DETAILED ACTION
This action is responsive to the Amendments and Remarks received 10/08/2025 in which claims 1–9, 11, 13–15, 18, and 19 are cancelled, claims 10, 16, and 20 are amended, and no claims are added as new claims.
Response to Arguments
Examiner incorporates herein previous Responses to Arguments as well as the prosecution history of application no. 13/881,643.
On page 8 of the Remarks, Applicant contends Hoppe addresses spatial progressivity, not temporal progressivity. Examiner disagrees for the reasons explained on this record, including the reasons provided in this and the preceding Office Action. Examiner notes both Hoppe and Wang explicitly teach temporal coding of images with an epitome as explained in the rejection of the independent claims, infra, and elsewhere throughout prosecution. It is simply unreasonable for Applicant to argue that the prior art does not teach using epitomes to compress video frames along the temporal dimension. Accordingly, Examiner is unpersuaded of error.
On page 8 of the Remarks, Applicant contends, without evidence or explanation, that Hoppe merely teaches differential encoding between levels of detail for a same image. Attorney arguments and conclusory statements unsupported by factual evidence are entitled to little probative value. In re Geisler, 116 F.3d 1465, 1470 (Fed. Cir. 1997). Furthermore, such an argument is unreasonable in view of Hoppe’s teachings and suggestions regarding an epitome being built to factor content among a set of images. See explanation, infra.
On page 8 of the Remarks, Applicant contends, without evidence or explanation, that Hoppe and Wang are deficient for failing to teach or suggest transmitting a complementary epitome. Examiner disagrees for the reasons explained on this record, including the reasons provided in this and the preceding Office Action. It is simply unreasonable to argue neither Hoppe nor Wang teaches complementary epitomes. Accordingly, Examiner is unpersuaded of error. See rejections, infra.
On page 8 of the Remarks, Applicant contends signaling indicators in a bitstream informing the decoder how to process the encoded signal is not inherent in the cited art. Examiner disagrees for the reasons explained on this record, including the reasons provided in this and the preceding Office Action. In this art, it is simply unreasonable to argue neither Hoppe nor Wang teaches or suggests basic indicators, such as flags, signaled in a bitstream for indicating the type of data in the bitstream. Accordingly, Examiner is unpersuaded of error.
On pages 8–9 of the Remarks, Applicant contends the claimed invention is novel because there is technical complexity in epitome-based coding, which requires condensing repeated content across images or subsequences. As explained on this record and herein, infra, the prior art likewise teaches epitome-based coding, which, by definition, condenses repeated content across images or subsequences. Accordingly, Examiner is unpersuaded of error.
On page 9 of the Remarks, Applicant contends there is a technical advantage of the claimed invention having to do with improved compression efficiency, reduced bitstream size (previous two features are essentially the same thing), error resilience, and random access (again, previous two features are essentially the same thing). Applicant does not argue that which is claimed. Furthermore, Examiner notes these same features (two of which are redundant with the other two) are also features of the prior art and their identical employment of epitomes. Examiner further notes that Applicant’s use of a complementary epitome in the claimed embodiment means Applicant’s claimed embodiment destroys the random access/error resilience feature Applicant asserts is present.
On page 9 of the Remarks, Applicant contends Hoppe only teaches epitomes for a single image and Wang only teaches epitomes for intra prediction. Because Examiner finds these arguments have been thoroughly addressed on this record, Examiner finds further response unnecessary.
On pages 10–32 of the Remarks, Applicant appears to disagree with almost every word uttered in the preceding Office Action. Although there are times in the 22 pages of arguments where “Applicant acknowledges” some point Examiner made is correct (e.g. page 22 and page 25), essentially conceding the point Examiner was conveying, Applicant still somehow turns those concessions into a multitude of paragraphs about how Applicant really meant something else or otherwise takes the opportunity to aver something completely different, yet equally untenable. In any event, Examiner finds none of the arguments or concessions appear to advance prosecution.
On page 14 of the Remarks, Applicant contends Examiner’s use of “absurd result” and “inconsistent with common sense and the knowledge of one skilled in the art” are “disrespectful.” Examiner notes Examiner’s terminology are legal terms of art in common practice in this legal field and therefore it is unreasonable to characterize it as “disrespectful” language. Regarding Examiner’s use of “absurd result,” Examiner suggests Applicant consider that reductio ad absurdum (i.e. the Absurdity Doctrine) is a legitimate legal doctrine used for interpreting written works and legal arguments by resorting to logic and common sense. Regarding Examiner’s use of the phrase “inconsistent with common sense and the knowledge of one skilled in the art,” again, this language is a cornerstone of the seminal obviousness case of KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 82 USPQ2d 1385 (2007). A conclusion of obviousness can be supported by finding “a person of ordinary skill has good reason to pursue the known options within his or her technical grasp. If this leads to the anticipated success, it is likely that product [was] not of innovation but of ordinary skill and common sense.” KSR, 550 U.S. at 421, 82 USPQ2d at 1397 (emphasis added); In re Bozek, 416 F.2d 1385, 1390, 163 USPQ 545, 549 (CCPA 1969) (explaining that a patent examiner may rely on “common knowledge and common sense of the person of ordinary skill in the art without any specific hint or suggestion in a particular reference”) (emphasis added); The legal conclusion of obviousness can take into account “the background knowledge, creativity, and common sense of the person of ordinary skill.” Zup v. Nash Mfg., 896 F.3d 1365, 1371, 127 USPQ2d 1423, 1427 (Fed. Cir. 2018) (quoting Plantronics, Inc. v. Aliph, Inc., 724 F.3d 1343, 1354 [107 USPQ2d 1706] (Fed. Cir. 2013) (citing Perfect Web Techs., Inc. v. InfoUSA, Inc., 587 F.3d 1324, 1328 [92 USPQ2d 1849] (Fed. Cir. 2009) (quoting KSR, 550 U.S. at 418-21) (emphasis added). It is, therefore, perfectly acceptable to characterize any factual findings and legal conclusions surrounding obviousness using such language. While Examiner regrets that Applicant felt disrespected, to impute to “Examiner disrespect” Examiner’s use of legal doctrine and legal analysis used extensively in patent law is wrong. Accordingly, Applicant’s assertion is unavailing.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103(a) which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
(a) A patent may not be obtained though the invention is not identically disclosed or described as set forth in section 102 of this title, if the differences between the subject matter sought to be patented and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains. Patentability shall not be negatived by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 10, 12, 16, 17, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as being unpatentable over Hoppe et al., “Factoring Repeated Content Within and Among Images,” ACM SIGGRAPH 2008 papers (SIGGRAPH '08, Los Angeles), 14, 11 August 2008 (herein “Hoppe”), in view of Wang et al., “Improving Intra Coding in H.264/AVC by Image Epitome,” 15 December 2009, Advances in Multimedia Information Processing – PCM 2009 (herein “Wang”).
Examiner incorporates herein the rationale and explanation presented in the prosecution history for application number 13/881,643. Particularly, the Final Office Action in that application dated 03/22/2019 is instructive.
Examiner finds Applicant’s invention is a simple substitution of prior art epitomes for conventional processes in the state-of-the-art video compression standard (e.g. H.264). Compression is the process of identifying and removing redundancies (repeated content) between/among data. In conventional video compression, repeated content within an image (spatial redundancies) are removed by a process called intra-prediction and repeated content between images (temporal redundancies) are removed by a process called inter-prediction. The output of the intra-prediction process is an I-frame, which is transmitted to the decoder and can be used as a prediction for subsequent frames. The output of the inter-prediction process is a P-frame, which is a residual frame that contains only differences between the real frame it is meant to encode and the predicted frame, e.g. the previously transmitted and decoded I-frame. See Wang, Section 1. Epitomes are not new as Applicant’s Specification admits. Epitomes to factor out repeated content within an image is not new. See Hoppe’s Title, Fig. 1(a), and Fig. 24. See also Wang, Abstract. Epitomes to factor out repeated content among a set of images is not new. See Hoppe’s title and Section 6. Epitome’s are also known as patches in the art. See e.g. the Abstract in Jojic et al., “Video epitomes,” Proceedings of the IEEE Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition, IEEE Computer Society Press, Los Alamitos, CA, June 2005 (herein Jojic). The crux of this application is whether the prior art taught or suggested using epitomes or patches in the conventional video compression framework as a substitute for conventional I-frames and P-frames. Examiner finds the prior art does teach or suggest applying epitomes in that way. First, Hoppe’s Section 2 explicitly recognizes conventional MPEG video compression is a related field of endeavor and Wang’s entire paper is concerned with applying epitomes to MPEG H.264. Hoppe’s Sections 4.5, 5.3, and 6 describe how to construct a growing epitome to represent a group of images (video frames are a group of images) wherein the initial epitome grows as additional image inputs are factored into the epitome and wherein only the difference between epitomes need be transmitted. Second, Jojic’s Introduction explains patches were already known in the art to be a way of computing optical flow (motion vectors for inter-prediction) between temporally neighboring video frames. Jojic’s Introduction also explicitly explains patches were used for video compression. Finally, a plethora of prior art references are listed under the Conclusion Section of this Office Action that demonstrate that using epitomes (patch libraries) for inter-prediction (or general image or video coding) was prior art within the possession of the skilled artisan prior to Applicant’s filing. For all the foregoing reasons, Examiner finds that, in view of the prior art and level of skill in the art, there is no patentable subject matter disclosed in this application for patent.
Regarding claim 10, the combination of Hoppe and Wang teaches or suggests a method comprising: decoding a signal representative of a sequence of images, implementing the following acts performed by a decoding device, for at least two subsequences of the sequence (Examiner notes it is conventional to divide a larger video into video subsequences and that the art, for many decades, has termed the subsequences as a group of pictures (GOP) or scenes; Examiner further notes there is no appreciable change in the interpretation of this claim from the now recited “subsequences” and the previously recited “scenes”), including a previous subsequence comprising at least one previous image associated with a previous instant, and a current subsequence comprising at least a first image of the current subsequence and at least one current image to be rebuilt that is not the first image and is associated with a current instant, each of the previous subsequence and the current subsequence having at least one image of the sequence of images that is not in the other of the previous subsequence and the current subsequence (Examiner notes this is just a description of video or other collection of images; see, supra): receiving the signal with the decoding device, the signal having been transmitted by an encoding device (Hoppe, Section 5.3: discusses the progressivity of the epitome in terms of transmitting the epitome from an encoder to a decoder; see also Hoppe, Fig. 24: demonstrating to the skilled artisan an input image encoded into an epitome and the image reconstructed by decoding the epitome; Examiner notes Applicant’s Specification, particularly page 10, lines 25–30 explicitly explains this process of building an epitome as that taught by Wang; Examiner further notes Applicant’s Specification (page 11, lines 9–19) teaches the encoder builds the epitome gradually as each new image is encountered during the progression of the encoding of the multiple images; Examiner finds Applicant’s Specification admits the prior art’s concatenation process as disclosed in Hoppe reads on the claimed generation of the epitome (page 11, lines 9–19); In consideration of the interview dated 07/30/2021, Examiner understands Applicant’s argument to be that the prior art is deficient for failing to teach building the epitome iteratively, as encoding progresses; In other words, Applicant has argued, in view of Wang’s first paragraph on page 195 of Wang, that Wang first stitches together a number of images to form a big image and then builds the epitome; Applicant also identified in the interview dated 07/30/2021 page 5, lines 18–20 of Applicant’s Specification for support for the embodiment now claimed; Examiner finds that portion of Applicant’s Specification is explained by the immediately preceding paragraph (Spec., pg. 5, ll. 13–17) wherein it is explained the set of images used to build the epitome is updated, rather than the epitome itself, such that the epitome is built anew for every frame to be encoded from an updated set of images; Applicant argues the claimed update or growth process of the epitome as images are encountered represents a nonobvious distinction over Wang’s process; First, Examiner finds Applicant’s argument is unsupportable by Applicant’s Specification as explained above; Specifically, to the extent Applicant is claiming the embodiment described on page 11 of the Specification, Applicant admits on that page that the epitome building process is prior art; Second, to the extent Applicant’s argument presented to the examiner in the interview is a different embodiment, i.e. the embodiment described on page 5, and the embodiment invoked by the original claim language, Examiner finds there is no description of an embodiment on page 5 of the Specification that matches the argument Applicant presented; Furthermore, Wang alone is not relied upon to teach this feature; Instead, Hoppe’s Section 6: teaches a collection of images representing a scene being represented by a common epitome E, wherein Hoppe demonstrates how the common epitome grows through the updating process from 53K to 122K as each input image is added as an input; In other words, Hoppe’s teaching of 53K to 69K, for example, teaches that the prior art updates a previous epitome (53K) to a current epitome (69K) as the new input image is added; It is noted Hoppe optionally creates sub-epitomes for each input image to speed up processing as discussed in Hoppe’s Section 4.5; Furthermore, this rejection’s rationale is further elaborated upon by incorporating the interview dated 10/21/2021; In that interview summary, Examiner explained, “the total E, (epitome) in Hoppe is built from E1 + E2 + E3, etc. in a fashion in which it is obvious from the size differentials explained in Hoppe’s Section 6 that the first E (being 53K) is the largest such that each additional epitome grows by adding only differences not already captured in the preceding epitomes. For example, the large delta from E2 to E3 (25K) is particularly addressed in Hoppe because it is so large, yet not even half the size of E1’s 53K. Such a fact tells one skilled in the art that the additional epitomes are added to the growing epitome by only adding the differences that are not already captured by the growing total E.”; Hoppe’s Section 5.3 explains how only epitome differences need be transmitted for higher spatial resolution; Examiner notes the skilled artisan would have been able to apply such a teaching of spatial progressivity to higher temporal resolution as Wang suggests in Wang’s Introduction—explaining usage of epitomes in the context of H.264 can reduce temporal redundancy among adjacent images; In short, the combination of Wang and Hoppe teaches the claimed complementary epitome for the reasons stated, supra; In addition, Hoppe alone teaches complementary epitomes both in Section 5.3 and Section 6; Hoppe’s Section 5.3 explains the progressivity of an epitome wherein only the difference between a first and second epitome need be transmitted and Hoppe’s Section 6 explains an epitome can grow as new input images are encountered all the while repeated content is factored out; The preceding explanation is relevant to building an epitome representative of a scene, which is a subsequence of a larger video sequence; Obviously, and as Hoppe teaches, another epitome can be built for separate (additional) scenes and that new epitome, as Hoppe also teaches, can be differentially encoded such that only non-redundant information between first and second epitomes is transmitted; Difference images, a foundational concept of video coding, is ubiquitously known to the skilled artisan, is represented in the teachings of Hoppe as explained, supra, and matches Applicant’s recited feature of a complementary epitome); reading a first indicator in the received signal; in response to the first indicator signaling that at least one epitome is transmitted in the signal (In this art, it is inherent to have indicators in bitstreams indicating what type of data is present in the bitstream; For example, Wang, Introduction: teaches using epitomes in the context of H.264; but see also treatment of limitations both supra and infra): reading a complementary epitome in the received signal, the complementary epitome representing a difference between an epitome representative of the current subsequence and a previous epitome representative of the previous subsequence, wherein the epitome representative of the current subsequence comprises constituent elements relevant to rebuild the at least one current image and the previous epitome comprises constituent elements relevant to rebuild the at least previous image (Examiner notes the prior art’s epitomes are built up and represent a group of images; Examiner notes Applicant’s Specification, particularly page 10, lines 25–30 explicitly explains this process of building an epitome as that taught by Wang; In addition, Hoppe alone teaches complementary epitomes both in Section 5.3 and Section 6; Hoppe’s Section 5.3 explains the progressivity of an epitome wherein only the difference between a first and second epitome need be transmitted and Hoppe’s Section 6 explains an epitome can grow as new input images are encountered all the while repeated content is factored out; see also the longer explanation, supra); reading a second indicator in the received signal (Hoppe, Section 5.3: teaches the complementary epitome E2/E1 (or remapped Ψ (E1)) is transmitted as a difference between the preceding epitome and the current epitome along with addition information representing the transform map); rebuilding the epitome representative of the current subsequence from the complementary epitome and the previous epitome representative of the previous subsequence (Hoppe, Section 5.3: teaches E2 as the updated epitome that is updated by adding a previous epitome to a complementary set of data representing differences between previous and current epitomes; Examiner notes Applicant’s Specification, particularly page 10, lines 25–30 explicitly explains this process of building an epitome as that taught by Wang; Examiner further notes Applicant’s Specification (page 11, lines 9–19) teaches the encoder builds the epitome gradually as each new image is encountered during the progression of the encoding of the multiple images; Examiner finds Applicant’s Specification admits the prior art’s concatenation process, as disclosed in Hoppe, reads on the claimed generation of the epitome (page 11, lines 9–19); In consideration of the interview dated 07/30/2021, Examiner understands Applicant’s argument to be that the prior art is deficient for failing to teach building the epitome iteratively, as encoding progresses; In other words, Applicant has argued, in view of Wang’s first paragraph on page 195 of Wang, that Wang first stitches together a number of images to form a big image and then builds the epitome; Applicant also identified, in the interview dated 07/30/2021, page 5, lines 18–20 of Applicant’s Specification for support for the embodiment now claimed; Examiner finds that portion of Applicant’s Specification is explained by the immediately preceding paragraph (Spec., pg. 5, ll. 13–17) wherein it is explained the set of images used to build the epitome is updated, rather than the epitome itself such that the epitome is built anew for every frame to be encoded from an updated set of images; Applicant argues the claimed update or growth process of the epitome as images are encountered represents a nonobvious distinction over Wang’s process; First, Examiner finds Applicant’s argument is unsupportable by Applicant’s Specification as explained above; Specifically, to the extent Applicant is claiming the embodiment described on page 11 of the Specification, Applicant admits on that page that the epitome building process is prior art; Second, to the extent Applicant’s argument presented to the examiner in the interview is a different embodiment, i.e. the embodiment described on page 5, and the embodiment invoked by the original claim language, Examiner finds there is no description of an embodiment on page 5 of the Specification that matches the argument Applicant presented; Furthermore, Wang alone is not relied upon to teach this feature; Instead, Hoppe’s Section 6: teaches a collection of images representing a scene being represented by a common epitome E, wherein Hoppe demonstrates how the common epitome grows through the updating process from 53K to 122K as each input image is added as an input; In other words, Hoppe’s teaching of 53K to 69K, for example, teaches that the prior art updates a previous epitome (53K) to a current epitome (69K) as the new input image is added; It is noted Hoppe optionally creates sub-epitomes for each input image to speed up processing as discussed in Hoppe’s Section 4.5; Furthermore, this rejection’s rationale is further elaborated upon by incorporating the interview dated 10/21/2021; In that interview summary, Examiner explained, “the total E, (epitome) in Hoppe is built from E1 + E2 + E3, etc. in a fashion in which it is obvious from the size differentials explained in Hoppe’s Section 6 that the first E (being 53K) is the largest such that each additional epitome grows by adding only differences not already captured in the preceding epitomes. For example, the large delta from E2 to E3 (25K) is particularly addressed in Hoppe because it is so large, yet not even half the size of E1’s 53K. Such a fact tells one skilled in the art that the additional epitomes are added to the growing epitome by only adding the differences that are not already captured by the growing total E.”; Hoppe’s Section 5.3 explains how only epitome differences need be transmitted for higher spatial resolution; Examiner notes the skilled artisan would have been able to apply such a teaching of spatial progressivity to higher temporal resolution as Wang suggests in Wang’s Introduction—explaining usage of epitomes in the context of H.264 can reduce temporal redundancy among adjacent images; In short, the combination of Wang and Hoppe teaches the claimed complementary epitome for the reasons stated, supra; In addition, Hoppe alone teaches complementary epitomes both in Section 5.3 and Section 6; Hoppe’s Section 5.3 explains the progressivity of an epitome wherein only the difference between a first and second epitome need be transmitted and Hoppe’s Section 6 explains an epitome can grow as new input images are encountered all the while repeated content is factored out); and inter image predicting the at least one current image of the current subsequence using the rebuilt epitome representative of the current subsequence in response to the second indicator signaling that the epitome representative of the current subsequence is used to predict one or more images of the sequence (While Hoppe also teaches this, Wang better explains the epitome is used for image prediction; Wang, Section 1: teaches, “image epitome can be used to generate prediction.”; Wang, Section 1: teaches, “this paper is the first time to introduce image epitome into the hybrid video coding framework for enhancing the accuracy of predictive coding.”; see also preceding Office Actions regarding claim 1 (now cancelled); see explanations, supra, regarding epitomes representing scenes as taught by Hoppe; One skilled in the art knows how to combine scenes (subsequences) into a sequence of images (i.e. a video); Additionally, Wang, Section 2, pg. 195: teaches that the epitome is built, i.e. updated, as an image with a temporal dimension from images in the video sequence; Examiner notes that, as the encoder encodes the video frames along the temporal dimension, the encoder builds (updates) the epitome, so that the set of images is “updated” along the temporal axis and the epitome is “updated” along the temporal axis; Hoppe, Section 4.2: teaches an epitome that “grows” and “restarts” at points within the input signal).
One of ordinary skill in the art, at the time of Applicant’s invention, would have been motivated to combine the elements taught by Hoppe, with those of Wang, because both references are drawn to the same field of endeavor such that one wishing to utilize image epitomes for image and video compression would be led to their relevant teachings, because both Hoppe and Wang recognize that video epitomes can improve conventional video compression schemes (Hoppe, Section 2; Wang, Abstract) in the same manner as claimed, and because the skilled artisan would find it obvious to use the progressivity of Hoppe’s epitome within Wang’s use of epitomes to achieve conventional video compression (both spatial and temporal compression) such that the combination represents a mere combination of prior art elements, according to known methods, to yield a predictable result. This rationale applies to all combinations of Hoppe and Wang used in this Office Action unless otherwise noted.
Regarding claim 12, the combination of Hoppe and Wang teaches or suggests the method according to claim 10, wherein said rebuilding act also takes account of a causal neighborhood of said current image (Wang, Section 3: teaches an L-block causal neighborhood; Examiner compares the teachings of Wang to paragraph [0101] of Applicant’s published Specification).
Claim 16 lists the same elements as claim 10, but is drawn to a device rather than a method. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 10 applies to the instant claim.
Regarding claim 17, the combination of Hoppe and Wang teaches or suggests the device for decoding according to claim 16, further comprising an input for receiving the signal; and an output delivering the rebuilt epitome representative of the current subsequence (Hoppe, Section 4.5 and 5.3: describing the receiving device receiving the signal and creating the epitome therefrom, which is the reciprocal process of the encoding device).
Claim 20 lists the same elements as claim 10, but is drawn to a CRM rather than a method. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 10 applies to the instant claim.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Cheung et al., “Video Epitomes,” International Journal of Computer Vision, Kluwer Academic Publishers, BO, vol. 76, no. 2, 23 December 2006. The publication teaches epitomes equivalent in size to the original image (Figs. 3(c) and (d)).
Hoppe (US 2009/0208110 A1) - (Hoppe, ¶¶ 0023, 0025, and 0031: discloses encoding a video using an epitome generated from among images, i.e., Applicant’s at least two images of a sequence; see also Hoppe, ¶¶ 0038 and 0063: disclosing images mapped to an epitome).
Chen (US 2011/0302527 A1) teaches epitomes as a model of patches extracted from a video sequence (¶ 0034).
Schmit (US 2010/0166073 A1) teaches patches as reference pictures for inter prediction of video (¶ 0003).
Pigeon (US 2010/0027662 A1) teaches patches created from a large collection of reference images for inter-prediction (¶ 0052).
Drezner (US 2009/0296816 A1) teaches a list of patches used as reference pictures for inter-prediction (e.g. ¶ 0029).
Crook (US 2004/0218035 A1) teaches using a reference patch codebook for matching current frames for compression (¶ 0058).
Blake (US 2006/0104542 A1) teaches the use of epitomes to regenerate the original image by using the epitome as a reference (prediction) image (¶ 0050).
Jojic et al., “Video epitomes,” Proceedings of the IEEE Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition, IEEE Computer Society Press, Los Alamitos, CA, June 2005.
Vincent Cheung, “Video Epitomes,” Website, accessed 06/12/2022.
Wang (US 2006/0256851) teaches “Scalable video coding is a desirable feature for many multimedia applications and services used in systems employing decoders with a wide range of processing power. Several types of video scalability schemes have been proposed, such as temporal, spatial and quality scalability. These proposed types consist of a base layer and an enhancement layer. The base layer is the minimum amount of data required to decode the video stream, while the enhancement layer is the additional data required to provide an enhanced video signal.” (¶ 0011).
Zhao (US 2011/0058607 A1) teaches “real-time” video is where the decoder decodes received information on the fly as the stream arrives rather than waiting until a whole encoded file is received and only then decoding the whole file. (¶ 0110).
Yin (US 2009/0122860 A1) teaches determining whether the current picture is stored as a reference picture and which previously stored reference picture is discarded from a reference picture buffer (e.g. 0062).
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 extension fee 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.
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/MICHAEL J HESS/Examiner, Art Unit 2481