DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Responsive to the communication dated 1/27/2026.
Claims 1, 7, 10, 11, 13, 17, 18, 19, 20 are amended.
Claims 2, 3, 15, 16 are cancelled.
Claims 21, 22 are newly presented.
Claims 1, 4 – 13, 16 - 22 are presented for examination.
Final Action
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 nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) 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.
Response to Arguments
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
The Applicant has cancelled claims 14 and 15 to overcome the rejection under 35 USC 101. Accordingly, the rejection under 35 USC 101 is withdrawn.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The Applicant asserts that the independent claims have been amended and that the art of record does not teach these amended elements. In particular the Applicant asserts that the features of “generating a first bounding area corresponding to the design” and “generating second bounding area, each corresponding to each piece in the design object” and “converting each of the unadjusted distances into corresponding unit distance by normalizing each of the unadjusted distances using a predetermined unit” and “adjusting distances between the first center and the second centers by increasing the distance based on the corresponding unit distance” are not made obvious by the art.
In response the Examiner notes that the Applicants assertion that li_2008 does not make obvious “generating a first bounding area corresponding to the design” and “generating second bounding area, each corresponding to each piece in the design object” is incorrect. For example, Li_2008, at page 5 in the section titled “splitting container” Li_2008 teaches that “… if some of the part P are themselves containers… the bounding boxes of the nested containers… nested container bounding boxes…” This teaches that individual parts P of the assembly do in fact have their own bounding boxes.
Nevertheless, the previous rejection is withdrawn and a new rejection is presented below that addresses the newly presented claims and the amended subject matter.
End Response to Arguments
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of 35 U.S.C. 112(a):
(a) IN GENERAL.—The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor or joint inventor of carrying out the invention.
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112:
The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor of carrying out his invention.
Claims 1, 4 – 13, 16 - 22 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), first paragraph, as failing to comply with the written description requirement. The claim(s) contains subject matter which was not described in the specification in such a way as to reasonably convey to one skilled in the relevant art that the inventor or a joint inventor, or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the inventor(s), at the time the application was filed, had possession of the claimed invention.
The Applicant has amended independent claims 1 and 13 to recite: “… converting each of the unadjusted distance into corresponding unit distance by normalizing each of the unadjusted distance using a predetermined unit; Adjusting distance between the first center and the second center by increasing the distance based on the corresponding unit…”, however, this amendment has new matter.
In particular the elements of “normalizing each of the unadjusted distance using a predetermined unit” does not appear to be part of the original disclosure because a search of the specification does not show any use of the word “normalizing” and does not disclose how to achieve “normalizing” by “using a predetermined unit.”
The original claim 3 recited: “converting the unadjusted distances into unit distances; and setting the adjusted distances based on the unit distances” and while “converting the unadjusted distance into unit distance” discloses the concept of “normalizing” the original claim does not disclose normalizing by “using a predetermine unit.” When reviewing the previous claim, claim 2 recites a “predetermined ratio”, however, this was used to adjust distance and not as part of any disclosed normalization. Accordingly, it appears that the Applicant has introduced a new concept into the claim that was not present in the original disclosure.
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.
Claims 1, 13, 20, 4, 5, 16, 6, 17, 7, 18, 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over li_2008 (Automated Generation of Interactive 3D Exploded View Diagrams, Aug 2008) in view of Vieilly_2013 (US 8,452,435 B1 May 28, 2013) in view of Exploded_View_2017 (Exploded view algorithm for CAD, Adaline Simonian, Aug 13, 2017 Stack Overflow) in view of Normalize_2016 (Normalized distance between two points – MATLAB, Stack Overflow, May 17, 2016).
Claim 1. li_2008 makes obvious “A method of generating an exploded view of a design object, the method comprising (abstract: “… we present an automatic method for computing explosion graphs… also includes an interface that allows user to interactively explore our exploded views using both directed controls and high-level interaction modes…”; page 5 section 7: “in this paper, we have presented techniques for creating and viewing interactive exploded view illustrations of 3D models composed of many distinct parts. Our contributions include an automatic method for decomposing models into exploded layers and algorithms for generating dynamic exploded views…”):
Generating a first bounding area corresponding to the design object (Page 4 section 4.3: “… axis aligned cube that is centered at the model’s bounding box center and is large enough to ensure that the entire model is visible…”; page 5: section 5 “… bounding box diagonal for the entire model…”) Generating second bounding areas, each corresponding to each piece in the design object
(section 4.2: “the system determines the set of parts P is subset of S that are unblocked in at least one direction by any other active part. For each part p is an element of P, the system computes the minimum distance p would have to move (in one of its unblocked directions) to escape the bounding box of the active parts in contact with p… some of the parts in P are themselves containers, the system
emphasizes their concentric containment relationships by considering only explosion directions where the bounding boxes of the nested containers remain inside the exploded bounding box of c. If none of the splitting directions satisfy this constraint, the system chooses the splitting direction that causes the smallest total volume of nested container bounding boxes to extend beyond the exploded bounding box of c…” NOTE: the above teaches collision detection (i.e., blocked/unblocked) which, at least, implies to those of ordinary skill in the art bounding boxes around the individual parts because it is the intersection between bounding boxes that indicate collisions (i.e., blocking). Also, the above teaches that the individual parts p in the set P may themselves be containers (i.e., sub-assemblies) and that these individual parts p in the set of P have bounding boxes. In other words, “nested” bounding boxes. There is a bounding box around sets of parts and then each part in the set has a bounding box and if the part is a sub-assembly there are more bounding boxes around each of the sub-parts of the sub-assembly.);
determining adjusted positions of the pieces (section 3.1: “when creating exploded views, illustrators carefully choose the direction in which parts should be separated (explosion directions) and how far parts should be offset from each other… the offsets between parts are chosen such that all the parts of interest are visible…”; section 4.1: “… an explosion direction and the current offset of p from its initial position…”; section 5.1: “… allows users to expand… to its fully exploded or collapsed position by updating its current offset…”); and displaying the pieces of the design objects at the adjusted positions (Figure 1, Figure 2, Figure 10).
Li_2008 does not explicitly recite: “…Determining unadjusted distances between a fist center of the first bounding area and second centers of the second bounding areas; converting each of the unadjusted distances into corresponding unit distance by normalizing each of the unadjusted distances using a predetermined unit; Adjusting distance between the first center and the second centers by increasing the distances based on the corresponding unit distances; determining adjusted positions of the pieces according to the adjusted distances…”
Vieilly_2013, however, makes obvious “generating a first bounding area corresponding to the design object; generating second bounding areas, each corresponding to each piece in the design object; determining unadjusted distances between a first center of the first bounding area and second centers of the second bounding areas;
determining adjusted positions of the pieces according to adjusted distances; and displaying the pieces of the design objects at the adjusted positions
( COL 8: “… FIGS. 19 and 20, reference is made to bounding spheres. However, in another example, bounding boxes could be used rather than bounding spheres. In step 404, a global bounding sphere is evaluated. In step 406, the directions of the actions are determined according to all of the bounding spheres for the parts. In step 408, the displacement values along the previously calculated directions are determined for all parts, according to their bounding sphere size and intersections… FIG. 20 illustrates an example of the movement of the bounding spheres for the parts with respect to a center of global bounding sphere. A vector between the center of the global bounding sphere 420 and the bounding sphere 422 for a part… translation along the vector can be computed…”
NOTE: by definition a vector is a magnitude and direction. The magnitude is a distance between the centers of the part bounding sphere and the center of the global bounding sphere. This is the determination of the unadjusted distance. Further, translations along the vector are an indication of adjusted distance between the first center and the second center.
COL 9 – 10 item 1: “… determining a global bounding region for the sub-assembly; determining a bounding region for each of the parts of the sub-assembly; for each of the parts of the sub-assembly, dynamically determining a vector for the respective parts according to a center of the global bounding region for the sub-assembly and a center of the bounding region for the respective part; dynamically determine a displacement for each of the parts in the direction of its respective vector… display each of the parts of the sub-assembly at a location indicated by the direction of its respective vector ands its respective displacement…”).
li_2008 and Vieilly_2013 are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor called displaying views of objects. Before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to combine li_2008 and Vieilly_2013. The rationale for doing so would have been that Li_2008 teaches algorithms and methods to generate exploded view diagrams but does not explicitly teach to have a computer that performs the algorithms and methods. Vieilly_2013 teaches a computer with software executable on the computer that can perform algorithms and methods that display an exploded view of an assembly of objects. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine li_2008 and Vieilly_2013 for the benefit of having a suite of algorithms and methods in conjunction with a computer that can execute the algorithms and methods and display the exploded view of objects in an assembly to obtain the invention as specified in the claims.
li_2008 and Vieilly_2013 does not explicitly recite: “…Converting each of the unadjusted distances into corresponding unit distance by normalizing each of the unadjusted distances using a predetermined unit; adjusting distance between the first center and the second centers by increasing the distances based on the corresponding unit distances…”
Exploded_View_2017; however, makes obvious “…Converting each of the unadjusted distances into corresponding unit distanceadjusting distance between the first center and the second centers by increasing the distances based on the corresponding unit distances…” (page 1: “… work with the center of the bounding box of each part… scale the position of each part… to scale the position by any float value to expand or contract the exploded view, with 1.0 being the original assembled model…” page 2: “…To illustrate them with an example I'll use the following numbers (bounding boxes along the axis only, only five parts):
P1: [ 0,10] (battery)
P2: [10,14] (motor)
P3: [14,16] (cog)
P4: [16,24] (bit holder)
P5: [18,26] (gear casing)
While parts P1 to P4 exactly touch each other, P4 and P5 actually overlap.
The first one is an algorithm which basically scales the distances by a factor, such as you proposed. It will suffer if size of pieces is much different in an assembly but also for overlapping parts (e.g. in your example along the axis the extension of circle cog is much smaller than bit holder).
Let the scaling factor be f, then the center of each bounding box is scaled by f, but extension is not.
Parts then would be
P1: 5 + [-5,5] => P1': 5*f + [-5,5]
P2: 12 + [-2,2] => P2': 12*f + [-2,2]
P3: 15 + [-1,1] => P3': 15*f + [-1,1]
P4: 20 + [-4,4] => P4': 20*f + [-4,4]
P5: 22 + [-4,4] => P5': 22*f + [-4,4]
The distance between the parts P1'to P4is then given by
P2' - P1' : (12*f-2) - (5*f+5) = 7*(f-1)
P3' - P2' : (15*f-1) - (12*f+2) = 3*(f-1)
P4' - P3' : (20*f-4) - (15*f+1) = 5*(f-5)
As expected the difference is zero for f = 0…” EXAMINER NOTE: The above teaches to find the distance between the center of bounding boxes of individual parts and the to convert this original position distance (i.e., unadjusted distance) to a unit distance (i.e., 1) and then to adjust the distance between the center of the bounding boxes by a factor multiplied with the original distance. By multiplying the factor against the original distance the increased distance is based on the corresponding unit distance.)
li_2008 and Exploded_View_2017 are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor called creating exploded/expanded views. Before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to combine li_2008 and Exploded_View_2017. The rationale for doing so would have been that Li_2008 teaches to automatically explode view of CAD assemblies with nested sub-assemblies and parts. Li_2008; however, does not appear to teach adjustable scale exploded views. Exploded_View_2017, however, teaches that exploded view drawing may be scaled up and down. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine li_2008 and Exploded_View_2017 for the benefit of being able to scale the exploded view as needed/desired to obtain the invention as specified in the claims.
li_2008 and Vielly_2013 and Exploded_View_2017 does not recites to converting each of the unadjusted distances into corresponding unit distance “by normalizing each of the unadjusted distances using a predetermined unit.”
Normalize_2016, however, makes obvious “by normalizing each of the unadjusted distances using a predetermined unit” (Page 2:
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EXAMINER NOTE: the above teaches to normalize the distance between two points (Euclidean distance) to a scale of 1 and that this is done by multiplying the unadjusted distance by normFactor-1 (i.e., 1 over the normFactor). The normFactor is determined before it can be used to normalize the distance and is therefore “predetermined.”).
Exploded_View_2017 and Normalize_2016 are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor called adjusting scale/distance. Before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to combine Exploded_View_2017 and Normalize_2016.
The rationale for doing so would have been that Exploded_View_2017 teaches to set the original distance between to point to 1 and Normalize_2016 teaches how to set the distance between to points to 1. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Exploded_View_2017 and Normalize_2016 for the benefit of having an original distance be the unit distance so that the scaling factors are easily understood on a percentage bases to the original size/distance between objects (e.g., 2 = 200% larger, 3 = 300% larger, etc.) to obtain the invention as specified in the claims.
Claim 13. The limitations of claim 13 are substantially the same as those of claim 1 and are rejected due to the same reasons as outlined above for claim 1. Vieilly_2013 makes obvious the further limitations of: “A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to:” (Fig. 1 storage 26, memory 14; COL 4: “… the present example embodiment comprising a computer application formed by a computer program that is operable in a computer system to carry out the various methods described herein…”).
Claim 20. The limitations of claim 20 are substantially the same as those of claim 1 and are rejected due to the same reasons as outlined above for claim 1. Vieilly_2013 makes obvious the further limitations of: “An electronic device for generating an exploded view of a design object, the electronic device comprising a processor, the processor configured to:” (Fig. 1 CPU 12; Fig. 16, 17, 18 illustrate exploded views; COL 1: “… the invention seeks to facilitate the display and/or manipulation of data defining assemblies to enable the generation of exploded views in an efficient manner…”).
Claim 4. Vieilly_2013 “wherein the adjusting of the positions comprises determining the adjusted distances based on a user selection input” (COL 6: “… FIG. 10 illustrates an example of the result of a translation in the direction of the axis 236. For example, this can be effected by the user selecting the translation control arrow 237… clicking the mouse button and then dragging the control by a desired amount…”).
Claim 5, 16. Li_2008 makes obvious “further comprising: adjusting a distance between a third center of each of third bounding areas corresponding to each of a plurality of design elements in a piece of the pieces and a second center of the piece” (Figure 1 The inner turbine assembly comprises a group of components that collectively have a third center and individually have centers. The assembly inner assembly itself and the outer shell make up two design elements of thew whole system. Figure 2 illustrates nested exploded views. The outer shell and the drill bit sub-assembly. Figure 11)
Vielly_2013 also makes obvious “further comprising: adjusting a distance between a third center of each of third bounding areas corresponding to each of a plurality of design elements in a piece of the pieces and a second center of the piece” (Fig. 17, 18).
Claim 6, 17. Li_2008 makes obvious “wherein an adjusted distance between the first center and one of the second centers is set to be greater than a distance between the second center and the third center” (Figure 1. The outer shell is separated farther apart than the separation of the inner turbine sub-assembly. Figure 2, Figure 11)
Vielly_2013 also makes obvious wherein an adjusted distance between the first center and one of the second centers is set to be greater than a distance between the second center and the third center” (Figures 17, 18).
Claim 7, 18. Li_2008 makes obvious “further comprising: Restoring the plurality of pieces from the adjusted positions to unadjusted positions according to the unadjusted distances, responsive to receiving a user selection input; and displaying the design object and each of pieces in the design object at the unadjusted positions” (page 4 section 5.1 “our system allows users to expand or collapse the entire exploded view with a single click… explode or collapsed position by updating its current offset… the system collapses parts in the opposite order…”; section 5.3: “… parts are exploded away from adjacent portions of the model as the user hovers over them with the mouse. When the mouse moves away, the part that was beneath the mouse returns to its initial position…”).
Vielly_2013 also makes obvious “further comprising: Restoring the plurality of pieces from the adjusted positions to unadjusted positions according to the unadjusted distances, responsive to receiving a user selection input; and Displaying the design object and each of pieces in the design object at the unadjusted positions” (Fig. 7 block 212 “restore initial position”).
Claim 21. Exploded_View_2017 makes obvious “wherein the adjusting the distance comprises: generating a corresponding displacement value of each of the unadjusted distances by multiplying a predetermined ratio to the corresponding unit distance; and adjusting the distance by adding the corresponding displacement value to each of the unadjusted distances” (page 2: Let the scaling factor be f, then the center of each bounding box is scaled by f,… Parts then would be
P1: 5 + [-5,5] => P1': 5*f + [-5,5]
P2: 12 + [-2,2] => P2': 12*f + [-2,2]
P3: 15 + [-1,1] => P3': 15*f + [-1,1]
P4: 20 + [-4,4] => P4': 20*f + [-4,4]
P5: 22 + [-4,4] => P5': 22*f + [-4,4]…).
Claims 8, 10, 19, 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over li_2008 in view of Vieilly_2013 in view of Exploded_View_2017 in view of Normalize_2016 in view of Han_2021 (US 2021/0166472 A1 published Jun. 3, 2021).
Claim 8, 19. Han_2021 makes obvious “further comprising: receiving selection of at least one of the pieces or design elements in each of the pieces in the exploded view with the pieces or the design elements displayed in the adjusted positions; and modifying design data corresponding to at least one of the selected pieces or design element, wherein the design data includes data about at least one of a pattern, a material, a supplemental material, or a measurement of the selected piece or the selected design element” (Fig. 3, Fig. 4, par 72: “… the ratio of each part…”).
Vieilly_2013 and Han_2021 are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor called displaying exploded views of objects. Before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to combine Vieilly_2013 and Han_2021. The rationale for doing so would have been that Vieilly_2013 teaches to display an exploded view next to user interface menus that allow the user to make modifications to the exploded view. See for example Fig. 8 which illustrates a menu that includes “attribute”, “properties”, “physical properties” options. While the implication is that attributes and physical properties of the assembly components may be modified by this menu, Vieilly_2013 does not explicitly teach that such properties include, for example, the claimed “pattern, a material”. Han_2021, however, clearly illustrates a user interface with an exploded view that allows a user to modify “physical” properties in box 413 of FIG 3. Box 423 of FIG. 4 illustrates modifications of object materials.
Accordingly, the Office finds that:
The prior art contained a “base” device (method, or product) upon which the claimed invention can be seen as an “improvement” because while Vieilly_2013 teaches to modify properties of the assembly components Vieilly_2013 doesn’t teaches to modify the material of the components or the size of the components.
The prior art contained a “comparable” device (method, or product that is not the same as the base device) that has been improved in the same way as the claimed invention as illustrated by Han_2021.
One of ordinary skill in the art could have applied the known “improvement” technique in the same way to the base device (method or product) and the results would have been predictable to one of ordinary skill in the art.
Therefore, the Office concludes that it would have been obvious to use the technique of Han_2021 to improve the similar device (methods, or product) of Vieilly_2013 in the same way as taught by Han_2021.
Claim 10. Li_2008 makes obvious “further comprising: displaying at least one of the pieces or one of the design elements selected based on a user selection input in the exploded view with the at least one of the pieces or one of the design elements at positions that are adjusted” (Page 4 section 5.1: “… the system also supports the direct manipulation of parts. As the user drags a part p, the system p along its explosion direction and updates the current offset of p…”; Page 4 section 5.3: “… parts are exploded away from adjacent portions of the model as the user hovers over them with the mouse…”; Page 4 section 5.4: “… interface for generating exploded views that expose user-selected target parts. The user just chooses the targets from a list of pats and the system automatically generates a labeled exploded view illustration…”)
Vielly_2013 also makes obvious “further comprising: displaying at least one of the pieces or one of the design elements selected based on a user selection input in the exploded view with the at least one of the pieces or one of the design elements at positions that are adjusted” (COL 4: “… a selected part of parts is or are selected for drag and drop manipulation…”; COL 5: “… the user is able to manipulate those parts… the manipulation can take the form of the user selecting a translation… associated with a coordinate axis, for example by putting a mouse pointer over the control concerned, clicking the mouse button and then dragging…”).
Claim 12. Han_2021 makes obvious “further comprising: displaying a modification object for modifying design data and the exploded view on a screen; and changing the exploded view based on modification of the design data of the modification object” (Fig. 3, Fig. 4, par 72: “… the ratio of each part…”).
Vieilly_2013 and Han_2021 are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor called displaying exploded views of objects. Before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to combine Vieilly_2013 and Han_2021. The rationale for doing so would have been that Vieilly_2013 teaches to display an exploded view next to user interface menus that allow the user to make modifications to the exploded view. See for example Fig. 8 which illustrates a menu that includes “attribute”, “properties”, “physical properties” options. While the implication is that attributes and physical properties of the assembly components may be modified by this menu, Vieilly_2013 does not explicitly teach that such properties include, for example, the claimed “pattern, a material”. Han_2021, however, clearly illustrates a user interface with an exploded view that allows a user to modify “physical” properties in box 413 of FIG 3. Box 423 of FIG. 4 illustrates modifications of object materials.
Accordingly, the Office finds that:
The prior art contained a “base” device (method, or product) upon which the claimed invention can be seen as an “improvement” because while Vieilly_2013 teaches to modify properties of the assembly components Vieilly_2013 doesn’t teaches to modify the material of the components or the size of the components.
The prior art contained a “comparable” device (method, or product that is not the same as the base device) that has been improved in the same way as the claimed invention as illustrated by Han_2021.
One of ordinary skill in the art could have applied the known “improvement” technique in the same way to the base device (method or product) and the results would have been predictable to one of ordinary skill in the art.
Therefore, the Office concludes that it would have been obvious to use the technique of Han_2021 to improve the similar device (methods, or product) of Vieilly_2013 in the same way as taught by Han_2021.
Claims 9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over li_2008 in view of Vieilly_2013 in view of Exploded_View_2017 in view of Normalize_2016 in view of Pate_2017 (US 2017/0221237 A1).
Claim 9. Pate_2017 makes obvious “further comprising: displaying the selected piece or the selected design element adjusted according to the modified design data in real time” (par 23: “… may receive user input indicating manipulations of the three-dimensional model, such as moving, rotating, and/or changing zoom levels of the model. Updated images of the views may be generated such that the views the updates in real-time. Such updates may result in a transition from a first to a second view of a three-dimensional graphical model being presented on a display as a moving real-time transition that responds to real-time interactive user controls…”; par 47: “model generator 112 may be implemented in any suitable way. In some embodiments, model generator 112 may be known CAD software or software that configures computing device 106 to generate a three-dimensional model…” par 78: “… data may be displayed in an exploded view…”).
li_2008 and Pate_2017 are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor called displaying models. Before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to combine li_2008 and Pate_2017. The rationale for doing so would have been Li_2008 teaches a user interface for interactive control of a 3D models and teaches to perform, for example, moving the 3D model object. Pate_2017 teaches to have real-time response to real-time user controls when displaying models and that the models can even be 3D exploded views. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine the interactive controls for interacting with 3D models as taught by Li_2008 with the real-time response taught by Late_2017 for the benefit of allowing the user that is manipulating the model to see the affect of their control commands without have to wait to obtain the invention as specified in the claims.
Claims 11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over li_2008 in view of Vieilly_2013 in view of Exploded_View_2017 in view of Normalize_2016 in view of Han_2021 in view of Chita-gun_2000 (EP 1 087 342 A2 published 28/03/2001).
Claim 11. Chita-gun_2000 makes obvious “further comprising: decreasing a transparency of at least one of the pieces or one of the design elements selected based on a user selection input in the exploded view with the at least one of the pieces or one of the design elements at positions that are adjusted” (abstract: “… the transparency of the components is specified… a clear perspective of the device comprising complicated components can be obtained because some components created with 3-D CAD system are rendered transparent…” Fig. 1 block S16 “specify component transparency”; par 112: “… internal components can be made visible by specifying outer components as being transparent…”; par 14: “… when performing the operation of specifying the transparency of a component, a level of transparency is preferably specified…”).
li_2008 and Chita-gun_2000 are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor called displaying objects. Before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to combine li_2008 and Chita-gun_2000. The rationale for doing so would have been that Li_2008 teaches to display complicated assemblies and Chita-gun_2000 teaches that to obtain a clear perspective of devices comprising complicated assemblies of components some components can be selected and the transparency of those components can be specified (see abstract, par 5, 11). Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine li_2008 and Chita-gun_2000 for the benefit of having the ability to show clear perspective when displaying a complicated assembly of components to obtain the invention as specified in the claims.
Claims 22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over li_2008 in view of Vieilly_2013 in view of Exploded_View_2017 in view of Normalize_2016 in view of Bottger_2006 (Complex Logarithmic Views for Small Details in Large Contexts, IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, VOL. 12, No. 5, September/October 2006).
Claim 22. Bottger_2005 makes obvious “wherein the normalization comprises: normalizing each of the unadjusted distances using a log unit” (Abstract: “… makes it difficult or even impossible to recognize shapes for large differences in magnification factors. In this paper we propose to use the complex logarithm and the complex root functions to show very small details even in very large context… thus keeping shapes intact and recognizable. They allow showing details that are orders of magnitude smaller than their surroundings in combination with their context in one seamless visualization…”).
Exploded_View_2017 in view of Bottger_2006 are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor called visualizing objects. Before the effective filing date, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to combine Exploded_View_2017 in view of Bottger_2006.
The rationale for doing so would have been That Exploded_View_2017 teaches to use a scaling factor to display object that different sizes and states that in such a scenario the displayed items may “suffer if size of pieces is much different in an assembly.” Bottger_2006 teaches that when displaying this that have different sizes to use logarithm scale because this will allow “to show very small details even in very large context” such as when a CAD assembly has small parts and very large parts. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Exploded_View_2017 in view of Bottger_2006 for the benefit of being able to display both very small and very large objects in an exploded view and be able to see details to obtain the invention as specified in the claims.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to BRIAN S COOK whose telephone number is (571)272-4276. The examiner can normally be reached 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM.
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/BRIAN S COOK/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2187