Ex Parte MunzDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardJun 24, 201612811022 (P.T.A.B. Jun. 24, 2016) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 12/811,022 06/28/2010 26875 7590 06/28/2016 WOOD, HERRON & EV ANS, LLP 2700 CAREW TOWER 441 VINE STREET CINCINNATI, OH 45202 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Heinrich Munz 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. KLAB-24 1827 EXAMINER MANSFIELD, THOMAS L ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 3623 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 06/28/2016 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): usptodock@whe-law.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte HEINRICH MUNZ Appeal2014-004195 Application 12/811,022 Technology Center 3600 Before: NEALE. ABRAMS, CHARLES N. GREENHUT, and MARK A. GEIER, Administrative Patent Judges. GREENHUT, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134 from a rejection of claims 16-34. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We reverse. Appeal2014-004195 Application 12/811,022 CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER The claims are directed to a control apparatus and method for an industrial robot. Claim 16, reproduced below, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter: 16 A control apparatus for an industrial robot, comprising: a multi-core computer processor having at least one first processor core and at least one second processor core; and an operating system configured to be executed by the multi-core processor, and further configured to assign hard real- time tasks_solely to the at least one first processor core and assign other tasks solely to the at least one second processor core, wherein the hard real-time tasks control at least a component of the industrial robot. REJECTIONS 1 Claims 16-18, 20-25, and 27-33 2 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Chauvel (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2006/0026322 Al; pub. Feb. 2, 2006) and Weiss (U.S. Patent No. 7,742,838 B2; iss. June 22, 2010). Final Act. 6. Claims 19, 26, and 34 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Chauvel, Weiss, and Demarest (US 5,568,593; iss. Oct. 22, 1996). Final Act. 10. OPINION Regarding the Examiner's reliance on Chauvel in each of the rejections above, Appellant correctly argues: 1 The rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 112, second paragraph, was withdrawn in the Advisory Action of June 13, 2013. 2 Based on the Examiner's discussion of this rejection, we, like Appellant, treat the omission of claims other than claim 16 in the rejection statement as a typographical error. Final Act. 6; App. Br. 3. 2 Appeal2014-004195 Application 12/811,022 The cited portions of Chauvel '322 only describe interrupting tasks being executed in a processor so that a higher priority task may be performed. The rejection amounts to an assertion that a higher priority task is inherently a hard real-time task. Appellant notes, however, that a "higher priority task" is not necessarily a "hard real-time task." App. Br. 8. The level of priority of a task or the use of interrupts to execute a task, and the characterization of a task as "hard real-time" or not, are related, but independent attributes. Although a "hard real-time" task is likely to receive a high priority and interrupt other tasks, the designation of a task as high priority in Chauvel, or one that warrants the use of an interrupt, does not necessarily mean that task is a "hard real-time task." See infra at 3--4. The Examiner appears to incorrectly read the Specification as equating the use of interrupts as something that defines whether a task is categorized as a "hard real-time task": Appellant's description of hard real time states: "to assign first interrupt routines triggered on the basis of first external interrupts and categorized as real-time tasks or hard real-time tasks to the first processor core" (emphasis added). This is exactly as Chauvel[] teaches ... Ans. 8 (quoting Spec. 4). However, in the embodiment described in the quoted paragraph (see also, e.g., claim 17), categorization as a "hard real-time task" is, in addition to being a first interrupt routine, a condition precedent to assigning the task to the first processor. The use of an interrupt for a task is not a definition or synonym of "hard-real time." The paragraph of the Specification immediately preceding that quoted by the Examiner defines, consistent with the definitions argued by Appellant, hard real-time: 3 Appeal2014-004195 Application 12/811,022 "In so-called hard real time, an overrun of the defined time frame constitutes an error." Spec. 4. As the Examiner does not apprise us of tasks in Chauvel satisfying this definition, the Examiner's rejections cannot be sustained on the basis set forth by the Examiner. "The PTO applies to [] verbiage of the proposed claims the broadest reasonable meaning of the words in their ordinary usage as they would be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art, taking into account whatever enlightenment by way of definitions or otherwise that may be afforded by the written description contained in [] applicant's specification." In re Morris, 127 F.3d 1048, 1054-55 (Fed. Cir. 1997). "'[R]eading a claim in light of the specification,' to thereby interpret limitations explicitly recited in the claim, is a quite different thing from 'reading limitations of the specification into a claim,' to thereby narrow the scope of the claim by implicitly adding disclosed limitations which have no express basis in the claim." In re Prater, 415 F.2d 1393, 1404---05, (CCPA 1969). DECISION The Examiner's rejections are reversed. REVERSED 4 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation