DETAILED ACTION
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 Objections
Claims 5 and 17 objected to because of the following informalities: a phrase ‘a dispatching command” needs to be re-written as “the dispatching command” if these are the same command mentioned in claims 1 and 13 respectively. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-7, 9-19 and 21-24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Stephen EP 3800151 A1.
Regarding claim 1, Stephen discloses
An elevator control system (fig. 1, item 2), comprising: a plurality of call-out units (item 22), each of which is provided at a corresponding elevator landing station (item 8) [0049, 0042], a control unit (item 24) configured to perform the following operations: receiving a call request message from one or more of the call-out units, wherein the call request message comprises, in addition to an identification of a departure floor (a desired destination floor 9) [0076], at least one of: an identification of a call requester (passenger entering destination requests) and a set of elevator resource demand features (size of a group of passengers 30) associated with the call requester: and generating a dispatching command (when destination dispatched is applied) for an elevator car in response to the received call request message [0055, 0056, 0076].
Regarding claim 13, Stephen discloses
A method for controlling an elevator, comprising: A. generating a call request message by one or more of a plurality of call-out units, wherein each call-out unit is provided at a corresponding elevator landing station, the call request message comprises, in addition to an identification of a departure floor, at least one of: an identification of a call requester and a set of elevator resource demand features associated with the call requester; and B. generating, by a control unit, a dispatching command for an elevator car in response to the call request message (See claim 1 rejection for details).
Regarding claims 2 and 14, Stephen discloses
, wherein the call requester comprises a passenger and device (“smart-phones”), the call-out unit is configured to: receive a user identity identification or device identification from a mobile terminal or device via a wireless channel, and send to the control unit a floor identification corresponding to the call-out unit and the received user identity identification or device identification [0037, 0052, 0055].
Regarding claims 3 and 15, Stephen discloses, wherein the set of elevator resource demand features comprises features in at least one of the following aspects: size of space occupied by the call requester [0057], weight of the call requester, priority level of the call requester to take an elevator, restrictive requirements for the call requester to take the elevator with other call requesters, and restrictive requirements for the call requester to take the elevator alone.
Regarding claims 4 and 16, Stephen discloses, wherein the size of space occupied by the call requester is represented by discrete values (a logic), and each discrete value corresponds to a space range [0079].
Regarding claims 5 and 17, Stephen discloses, wherein the call request message comprises the identification of the departure floor and the identification of the call requester, the operation of generating the dispatching command for the elevator car is implemented in the following manner: determining the set of elevator resource demand features corresponding to the identification of the call requester; determining, based on the determined set of elevator resource demand features, an elevator car matching the call request message; generating a dispatching command instructing the matched elevator car to travel to the departure floor [0055, 0056, 0075, 0076].
Regarding claims 6 and 18, Stephen discloses, wherein the control unit comprises local memory (database 34) storing the set of elevator resource demand features of the call requester, and the control unit obtains the set of elevator resource demand features corresponding to the identification of the call requester by accessing the local memory [0094].
Regarding claims 7 and 19, Stephen discloses, wherein the set of elevator resource demand features of the call requester is stored in cloud, and the control unit obtains the set of elevator resource demand features corresponding to the identification of the call requester by accessing the cloud [0061, 0094].
Regarding claims 9 and 21, Stephen discloses, wherein the call request message comprises the identification of the departure floor and the set of elevator resource demand features, the operation of generating the dispatching command for the elevator car is implemented in the following manner: determining an elevator car matching the call request message based on the set of elevator resource demand features in the call request message; generating a dispatching command instructing the matched elevator car to travel to the departure floor [0055-0057].
Regarding claims 10 and 22, Stephen discloses, wherein the call-out unit is configured to perform the following operations: obtaining an image near a panel of the call-out unit when the call-out unit receives a user input; extracting a profile of a moving object in the obtained image; determining, based on the extracted profile, a set of elevator resource demand features associated with the call requester [0039, 0040, 0089, 0104].
Regarding claims 11 and 23, Stephen discloses, wherein the call request message comprises the identification of the departure floor, the identification of the call requester and the set of elevator resource demand features, the control unit is further configured to perform at least one of the following operations: storing the set of elevator resource demand features corresponding to the identification of the call requester in local memory of the control unit; uploading the set of elevator resource demand features corresponding to the identification of the call requester to cloud [0061, 0094].
Regarding claim 12, Stephen discloses,
An elevator system (fig. 1) comprising the elevator control system of claim 1 (see claim 1 rejection for details).
Regarding claim 24, Stephen discloses,
A computer-readable storage medium having instructions stored in the computer-readable storage medium (database), when the instructions are executed by a processor (item 24 or IT infrastructure) [0093, 0094], the processor is caused to execute the method of claim 13 (see claim 13 rejection for detail).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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 8 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Stephen EP 3800151 A1.
Regarding claims 8 and 20, Stephen discloses wherein the set of elevator resource demand features of the call requester is stored in local memory of the control unit and in cloud, and the control unit first obtains the set of elevator resource demand features corresponding to the identification of the call requester by accessing the local memory (locally), and obtains the set of elevator resource demand features corresponding to the identification of the call requester by accessing the cloud when the obtaining fails [0061, 0075, 0094].
Stephen does not explicitly say “when the obtaining fails”. However, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to store the set of elevator resource demand features and access via the cloud when the obtaining fails to achieve redundancy.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
HU (CN109095297B) discloses sending an elevator request comprising a user identification, a starting floor and a target floor to a cloud server.
Friedli et al. (US 5,689,094) disclose a storage device which stores information about the desired destination floor or serve for the identification of the elevator user.
Berryhill (US 2016/0221791 A1) discloses assigning elevator calls.
Nichols et al (US 2021/0101776 A1) disclose a method of controlling an elevator system.
Daniel (“Implementation, Simulation and Validation of Dispatching Algorithms for Elevator Systems”) discloses an elevator dispatching algorithm.
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/BICKEY DHAKAL/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2896