DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 5/28/2026 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Claim Status
Claims 1-20 are pending in this Office Action.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1, 13, and 17 have been fully considered, but are not persuasive.
Applicant argues Gavade does not appear to teach “the first nDVR comprising one or more servers and the second nDVR comprising one or more servers”.
The Examiner respectfully disagrees. Gavade teaches a local media content server, which is located at a user premises of the user (e.g., the user's home). The local media content server may be a digital video recorder (“DVR”) and perform function of a DVR, such as recording media content (par. 17-18, Fig. 1 and 2). As seen in Fig. 1, the local media content server 102 is communicatively coupled to a local area network 110 as well as a network 116 (par. 23 and 39). Therefore, Gavade clearly teaches that a network DVR may comprise one or more servers. Gavade further teaches “Commonly, a user accessing a particular media content program can use equipment located at the user's premises (e.g., a local media content server such as a digital video recorder or other set-top device) to record the media content program for later viewing” (par. 1). This demonstrates that it was common or obvious for user equipment to be a network DVR comprising one or more servers. Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify the networked DVRs of Milne by incorporating one or more servers as disclosed by Gavade.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 7-8, 14-15, and 18-19 would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1-6, 9-11, 13, 16-17, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Milne et al. (US 2017/0262182) in view of Gavade et al. (US 2017/0223394).
Regarding claims 1, 13, and 17, Milne teaches: A method, a non-transitory computer-readable medium, and a system comprising:
determining, by a first network digital video recorder (nDVR), a first utilization associated with the first nDVR [networked DVRs 800, 802, 804 (par. 92, Fig. 8 and 17). A lead DVR is established among the DVRs which has the smallest amount of content stored on it (par. 98, Fig. 10 and 19)]
receiving, by the first nDVR, information indicating a second utilization associated with a second nDVR [the lead DVR receives information indicating files that are stored and storage size of each element of each piece of content stored on the other DVRs in the network (par. 99, Fig. 10 and 19)]
storing, by the first nDVR and based on the first utilization and the second utilization, one or more content segments [the lead DVR executes a load balancing algorithm to determine which content elements should be moved to which DVR based on which storage is most or least full (par. 99-106, Fig. 10 and 19)] and
sending, by the first nDVR and to a computing device, the one or more content segments [sending the content to an audio video display device (AVDD) 12 which is a computing device that includes a processor, a speaker, and a display for outputting the content from the DVR (par. 46-48, 53-54, 106, Fig. 1-2, 8, and 10)].
Milne does not explicitly disclose: the first nDVR comprising one or more servers and the second nDVR comprising one or more servers.
Gavade teaches: the first nDVR comprising one or more servers and the second nDVR comprising one or more servers [a local media content server 102 (e.g., a digital video recorder (“DVR”) is communicatively coupled with local area network 110 and network 116 (par. 17-18, 23, 39, 41-42, and 60-61, Fig. 1 and 2)].
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, having the teachings of Milne and Gavade before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the method of Milne with the teaching of Gavade, such that each DVR comprises one or more servers. The motivation for doing so would have been to allow users to view the media content stored on the DVR using a portable device such as a mobile phone or a tablet device, in addition or as an alternative to viewing the media content program using a television and the content could be accessed through a home network, an office intranet, or remotely through the Internet (Gavade – par. 17-18). Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine the teachings of Milne and Gavade to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim. Further, Gavade teaches “Commonly, a user accessing a particular media content program can use equipment located at the user's premises (e.g., a local media content server such as a digital video recorder or other set-top device) to record the media content program for later viewing” (par. 1). This demonstrates that it was common or obvious for user equipment to be a network DVR comprising one or more servers. Therefore, it would have been obvious to modify the networked DVRs of Milne by incorporating one or more servers as disclosed by Gavade.
Regarding claim 2, Milne and Gavade teach the method of claim 1; Milne further teaches: determining, by the first nDVR and based on the first utilization and the second utilization, that the second nDVR will not record the one or more content segments [determining by the lead DVR as part of load balancing, which DVR will record the content elements, such as based on storage space, where a DVR that is most full would not record the content (par. 100-101, 140-145, Fig. 20 and 22)].
Regarding claim 3, Milne and Gavade teach the method of claim 1; Milne further teaches: determining, by the first nDVR and based on the first utilization and the second utilization, that the second nDVR will record a second one or more content segments and that the first nDVR will not record the second one or more content segments [determining by the lead DVR as part of load balancing, which DVR will record the content elements, such as based on storage space, where a DVR that is most full would not record the content and a DVR that is less full would be selected (par. 100-101, 140-145, Fig. 20 and 22)].
Regarding claim 4, Milne and Gavade teach the method of claim 1; Milne further teaches: the first utilization comprises one or more of: a current disk writing activity, a maximum disk writing activity capacity, a current disk reading activity, a maximum disk reading activity capacity, a current network activity, a maximum network activity capacity, a current computing activity, or a maximum computing activity capacity [the current workload of the DVR or busyness including the current input/output (I/O) operations of the DVR (par. 101-104)].
Regarding claim 5, Milne and Gavade teach the method of claim 1; Milne further teaches: the storing the one or more content segments is further based on one or more of: a content channel associated with the first nDVR, a content channel associated with the one or more content segments, a geographic location of the first nDVR, a geographic location of one or more users requesting the one or more content segments, or the first nDVR already storing other content segments associated with the one or more content segments [a customer preference may be input to command that an entire program series be recorded to a specific DVR, and the load balancing algorithm takes into account the customer preference (par. 96 and 101)].
Regarding claims 6, 16, and 20, Milne and Gavade teach the method of claim 1; Milne further teaches: the storing the one or more content segments is further based on one or more issues associated with the second nDVR, wherein the one or more issues comprise one or more of: a loss of communication between the first nDVR and the second nDVR, an inability to satisfy one or more user recording requests, a current disk writing activity exceeding a disk writing activity threshold value, a current disk reading activity exceeding a disk reading activity threshold value, a current network activity exceeding a network activity threshold value, a current computing activity exceeding a computing activity threshold value, a component failure, a network failure, an incapacity of the second nDVR, a failure to receive a heartbeat message from the second nDVR, or a failure to receive second information indicating a third utilization expected from the second nDVR [an issue where the DVR that was scheduled to store the content elements is determined to have less storage available than is needed (par. 100-101)].
Regarding claim 9, Milne and Gavade teach the method of claim 1; Milne further teaches: the one or more content segments are associated with one or more of: a content item selected by a user for recording, previously stored content that is to be archived, or previously stored content that is to be moved to a media storage from which the content is available for playback [a program commanded by the user to be recorded (par. 101) and moving content stored in a DVR to another DVR for storage (par. 100)].
Regarding claim 10, Milne and Gavade teach the method of claim 1; Gavade further teaches: the first nDVR is associated with a first group of users and the second nDVR is associated with a second group of users [each local media content server 102 may be associated with one or more users 108 (e.g., users 108-1 and/or 108-2). For example, each local media content server 102 may be associated with a home of users 108 (par. 23 and 33, Fig. 1)].
Regarding claim 11, Milne and Gavade teach the method of claim 1; Milne further teaches: the one or more content segments are associated with one or more of: video content, audio content, media content, stored content, recorded content, an audio program, a video program, an audio/video program, a content item, or a television show [storing received audio and video (par. 33)].
Claim 12 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Milne et al. (US 2017/0262182) in view of Gavade et al. (US 2017/0223394) and further in view of Beaty et al. (US 2019/0268631).
Regarding claim 12, Milne and Gavade teach the method of claim 1; While Gavade discloses that data may be arranged in one or more databases (par. 95), Milne and Gavade do not explicitly disclose: storing the information in a first portion of a data structure; and storing second information indicating the second utilization in a second portion of the data structure.
Beaty teaches: storing the information in a first portion of a data structure; and storing second information indicating the second utilization in a second portion of the data structure [storing various information in a data structure 102a, such as storing information in records which consist of the different fields (par. 18, Fig. 2)].
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, having the teachings of Milne, Gavade, and Beaty before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the method of Milne and Gavade by incorporating the teaching of Beaty for storing the information in a first portion of a data structure and storing second information indicating the second utilization in a second portion of the data structure. The motivation for doing so would have been to store the first information and the second information for retrieval at a later time (Beaty – par. 6). Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine the teachings of Milne and Gavade with Beaty to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Alexander Boyd whose telephone number is (571)270-0676. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday 9am-5pm PST.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Benjamin Bruckart can be reached at 571-272-3982. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/ALEXANDER BOYD/Examiner, Art Unit 2424
Prosecution Insights