Ex Parte Chakrabarti et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 21, 2012

11543888 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 21, 2012)

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.
11/543,888 10/06/2006 Anirban Chakrabarti 042144-8 8168
11951 7590 09/21/2012
LeClairRyan
70 Linden Oaks
Suite 210
Rochester, NY 14625
EXAMINER
ALATA, YASSIN
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2427
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/21/2012 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 BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS
AND INTERFERENCES
____________

Ex parte ANIRBAN CHAKRABARTI,
RAVI CHANDRA NALLAN, and
SUBHABRATA BHATTACHARYA
____________

Appeal 2011-006177
Application 11/543,888
Technology Center 2400
____________

Before MARC S. HOFF, CARLA M. KRIVAK, and
THOMAS S. HAHN, Administrative Patent Judges.

HOFF, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

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Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a final rejection of
claims 1-34. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm-in-part.

STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants’ claimed invention concerns transmitting video data over a
grid infrastructure network made up of primary grid enabled mini servers
(GEMS). The claimed method includes identifying a plurality of attributes
from a plurality of GEMS. Video data is partitioned into a plurality of
discrete fragments using a shard creator indicative of the plurality of
attributes in each of the plurality of primary GEMS and the plurality of
discrete fragments are allocated among the plurality of primary GEMS based
on the plurality of attributes. The method includes decoding the plurality of
discrete fragments of video data using a streaming server for transmitting
video data to at least one user (Spec. 3).
Independent claim 1, reproduced below, is representative of the
subject matter on appeal.
1. A method for transmitting a video data over a grid
infrastructure network, comprising:

receiving a request from at least one user for viewing the
video data;

identifying a plurality of attributes that are representative
of at least one of network resources and network performance
from a plurality of primary grid enabled mini servers (GEMS),
wherein the plurality of primary GEMS together form the grid
network;

partitioning tile video data into a plurality of shards
which are to be contained in the GEMS using a shard creator
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indicative of the plurality of attributes in each of the plurality of
primary GEMS, allotting entities into shards for said primary
GEMS based on a difference between sizes of said allotted
entities and individual shard capacities of said GEMS, to
thereby progressively fit as many entities into shards for a GEM
as a shard capacity for each GEM can hold, until all entities are
allotted, or if this does not succeed in allotting all of the
entities, using a weighted average of the GEM capacities and a
size of un-allotted entities to iteratively improve the allocation
of the entities until all entities are allotted;

allocating the plurality of shards among the plurality of
primary GEMS based on the plurality of attributes of each of
the plurality of primary GEMS; and

decoding the plurality of discrete shards of the video data
using a streaming server for transmitting the video data to the at
least one user.

REFERENCE
Sim U.S. Pat. App. Pub. No.: 2002/0133491 A1 Sep. 19, 2002

REJECTION
The Examiner rejected claims 1-34 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) based
upon the teachings of Sim. Ans. 3-13.

ISSUES
With respect to independent claims 1, 16, and 34, Appellants argue
that the Examiner may not consider the name of a node as corresponding to
an attribute “representative of at least one of network resources and network
performance” (App. Br 13). Appellants further argue that there is no
enablement in Sim teaching how to use its various considerations for
determining a block size (App. Br. 12).
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With respect to claim 2, Appellants argue that Sim does not teach the
shard catalog recited in the claim (App. Br. 14).
With respect to claims 3 and 30, Appellants argue that Sim does not
teach that its video partitioning depends on encoding algorithm and
corresponding bit rate (App. Br. 16).
With respect to claims 5-7, 11, 12, 21, 22, 32, and 33, Appellants
argue that Sim does not teach seamless streamed video data transfer to a
proxy (App. Br. 18).
With respect to claims 8 and 9, Appellants argue that Sim does not
disclose a Grid Node Attributes (GNA) catalog adapted to help a scheduler
to decide on a probable plurality of GEMS (App. Br. 19-20).
With respect to claims 25 and 26, Appellants argue inter alia that Sim
does not teach distributing at least one unallotted shard among the plurality
of primary GEMS based on a pre-desired ratio (App. Br. 24-25).
With respect to claim 27, Appellants argue that Sim does not disclose
segregating video data by matching overall size of video data proportional to
the ratio of the capacities of the plurality of primary GEMS (App. Br. 26).
With respect to claim 28, Appellants argue that Sim does not teach
adding a weight factor to the at least one unallotted shard for determining an
effective set that distributes proportionally the plurality of shards among the
plurality of primary GEMS (App. Br. 28).
Appellants’ arguments present us with the following issues:
1. Does Sim’s disclosure of a node name as an attribute correspond to
the claimed attributes “that are representative of at least one of network
resources and network performance?”
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2. Does Sim’s disclosure enable the person skilled in the art to
determine an appropriate block size?
3. Does Sim teach the claimed shard catalog?
4. Does Sim teach that video partitioning depends on encoding
algorithm and corresponding bit rate?
5. Does Sim teach seamless streamed video data transfer to a proxy?
6. Does Sim teach a GNA catalog adapted to help a scheduler to
decide on a probable plurality of GEMS, as claim 8 recites?
7. Does Sim teach distributing at least one unallotted shared among
the plurality of primary GEMS based on a pre-desired ratio?
8. Does Sim teach segregating video data by matching overall size of
video data proportional to the ratio of the capacities of the plurality of
primary GEMS?
9. Does Sim teach adding a weight factor to the at least one unallotted
shard for determining an effective set that distributes proportionally the
plurality of shards among the plurality of primary GEMS?

PRINCIPLES OF LAW
“A rejection for anticipation under section 102 requires that each and
every limitation of the claimed invention be disclosed in a single prior art
reference.” See In re Buszard, 504 F.3d 1364, 1366 (Fed. Cir. 2007)
(quoting In re Paulsen, 30 F.3d 1475, 1478-79 (Fed. Cir. 1994)).

ANALYSIS
CLAIMS 1, 4, 10, 13-20, 23, 24, 29, 31, AND 34
We are not persuaded by Appellants’ arguments that (a) the Examiner
may not read the name of a node as corresponding to an attribute
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“representative of at least one of network resources and network
performance,” and (b) there is no enablement in Sim teaching how to use its
various considerations for determining a block size (App. Br. 12, 13).
We agree with the Examiner’s finding that Sim teaches that each node
has a unique attribute set representing the name of the node (Ans. 15; Sim ¶¶
[0072]-[0075]). We further agree with the Examiner’s finding that
independent claims 1 and 16 do not clarify (i.e., specify) the nature of the
“network resource,” and that the name of a node is an attribute that is
representative of at least one of the network resources and network
performance corresponding to that node (Ans. 15-16). We therefore agree
with the Examiner that Sim teaches the attributes as claimed.
With respect to determining a block size, we agree with the
Examiner’s finding that Sim teaches that several goals come into play in
determining the block size, including maximizing space usage within an
MTU, minimizing congestion at the distribution nodes, and preventing
storage fragmentation (¶ [0139]). We further find that these goals, combined
with educated assumptions about the physical network, network operational
parameters, size of the flash interval, and minimizing network congestion,
motivate Sim to suggest a possible block size of 256 Kbytes (¶ [0141]). Sim
further discloses that changes in these assumptions would cause this block
size to change (id.). We agree with the Examiner that Sim’s disclosure is
sufficiently enabling to support a finding that Sim’s blocks are analogous to
the claimed shards.
Consequently, we agree with the Examiner that Sim teaches all the
limitations of independent claims 1 and 16, as well as those of dependent
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claims not separately argued. We will sustain the Examiner’s rejection of
claims 1, 4, 10, 13-20, 23, 24, 29, 31, and 34.
CLAIM 2
We are not persuaded by Appellants’ argument that Sim fails to teach
the recited shard catalog (App. Br. 14). We agree with the Examiner that
Sim contains extensive disclosure concerning keeping track of the location
of blocks (analogous to the claimed shards). We agree with the Examiner’s
citation of Sim paragraphs [0189]-[0221] (Ans. 20), and the exemplary
paragraph [0202]: “the distribution map indicates where the file is
replicated; and the block index array . . . includes information about the
layout of the block files so that DS knows how to distribute the blocks for
accelerated transport and VFCS 470 knows how to assemble the file in real
time.” We adopt the Examiner’s further examples (Ans. 21) as more
evidence that Sim teaches a shard catalog as claimed.
Accordingly, we find that Sim teaches all the limitations of claim 2.
We will sustain the Examiner’s § 102 rejection.
CLAIMS 3 AND 30
We find error in the Examiner’s finding that Sim teaches wherein
partitioning the video data into the plurality of discrete entities depends on
encoding algorithm and corresponding bit rate (Ans. 22-23). The Examiner
does not support the statement that “bit rate is always associated with the
process of encoding” with any evidence. The Examiner cites Sim on
chunking linear or non-linear files (Ans. 22-23, citing Sim ¶ [0126]), but it is
not understood how this bears on the claim language that partitioning
depends on encoding algorithm and corresponding bit rate.
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We find that Sim fails to teach all the limitations of claims 3 and 30,
and we will not sustain the Examiner’s § 102 rejection.
CLAIMS 5-7, 11, 12, 21, 22, 32, AND 33
We agree with Appellants’ argument that Sim does not teach the
limitation of “seamless streamed video data transfer to a proxy” (emphasis
added) recited in claims 5, 21, and 32 (App. Br. 18). The Examiner has not
identified a teaching in Sim of seamless streamed video transfer to the
Virtual File Control System (VFCS), cited by the Examiner as
corresponding to the claimed proxy (Ans. 6; Sim ¶ [0278]). We agree with
Appellants that Sim teaches only streaming from the VFCS to an end user
(App. Br. 18).
We find that Sim does not teach all the limitations of claims 5-7, 11,
12, 21, 22, 32, and 33. Accordingly, we will not sustain the Examiner’s
§ 102 rejection.
CLAIMS 8 AND 9
We agree with Appellants’ argument that Sim does not teach “a GNA
catalog adapted to help a scheduler to decide on probable plurality of
primary GEMS which would be required in transmitting the video data
requested by the at least one user,” recited in claim 8. The Examiner’s
citation of disclosure in Sim concerning “content pruning” and removal of
“least likely to be used blocks of a file” is not pertinent to this limitation.
We find that Sim does not teach all the limitations of claims 8 and 9.
Accordingly, we will not sustain the Examiner’s § 102 rejection.
CLAIMS 25 AND 26
We are persuaded by Appellants that Sim does not teach “distribute
the at least one unallotted fragment among the plurality of primary GEMS
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based on a pre-desired ratio” (App. Br. 25-26). The Examiner’s position that
“distribution rules, distribution criteria and distribution map can be read as
being a pre-desired ratio” (Ans. 28, citing ¶¶ [0117], [0144], [0152], [0157],
and [0158]) is erroneous. While the cited sections of Sim do teach details of
video distribution, Appellants are correct that Sim does not teach the pre-
desired ratio that is actually claimed.
We find that Sim does not teach all the limitations of claims 25 and
26. Accordingly, we will not sustain the Examiner’s § 102 rejection.
CLAIM 27
We agree with Appellants that Sim does not teach “wherein the video
data is segregated by matching overall size of video data proportional to the
ratio of the capacities of the plurality of primary GEMS” (App. Br. 26). We
find that the Examiner’s citation of Sim ¶ [0130] is inapposite, in that it only
discloses adding more storage as is needed. We do not agree with the
Examiner’s finding that Sim teaches segregating the video data in the
manner claimed.
Because we find that Sim does not teach all the limitations of claim
27, we will not sustain the Examiner’s § 102 rejection.
CLAIM 28
The Examiner finds that Sim teaches “adding a weight factor to the at
least one unallotted fragment for determining an effective set that distributes
proportionally the plurality of shards among the plurality of primary
GEMS.” It is the Examiner’s position that Sim teaches distributing blocks or
segments between nodes, and distributing them efficiently “based on
distribution rules, distribution criteria and distribution map . . . is analogous
to” adding a weight factor as claimed (Ans. 29).
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We agree with Appellants that the Examiner has failed to identify a
teaching of the claimed weight factor in Sim (App. Br. 29). The Examiner’s
citation of Sim paragraph [0158] fails to support the Examiner’s position.
The Examiner also states that “[t]he claim is unclear about the nature
of the weighting facto[r] that is added to the shards and unclear that the
distribution is proportional to what” (Ans. 29), but such a position cannot be
the basis for ignoring the expressed language of the claim.1
We find that the Examiner did not establish that Sim teaches all the
limitations of claim 28. We will not sustain the Examiner’s § 102 rejection.

CONCLUSIONS
1. Sim’s disclosure of a node name as an attribute corresponds to the
claimed attributes “that are representative of at least one of network
resources and network performance.”
2. Sim’s disclosure enables the person skilled in the art to determine
an appropriate block size.
3. Sim teaches the claimed shard catalog.
4. Sim does not teach that video partitioning depends on encoding
algorithm and corresponding bit rate.
5. Sim does not teach seamless streamed video data transfer to a
proxy.
6. Sim does not teach a GNA catalog adapted to help a scheduler to
decide on a probable plurality of GEMS, as claim 8 recites.

1 We note that the Examiner has not rejected the claim under 35 U.S.C.
§ 112, second paragraph.
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7. Sim does not teach distributing at least one unallotted shard among
the plurality of primary GEMS based on a pre-desired ratio.
8. Sim does not teach segregating video data by matching overall size
of video data proportional to the ratio of the capacities of the plurality of
primary GEMS.
9. Sim does not teach adding a weight factor to the at least one
unallotted shard for determining an effective set that distributes
proportionally the plurality of shards among the plurality of primary GEMS.

DECISION
The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1, 2, 4, 10, 13-20, 23, 24,
29, 31, and 34 is affirmed. The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 3, 5-9,
11, 12, 21, 22, 25-28, 30, 32, and 33 is reversed.
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)(2010).

AFFIRMED-IN-PART

Vsh/pgc