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 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.
Claim(s) 21 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over CN111951510 in view of KSR v. Teleflex 550 U.S. 398 (2007).
With respect to claims 21, With respect to claim 1, the 510 reference teaches a control method comprising:
obtaining thermal images of a fire area through an aerial vehicle, see step S1 at page 2, bottom portion of the page.
The 510 reference teaches a temperature distribution as disclosed in the sixth full para., wherein fire critical temperatures are stored as well as the temperature range corresponding to fire risks of various levels. The 510 reference teaches dividing the fire area into a plurality or sub-areas (sub-area heat maps), see steps S1 and S2, see also page 5, lines 1-3; page 5, the first full paragraphs 7 and 8 which teach that a forest area that is imaged is dividing into subareas and that the temperature risks are assessed by each sub-area. The 510 reference teaches that the risk grade of each fire point with monitoring of fire and smoke, are sent to the central monitoring platform wherein the monitoring images, according to page 9, last paragraph, discloses that the monitoring images of the flame or smoke are sent to a handheld mobile terminal .
The 510 reference teaches, at page 7, first full paragraph “… the invention divides the forest area in toa plurality of inspection subareas….,” and shorts the subarea with infrared thermal imaging to analyze the temperature of each subarea. The areas are mapped to different features wherein the features are by different “fire point” or “fire risks” or wherein smoke was visible.
The 510 reference uses GPS position on the fire points, fire points and location of smoke. Moreover, the last para. of page 7 states that the plurality of inspection subareas are connected with each other according to a gridding dividing mode. Therefore, each of the areas are divided into grids which inherently have a boundary between each of the areas. See also the first full para. of page 5 regarding the division of the forest terrain. See also step S3, at page 5 wherein the sub-areas are represented are represented by “different colors on the heat map represent different temperatures of the inspection sub-area….”, regarding the color of the projection areas.
The 510 reference teaches sub-areas with different features associated with terrain features stored in a database (see page 5, beginning at line 28.).
At page 5, line 9, the 510 reference teaches a regional terrain analysis module extracts the terrain features of the divided inspection subareas and compares the terrain features with those corresponding to various terrain types within the database and screens the terrain types corresponding to the terrain features of the inspection subareas. The 510 reference teaches a filling pattern for terrain features of the “flat type”, “hill type”, “basin type”, “Z-shape”, “zigzag shape” and “circular diffusion shape”.
What is not taught by the 510 reference is distinguishing the sub-areas on the map with different image features which consist of a transparency.
The specification, while making reference to a transparency for subareas, (see para. 34), does very little to explains why a projection area using a transparency is novel. There does not appears to be any other sections of the specification which would teach why this feature is novel, nor is there a teaching that the transparency contains any patterns.
Because a transparency in and of itself, carries no information, the use of a transparency does not appear to drastically affect the projection of the subarea. Hence, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to try a reasonable number of projections, some with patterns and some without (transparency) for the purpose of projecting onto subareas. However, the 510 provides a teaching for the projection of color and filling patterns.
Allowed Claims
Claims 1-20 and 22 are allowed by amendment and as set forth in the Interview Summary.
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JEROME GRANT II whose telephone number is (571)272-7463. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m..
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jennifer Mehmood can be reached at 571-272-2976. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/JEROME GRANT II/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2664