans. 8. Appellants recognized the inconsistency and addressed the substance of the rejection. Accordingly, the Examiner’s misstatement of the paragraph of Section 112 under which claims 26 and 43 stand rejected is harmless error. 3 Appeal 2015-005661 Application 11/167,218 Rejection Under 35 U.S.C. $ 11211 The Examiner rejects independent claims 26 and 43 under 35 U.S.C. § 112 | 1 because: The specification does not clearly disclose “then, separately providing a user interface configured to permit access by a user to rule language or primitive definitions to create new rules for the event detection device, and configured to provide to the event detection device via the application programming interface the new rules as the one or more rules, wherein the user interface is configured to provide new rules that do not previously exist within the event detection system and thereby provide new functionality to the event detection system.” Final Act. 2 (emphasis omitted). In particular, the Examiner finds the Specification does not disclose “new rules that do not previously exist within the event detection system” because “the detection event system has pre programed or programmed rules before, and the ‘new rules’ are generated from the pre-programed or programmable rules ... in combination with user inputs (user queries).” Ans. 8. Thus, the Examiner determines that even “the ‘new types of video []tripwires’ or ‘new types of area of interest’ are the combination of the pre-existing rules according to the new query or rule from the user inputs.” Id. Appellants point to Figures 22 and 26—28 and paragraphs 84, 108— 125, 167 of the Specification for support of the identified limitation. App. Br. 25—26; Reply Br. 17—20. More specifically and with respect to the particular portion identified by the Examiner as not sufficiently disclosed in Appellants’ Specification, Appellants reference paragraph 121. App. Br. 26; Reply Br. 18—19. Paragraph 121 of Appellants’ Specification discloses a software development kit providing users access to “underlying rule language and/or primitive definitions,” which allow users “to create his/her 4 Appeal 2015-005661 Application 11/167,218 own rule elements,” such as “new types of video tripwires ... or new types of areas of interest.” Spec. 1121. We disagree with the Examiner that this particular disclosure is insufficient to support the limitations recited in claims 26 and 43. Although the Specification indicates that the “underlying rule language and/or primitive definitions” may already be a part of the event detection system, the newly created elements disclosed as being built from the rule language and primitive definitions sufficiently disclose allowing “access by a user to rule language or primitive definitions to create new rules for the event detection device,” as recited in claim 26 and similarly recited in claim 43. The elements that a user creates from the underlying rule language and/or primitive definitions constitute “new rules” that did not previously exist in the event detection system, otherwise they would not need to be created. Anticipation Rejections The Examiner rejects independent claims 26 and 43 as anticipated by Bolle and, separately, as anticipated by Buehler. Final Act. 3—4, 6, 9. The Examiner identifies Bolle’s authentication module and Buehler’s computer “programmed to provide image analysis” as disclosing the recited API framework. Final Act. 4, 6. With respect to the rejection based on Bolle, the Examiner construes the API framework as “any device to receive commands from the user,” and states Bolle discloses an API framework because Bolle’s authentication module “receives commands or queries from the user to perform the actions as object identification.” Ans. 4. With respect to the rejection based on Buehler, the Examiner does not explicitly construe API framework, but states that “Buehler teaches a computer [that] is considered as an application programming interface framework to allow 5 Appeal 2015-005661 Application 11/167,218 users to input control signals for detecting video objects.'1'’ Ans. 5 (emphasis added). Appellants argue that neither Bolle’s authentication module nor Buehler’s computer is the same as Appellants’ API framework recited in claims 26 and 43. App. Br. 17—19, 21—23. In response to the Examiner’s more explicit statements regarding the broad construction applied to the recited API framework, Appellants contend an ordinarily skilled artisan would have known the meaning of API, and no reasonable definition of API would be broad enough to encompass an entire computer or simply “any device to receive commands from a user.” Reply Br. 7—8 (citing various online encyclopedias describing APIs). We agree with Appellants that the Examiner’s construction is unreasonably broad. The Microsoft Computer Dictionary defines an application programming interface as “[a] set of routines used by an application program to direct the performance of procedures by the computer’s operating system.” Microsoft Computer Dictionary 40 (5th ed. 2002). Appellants’ usage in their Specification regarding a software development kit interfacing with the API framework to provide access to “underlying rule language and/or primitive definitions” to configure the event detection system is consistent with such a definition. See Spec. 11108, 116, Fig. 27. Because we determine the Examiner’s construction is unreasonably broad, we further agree with Appellants that the Examiner has not demonstrated sufficiently that either Bolle or Buehler teaches an API framework, as recited in claims 26 and 43. Therefore, on this record, we must reverse the Examiner’s rejection of claims 26 and 43, as well as claims 6 Appeal 2015-005661 Application 11/167,218 27-42 and 44—59, which ultimately depend from claims 26 and 43 respectively. Summary On this record, we are persuaded the Examiner erred in rejecting claims 26 and 43 under 35U.S.C. § 112 ]f 1 for failing to have written description support of the subject matter recited in claims 26 and 43, claims 26, 33—38, 43, and 52—59 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(e) as anticipated by Bolle, and claims 26—59 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(e) as anticipated by Buehler. DECISION For the reasons discussed above, we reverse the Examiner’s decision to reject claims 26—59. REVERSED 7