2019003837 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 31, 2020)

GENERAL INSTRUMENT CORPORATION

Patent Trials and Appeals BoardDec 31, 2020

2019003837 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 31, 2020)

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. 13/923,261 06/20/2013 Praveen N. Moorthy CS39626 5885 21924 7590 12/31/2020 ARRIS Enterprises LLC Legal Dept - Docketing 101 Tournament Drive HORSHAM, PA 19044 EXAMINER JAHNIGE, CAROLINE H ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2451 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 12/31/2020 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): ARRIS.docketing@commscope.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte PRAVEEN N. MOORTHY and HAIFENG XU Appeal 2019-003837 Application 13/923,261 Technology Center 2400 Before JEREMY J. CURCURI, IRVIN E. BRANCH, and MICHAEL J. ENGLE, Administrative Patent Judges. ENGLE, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellant1 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1 and 3–10, which are all of the claims pending in the application.2 We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We AFFIRM. 1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42(a). Appellant identifies ARRIS Technology, Inc. as the real party in interest. Appeal Br. 3. 2 Claims 11–14 and 16–24 were canceled after the Final Office Action in an amendment dated February 21, 2018. Appeal 2019-003837 Application 13/923,261 2 TECHNOLOGY The application relates to converting or translating Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH) to HTTP Live Streaming (HLS). Spec. ¶ 1. REPRESENTATIVE CLAIM Claim 1 is representative and reproduced below: 1. A method of translating dynamic adaptive streaming over HTTP (DASH) to HTTP live streaming (HLS), the method comprising: receiving a DASH media presentation description (mpd) file from a DASH server; extracting content from the DASH mpd file by parsing content from the DASH mpd file, wherein the content is provided in xml; building a HLS manifest file from the extracted content; and providing the HLS manifest file to an HLS client. REFERENCES The Examiner relies on the following references as prior art: Name Reference Date Biderman US 2012/0311094 A1 Dec. 6, 2012 Cappio US 2012/0124179 A1 May 17, 2012 Lindquist US 2012/0284804 A1 Nov. 8, 2012 Romero A Dynamic Adaptive HTTP Streaming Video Service for Google Android Oct. 6, 2011 Visharam US 2012/0254456 A1 Oct. 4, 2012 Appeal 2019-003837 Application 13/923,261 3 REJECTIONS The Examiner makes the following rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a). Claims Rejected References Final Act. 1, 3–7 Visharam, Lindquist, Romero 5 8, 9 Visharam, Lindquist, Romero, Biderman 12 10 Visharam, Lindquist, Romero, Biderman, Cappio 14 ANALYSIS Claim 1 recites “receiving a DASH media presentation description (mpd) file” and translating that to ultimately provide “a HLS manifest file.” Although Lindquist discloses outputting an HLS file, Appellant argues that “Lindquist is not disclosing conversion of a DASH mpd file, but instead is using a Smooth Streaming file.” Appeal Br. 6. According to Appellant, the Examiner relies on “Romero to show that Smooth Streaming and DASH manifest files are both XML based,” but Appellant contends that “just because two types of software use the same language, such as xml, does not mean that any program written in that language is obvious to write.” Id. at 6–7. Although we agree with Appellant’s broad point that two types of software using XML would not automatically render obvious all programs written in XML, the Examiner’s determinations here are much narrower. In particular, the Examiner finds that Visharam teaches “manifests/playlists and encoded streams in different formats” that can be “transformed into the format required for the requesting agent device.” Ans. 3 (citing Visharam ¶¶ 348, 349, 358, 377). The Examiner further finds that Visharam discloses HLS and DASH as two such available formats. Id. (citing Visharam ¶ 348). Appeal 2019-003837 Application 13/923,261 4 The Examiner relies on Lindquist for teaching the details of “transforming a smooth streaming manifest into an HLS playlist/manifest” and relies on Romero for teaching that a “DASH mpd file is an xml file” that “a client may parse.” Id. at 3–4 (citing Lindquist ¶¶ 102, 103; Romero 15–16). Thus, the Examiner relies on Lindquist and Romero “to provide the details” of transformations already taught or suggested by Visharam. Id. at 4. Appellant fails to sufficiently address Visharam or the Examiner’s reasons for its combination. The Examiner provides reasons for combining the various references that are supported by evidence drawn from the record. See Final Act. 6 (“Doing so provides details on the type of information that would need to be retrieved for the received manifest in order to create a new manifest.”), 7 (“Doing so provides the details of the format of the DASH manifest which would be converted.”). Appellant’s broad argument does not directly address the particulars of the Examiner’s reasoning, and we do not readily see any reversible error. For similar reasons we are not persuaded by Appellant’s argument that Lindquist’s “‘playlist’ is much less complex, and is more typically modified than the complex ‘media file’ of a manifest, as in claim 1.” Appeal Br. 7. Visharam summarizes its invention as a technique “for creating universal adaptive bit rate streams using a generic container format to store audio, video, and supplemental data that allows seamless trans- containerization from one adaptive streaming format to another.” Visharam Abstract (emphasis added). Similarly, the cited portions of Visharam are in a section titled “Universal Media File Formatting.” Visharam ¶ 347 (emphasis added). Thus, Visharam is not limited to playlists and Appeal 2019-003837 Application 13/923,261 5 Appellant’s argument against Lindquist alone fails to sufficiently address the Examiner’s combination with Visharam. Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s rejection of claim 1, and its dependent claims 3–10, which Appellant argues are patentable for similar reasons. See Appeal Br. 8; 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv). OUTCOME The following table summarizes the outcome of each rejection: Claim(s) Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed 1, 3–7 103(a) Visharam, Lindquist, Romero 1, 3–7 8, 9 103(a) Visharam, Lindquist, Romero, Biderman 8, 9 10 103(a) Visharam, Lindquist, Romero, Biderman, Cappio 10 Overall Outcome 1, 3–10 TIME TO RESPOND No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R. § 1.36(a)(1)(iv). AFFIRMED