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 .
Status of the Application
This Office-Action acknowledges the Amendment filed on 3/4/2025 and is a response to said Amendment. In this case, the Examiner acknowledges the Notice of Withdraw from Issue that had been filed on 1/28/2026. It had come to the Examiner’s attention regarding prior art pertaining to Claims 12. This Office Action is being filed to address the issue.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
Claim 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Schultz (US 20110258180) in view of Meadows (US 20130095939).
Regarding Claim 12.
Schultz discloses a method of communicating topographical information to and from devices by means of an accessible network upon a golf course ([0027]), the topographical information being a location of a pin on a green of a hole on said golf course ([0025], [0036]), the method comprising:
selecting on a display screen ([0047]: user interface 210 may be a touch screen display), one or more greens ([0047]) from a plurality of greens of the golf course ([0055]), for setting a pin position on each of said plurality of greens ([0029], [0047]: set/edit hole location);
setting a position of said pin associated with each of said plurality of greens ([0029], [0047]: set/edit hole location);
storing said position of the pin associated with each of said plurality of greens ([0025], [0029]: storage component/database);
uploading said position of the pin associated with each of said greens to a central information processing site connected to a course database ([0050]: website); and
making available locations of the one or more pins ([0050]: website) to a location aware device ([0027]: user interface 210 may be a mobile GPS device/smart phone) for […], and wherein said topographical information includes slope information associated with said greens ([0038]: “a topographical characteristic of golf hole location 102 may be that it is on a slope”).
Schultz discloses a method for assisting a greens superintendent in the task of moving a golf hole which is done for green maintenance purposes and to encourage golfers to replay the course ([0002-3],[0006]). The resulting presentation may be in the form of a golfer pinsheet or a website that is updated to show golf hole locations ([0050]).
Schultz does not disclose: “receiving at least one signal transmitted from at least one radio-frequency tag associated with at least one golf club”, “determining an orientation of a processing unit via an accelerometer”, or “determining a distance from said location aware device to said one or more pins, wherein said distance is determined by a microcontroller processing said stored position of the pin and deriving calculations”.
However, Meadows teaches a system and method for tracking golf shots including:
receiving at least one signal transmitted from at least one radio-frequency tag associated with at least one golf club ([0036] Data transmitted from the tags is received by the RFID transceiver 165 of the location-aware device 100; [0037]: RFID tag 200 that is attached to a golf club); and
determining an orientation of a processing unit via an accelerometer ([0033]: accelerometer on location-aware device (which has a processing unit 105), OR [0040]: accelerometer 220 on the RFID tag (which has a processing unit 205));
determining a distance from said location aware device to said one or more pins ([0029]: “the primary purpose of the portable location-aware device 100 is to provide a golfer with distance information to various points on a green, to various targets and hazards on the golf course” where “target” on a golf course is interpreted as a pin/hole, see also [0005]; [0030]);
wherein said distance is determined by a microcontroller processing said stored position of the pin and deriving calculations ([0030]: “distance information is provided to the user by referencing mapped data stored in the flash memory 110, for example, to real time Global Positioning System (GPS) position data acquired by an onboard GPS receiver 120. The microcontroller 105 processes the GPS data and derives calculations to the mapped points and various areas on the course”).
All the claimed elements (the collection of pin location data and tracking golf shots using a “smart” golf club) were known in the prior art and one skilled in the art could have combined the elements as claimed by known methods with no change in their respective functions, and the combination would have yielded predictable results to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention. That is, the method of Schultz may be utilized to map the golf course and the system of Meadows may be used to play the course with no change in their respective functions and with predictable results.
More specifically, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made (pre-AIA ) to modify the method of Schultz to determine distance from the user device to the target/pin because “it is essential for a player to have accurate distance measurements corresponding to a golf hole before taking a shot” (Meadows [0005]). By knowing the distance to the pin, the player may make a more informed golf club selection and adjust his swing accordingly.
Additionally, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made (pre-AIA ) to modify the method of Schultz to use the RFID-equipped golf club for playing the course as taught by Meadows to automatically detect and store golf shot data into the location-aware device for scoring purposes or post-round analysis (Meadows [0009], [0036]).
*It is also noted that the references may be reversed such that Meadows is the primary reference and Schultz is the modifying reference.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 13-36 objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Claims 37-46 allowed.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JEFFREY WONG whose telephone number is (571)270-3003. The examiner can normally be reached M-F: 9-5pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Kang Hu can be reached at (571) 270-1344. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/JEFFREY K WONG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3715