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 .
DETAILED ACTION
This is a FAOM, in responses Patent Application filed 12/29/2022 in view of the Preliminary Amendments filed 03/01/2023; also, the amendments to the Specifications and drawing filed 03/01/2023 is hereby acknowledged. The current patent application is a Continuation of PCT/CN2021/092073 , filed 05/07/202; claims foreign priority to 202010614694.3, filed 06/30/2020. Claim(s) 1-17 are pending. Claim(s) 1, 7 and 10 are independent claims.
In addition, 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 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.
Information Disclosure Statement
A signed and dated copy of applicant’s IDS, which were filed on 08/20/2024, is/are attached to this Office Action.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claim 7 fails to recite statutory subject matter, as defined in 35 U.S.C. 101, because: The claimed invention is/are directed to a judicial exception (i.e., abstract idea) without significantly more.
Step 1: YES (Claim(s) is/are process, machine, manufacture or composition of the matter). It is noted, claim 7 recites a processor comprising: an operation circuit, wherein the “operation circuit” includes a “first subcircuit and a second subcircuit”, the first subcircuit includes “M*N operation” component, and M and N are positive integers; each of the M*N operation components units is “configured” to “compute an absolute value” of a difference between a target parameter input into each operation component unit and target data input into each operation; and the second subcircuit is configured to “compute and output a sum of absolute values” output by all the M*N operation components ...... and therefore fall into one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter (process, machine, manufacture or composition of the matter).
Step 2A : Prong One: ( whether a claim recites a judicial exception ?) the claim(s) recite a processor comprising: an operation circuit, wherein the “operation circuit” includes a “first subcircuit and a second subcircuit”, the first subcircuit includes “M*N operation” component, and M and N are positive integers; each of the M*N operation components units is “configured” to “compute an absolute value” of a difference between a target parameter input into each operation component unit and target data input into each operation; and the second subcircuit is configured to “compute and output a sum of absolute values” output by all the M*N operation components ...
These limitation(s) recite mental processes and mathematical concepts (mathematical calculations)....since computing an absolute value of a difference between each of the M*N parameters and corresponding data to obtain M*N absolute values; and computing a sum of the M*N absolute values ... is a high level mathematical calculations (see the specifications USPGPUB 20230143985 Para(s) 11 and 76-85 for support of the high level mathematical calculations...). Moreover, the claim recites only the idea of a solution or outcome (i.e., .. “compute and output a sum of absolute values” output by all the M*N operation components....).
Step 2A : Prong Two: (Do the claim(s) recite “additional element(s) that integrate the “Judicial Exception” into “A Practical Application” ? The claim(s) recite additional limitation(s) of “processor”, “operation circuit”, “first and second sub circuit” and “operation components”... These limitation(s) only recite a generic computer component(s) that only amounts to mere instructions to implement the abstract idea on a computer, and therefore, do not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application. (MPEP 2106.04(d), 2106.05(f)).
Step 2B: (Whether a Claim Amounts to Significantly More) ? The claim(s) recite additional limitation(s) of “processor”, “operation circuit”, “first and second sub circuit” and “operation components”... These limitation(s) only recite a generic computer component(s) that only amounts to mere instructions to implement the abstract idea on a computer, and therefore, do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea itself (MPEP 2106.05, 2106.05(f)).
Accordingly, claim 7 fails to recite statutory subject matter, as defined in 35 U.S.C. 101.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim(s) 8-9 are 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 and amending to remedy the 101 rejection(s).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim(s) 1-6 and 10-17 are allowed.
Reason for Allowance
Under the broadest reasonable interpretation of the claimed limitation which is consistence with the Applicant's Specification, the prior arts of recorded when taken individually or in combination do not expressly teach or render obvious the limitations recited in claim(s) 1-17 when taken in the context of the claims as a whole, especially the concept of, for performing “... A data feature extraction method applied to a data feature extraction apparatus, the method comprising: reading first feature extraction parameters from a target memory, wherein the first feature extraction parameters comprise parameters obtained by performing first quantization processing on network parameters, wherein the network parameters are in a target neural network and that are used to extract a target feature;
determining second feature extraction parameters based on the first feature extraction parameters, wherein the second feature extraction parameters comprise M*N parameters, and M and N are positive integers;
reading first to-be-extracted feature data from the target memory;
determining second to-be-extracted feature data based on the first to-be-extracted feature data, wherein the second to-be-extracted feature data comprises M*N pieces of data, and the M*N pieces of data are in a one-to-one correspondence with the M*N parameters; and
performing an addition convolution operation on the second feature extraction parameters and the second to-be-extracted feature data by using a target processor, to obtain first feature data, wherein the addition convolution operation comprises: computing an absolute value of a difference between each of the M*N parameters and corresponding data to obtain M*N absolute values; and computing a sum of the M*N absolute values...” as claims and further supports in the USPGPUB 20230143985 A1 Para 11.
In addition, neither a reference uncovered that would have provided a basis of evidence for asserting a motivation, nor one of ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, would have combined them to arrive at the present invention as recited in the context of independent claim(s) 1, 7 and 10 as a whole.
Thus, claim(s) 1, 7 and 10 is/are allowed over the prior arts of record. Also, dependent claim(s) 2-6, 8-9 and 11-17 are also allowable due to its dependency of independent claim(s) 1, 7 and 10; if Claim 7 rewritten and/or amending to remedy the 101 rejection(s) as recited herein.
Any comments considered necessary by applicant must be submitted no later than the payment of the issue fee and, to avoid processing delays, should preferably accompany the issue fee. Such submissions should be clearly labeled “Comments on
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Du et al.,(“US 20200097826 A1” filed 11/28/2019, discloses a coarse-grained pruning unit configured to perform coarse-grained pruning on a weight of a neural network to obtain a pruned weight, an operation unit configured to train the neural network according to the pruned weight. The coarse-grained pruning unit is specifically configured to select M weights from the weights of the neural network through a sliding window, and when the M weights meet a preset condition, all or part of the M weights may be set to 0. The processing device can reduce the memory access while reducing the amount of computation, thereby obtaining an acceleration ratio and reducing energy consumption... [the Abstract and Para(s) 12-26].
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/QUOC A TRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2145