QUALCOMM IncorporatedDownload PDFPatent Trials and Appeals BoardNov 30, 20202019002890 (P.T.A.B. Nov. 30, 2020) 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. 14/819,306 08/05/2015 Natan Haim Jacobson 1414-728US01/146531 3680 15150 7590 11/30/2020 Shumaker & Sieffert, P. A. 1625 Radio Drive, Suite 100 Woodbury, MN 55125 EXAMINER HUANG, FRANK F ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2485 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 11/30/2020 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): ocpat_uspto@qualcomm.com pairdocketing@ssiplaw.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte NATAN HAIM JACOBSON, VIJAYARAGHAVAN THIRUMALAI, RAJAN LAXMAN JOSHI, and MIN DAI Appeal 2019-002890 Application 14/819,306 Technology Center 2400 Before JAMES R. HUGHES, JOYCE CRAIG, and MATTHEW J. McNEILL, Administrative Patent Judges. HUGHES, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF THE CASE Claims 1–36 are pending, stand rejected, are appealed by Appellant, and are the subject of our decision under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a).1 See Final Act. 1; Appeal Br. 1.2 We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). 1 We use the word Appellant to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42(a). Appellant identifies the real party in interest as QUALCOMM Incorporated. See Appeal Br. 3. 2 We refer to Appellant’s Specification (“Spec.”), filed Aug. 5, 2015 (claiming benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/035,363, filed Aug. 8, 2014, and U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/146,935, filed Apr. 13, 2015); Appeal Brief (“Appeal Br.”), filed Oct. 9, 2018; and Reply Brief Appeal 2019-002890 Application 14/819,306 2 We REVERSE. CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER The invention, according to Appellant, generally relates “to the field of video coding and compression, and particularly to video compression for transmission over display links.” Spec. ¶ 2. The invention codes a slice of video data by using a spatial prediction mode for the first line of the slice and using a different coding mode for the other lines of the slice. See id. ¶¶ 7–10. “[T]here are challenges with compressing content in the first line of a slice, relative to non-first lines,” “because non-first lines can exploit highly correlated predictors in the reconstructed lines above the non-first lines of the slice, whereas first lines cannot.” Id. ¶ 74. Accordingly, the spatial prediction mode of the invention, in one example, predicts a current pixel X0 of a current block of the first line of a slice based on the second-left neighbor pixel X-2 of the previous block of the first line. Id. ¶ 78. This method of prediction is called “interleaved prediction.” Id. Appellant’s claims recite a method, a device, an apparatus with means, and a non- transitory computer readable storage medium for coding video data. Claim 1 (directed to a method), 10 (directed to a device), 19 (directed to an apparatus with means), and 26 (directed to a non-transitory computer readable storage medium) are independent. Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter: 1. A method for coding video data via a plurality of coding modes in display link video compression, comprising: (“Reply Br.”), filed Feb. 26, 2019. We also refer to the Examiner’s Final Office Action (“Final Act.”), dated Dec. 18, 2017; and Answer (“Ans.”), dated Jan. 4, 2019. Appeal 2019-002890 Application 14/819,306 3 coding a slice of the video data, the slice comprising a plurality of pixels organized into a plurality of blocks, the blocks being arranged in a first line and a plurality of lines other than the first line, the coding of the slice comprising: coding a current pixel of the first line in a spatial prediction mode using a previous pixel of the first line as a predictor, wherein the current pixel of the first line and the previous pixel of the first line are separated by at least one intervening pixel and the number of intervening pixels between the current pixel and the previous pixel is fixed; and coding another pixel of one of the lines other than the first line in a coding mode other than the spatial prediction mode. Appeal Br. 10 (Claims App.). REFERENCES The prior art relied upon by the Examiner is: Name Reference Date Takeda et al. (“Takeda”) US 2007/0071094 A1 Mar. 29, 2007 MacInnis et al. (“MacInnis”) US 2014/0092960 A1 Apr. 3, 2014 REJECTION3 The Examiner rejects claims 1–36 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Takeda and MacInnis. See Final Act. 3–19. 3 The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (“AIA”), Pub. L. No. 112–29, 125 Stat. 284 (2011), amended 35 U.S.C. § 103. Because the present application has an earliest effective filing date (Aug. 8, 2014) after the AIA’s effective date (March 16, 2013), this decision refers to 35 U.S.C. § 103. Appeal 2019-002890 Application 14/819,306 4 ANALYSIS The Examiner rejects independent claim 1 (as well as independent claims 10, 19, and 26, and dependent claims 2–9, 11–18, 20–25, and 27–36) as obvious over Takeda and MacInnis. See Final Act.3–19; Ans. 4–16. In particular, the Examiner relies on MacInnis for teaching a spatial prediction mode for the first line of a slice where “the number of intervening pixels between the current pixel and the previous pixel is fixed.”4 Ans. 17–18; Appeal Br. 10 (Claims App.) (claim 1). Appellant contends that Takeda and MacInnis do not teach a fixed number of intervening pixels. See Appeal Br. 7–8; Reply Br. 2–3. Specifically, Appellant contends that, contrary to the Examiner’s finding, MacInnis “expressly discloses a variable (non-fixed) spacing between a current sample and a predictor.” Appeal Br. 8. We agree with Appellant that the Examiner-cited portions of MacInnis (in combination with Takeda) do not teach or suggest “the number of intervening pixels between the current pixel and the previous pixel is fixed.” Appeal Br. 10 (Claims App.) (claim 1). MacInnis “relates to compression and decompression techniques for image transmission and display” (MacInnis ¶ 2) and describes a prediction engine that “may adaptively predict pixel components from neighboring 4 In the Final Rejection, the Examiner initially appears to find that Takeda (which the Examiner refers to as “D1”) teaches a fixed number of intervening pixels, by mentioning this feature in the section of the Final Rejection discussing Takeda. See Final Act. 4–6. But the Examiner’s citation to “para. 77” in this section references disclosure actually found in MacInnis (which the Examiner refers to as “D2”). See Final Act. 6; MacInnis ¶ 77. In the Answer, the Examiner clearly relies on MacInnis for teaching a fixed number of intervening pixels. See Ans. 6–7. Appeal 2019-002890 Application 14/819,306 5 reconstructed pixels of the line above, and the left pixels of the same line of the pixel to be predicted” (id. ¶ 54). In an embodiment, MacInnis describes predicting “the current sample where the predictor is a sample to the left of the current sample” and “[t]he relative position of the reference sample may be between (-3) and (-10).” Id. ¶ 151. MacInnis further describes that “[t]he relative position is a vector . . . referred to as the block prediction vector.” Id. The Examiner relies on MacInnis’s block prediction vector for teaching the claimed fixed number of intervening pixels. See Ans. 17. Specifically, the Examiner finds that “a vector is known to have a fixed length, i.e. a fixed number of intervening pixels,” and “[o]nce the vector is find [sic] it represent[s] a fixed length between the current pixel and the previous pixel.” Id. The Examiner further cites to a Wikipedia article for “motion vector” to support the idea that “a fixed length is well known as prediction vector, or called motion vector, or intra prediction position vector.” Id. at 18. We disagree with the Examiner’s findings. MacInnis describes a search that “compares a set of 9 consecutive samples with reference samples using various potential vectors with values ranging from -3 to -10,” and a selection of “[t]he vector with the lowest [sum of absolute differences] value.” MacInnis ¶ 152. In other words, the block prediction vector is variable throughout MacInnis’s coding process, because it depends on the best vector for a given set of samples. The Examiner’s assertion that a block prediction vector is fixed after it is selected (see Ans. 17) relies on an unreasonably broad interpretation of the claim term “fixed.” Under this interpretation, the number of pixels between the current pixel and previous Appeal 2019-002890 Application 14/819,306 6 pixel used as a predictor in the claimed spatial prediction mode could vary for each current pixel being coded, thus rendering meaningless the term “fixed.” We also see no support for the Examiner’s finding that a block prediction vector is known to be of fixed length (see Ans. 18) in the cited Wikipedia article for “motion vector.” That article does not appear to relate to predicting pixels in the same line, let alone describe a vector of fixed length. Although not specifically cited by the Examiner, we note that MacInnis describes the following: “A vector, once selected, applies to each group of 3 samples. Therefore the block search is performed every 3 samples.” MacInnis ¶ 154. The Examiner, however, does not present findings that this disclosure of using the same block prediction vector for three samples meets the limitation of a fixed number of intervening pixels. Even if it did, however, MacInnis also describes that “[t]he search to find the best vector may be performed on the previous line of samples, rather than the line that is currently being coded” and “[t]he current samples and the reference samples being compared are in the same scan line, e.g., the line above the line of the sample to be coded.” Id. ¶ 152. The Examiner does not explain how MacInnis’s selection of a block prediction vector based on samples from a previous line renders obvious the fixed number of intervening pixels recited in claim 1, where the fixed number relates to a spatial prediction mode for a first line (same line) of a slice of video data. Consequently, we are constrained by the record before us to find that the Examiner erred in finding that the combination of Takeda and MacInnis renders obvious Appellant’s claim 1. Independent claims 10, 19, and 26 Appeal 2019-002890 Application 14/819,306 7 include limitations of commensurate scope. Claims 2–9, 11–18, 20–25, and 27–36 depend from and stand with claims 1, 10, 19, and 26. Accordingly, we do not sustain the Examiner’s obviousness rejection of claims 1–36 over Takeda and MacInnis. CONCLUSION Appellant has shown that the Examiner erred in rejecting claims 1–36 under 35 U.S.C. § 103. We, therefore, do not sustain the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1–36. DECISION SUMMARY In summary: Claims Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed 1–36 103 Takeda, MacInnis 1–36 REVERSED Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation