The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
The specification has not been checked to the extent necessary to determine the presence of all possible minor errors. Applicant’s cooperation is requested in correcting any errors of which applicant may become aware in the specification.
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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claim 40 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Jung et al. (US 10,827,334), considered with Palin et al. (US 9,265,080).
Jung discloses a method (see figures 11 and 12), applied to an electronic device (electronic device with display, e.g., Smart TV), including receiving a Bluetooth broadcast message separately sent by each audio device of at least one audio device (e.g., portable wireless speakers), to receive at least one Bluetooth broadcast message (see fig. 12, regarding “Advertise” S12010), and displaying an establishment pop-up box (e.g., “Speaker #1 CONNECT” “YES”? “NO”?), wherein the establishment pop-up box asks a user whether to allow the electronic device to establish a connection with the at least one audio device (e.g., portable wireless speakers). See col. 18, lines 21-28, regarding “when connection is approved by the user, the first device transmits a connection request message to the second device (S12050). In other words, in the existing Bluetooth communication, when various peripheral devices approach and transmit an advertising message, pop-up is displayed to the user for all peripheral devices that transmit the advertising message to confirm an intention for connection.”
Jung discloses the invention as claimed, but fails to specifically teach that each Bluetooth broadcast message of the at least one Bluetooth broadcast message indicates whether the corresponding audio device (e.g., portable wireless speaker) has established stereo and whether the corresponding audio device is allowed to establish stereo. Palin discloses a method (see figs. 2A-2B, for example), applied to an electronic device (e.g., speaker A), including receiving a Bluetooth broadcast message separately sent by each audio device (e.g., speaker B) of at least one audio device, to receive at least one Bluetooth broadcast message, wherein each Bluetooth broadcast message of the at least one Bluetooth broadcast message indicates whether the corresponding audio device has established stereo and whether the corresponding audio device is allowed to establish stereo, in the same field of endeavor, for the purpose of first “check[ing] if any stereo capable speakers are in the radio range (e.g., indicating this with certain UUID in BLE advertisement field) …, if the RSSI is over certain level”, before pairing speaker B with speaker A. See also, Palin, col. 26, lines 55-64, regarding “when speaker A (102A) gets advertisement 150 from Speaker B (102B), it will check if the sender is capable of forming, for example a stereo pair with another speaker, for example by checking the service universally unique identifier (UUID) in the advertisement field. If it is, then Speaker A (102A) creates a Bluetooth Low Energy protocol (BTLE) connection and provides information over Bluetooth Low Energy Protocol (BTGLE) to Speaker B (102B) in order to active a Bluetooth protocol (BT) connection”.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify Jung, in view of Palin, such that the electronic device (e.g., Smart TV) receives a Bluetooth broadcast message separately sent by at least one audio device (e.g., portable wireless speakers), wherein each Bluetooth broadcast message of the at least one Bluetooth broadcast message indicates whether the corresponding audio device has established stereo and whether the corresponding audio device is allowed to establish stereo. A practitioner in the art would have been motivated to do this for the purpose of first checking if the at least one speaker (e.g., portable wireless speakers) are in the audio range (e.g., if RSSI is over certain level) and if the at least one speaker is capable of establishing stereo before displaying the pop-up window to the user for connection.
Claims 41-59 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.
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. The references cited on the PTO-892 each disclose a method applied to an electronic device for connecting the electronic device to another electronic device.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to PAUL W HUBER whose telephone number is (571)272-7588.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Duc Nguyen, can be reached at telephone number 571-272-7503. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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Examiner interviews are available via a variety of formats. See MPEP § 713.01. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) Form at https://www.uspto.gov/InterviewPractice.
/PAUL W HUBER/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2691
pwh
April 8, 2026
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