requires selection between two or more possible output paths that was how the board articulated the claim construction dispute and the proposed construct i do work for my children all kinds of things it doesn't mean they have choices no but but you have the choice you are making the choice that is where you are the director yes but the why when and why does there have to be two different choices simply going to direct someone to something sometimes there is no choice that all of them just give more direction to do it well i think in order for the act of directing to mean something that and there needs to at least be two possible different things you might have directed otherwise you may be making a statement but if there was no other choice then to use your child analogy if the child is going to do what the child is going to do regardless of what you say you're not really directing you're just making a statement and then whatever was coming from direction there in order to direct something and in order for that to be a step that takes place at a certain time in response to a certain event there needs to be an act of force exerted or decision made and in order for that decision to have meaning it had you have to be selecting between two other two potential different now true why doesn't this when this is a dream that articulate all of the things that are supposed to occur in a myth if and really what  that's going to be performing those actions right so it's really an interactive television programming guide said methot comprising and it says receiving storing causing receiving receiving directing i mean i don't i don't see how when you're just saying when you're to kill a game who has to happen and the order in which it has to occur i'm not sure i understand why that word necessarily requires two or more option so even if this court doesn't think that the selection of two or more possible output paths is the proper claim construction giving this term any meaning at all just giving it the meaning that it is an action step an action that is performed at a certain time by a certain component is still giving it more meaning than the board gave it because the board essentially said this term has no meaning at all in saying that it does not the the bumpers that go in the gutters the bumpers are directing the ball towards the pins nor by removing her throw but yes but in the event well so the so i think in that analogy though i would say the thing that is doing the directing is the bumpers the bumpers direct the ball towards the pins by removing the output path of the gutter so before there were two options you could actually three because there's two gutters but you could go in the gutter still not ready to go keep going because somebody else is so so for the for the step of directing an output to have any meaning whatsoever it cannot read on something that has a dedicated output path because where you have a dedicated output that the fate of the input to the output is hardwired into the system it exists at all times it is not in response to any particular event so if you look at for instance the the dependent claims which is the thing when something is hard wired you know just pushing it down that hard path is directing it even though there's no place else it could go it's still being directed from maybe one device to another from one place to another the signals being directed even though there's no where else the signal could go it's still propagating down the path but in that case it's not being directed by an interactive program guide which the claim requires in that case it's being directed simply by virtue of the existence of the hardware and it's not being a just a nd even we've got a claim of maybe i'm looking at the wrong claim that this is a method claim yes ok the only thing you've got here you don't see what it's doing the directing because it's a magic  and the limitation is directing it how cool it and then it has more language it says to said video recorder and then it also says to be viewed by said display device so there's different things going to be sent to places and it doesn't say what's doing it nolan says is directing it which says no more than sending it so so you're clear you're correct i misspoke when i said i i should have said swift if you look her example on page twenty dollars of our opening brief we reproduce the directing output step from claim one and we have there in red the language with said interactive television program guide that was what i was intending to refer to so i should have said you are television program guide mean that directing an output means there has to be a you know a single dedicated line or not and then again so if there is just a single dedicated line then there device the interactive program guide isn't what you are using to direct the output from from the tuner to wherever the destination is it's just the wire that connects the components is what causes the output so you're going to give the language with set of interactive television program varied as requiring that the television is an interactive television program by the form of the directing so i think if you say i think it's clear if you look at the if you look at the claim as a whole because interactive television program guide is also referenced if you look in for example of the the preamble or if you look in cl nine and claim seventeen we're talking about how you have this overall system and the interactive television program guide is what is navigating this entire system and so you receive the selection by something you can interact with but it's also something that's displayed on the television so the the interactive television guide has a user interface and the user interface is displayed on the television ok but the interactive program guide itself is the process it's the computer process that's handling all of these procedures and it is user interface a sort of a bridge that you scroll and you can you have a remote control and you can see what happens with a user interface  part of the interactive television program guide and part of what the interactive television program guide involves is also it is configured into the set top box that is configured with machine program logic as claimed seventeen tells us for making decisions like how do i accommodate particular user requests and so if we do user requests to view a particular program at a particular time the interactive program guide will then send a command that directs of tune are to give an output to for instance a display at that particular time and if the user instead selects to record a program at a particular time the interactive television program guide but by interfacing with that then the control circuitry is part of that it will issue a command to direct the output of one of the tuners to the recording device instead of to the display and the fact that it has those options of going to either the display or the recording device is how you get the functionality that you can record one program while simultaneously watching another or you could record two programs at once or you could have picture in picture display and watch two programs at once either way you need to have a tuner that can be directed to a comedy through the user selection and that user selection  previous limitation of the claims and then directing an output happens in response to the user selection in order to accommodate that selection i see that i'm into my rebuttal time so if there are no further questions i the listen on behalf of comcast and they produce the cork robi's appeal is entirely based on a wrong interpretation of directing output but even if you were right the appeal still fails because two of the foreground path i'm not going to belabor that point with more analogies but if there were any dispute about what it means in the abstract the claims in the specification of the patent make it clear the claims  box with two tuners one each for the display and the video recorder one each suggest exactly what it says there is one tuner for the video recorder and one tuner for the display there's no guide because it's not just directing it's directing it with the guide so that implies some action right so that the previous two steps are receiving the user selection of the two programs so you have receiving the user selection of the program to record and to display then you have a separate staff of directing the output in that instance that the god of the program logic depending on the client is sending the output on its way and then the next step is displaying one of the interacting it's still the interactive television program guide that's doing the sending it's just there isn't a user selection option at that stage of the play if the user selection has already occurred in the class right that's right at that stage there's not likely another recorder and so again that suggests dedicated output that's the extant of a two tuner set top box in the entire specification and it's preceded by two other environments that have direct the specification says that you can connect the v c r to the television from the date daisy chain of one after the other it also says that for watching record you can never connect the television directly to the antenna cover all watching record functionality based on one sentence and that was not only then but late that's why there are four separate grounds of obviousness of the board fam two of which actually ha and just to pick up on it on a few things that were said i want to make sure that is clear everybody agrees it seems that directing output does have to be a separate step i mean i just heard  council say that it is a separate step but if you have hard wired dedicated output paths then directing output is never a step that happens at a certain time in response to a certain event there is no time before the directing output starting from the existence i understand to receive the user selections to record as he views or selections yes when you receive those selections receiving isn't initiating it isn't direct wouldn't there then be software that would be necessary to then direct that would be present and according to the claims yes but not according to the prior art cited that has direct dedicated output paths there is no event of directing the output yourself there is no logic at all correct if there are the tuner outputs to a given destination and there is no machine program logic or anything involved in that should the wire do the directing if it's hard wired if you want to construe the word directing very broadly and say that the wire is doing the directing then i don't necessarily disagree with that being the outcome of a broad construction but you're certainly not directing an output with an interactive program guide in response to a user selection because that output is always directed because that wire is always what you just edit in response to a user dead if your construction of directing an output in claim one is so broad that it reads on dedicated output paths and dependent claims are meaningless they're impossible if you have dedicated output paths than that is an indication  is is if you have an embodiment that has a dedicated output path then a dependent claim that says directing an output at a certain time doesn't make sense anymore directing an output  selection and then it says directing an output right because directing a tuner to tune to a specific channel is a different direction than directly there is now dedicating line me to claim language right because i don't think so because directing an output of the tuner to a particular destination is its own choice regardless of what channel that tuner is tuned to in order to direct the output of the tuner to a particular destination you need to have at least more than her address to help would have the st tuner of the st television program selected to be recorded to said video recorder is the full limitation and it could include the tuning st think those words add more limitations they don't embrace the limitations that were already recited so that directing an output has to be done with the interactive television program guide that it's a separate step from receiving the user selection and i so the fact that it then goes on to talk about what is being directed at is ok what the and how that relates to the user selection doesn't mean that directly to output isn't its own st