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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The listing of references in the PCT international search report is not considered to be an information disclosure statement (IDS) complying with 37 CFR 1.98. 37 CFR 1.98(a)(2) requires a legible copy of: (1) each foreign patent; (2) each publication or that portion which caused it to be listed; (3) for each cited pending U.S. application, the application specification including claims, and any drawing of the application, or that portion of the application which caused it to be listed including any claims directed to that portion, unless the cited pending U.S. application is stored in the Image File Wrapper (IFW) system; and (4) all other information, or that portion which caused it to be listed. In addition, each IDS must include a list of all patents, publications, applications, or other information submitted for consideration by the Office (see 37 CFR 1.98(a)(1) and (b)), and MPEP § 609.04(a), subsection I. states, “the list ... must be submitted on a separate paper.” Therefore, the references cited in the international search report have not been considered. Applicant is advised that the date of submission of any item of information in the international search report will be the date of submission of the IDS for purposes of determining compliance with the requirements for the IDS with 37 CFR 1.97, including all timing statement requirements of 37 CFR 1.97(e). See MPEP § 609.05(a).
The information disclosure statement filed August 31, 2023 fails to comply with 37 CFR 1.98(a)(2), which requires a legible copy of each cited foreign patent document; each non-patent literature publication or that portion which caused it to be listed; and all other information or that portion which caused it to be listed. It has been placed in the application file, but the information referred to therein has not been considered. The examiner notes that the reference on the IDS that has not been struck through (Song et al.) was considered because it appeared in a search conducted by the examiner.
Claim Objections
Claims 5-6 and 10 are objected to because of the following informalities: these claims recite the phrases "the clock comprised by the surveying device" and "the clock comprised by the component" Although the phrase does not render the claims indefinite, the claim language would be more clear if other phrasing (e.g., "the clock of the surveying device," "the clock of the component"). Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claim 19 is 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.
Claim 19 is rejected because it is unclear as to how the components of claim 19 differ from the one or more components of claim 1. More specifically, it is unclear as to whether the components of claim 19 refers to all of the components of the location-determining system or simply two or more components of said location-determining system. For the purposes of examination, the examiner is understanding claim 19 to indicate the latter, as it is the broader interpretation of the claim.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1, 12-17, and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Zhou et al. (H. Zhou, Z. Yao and M. Lu, "UWB/Lidar Coordinate Matching Method With Anti-Degeneration Capability," in IEEE Sensors Journal, vol. 21, no. 3, pp. 3344-3352, 1 Feb.1, 2021, doi: 10.1109/JSEN.2020.3023738.).
Regarding claim 1, Zhou et al. discloses,
A method for determining the locations of one or more components of a location-determining system in an environment (abs., “This article presents a ultra-wideband (UWB)/Lidar coordinate matching method…” The examiner notes that UWB coordinates come from UWB sensors in the environment. See, e.g., fig. 1), the method comprising: providing a surveying device (fig. 2) comprising: (i) a ranging subsystem comprising a transmitter and a receiver configured to receive signals transmitted by the transmitter and reflected off objects in the environment whereby a three-dimensional map of the shape of the environment can be generated (p. 3348, section IV, para. 2, “Fig. 2 is our handheld device used in the experiments which consists of…a Lidar sensor…Note that the 3D Lidar SLAM algorithm used in our experiments is the LOAM [15] algorithm.” The examiner notes that the LOAM algorithm is used to generate 3D maps, as can be seen in figs. 3, 6. See also J. Zhang and S. Singh, “LOAM: Lidar odometry and mapping in real-time,” in Proc. Robotics: Sci. Syst. Conf. (RSS), Berkeley, CA, USA. Cambridge, MA, USA : MIT Press, Jan. 2014, pp. 109–111.); and (ii) a communication subsystem configured for transmitting signals to the said one or more components or detecting signals from the said one or more components (p. 3348, section IV, paras. 1-2, “Each UWB anchor is connected to a wireless communication module that uploads the sensor data to a server…Fig. 2 is our handheld device used in the experiments which consists of…a wireless communication module.” The examiner further notes that, per p. 3345, section III, para. 1, the UWB SLAM is provided by peer-to-peer range measurements between UWB nodes, including the UWB anchor on the surveying device); moving the surveying device in the environment whilst operating the ranging subsystem and the communication subsystem (p. 3348, section A, para. 1, “In the first experiment, a person lifted the handheld device from the ground and walked slowly around the pool.”); and causing one or more processors (p. 3348, section IV, para. 2, “Fig. 2 is our handheld device used in the experiments which consists of a computer…”) to: (i) form the said three-dimensional map of the environment (p. 3348, section A, para. 2, “Fig. 3a shows the top view of the UWB sensor locations under the Lidar global coordinate system before the trajectory mapping process.”); and (ii) correlate that map with data received by or from the one or more components to determine the positions of the one or more components (p. 3348, section A, para. 2, “…as shown in fig. 3b, the two coordinate systems were matched together after the trajectory matching process and the estimated locations of the UWB sensors under the Lidar global coordinate system were close to what they really were.” The examiner notes that the two coordinate systems are the UWB global coordinate system and the Lidar global coordinate system, as disclosed in the same paragraph. The examiner further notes that the trajectory matching process is being understood as a correlation of the Lidar map with data received from the UWB components).
Regarding claim 12, Zhou et al. discloses,
A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the surveying device moves autonomously (p. 3347, last line-3348, first line, “Additionally, if the robot equipped with the Lidar sensor and the mobile UWB sensor moves slowly...” The examiner notes that, per p. 3344, section I, para. 1, UWB/Lidar SLAM disclosed in the reference is explicitly for “truly autonomous robots”).
Regarding claim 13, Zhou et al. discloses,
A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein: the one or more components are sensors configured to receive signals from a transmitter attached to the surveying device; the one or more components are transmitters configured to transmit signals to a sensor attached to the surveying device; or the one or more components are passive markers configured to reflect signals to a detector attached to the surveying device (p. 3345, section III(A), para. 1, “In our proposed scheme, one UWB sensor is located at the origin of the Lidar body frame and the other UWB anchors are placed at unknown locations. The peer-to-peer range measurements are provided by each pair of UWB nodes.” The examiner notes that UWB sensors and anchors receive and transmit signals).
Regarding claim 14, Zhou et al. discloses,
A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein: the positions of the one or more components are determined absolutely; or the positions of the one or more components are determined relatively (fig. 3, caption, “Views of the UWB sensor locations under the Lidar global coordinate system. The green dots represent the positions of the UWB sensors.” The examiner notes that, per the final paragraph of section I, the Lidar global coordinate system has an origin at the geometric center of the Lidar sensor at time t = 0, thus indicating that the UWB sensor positions are determined relative to the geometric center of the Lidar sensor at an initial time).
Regarding claim 15, Zhou et al. discloses,
A method as claimed in claim 14, wherein the positions of the one or more components are determined relatively with reference to one of the components of the location-determining system or with reference to a starting location of the surveying device (fig. 3, caption, “Views of the UWB sensor locations under the Lidar global coordinate system. The green dots represent the positions of the UWB sensors.” The examiner notes that, per the final paragraph of section I, the Lidar global coordinate system has an origin at the geometric center of the Lidar sensor at time t = 0, thus indicating that the UWB sensor positions are determined relative to the geometric center of the Lidar sensor at an initial time).
Regarding claim 16, Zhou et al. discloses,
A method as claimed in claim 1, further comprising providing a user interface (p. 3348, section IV, para. 2, “Fig. 2 is our handheld device used in the experiments which consists of a computer (Intel NUC8i7h), a Lidar sensor (Velodyne VLP16), a wireless communication module and a display screen.”) via which a user can verify or adjust the determined positions of the one or more components (fig. 4, noting that determining the error of the point pairs with/without the anti-degeneration algorithm requires knowledge of both the actual and measured positions of the UWB sensors).
Regarding claim 17, Zhou et al. discloses,
A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the signals are radio signals (p. 3345, section III(A), para. 1, “…the other UWB anchors are placed at unknown locations.” The examiner notes that UWB anchors transmit and receive radio signals).
Regarding claim 19, Zhou et al. discloses,
A method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the method is for determining the locations of components of the location-determining system in the environment, the communication subsystem is configured for transmitting signals to the said components or detecting signals from the said components (p. 3345, section III(A), para. 1, “In our proposed scheme, one UWB sensor is located at the origin of the Lidar body frame and the other UWB anchors are placed at unknown locations. The peer-to-peer range measurements are provided by each pair of UWB nodes.” The examiner notes that UWB sensors and anchors receive and/or transmit signals), and the one or more processors are caused to correlate that map with data received by or from the components to determine the positions of the components (fig. 3, showing the positions of the UWB sensors on the Lidar map).
Regarding claim 20, the same cited section and rationale as claim 1 is applied.
Regarding claim 21, the same cited section and rationale as claim 1 is applied.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claims 2-4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhou et al. as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Yavari et al. (Yavari, M. and Nickerson, B.G. (2014, March 27). Ultra wideband wireless positioning systems. [Technical report, University of New Brunswick].
Regarding claim 2, Zhou et al. discloses a method as claimed in claim 1. Zhou et al. further discloses (note: what Zhou et al. does not further disclose is struck through),
…wherein the correlating step comprises comparing, over time, one or more (p. 3347, section C, para., 4, “In the first step, m, m ≥ 4 points are sampled from the estimated trajectory of the Lidar sensor provided by the Lidar SLAM to the columns of XL. The coordinates of the same points estimated by the UWB SLAM are ascribed to the columns of XU”.).
That is, Zhou et al. discloses determining UWB node positions based on signals they transmit, but is silent as to how said signals are used to determine UWB node positions. Yavari et al. discloses determining the positions of UWB nodes by comparing signal characteristics of the signals sent by the nodes (p. 8, para. 1, “In the two-step approach, positioning is based on parameters extracted from the signal…the two-step approach imposes less complexity and is close in performance to the direct approach, so the two step approach is more prevalent in practice.”).
Zhou et al. and Yavari et al. are both analogous to the claimed invention because they are both in the same field of endeavor, namely UWB positioning. It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to use signal characteristics to determine the position of UWB nodes, as Yavari et al. does, in the invention of Zhou et al. because the signal characteristic approach of Yavari et al. is less complex and has similar performance quality to the direct approach (see Yavari, p. 8, para. 1).
Regarding claim 3, Zhou et al. as modified by Yavari et al. discloses the method of claim 2. Zhou et al. is silent as to how UWB node positions are extracted from the UWB nodes, and therefore does not teach,
…wherein the one or more signal characteristics comprise one or more of: a time at which a signal is received by or from the one or more components, a time-of-flight of a signal received by or from the one or more components, a time difference of arrival of a signal received at two different receivers, and a direction from which a signal is received by or from the one or more components
Yavari et al. teaches,
…wherein the one or more signal characteristics comprise one or more of: a time at which a signal is received by or from the one or more components, a time-of-flight of a signal received by or from the one or more components, a time difference of arrival of a signal received at two different receivers, and a direction from which a signal is received by or from the one or more components (pp. 10-15 disclose methods of determining UWB position using time of arrival, time difference of arrival, and angle of arrival positioning methods. Additionally, p. 36 discloses a time-of-flight calculation, “Consequently, each of the nodes has an estimate of the round trip time, Tr, and turn around time, Tta.”).
It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to use one or more of the above signal characteristics to determine the position of UWB nodes, as Yavari et al. does, in the invention of Zhou et al. because the signal characteristic approach of Yavari et al. is less complex and has similar performance quality to the direct approach (see Yavari, p. 8, para. 1). Furthermore, the listed techniques are common techniques in the art that a skilled inventor would be well aware of.
Regarding claim 4, Zhou et al. as modified by Yavari et al. discloses a method as claimed in claim 2. Zhou et al. does not disclose,
…wherein the surveying device comprises a clock, the one or more components each comprise a clock, and, for a component of the one or more components, a timing offset between the clock comprised by the surveying device and the clock comprised by the component is known
Yavari et al. discloses,
…wherein the surveying device comprises a clock, the one or more components each comprise a clock (p. 36, “The crystal oscillators used in sensor devices (source or target nodes)…” The examiner notes that a crystal oscillator is component that acts as a clock), and, for a component of the one or more components, a timing offset between the clock comprised by the surveying device and the clock comprised by the component is known (p. 43, “The Dart technology includes the Dart Hub, Dart Sensors and Dart Tag. The positioning software is implemented on the Dart Hub. In addition, the Dart Hub provides power, data and clock for the Dart Sensors. The Dart Sensors act as source nodes to receive the UWB from the Dart tags which are attached to moving objects.” ).
It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Zhou et al. with the clock timing offset of Yavari et al. because clock timing offset is a known source of error in UWB positioning (see, e.g., Yavari, p. 36). The use of the Dart technology system as disclosed by Yavari et al. is one method of mitigating this error by using a known timing offset.
Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhou et al. in view of Yavari et al. as applied to claim 2 above, and further in view of Leeper et al. (US 2005/0026563 A1).
Regarding claim 5, Zhou et al. as modified by Yavari et al. discloses a method as claimed in claim 2. Neither Zhou et al. nor Yavari et al. discloses,
…wherein the surveying device comprises a clock, the one or more components each comprise a clock, and the method further comprises determining, for a component of the one or more components, a timing offset between the clock comprised by the surveying device and the clock comprised by the component.
Leeper et al. discloses,
…wherein the surveying device comprises a clock, the one or more components each comprise a clock, and the method further comprises determining, for a component of the one or more components, a timing offset between the clock comprised by the surveying device and the clock comprised by the component (para. 0052, “In blocks 414 and 416, respectively, the ranging agents 112, 114 of the devices 102, 104 exchange the recorded transmit and receive strobe times, from which signal propagation delay (tp) and timing offset (to) may be calculated.”).
Leeper et al. is analogous to the claimed invention because it is in the same field of endeavor, namely UWB positioning. It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Zhou et al. as modified by Yavari et al. with the clock timing offset determination of Leeper et al. because clock timing offset is a known source of error in UWB positioning (see, e.g., Yavari, p. 36). Leeper et al.’s method mitigates this error by determining the timing offset.
Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhou et al. as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Song et al. (Y. Song, M. Guan, W. P. Tay, C. L. Law and C. Wen, "UWB/LiDAR Fusion For Cooperative Range-Only SLAM," 2019 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), Montreal, QC, Canada, 2019, pp. 6568-6574, doi: 10.1109/ICRA.2019.8794222.).
Regarding claim 7, Zhou et al. discloses the method of claim 1. Zhou et al. does not disclose,
…wherein the correlating step further comprises determining, for a component of the one or more components, at least one aspect of the orientation of that component.
Song et al. discloses,
…wherein the correlating step further comprises determining, for a component of the one or more components, at least one aspect of the orientation of that component (p. 6570, “construct/update LiDAR map as well as UWB map using…beacons’ pose estimates.” The examiner notes that the beacons’ pose estimates are understood to include their orientations, since pose refers to the six-dimensional position and orientation of the beacon).
Song et al. is analogous to the claimed invention because it is in the same field of endeavor, namely UWB/LIDAR fusion for SLAM. It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Zhou et al. with the orientation sensor of Song et al. because the pose of the beacon affects its measurement position in UWB ranging, and is therefore useful to know in correlating UWB and LIDAR maps. See, e.g., the discussion in section I, paras. 1-2 of Song et al. regarding the accumulated errors due to incorrect measurements of a robot’s pose.
Claims 8-9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhou et al. in view of Song et al. as applied to claim 7 above, and further in view of Van de Velde (Van de Velde, S. (2019, Feb. 7). How ultra-wideband indoor positioning creates new artistic experiences. Pozyx. https://www.pozyx.io/newsroom/how-uwb-indoor-positioning-creates-new-artistic-experiences.).
Regarding claim 8, Zhou et al. as modified by Song et al. teaches a method as claimed in claim 7. Zhou et al. does not teach,
wherein the correlating step comprises determining the yaw aspect of the orientation of that component.
Song et al. teaches (note: what Song et al. does not teach is struck through),
wherein the correlating step comprises determining
Van de Velde teaches determining the yaw aspect of the orientation of a component in a UWB beacon system (p. 3, para. 8).
Van de Velde is analogous to the claimed invention because it is in the same field of endeavor. It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Zhou et al. with the orientation sensor of Song et al. for the reasons disclosed above with respect to claim 7. Further modifying the invention of Zhou et al. with the determination of the yaw aspect of orientation of Van de Velde would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art because, although Song et al.’s pose determination is silent as to the specific aspects of the pose that are determined, roll, pitch, and yaw are the most common methods of describing a pose measurement.
Regarding claim 9, Zhou et al. as modified by Song et al. teaches a method as claimed in claim 7. Zhou et al. does not teach,
…wherein the roll and/or pitch aspects of the orientation of that component are determined by an orientation sensor associated with that component.
Song et al. does not teach,
…wherein the roll and/or pitch aspects of the orientation of that component are determined by an orientation sensor associated with that component.
Van de Velde teaches using an orientation sensor to determine the roll and/or pitch aspects of the orientation of a component in a UWB beacon system (p. 3, para. 8).
It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Zhou et al. with the orientation sensor of Song et al. for the reasons disclosed above with respect to claim 7. Further modifying the invention of Zhou et al. with the determination of the yaw aspect of orientation of Van de Velde would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art because, although Song et al.’s pose determination is silent as to the specific aspects of the pose that are determined, roll, pitch, and yaw are the most common methods of describing a pose measurement.
Claim 10 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhou et al. as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Leeper et al.
Regarding claim 10, Zhou et al. teaches a method as claimed in claim 1. Zhou et al. does not teach,
…wherein the correlating step further comprises determining, for a component of the one or more components of the location-determining system, a timing offset between that component and another component of the location-determining system, said timing offset being due to signal propagation delays in a network used to synchronise a clock comprised by the component and a clock comprised by said another component
Leeper et al. teaches,
…wherein the correlating step further comprises determining, for a component of the one or more components of the location-determining system, a timing offset between that component and another component of the location-determining system, said timing offset being due to signal propagation delays in a network used to synchronise a clock comprised by the component and a clock comprised by said another component (para. 0052, “In blocks 414 and 416, respectively, the ranging agents 112, 114 of the devices 102, 104 exchange the recorded transmit and receive strobe times, from which signal propagation delay (tp) and timing offset (to) may be calculated.”).
It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Zhou et al. as modified by Yavari et al. with the clock timing offset determination of Leeper et al. because clock timing offset is a known source of error in UWB positioning (see, e.g., Yavari, p. 36). Leeper et al.’s method mitigates this error by determining the timing offset.
Claim 11 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhou et al. as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Gong et al. (S. Gong, H. Liu, Y. Hu and J. Zhang, "ROS-based object localization using RFID and laser scan," 2012 IEEE International Conference on Information and Automation, Shenyang, China, 2012, pp. 406-411, doi: 10.1109/ICInfA.2012.6246839.).
Regarding claim 11, Zhou et al. discloses a method as claimed in claim 1. Zhou et al. further discloses (note: what Zhou et al. does not disclose is struck through),
…comprising refining the determined locations of the one or more components by, for at least one of the components: forming an initial determination of that component's position (p. 3346, para. 2, “…we use the classic MDS algorithm to initialize the UWB positions”);
Gong et al. discloses,
…comprising refining the determined locations of the one or more components by, for at least one of the components: forming an initial determination of that component's position (section III(B), “While the antenna carried by mobile robot detects a RFID tag, our system will record a position of the robot and estimate the existing area of the object.”); and searching the three-dimensional map in at least the region of that initially determined position for a shape corresponding to the shape of the component (section III(C), “The information store in the RFID tag just include object id. The object information is retrieved from a database according the object id. As our software architecture mentioned, the semantic information of object can guide the robot to choose a suitable feature extraction algorithm to further detect the object.” The examiner notes that Table 1 shows that shape is one piece of object information that is used, and, per section III(D), the shape of the object is used to determine its location with the laser rangefinder); and adopting the position of that shape in the three-dimensional map as the determined position of the component (section III(D), “With the certain a circle has detected in the RFID tag existing area, if there is not ambiguous information such as multi-circle in the same existing area. It just make sure the circle which is detected is the flowerpot attached the tag.”).
Gong et al. is analogous to the claimed invention because it is within the same field of endeavor. It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the UWB/LIDAR fusion of Zhou et al. with the component shape determination of Gong et al. because the use of the LIDAR to determine the shape corresponding to the shape of the component allows for the use of UWB tags as indicators of obstacles in the environment, thus making it easier for the surveying device to move through the environment without hitting said obstacles.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 6 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the objections, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
Regarding claim 6, Zhou et al. as modified by Yavari et al. and Leeper et al. discloses a method as claimed in claim 5, but fails to disclose,
…wherein determining the timing offset between the clock comprised by the surveying device and the clock comprised by the component comprises: maintaining a histogram representing a plurality of estimated timing offsets by, for each estimated timing offset: identifying two instances in time where one or more of the measured characteristics of the signals received by or from the component are substantially the same; identifying two instances in time where the location or path trajectory of the surveying device is substantially the same; and in response to determining that a time difference according to the clock comprised by the component between the two signal characteristic instances is substantially equal to a time difference according to the clock comprised by the surveying device between the two location or path trajectory instances, incrementing a bin of the histogram that represents a time difference between the first of the two signal characteristic instances according to the clock comprised by the component and the first of the two location or path trajectory instances according to the clock comprised by the surveying device, that time difference being an estimated timing offset; and determining the timing offset between the clock comprised by the surveying device and the clock comprised by the component in dependence on the maintained histogram.
Yavari et al. discloses a surveying device comprising a clock and a plurality of components comprising a clock, but fails to disclose,
…determining the timing offset between the clock comprised by the surveying device and the clock comprised by the component comprises: maintaining a histogram representing a plurality of estimated timing offsets by, for each estimated timing offset: identifying two instances in time where one or more of the measured characteristics of the signals received by or from the component are substantially the same; identifying two instances in time where the location or path trajectory of the surveying device is substantially the same; and in response to determining that a time difference according to the clock comprised by the component between the two signal characteristic instances is substantially equal to a time difference according to the clock comprised by the surveying device between the two location or path trajectory instances, incrementing a bin of the histogram that represents a time difference between the first of the two signal characteristic instances according to the clock comprised by the component and the first of the two location or path trajectory instances according to the clock comprised by the surveying device, that time difference being an estimated timing offset; and determining the timing offset between the clock comprised by the surveying device and the clock comprised by the component in dependence on the maintained histogram.
Leeper et al. discloses determining the timing offset between the clock of the surveying device and the clock of the component, but fails to disclose,
…wherein determining the timing offset between the clock comprised by the surveying device and the clock comprised by the component comprises: maintaining a histogram representing a plurality of estimated timing offsets by, for each estimated timing offset: identifying two instances in time where one or more of the measured characteristics of the signals received by or from the component are substantially the same; identifying two instances in time where the location or path trajectory of the surveying device is substantially the same; and in response to determining that a time difference according to the clock comprised by the component between the two signal characteristic instances is substantially equal to a time difference according to the clock comprised by the surveying device between the two location or path trajectory instances, incrementing a bin of the histogram that represents a time difference between the first of the two signal characteristic instances according to the clock comprised by the component and the first of the two location or path trajectory instances according to the clock comprised by the surveying device, that time difference being an estimated timing offset; and determining the timing offset between the clock comprised by the surveying device and the clock comprised by the component in dependence on the maintained histogram.
Thus, both Yavari et al. and Leeper et al. fail to correct the deficiencies in Zhou et al.
In reference to independent claim 6, the prior art made of record individually or in any combination, fails to teach, render obvious, or fairly suggest to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing the combination of the claimed features of claim 6. Therefore, claim 6 contains subject matter that is allowable over prior art.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
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/Anna K. Gosling/Examiner, Art Unit 3648
/VLADIMIR MAGLOIRE/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3648
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