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 .
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(s) 1-2 and 8-12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Eom (U.S. PGPUB 20160261803) in view of Kao et al. (U.S. PGPUB 20140129977).
With respect to claim 1, Eom discloses a system for displaying views of an application on a display (paragraph 61, FIG. 1 illustrates a network environment including an electronic device according to various embodiments of the present disclosure), wherein the views represent 3D image content for a 3D display (paragraph 101, The display module 310 may display the images in three dimensions by displaying the images on the display according to the additional information), the system comprising:
a memory comprising system data representing an operating system and application data representing the application (paragraph 65, The memory 130 may store, for example, instructions or data related to at least one other element of the electronic device 101. According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the memory 130 may store software and/or a program 140);
a processor subsystem configured to communicate with the memory and to execute the operating system and the application (paragraph 64, The processor 120 may control, for example, one or more other elements of the electronic device 101 and/or process an operation or data related to communication);
wherein the operating system is configured to provide:
a window manager for managing visibility of views generated by applications (paragraph 87, The window manager 242 may manage a GUI resource used in a screen);
one or more display server components (paragraph 75, the server 106 may include a group of one or more servers), the one or more display server components being specific to a type of display (paragraph 78, the server 106 may include an image display server module 108 capable of supporting the image display module 180 implemented in the electronic device 101. For example, the image display server module 108 may include one or more elements of the image display module 180 and may perform (on behalf of the image display module 180) at least one of operations of the image display module 180) and configured to, based on visibility information obtained from the window manager, composite the views into a display signal for display (paragraph 101, The display module 310 may display the plurality of images on the display such that the plurality of images overlap with each other according to each piece of additional information based on a layer of each image, paragraph 112, According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the update module 320 may determine an area in which the changed higher layer image and the lower layer image overlap and acquire information on the determined area in which the images overlap);
wherein the application is configured to provide the 3D image content to the window manager in the form of at least two views which are arranged with respect to each other in accordance with a view configuration (paragraph 101, Further, the display module 310 may display a plurality of images including additional information. The display module 310 may display the plurality of images on the display such that the plurality of images overlap with each other according to each piece of additional information based on a layer of each image), wherein the at least two views comprise a primary view comprising 2D image data (paragraph 182, In general, when an image 1420 does not include additional information, the image 1420 is two-dimensionally displayed through the electronic device 101) and a secondary view comprising 3D-enabling auxiliary data which is indicative of depth of the 2D image data (paragraph 102, the additional information may include at least one piece of depth information and height information. The additional information may be included in a data format of the image, paragraph 182, when the image 1420 includes additional information data 1410, an electronic device 1440 may display the image 1420 according to the additional information data 1410 so as to stereoscopically display the image 1420 in three dimensions) wherein the application is configured to:
i) stack the primary view in front of the secondary view to provide a view configuration in which the primary view occludes the secondary view (paragraph 185, The first image may be a higher layer than the second image. In this case, the electronic device 101 may overlappingly display the first image on the second image, paragraph 195, electronic device 101 may overlappingly display the first image on the second image), or
ii) provide the primary view to the window manager by indicating a viewport which comprises the 2D image data of the primary view and provide the secondary view to the window manager by arranging the 3D-enabling auxiliary data of the secondary view outside of the viewport,
to cause a 2D display server component for a 2D display to omit drawing, or overdraw, the secondary view when compositing the at least two views into the display signal (paragraph 76, all or some of the operations performed by the electronic device 101 may be performed by another electronic device or a plurality of electronic devices (for example, the electronic device 102 or 104 or the server 106), paragraph 187, In operation 1530, the electronic device 101 may display the second image according to the changed first image and the updated additional information corresponding to the second image. As described above, by updating the additional information based on the input, the electronic device 101 may change the second image according to the change in the first image and display the second image on the display). However, Eom does not expressly disclose providing a view configuration in which the primary view entirely occludes the secondary view and causing the 2D display server component to entirely omit drawing, or entirely overdraw, the second view when compositing the at least two views into the display signal.
Kao et al., who also deal with a window manager, disclose a method for providing a view configuration in which the primary view entirely occludes the secondary view and causing the display component to entirely omit drawing, or entirely overdraw, the second view when compositing the at least two views into the display signal (paragraph 68, At 418, the graphics device 226 may render and/or paint the composite notification message 308. The graphics device 226 may render and/or paint the composite notification message 308 such that message content of the primary notification message 316 overlaps message content of the secondary notification message 318 or vice-versa. In some instances, the overlapping of the message content of the primary notification message 316 and the secondary notification message 318 may be complete such that no portion of the underlying message content is viewable when the composite notification message 308 is provided to the display device 232, paragraph 83, The primary notification representation 602(1) and the secondary notification representation 604(1) may also be arranged such that they have the same range of X and Y display coordinates, i.e., the primary notification representation 602(1) may completely overlay the secondary notification representation 604(1)).
Eom and Kao et al. are in the same field of endeavor, namely computer graphics.
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to apply the method of providing a view configuration in which the primary view entirely occludes the secondary view and causing the display component to entirely omit drawing, or entirely overdraw, the second view when compositing the at least two views into the display signal, as taught by Kao et al., to the 2D display server of the Eom system, because the operating system 206 may provide "windows" via a graphical-user-interface (GUI), and the notification controller module 212 and/or the primary notification module 214 may be incorporated into a windows manager. Incorporating the notification controller module 212 and/or the primary notification module 214 into components of the operating system 206 provides a measure of security (paragraph 33 of Kao et al.), thus implementing a secure method to display multiple user interface windows.
With respect to claim 2, Eom as modified by Kao et al. disclose the system according to claim 1, wherein the application is configured to assign a relative Z-order to the primary view and the secondary view which causes the primary view to be stacked in front of the secondary view (Eom: paragraph 185, The first image may be a higher layer than the second image. In this case, the electronic device 101 may overlappingly display the first image on the second image).
With respect to claim 8, Eom as modified by Kao et al. disclose the system according to claim 4, wherein the 3D display server component is configured to composite the at least two views by: arranging the primary view and the secondary view to be simultaneously shown in the display signal in accordance with a stereo display format (Eom: paragraph 182, when the image 1420 includes additional information data 1410, an electronic device 1440 may display the image 1420 according to the additional information data 1410 so as to stereoscopically display the image 1420 in three dimensions); or generating one or more further views based on the primary view and the secondary view, and simultaneously arranging the primary view and the one or more further views in the display signal in accordance with a multiview display format.
With respect to claim 9, Eom as modified by Kao et al. disclose the system according to claim 1, wherein the 3D-enabling auxiliary data is one of the group of: further 2D image data which together with the 2D image data represents a pair of stereo images, or depth-related data indicative of a distance of objects shown in the 2D image data to a camera or viewer (Eom: paragraph 102, the depth information may be information on each pixel value for expressing a depth of at least one object included in the image).
With respect to claim 10, Eom as modified by Kao et al. disclose a display device comprising the system according to claim 1 (Eom: paragraph 62, Referring to FIG. 1, an electronic device 101 within a network environment 100).
With respect to claim 11, Eom as modified by Kao et al. disclose a computer-implemented method of providing views of an application to a window manager of an operating system, as executed by the system of claim 1; see rationale for rejection of claim 1.
With respect to claim 12, Eom as modified by Kao et al. disclose a non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising a computer program representing an application (Eom: paragraph 291, at least some of the devices (for example, modules or functions thereof) or the method (for example, operations) according to the present disclosure may be implemented by a command stored in a computer-readable storage medium in a programming module form), the computer program comprising instructions for causing a processor system to perform the method according to claim 11 (see rationale for rejection of claim 11).
Claim(s) 3 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Eom (U.S. PGPUB 20160261803) in view of Kao et al. (U.S. PGPUB 20140129977) and further in view of Menard et al. (U.S. PGPUB 20180096529).
With respect to claim 3, Eom as modified by Kao et al. disclose the system according to claim 1. However, Eom as modified by Kao et al. do not expressly disclose the application is configured to provide a barrier view stacked in between the primary view and the secondary view, wherein the barrier view is opaque and comprises homogenous image data.
Menard et al., who also deal with a multi-layer user interface, disclose a method wherein the application is configured to provide a barrier view stacked in between the primary view and the secondary view, wherein the barrier view is opaque and comprises homogenous image data (paragraph 44, The content platform (e.g., web browser) may render opaque background for the one or more of the root layer 402, scroll block layer 404 or text block layer 406 so that one or more surfaces or objects 408, 410 in an environment are obscured (e.g., blocked) from view when viewed in the field of view of an AR-device user interface (e.g., display)). The root layer or scroll block layer provides a barrier view stacked between the text block layer and content.
Eom, Kao et al., and Menard et al. are in the same field of endeavor, namely computer graphics.
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to apply the method wherein the application is configured to provide a barrier view stacked in between the primary view and the secondary view, wherein the barrier view is opaque and comprises homogenous image data, as taught by Menard et al., to the Eom as modified by Kao et al. system, because this may lay out and render with a desktop or mobile device for non-AR content (paragraph 44 of Menard et al.).
Claim(s) 4-7 and 13-14 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Eom (U.S. PGPUB 20160261803) in view of Kao et al. (U.S. PGPUB 20140129977) and further in view of Bennett et al. (U.S. PGPUB 20110164034).
With respect to claim 4, Eom as modified by Kao et al. disclose the system according to claim 1, wherein the one or more display server components comprise a 3D display server component for a 3D display (paragraph 75, the server 106 may include a group of one or more servers). However, Eom as modified by Kao et al. do not expressly disclose the application is configured to signal the 3D display server component that the at least two views represent 3D image content.
Bennett et al., who also deal with displaying content for a display, disclose a method wherein the application is configured to signal the 3D display server component that the at least two views represent 3D image content (paragraph 60, The command is received by an API, and processed by the API according to a calling convention for the particular call. The command may specify one or more parameters for the screen region. The parameters can specify, for example, one or more of: a type of video content to be displayed within the screen region (e.g., 2D, stereoscopic 3D, or a particular type of multi-view 3D), paragraph 103, As shown in FIG. 6, first application 606 transmits (e.g., streams) 3D content 622 to API 602. As described above for three-dimensional content, images of differing perspective are delivered to the right and left eyes of a viewer. The images are combined in the visual center of the brain of the viewer to be perceived as a three-dimensional image).
Eom, Kao et al., and Bennett et al. are in the same field of endeavor, namely computer graphics.
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to apply the method wherein the application is configured to signal the 3D display server component that the at least two views represent 3D image content, as taught by Bennett et al., to the Eom as modified by Kao et al. system, because different types of three-dimensional content (e.g., different resolutions, different numbers of image pairs, different stereoscopic depths, etc.) are enabled to be individually or simultaneously displayed. In embodiments, any number of different types of two-dimensional and three-dimensional content may be displayed in any number of regions of screen 618 (paragraph 105 of Bennett et al.).
With respect to claim 5, Eom as modified by Kao et al. and Bennett et al. disclose the system according to claim 4, wherein the 3D display server component provides an API for allowing applications to interface with the 3D display server component (Bennett et al.: paragraph 65, programming elements 108 may enable API 106 to configure and/or provide two- and three-dimensional content for display by display devices that are capable of separately displaying two-dimensional and three-dimensional content), and wherein the application is configured to signal the 3D display server component via the API that the at least two views represent 3D image content (Bennett et al.: paragraph 60, The command is received by an API, and processed by the API according to a calling convention for the particular call. The command may specify one or more parameters for the screen region. The parameters can specify, for example, one or more of: a type of video content to be displayed within the screen region (e.g., 2D, stereoscopic 3D, or a particular type of multi-view 3D), Bennett et al.: paragraph 103, As shown in FIG. 6, first application 606 transmits (e.g., streams) 3D content 622 to API 602. As described above for three-dimensional content, images of differing perspective are delivered to the right and left eyes of a viewer. The images are combined in the visual center of the brain of the viewer to be perceived as a three-dimensional image), for example by registering an identifier of the at least two views with the 3D display server component via the API (Bennett et al.: paragraph 66, Further commands and/or parameters may be defined to indicate various types of three-dimensional content, such as "3D-4" to indicate 3D multiview content with four camera views, "3D-8" to indicate 3D multiview content with eight camera views).
With respect to claim 6, Eom as modified by Kao et al. and Bennett et al. disclose the system according to claim 1, wherein the one or more display server components comprise a 3D display server component (Eom: paragraph 75, the server 106 may include a group of one or more servers), and wherein the 3D display server component is configured to detect that the at least two views represent 3D image content based on metadata of the application (Bennett et al.: paragraph 66, 2D/3D supporting programming elements 108 may be capable of enabling application 104 to display 2D and 3D content at display device 102 in a manner based on the content itself and/or based on one or more commands and/or parameters provided with the commands, one or more parameters may be included with commands/calls that indicate types and characteristics of 2D and 3D content and/or the screen regions in which the content is to be displayed).
With respect to claim 7, Eom as modified by Kao et al. and Bennett et al. disclose the system according to claim 6, wherein the metadata of the application comprises an identifier of the application (Bennett et al.: paragraph 103, As shown in FIG. 6, first application 606 transmits (e.g., streams) 3D content 622 to API 602. As described above for three-dimensional content, images of differing perspective are delivered to the right and left eyes of a viewer, paragraph 104, the second content, which may be two-dimensional or three-dimensional content, may be internally generated by second application 608 or received from an external source and processed by application 608). The identifier corresponds to a first application or a second application.
With respect to claim 13, Eom as modified by Kao et al. and Bennett et al. disclose a computer-implemented method of compositing views of an application executed on an operating system, wherein the views represent 3D image content for a 3D display (Eom: paragraph 101, The display module 310 may display the images in three dimensions by displaying the images on the display according to the additional information), wherein the operating system is configured to provide:
a window manager for managing visibility of views generated by applications (Eom: paragraph 87, The window manager 242 may manage a GUI resource used in a screen);
a 3D display server component for a 3D display (Eom: paragraph 75, the server 106 may include a group of one or more servers), the 3D display server component being configured to, based on visibility information obtained from the window manager, composite the views into a display signal for the 3D display (Eom: paragraph 101, The display module 310 may display the plurality of images on the display such that the plurality of images overlap with each other according to each piece of additional information based on a layer of each image, Eom: paragraph 112, According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the update module 320 may determine an area in which the changed higher layer image and the lower layer image overlap and acquire information on the determined area in which the images overlap);
wherein the application is configured to provide the 3D image content to the window manager in the form of at least two views which are arranged with respect to each other in accordance with a view configuration (Eom: paragraph 101, Further, the display module 310 may display a plurality of images including additional information. The display module 310 may display the plurality of images on the display such that the plurality of images overlap with each other according to each piece of additional information based on a layer of each image), wherein the at least two views comprise a primary view comprising 2D image data (Eom: paragraph 182, In general, when an image 1420 does not include additional information, the image 1420 is two-dimensionally displayed through the electronic device 101) and a secondary view comprising 3D-enabling auxiliary data which is indicative of depth of the 2D image data (Eom: paragraph 102, the additional information may include at least one piece of depth information and height information. The additional information may be included in a data format of the image, Eom: paragraph 182, when the image 1420 includes additional information data 1410, an electronic device 1440 may display the image 1420 according to the additional information data 1410 so as to stereoscopically display the image 1420 in three dimensions), wherein the application is configured to:
i) stack the primary view in front of the secondary view to provide a view configuration in which the primary view occludes the secondary view (Eom: paragraph 185, The first image may be a higher layer than the second image. In this case, the electronic device 101 may overlappingly display the first image on the second image, paragraph 195, electronic device 101 may overlappingly display the first image on the second image), or
ii) provide the primary view to the window manager by indicating a viewport which comprises the 2D image data of the primary view and provide the secondary view to the window manager by arranging the 3D-enabling auxiliary data of the secondary view outside of the viewport,
to cause a 2D display server component for a 2D display to omit drawing, or overdraw, the secondary view when compositing the at least two views into the display signal (Eom: paragraph 76, all or some of the operations performed by the electronic device 101 may be performed by another electronic device or a plurality of electronic devices (for example, the electronic device 102 or 104 or the server 106), Eom: paragraph 187, In operation 1530, the electronic device 101 may display the second image according to the changed first image and the updated additional information corresponding to the second image. As described above, by updating the additional information based on the input, the electronic device 101 may change the second image according to the change in the first image and display the second image on the display);
the method comprising, by the 3D display server component: determining that the at least two views represent 3D image content on the basis of signaling received from the application (Bennett et al.: paragraph 60, The command is received by an API, and processed by the API according to a calling convention for the particular call. The command may specify one or more parameters for the screen region. The parameters can specify, for example, one or more of: a type of video content to be displayed within the screen region (e.g., 2D, stereoscopic 3D, or a particular type of multi-view 3D), Bennett et al.: paragraph 103, As shown in FIG. 6, first application 606 transmits (e.g., streams) 3D content 622 to API 602. As described above for three-dimensional content, images of differing perspective are delivered to the right and left eyes of a viewer. The images are combined in the visual center of the brain of the viewer to be perceived as a three-dimensional image), or metadata of the application (Bennett et al.: paragraph 66, 2D/3D supporting programming elements 108 may be capable of enabling application 104 to display 2D and 3D content at display device 102 in a manner based on the content itself and/or based on one or more commands and/or parameters provided with the commands, one or more parameters may be included with commands/calls that indicate types and characteristics of 2D and 3D content and/or the screen regions in which the content is to be displayed); and
processing the primary view and the secondary view to obtain the display signal for the 3D display (Eom: paragraph 182, when the image 1420 includes additional information data 1410, an electronic device 1440 may display the image 1420 according to the additional information data 1410 so as to stereoscopically display the image 1420 in three dimensions). It would have been obvious to apply the method of determining that the at least two views represent 3D image content on the basis of signaling received from the application, or metadata of the application, because different types of three-dimensional content (e.g., different resolutions, different numbers of image pairs, different stereoscopic depths, etc.) are enabled to be individually or simultaneously displayed. In embodiments, any number of different types of two-dimensional and three-dimensional content may be displayed in any number of regions of screen 618 (paragraph 105 of Bennett et al.). Kao et al. discloses providing a view configuration in which the primary view entirely occludes the secondary view and causing the display component to entirely omit drawing, or entirely overdraw, the second view when compositing the at least two views into the display signal (paragraph 68, At 418, the graphics device 226 may render and/or paint the composite notification message 308. The graphics device 226 may render and/or paint the composite notification message 308 such that message content of the primary notification message 316 overlaps message content of the secondary notification message 318 or vice-versa. In some instances, the overlapping of the message content of the primary notification message 316 and the secondary notification message 318 may be complete such that no portion of the underlying message content is viewable when the composite notification message 308 is provided to the display device 232, paragraph 83, The primary notification representation 602(1) and the secondary notification representation 604(1) may also be arranged such that they have the same range of X and Y display coordinates, i.e., the primary notification representation 602(1) may completely overlay the secondary notification representation 604(1)). It would have been obvious to apply the method of Kao et al. to the 2D display server component of the Eom as modified by Bennett et al. system; see rationale for rejection of claim 1.
With respect to claim 14, Eom as modified by Kao et al. and Bennett et al. disclose a non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising a computer program representing a 3D display server component (Eom: paragraph 291, at least some of the devices (for example, modules or functions thereof) or the method (for example, operations) according to the present disclosure may be implemented by a command stored in a computer-readable storage medium in a programming module form), the computer program comprising instructions for causing a processor system to perform the method according to claim 13 (see rationale for rejection of claim 13).
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see pages 5-8, filed February 4, 2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1, 11, and 13 under U.S.C. 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Kao et al. (U.S. PGPUB 20140129977).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
U.S. PGPUB 20160225012 to Ha et al. for a method of superimposing a primary display area with secondary content
U.S. PGPUB 20130305184 to Kim et al. for a method of displaying a third display window to overlap a first display window and second display window.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ANDREW GUS YANG whose telephone number is (571)272-5514. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9 AM - 5:30 PM.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Kent Chang can be reached at (571)272-7667. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/ANDREW G YANG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2614
2/20/26