Ex Parte RUSSELL et al

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Apr 5, 2019

14478633 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Apr. 5, 2019)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
14/478,633 09/05/2014
23117 7590 04/09/2019
NIXON & V ANDERHYE, PC
901 NORTH GLEBE ROAD, 11 TH FLOOR
ARLINGTON, VA 22203
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Jeffrey W. RUSSELL
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.
SJP-6011-3 1360
EXAMINER
DANG, PHILIP
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2488
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
04/09/2019 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):
PTOMAIL@nixonvan.com
pair_nixon@firsttofile.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED ST ATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
ExparteJEFFREYW. RUSSELL and GREGORY A. VOSE 1
Appeal2018-005760
Application 14/478,633
Technology Center 2400
Before ROBERT E. NAPPI, ERIC S. FRAHM, and MICHAEL T. CYGAN,
Administrative Patent Judges.
NAPPI, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
This is a decision on appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the
Examiner's Final Rejection of claims 1 through 8 and 11 through 22, which
constitute all the claims pending in this application. Claims 9 and 10 have
been cancelled. We have jurisdiction under35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.
1 According to Appellant, the real party in interest is Vose Technical
Systems Inc. App. Br. 3.
Appeal 2018-005760
Application 14/478,633
INVENTION
The invention is directed to a common surveillance system which
allows multiple users to share and communicate surveillance data with each
other as well as with one or more agencies. Abstract.
Claim 1 is illustrative of the invention and is reproduced below.
A system for generating a common operating platform of
a surveillance system for display by remote client devices, the
system comprising:
a processing system having at least processing circuitry,
the processing system configured to:
generate, for display on a display device, a client-specific
status board having a customized surveillance platform
including multiple display views from multiple surveillance
sources, each of the multiple display views being associated
with a time and place,
generate, for display on the display device, the common
operating platform comprising a map having multiple display
views from multiple surveillance sources that are provided by
the client devices, and
communicate, in response to an operation input, one or
more display views in real-time between the client-specific
status board and the common operating platform using a
communications bridge that enables bidirectional
communication between the status board and the common
operating platform.
App. Br. 21 (Claims Appendix).
2
Appeal 2018-005760
Application 14/478,633
REJECTIONS AT ISSUE2
The Examiner has rejected claims 1 through 4, 7, 14 through 1 7 and
20 through 22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Lipton
(US 8,564,661 B2, issued October 22, 2013) and Fulgham (US 8,386,597
B2, issued February 26, 2013). Final Act. 3-22.
The Examiner has rejected claims 5, 8, and 18 under35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Lipton, Fulgham and Mate (US
2013/0176438 Al, published July 11, 2013). Final Act. 22-26.
The Examiner has rejected claims 6 and 19 under35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
as being unpatentable over Lipton, Fulgham and Kundu (US 2013/0004090
Al, published January 3, 2013). Final Act. 26-29.
The Examiner has rejected claims 11 through 13 under 3 5 U.S. C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Lipton, Gopalakrishnan (US 7,873,911
B2, issued January 18, 2011) and Barker (US 2012/0313781 Al, published
December 13, 2012). Final Act. 29-35.
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed Appellants' arguments in the Briefs, the
Examiner's rejection, and the Examiner's response to Appellants'
arguments. Appellants' arguments have persuaded us of error in the
Examiner's obviousness rejections.
2 Throughout this Decision, we refer to the Appeal Brief ("App. Br.") filed
January 22, 2018, the Reply Brief ("Reply Br.") filed May 16, 2018, the
Final Office Action ("Final Act.") mailed February 13, 2017, and the
Examiner's Answer ("Ans.")mailed March 16, 2018.
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Appeal 2018-005760
Application 14/478,633
With respect to independent claims 1 and 14, Appellants argue that
the combination of Lipton and Fulgham does not teach a client specific
status board, displaying multiple views from multiple sources and a common
operating platform having a map showing images related to the multiple
views and communicating views between the status board and the common
operating platform using a bridge that enables bidirectional communication.
App. Br. 13-16; Reply Br. 2-7.
The Examiner in the Final Rejection of independent claims 1 and 14,
relies upon Lipton to disclose the claimed "generate, for display on a display
device, a client-specific status board," "generate, for display on the display
device, the common operating platform" and communicating display views
between the two displays using a bidirectional communication bridge. Final
Act. 3---6, 12-14. Specifically, the Examiner cites to the discussion of a user
interface in Lipton, column 17 line 12 as meeting the claimed client status
board, and the discussion of a display having a map as the common
operating platform, citing Lipton column 27, lines 32-35. Final Act. 4--5,
14. In the Answer the Examiner identifies that Lipton teaches that video
surveillance data is communicated between a user def med status board ( the
alert console, item 2211 in Fig. 22) and the common operating platform (a
computer system) via a common bridge (the Internet). Answer 40-44.
(citing various columns of Lipton).
The Examiner fmds bidirectional communication to be enabled by a
network (e.g., the Internet or other network or direct connection between I/0
[input/output] devices) between the status board ( user interface having
human-readable graphical displays) and the common operating platform ( a
video surveillance system, i.e., a computer system). Final Act. 5---6.
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Appeal 2018-005760
Application 14/478,633
The Examiner rejects independent claim 11 under a different
combination of references. However, the Examiner relies upon the same
portions in Lipton, discussed above with respect to claim 1, to teach the
disputed limitations directed to a client specific status board, a common
operating platform and the bidirectional communication between the two.
Final Act. 29-31.
We have reviewed the teachings of Lipton cited by the Examiner and
disagree with the Examiner's fmdings that they teach or make obvious the
disputed limitations of independent claims 1, 11 and 14. Claim 1 recites
generating for display, a client specific status board and a common operating
platform comprising a map. Claim 1 recites that each of these displays
( status board and common operating platform) have views from surveillance
sources and that views are communicated between the status board and the
common operating platform bi-directionally via a bridge. Independent
claims 11 and 14 recite similar limitations.
The Examiner has not clearly identified, nor is it readily apparent to
us where Lipton teaches bi-directional communication between two separate
displays that meet the claimed status board and the common operating
platform. The Examiner fmds Lipton to teach the status board to
communicate through the network to another computer system. Ans. 40-43.
The Examiner further fmds Lipton to teach bidirectional communication of
devices on the network. Final Act. 6. However, the Examiner has not
identified any teaching that Lipton's system is configured to communicate
one or more display views between the status board and any particular
display corresponding to the common operating platform. Lipton does teach
a display including a map in column 27, lines 32-35, as identified by the
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Appeal 2018-005760
Application 14/478,633
Examiner, but there is no discussion of a view being bi-directionally
communicated between an interface of such display and another display.
Accordingly, we do not sustain the Examiner's rejection of independent
claims 1, 11, and 14.
The Examiner's rejections of dependent claims 2 through 8, 12, 13
and 15 through 22 similarly rely upon Lipton to teach the disputed
limitations of claims 1, 11, and 14 and the Examiner has not shown that the
additional references relied upon teaches the disputed limitations.
Accordingly, we do not sustain the Examiner's rejections of these claims for
the same reasons as claims 1, 11, and 14.
DECISION
We reverse the decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1 through 8
and 11 through22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).
REVERSED
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