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 .
Response to Amendment
Applicant's request for reconsideration of the finality of the rejection of the last Office action is persuasive and, therefore, the finality of that action is withdrawn.
The finality included allowable subject matter, which applicant included into their independent claims.
The indicated allowability of claims 21, 23, and 25 is withdrawn in view of the newly discovered reference(s) to You (CN 113148046A). Rejections based on the newly cited reference(s) follow.
It is noted that You has a publication date of 7/23/2021, wherein the application has claimed priority for a foreign application filed on 10/07/2020. Applicant cannot rely upon the certified copy of the foreign priority application to overcome this rejection because a translation of said application has not been made of record in accordance with 37 CFR 1.55. When an English language translation of a non-English language foreign application is required, the translation must be that of the certified copy (of the foreign application as filed) submitted together with a statement that the translation of the certified copy is accurate. See MPEP §§ 215 and 216.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 5-6, 8-9, 11-12, and 17-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claims 5, 6, 8, 11, and 17 recite the limitation "the intensity" in line 4. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claims 6, 9, 12, and 18 depend on these claims, and are therefore, also rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b).
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.
Claim(s) 1-3, 5-6, 8-9, 11-15 and 17-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over You (CN 113148046A).
In regards to claims 1, 13 and 19, You discloses a draft information generation device and method (abstract and fig. 2), comprising: a range-finding sensor (2) to be mounted on a side of a vessel configured to measure a distance to a water surface (3) by transmitting a range-finding signal (as can be seen in fig. 2 and discussed in the abstract, range finders 2 send a signal to the water surface 3 to measure the distance S); and means configured to calculate a draft height based on the distance to the water surface, wherein the range-finding sensor is configured to measure the distance at multiple times (page 2, steps S1 and S2), and the processing circuitry is configured to calculate the draft height using a statistical value of the distance measured at the multiple times (page 2, step S3 calculating Sa), and the means is further configured to calculate the draft height by subtracting an average value of the distance from the vessel to the water surface measured using LiDAR in the range-finding sensor (page 2 “the rage finder is set as a laser range finder”) at the multiple times from a mold depth (page 2, step S3 D-Sa, wherein D is the height from the deck to the bottom of the ship which appears to meet the definition of a Mold depth as described in the instant specification).
You does not explicitly disclose that the means to perform the calculation is processing circuitry (claim 1) or a non-transitory computer-readable recording medium storing a program to cause a processing unit to execute the method (claim 19), or that the mold depth is pre-stored (claim 1, 13, and 19). However, it is noted on page 5, ⁋ 3, the mold depth is obtained by design data of the ship in advance. Further, the examiner takes official notice that it is very well known in the art of laser range finding to use processing circuitry/non-transitory computer readable recording medium for calculations and storing information, in order to avoid manual logging and calculations, which can lead to human error and slower calculation times.
Therefore, it would be obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to include into You’s device processing circuitry to both provide the pre-stored mold depth as discussed by You, and to calculate the draft height in order to speed up the calculations and avoid human error in the calculations.
In regards to claims 2, 14, and 20, You discloses a plurality of the range-finding sensors (2); wherein: the plurality of range-finding sensors are mounted at different positions on the vessel and measuring the distance at different positions on the vessel (page 4 ⁋ 4).
In regards to claims 3 and 15, the different positions of the vessel include a bow of the vessel, a stern of the vessel, and a longitudinal middle of the vessel (page 4, ⁋4).
In regards to claims 5, 8, 11, and 17, You teaches the draft information generation device and method, as discussed above. You discloses configuring the processing circuitry to select the distance measured at the multiple times (page 5, ⁋s 1-2); and to execute a prescribed interpolation processing for the selected distances to generate data for calculation of the draft height consisting of distances arranged in time series (page 5, ⁋s3-5). You does not explicitly teach using the intensity of the range-finding signal to make the selection of the distance measured. However, the examiner takes official notice that it would be well-known to a person skill in the art of laser range finders to select measured values based on their intensity, in order to remove spurious low intensity signals due to noise, thus leading to more accurate detection of distance. Therefore, it would be obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to include into You the step of using the intensity of the range-finding signal to make the selection of the distance measured as it is well known in the art of laser range finding, and further in order to remove spurious low intensity signals due to noise, thus leading to more accurate detection of distance.
In regards to claims 6, 9, 12, 18, You teaches the draft information generation device and method, as discussed above. You further discloses the processing circuitry is further configured: to detect a frequency component of the distance measured at the multiple times (as can be seen in fig. 3, and as discussed on page 5, ⁋s 1-2); and to execute the interpolation processing using the frequency components (page 4, ⁋s 3-5).
Claim(s) 22, 24 and 26 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over You (CN 113148046A) in view of Dai (CN 106741706A), previously cited.
In regards to claims 22, 24, and 26, You teaches the draft information generation device, and method, as discussed above. You is silent to the processing circuitry being configured to measure an attitude of the vessel, and correct data measured by the range-finding sensor based on the attitude.
However, Dai, in the same field of endeavor of draft calculation, teaches measuring an attitude of the vessel, and correcting data measured by the range-finding sensor based on the attitude (⁋ 15, and ⁋30 teaches controller corrects draft value).
Therefore, It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the prior art of You to include measuring the attitude of the vessel and correcting data in the range-finding signal based on the attitude as suggested by Dai, in order to yield the predictable result of being able to accurately calculate the draft value even in the case of one of the sensors failing (⁋ 53 of Dai).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to KARA E GEISEL whose telephone number is (571)272-2416. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 10am-6pm.
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/KARA E. GEISEL/
Art Unit 2877