Application of Freeman
| Decision Date | 30 March 1978 |
| Docket Number | Appeal No. 75-531. |
| Citation | 573 F.2d 1237 |
| Parties | Application of Richard Don FREEMAN. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Customs and Patent Appeals (CCPA) |
Robert O. Nimtz, Murray Hill, attorney of record, for appellant.
Joseph F. Nakamura, Washington, D. C., for the Commissioner of Patents, Jere W. Sears, Washington, D. C., of counsel.
Before MARKEY, Chief Judge, and RICH, BALDWIN, LANE and MILLER, Judges.
Appeal from the decision of the Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) Board of Appeals (board), affirming the rejection of claims 1-10, all of the claims in application serial No. 32,025, filed May 6, 1970, and entitled "Computer Typesetting." We reverse.
The subject matter of Freeman's invention is a system for typesetting alphanumeric information, using a computer-based control system in conjunction with a photo-typesetter of conventional design. Freeman's overall scheme is represented by Figure 1 of his application.
Input device 140 provides the identities of symbols and alphanumeric characters to be composed and the positional commands for placement of such symbols and characters in the final composition. Although shown in Figure 1 as a keyboard, input device 140 may be a card reader, a magnetic or paper tape reader, or other known input device. Memory 160 stores character specifications and provides computer 100 with detailed information about the exact nature of the characters which may be selected by coded input signals from input device 140. Memory 160 may be part of computer memory 130. Computer 100 represents a broad category of data processors, including general purpose digital computers.
Output unit 170 receives character position signals from computer 100 and generates a permanent record of the desired positional relationship of the characters. As shown in Figure 1, output unit 170 may include a display device, such as cathode ray tube (CRT) 175, and a photographic system, such as camera 176. Output unit 170 may also be a computer microfilm printer, or other means of producing a permanent record.
Freeman's system is especially useful in printing mathematical formulae. Its particular advantage over prior computer-aided printing systems is its positioning of mathematical symbols in an expression in accordance with their appearance, while maintaining the mathematical integrity of the expression.
The functioning of appellant's invention is best understood in appellant's example, wherein the objective is the photocomposing of the mathematical expression:
One embodiment of appellant's invention employs a hierarchical "tree structure" computer storage arrangement. Applied to the above mathematical expression, the hierarchical arrangement produces this tree structure:
Each particular tree structure depends on spatial relationships of the symbols, not on their mathematical meaning, i. e., all symbols, whether characters or operators, are treated in the same way. As in Figure 3 above, the "head" of the tree structure is the symbol at the extreme left of the main line of the formula. New "branches" of the tree are started by those symbols which begin new lines, above, on, or below the main line of the formula, e. g., exponents and initial symbols of numerators and denominators.
The tree structure storage arrangement is used to determine the sequence, indicated by the circled numbers in Figure 3, in which the symbols of the formula are processed by the "local positioning algorithm" disclosed by appellant. Symbols attached by arrows leading out from a given symbol are called "subordinates" of the given symbol. In Figure 3, for example, the "1," the "7," and the "h" are subordinates of the integral sign.
Another basic feature of appellant's invention is the use of a set of "concatenation points" for each character. Prior art devices, like the typical Linotype machine, employed a rectangular, edge-to-edge concatenation system. Appellant's sets of concatenation points correspond roughly to the eight major compass directions, as shown in this figure:
To form the expression "2†" from the above characters, the West concatenation point of the"†" is specified to coincide with the East concatenation point of the "2". A particular advantage of appellant's concatenation point positioning technique is its applicability to both straight linear text and to subscripts, superscripts, division signs, and integral signs. To form the expression "†2," the Southwest concatenation point of the "small 2" is specified to coincide with the Northeast concatenation point of the "†."
Appellant's local positioning algorithm, using concatenation points to typeset mathematical expressions stored in a hierarchical tree structure, is disclosed in its simplest form:
In sum, appellant's invention includes three signal-processing steps. First, the input codes are read, and a tree structure of symbols representing the mathematical expression is built. Second, the signals specifying the relative concatenation point positions of the symbols are composed by application of the local positioning algorithm. Third, an image of the expression, with all symbols in proper position, is generated on the CRT or other output device.
Claims 1-7 are apparatus claims:
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