In both common usage and patent drafting, "computer" has become shorthand for an incredibly broad range of hardware and software, across almost every possible technological space. The breadth of meaning attributable to that single word can be a challenge for litigants and courts working through issues of claim construction or other issues (e.g., Section 101 challenges, in which references to concrete computer components can lift a patent out of abstractness, and references to generic components can doom it). On the one hand, "computer" is readily understood by almost everyone in a general sense; on the other, standing alone, it has no specific meaning.
Judge Noreika recently addressed the question of whether a claimed "'computer . . . to computationally' obtain, change, or calculate specified aspects of the radiation beam arrangement or weights" should be construed as a means-plus-function term under 35 U.S.C. § 112, ¶ 6 (pre-AIA). In Best Med. Intl. v. Varian Med. Sys., Inc., C.A. No. 18-1599-MN, plaintiff proposed a plain and ordinary meaning construction. Defendants argued for a means-plus-function construction, proposing structures and functions "for each of the variations of the term."
Judge Noreika rejected the proposed means-plus-function construction, and instead adopted a plain and ordinary meaning construction. The claims did not consistently treat "computer" as a functional term, and the Judge found sufficient structure in both the claims and specification to avoid means-plus-function treatment. Interestingly, she first focused on peripherals (as opposed to the computer itself), noting that the cited references "suggest components connected to or communicating with the computer, and evidence the structural nature of the computer." Although the specification's references to the computer referred to it as "conventional" and "suitable," those references were found to support the concrete nature of the claimed computer.
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