Ex Parte Eichenberger et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Apr 25, 2013

10919005 (P.T.A.B. Apr. 25, 2013)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte ALEXANDRE E. EICHENBERGER, KAI-TING AMY WANG,
AND PENG WU

Appeal 2010-010821
Application 10/919,005
Technology Center 2100
____________

Before THU A. DANG, JAMES R. HUGHES, and
GREGORY J. GONSALVES, Administrative Patent Judges.

HUGHES, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

STATEMENT OF THE CASE
This is an appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s final
rejection of claims 1-5, 7, and 21-33, which are all the claims remaining in
the application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.
Appeal 2010-010821
Application 10/919,005

2
Appellants’ Invention
Appellants’ invention relates in general to a system and method for
vectorizing loop code for execution on Single Instruction Multiple Datapath
(SIMD) architectures that impose strict alignment constraints on the data.
(Spec. 2, 11. 3-6.)1
Representative Claim
Independent claim 1, reproduced below with the key disputed
limitations emphasized, further illustrates the invention:
1. A computer-implemented method comprising:
identifying a loop containing statements that operate over
an array of values, wherein each statement includes one or more
operations and at least one of the statements includes a plurality
of the operations;
transforming the operations into a set of virtual vector
operations;
individually selecting an expansion for each of the virtual
vector operations, wherein the selection is based upon a cost
model and the expansion associated with each of the virtual
vector operations materializes as one or more distinct
expansions chosen from a plurality of possible expansions; and
expanding each of the virtual vector operations into a
native code implementation in accordance with each of the
virtual vector operations’ individually selected expansion,
wherein at least one of the virtual vector operations is
expanded into a plurality of distinctly different expansions.

1 We refer to Appellants’ Specification (“Spec.”), Reply Brief (“Reply Br.”)
filed May 17, 2010 and Appeal Brief (“App. Br.”) filed Dec. 4, 2009. We
also refer to the Examiner’s Answer (“Ans.”) mailed Mar. 18, 2010.
Appeal 2010-010821
Application 10/919,005

3
Rejections on Appeal
1. The Examiner rejects claims 1-4, 7, 21-25, 27-31, and 33 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Suzuki (U.S. Patent App.
Pub. No. 2004/0003381 A1, published Jan. 1, 2004), Scarborough
(Scarborough and Kolsky, A Vectorizing Fortran Compiler, 30(2) IBM J.
Research Development, 163-171, March 1986), and Schouten (Schouten et.
al., Inside the Intel Compiler, 2003(106) Linx Journal, February 2003).
2. The Examiner rejects claims 5, 26, and 32 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Suzuki, Scarborough, Schouten, and
Levine (Levin et al., A Comparative Study of Automatic Vectorizing
Compilers, 17(10-11) Parallel Computing, 1223-1244, Dec. 1991).

ISSUE
Based upon our review of the administrative record, Appellants’
contentions, and the Examiner’s findings and conclusions, we have
determined that the following issue is dispositive in this appeal:
Under § 103, did the Examiner err in finding that the combination of
Suzuki, Scarborough, and Schouten would have taught or suggested
“expanding each of the virtual vector operations into a native code
implementation in accordance with each of the virtual vector operations’
individually selected expansion, wherein at least one of the virtual vector
operations is expanded into a plurality of distinctly different expansions”
(emphasis added), within the meaning of independent claim 1 and the
commensurate limitations recited in independent claims 21, 22, and 28?

Appeal 2010-010821
Application 10/919,005

4
ANALYSIS
Claims 1-4, 7, 21-25, 27-31, and 33
Appellants contend, inter alia:
Schouten never teaches or suggests this detail level of
expansion (operation level), but rather teaches expansions at the
loop level and instruction level. As such, by combining
Schouten with Scarborough and Suzuki, the combination would
teach expanding entire loops and/or instructions into different
expansions, and not “individually selecting an expansion for
each of the virtual vector operations … and expanding each of
the virtual vector operations into a native code implementation
…, wherein at least one of the virtual vector operations is
expanded into a plurality of distinctly different expansions” as
claimed by Appellants.
(App. Br. 8-9.) We agree for essentially the same reasons argued by
Appellants. (Id.)
The Examiner contends that while Schouten does not transform an
entire loop into different expansions as asserted by Appellants, an entire
loop could be represented by a virtual vector operation. (Ans. 12.) We do
not find this argument to be persuasive. We find that the cited references do
not teach or suggest individually selected expansions for each virtual vector
operation, as claimed. As argued by Appellants, the present claims require
an entirely different level of expansion because a plurality of virtual vector
operations are individually expanded, as required by the language of claim 1
and commensurate language in independent claims 21, 22, and 28.
Based on this record, we conclude that the Examiner erred in rejecting
independent claims 1, 21, 22, and 28. Accordingly, we reverse the
Examiner’s rejection of claims 1, 21, 22, and 28 and dependent claims 2-4,
7, 23-25, 27, 29-31, and 33.
Appeal 2010-010821
Application 10/919,005

5
Claims 5, 26, and 32
We do not find, nor has the Examiner established, that Levine cures
the deficiencies of Suzuki, Scarborough, and Schouten discussed supra.
Accordingly, we reverse the Examiner’s rejection of dependent claims 5, 26,
and 32 for the same reasons discussed supra.

CONCLUSION OF LAW
Appellants have shown that the Examiner erred in rejecting claims 1-
5, 7, and 21-33 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).

DECISION
We reverse the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1-5, 7, and 21-33 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a).

REVERSED

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