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 .
Priority
Applicant’s claim for the benefit of a prior-filed application under 35 U.S.C. 119(e) or under 35 U.S.C. 120, 121, 365(c), or 386(c) is acknowledged. Applicant has not complied with one or more conditions for receiving the benefit of an earlier filing date under 35 U.S.C. 120 as follows:
The later-filed application must be an application for a patent for an invention which is also disclosed in the prior application (the parent or original nonprovisional application or provisional application). The disclosure of the invention in the parent application and in the later-filed application must be sufficient to comply with the requirements of 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or the first paragraph of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, except for the best mode requirement. See Transco Products, Inc. v. Performance Contracting, Inc., 38 F.3d 551, 32 USPQ2d 1077 (Fed. Cir. 1994).
The disclosure of the prior-filed application, Application No. 17/341,242, fails to provide adequate support or enablement in the manner provided by 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, first paragraph for one or more claims of this application. Regarding claims 2, 10, and 18, no support could be found for wherein the FEA data comprises a fetched audio signal and an FEA signal. Instead, the FEA data as described in the specification paragraph [0028] and shown in Fig. 2 appears to be a single generic audio stream received from a far end device, with no details given regarding the signals comprising it. Accordingly, claims 2-7 and 10-20 are not entitled to the benefit of the prior application.
Response to Amendment
The Office Action is responsive to amendments filed for application 18/520,901 on 03/17/2026. Please note claims 1-20 remain in the application.
In response to the amendments filed to claims 1-3, 6, 8-10, and 18-20 the previous rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C 112(b) has been withdrawn.
In response to the amendments to the specification and the replacement drawings filed on 03/17/2026, the previous objection to the figures has been withdrawn.
In response to the Terminal Disclaimer filed on 03/17/2026, the previous rejection of claims 8-17 on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting has been withdrawn.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see pages 12-13 of the remarks filed 03/17/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1, 8, and 18 under either 35 U.S.C. 102 or 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of newly found prior art references, explained in detail below.
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 and 8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gunawan et al (hereinafter Gunawan), US-PG-PUB No. 2018/0041639 in view of Sugimoto, US-PG-PUB No. 2009/0024864.
Regarding Claim 1, Gunawan teaches a method, comprising:
establishing a conference meeting (A conference between multiple participants.....¶[0022], lines 4-5) including a first user equipment (UE) (Participants interact via endpoint devices (user equipment), including a first endpoint device, capable of recording and transmitting a far-end audio stream to the other endpoints…..¶[0022], lines 5-8) among a plurality of UE (The plurality of participants use a plurality of endpoint devices.....¶[0022], lines 5-8);
receiving far end audio (FEA) data from the first UE (A receiving device receives a far-end audio stream (FEA data) from a far-end endpoint (the first device).....¶[0065], lines 3-4);
generating first modified FEA data (The received data stream is split into frames, modifying it.....¶[0065], lines 4-5);
determining a first difference between the first modified FEA data (Each frame has a nuisance parameter value calculated for it.....¶[0065], lines 9-12) and a predefined value (The nuisance parameter value is compared to a predefined nuisance threshold value, evaluating the difference between them.....¶[0065], lines 15-19);
responsive to the first difference satisfying a predefined threshold (Should the nuisance parameter value exceed the threshold (thus not satisfying the threshold) the audio will be further modified prior to being output, otherwise, it can be inferred that the framed audio data is output as-is.....¶[0065], lines 19-21), outputting from a speaker (¶[0065], lines 19-21), the first modified FEA data (¶[0065], lines 19-21).
Gunawan fails to explicitly teach wherein audio is stored in a buffer and output from said buffer, instead teaching where it is output from a speaker of the receiving device. The examiner notes that while not explicitly disclosed, buffered amplifiers and speakers are well known features of audio output devices.
However, Sugimoto teaches an audio output system comprising a signal processor and speaker (analogous to the modifying element and speaker of Gunawan), wherein, as shown in Fig. 1, processed (modified) audio is stored in a buffer (Digital signal processor (18) outputs audio data to buffer (19)), and the system outputs, from the buffer, the modified data (Data is output from the buffer (19) to DAC (20) and speaker (21)).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Gunawan by Sugimoto to provide the benefit of reduced power consumption in the modification of the audio data (Sugimoto, ¶[0009], lines 1-5). Such modification would make obvious the feature(s) of storing the first modified FEA data in a buffer; and outputting, from the buffer, the first modified FEA data.
Regarding Claim 8, Gunawan teaches a method, comprising: establishing a conference meeting (A conference between multiple participants.....¶[0022], lines 4-5) including a first user equipment (UE) (Participants interact via endpoint devices (user equipment), including a first endpoint device, capable of recording and transmitting a far-end audio stream to the other endpoints…..¶[0022], lines 5-8) among a plurality of UE (The plurality of participants use a plurality of endpoint devices.....¶[0022], lines 5-8); receiving far end audio (FEA) data from the first UE (A receiving device receives a far-end audio stream (FEA data) from a far-end endpoint (the first device).....¶[0065], lines 3-4); generating first modified FEA data (The received data stream is split into frames, modifying it.....¶[0065], lines 4-5);
determining a difference between the first modified FEA data (Each frame has a nuisance parameter value calculated for it.....¶[0065], lines 9-12) and a predefined value (The nuisance parameter value is compared to a predefined nuisance threshold value, evaluating the difference between them.....¶[0065], lines 15-19);
responsive to the difference exceeding a predefined threshold, generating a second modified FEA data (Should the nuisance parameter value exceed the threshold (thus not satisfying the threshold) the audio will be further modified prior to being output.....¶[0065], lines 19-21);
outputting, from a speaker (¶[0065], lines 19-21), the second modified FEA data (¶[0065], lines 19-21).
Gunawan fails to explicitly teach wherein audio is stored in a buffer and output from said buffer, instead teaching where it is output from a speaker of the receiving device. The examiner notes that while not explicitly disclosed, buffered amplifiers and speakers are well known in the audio processing arts.
However, Sugimoto teaches an audio output system comprising a signal processor and speaker (analogous to the modifying element and speaker of Gunawan), wherein, as shown in Fig. 1, processed (modified) audio is stored in a buffer (Digital signal processor (18) outputs audio data to buffer (19)), and the system outputs, from the buffer, the modified data (Data travels from the buffer (19) to DAC (20) and speaker (21)).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Gunawan by Sugimoto to provide the benefit of reduced power consumption in the modification of the audio data (Sugimoto, ¶[0009], lines 1-5). Such modification would make obvious the feature(s) of storing the first modified FEA data in a buffer; and outputting, from the buffer, the first modified FEA data.
Claim(s) 2 and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gunawan in view of Sugimoto in further view of Bryans et al (hereinafter Bryans), US-PG-PUB No. 2018/0219922 (previously cited).
Regarding claim 2, the combination of Gunawan and Sugimoto, as explained above, teach the method of claim 1, but fail to teach wherein the FEA data comprises a fetched audio signal and an FEA signal, wherein the fetched audio signal comprises a shared audio signal and the FEA signal.
Bryans teaches a conferencing system wherein FEA data may comprise a fetched audio signal (A signal to a far end (FEA data) includes a mix of near end program audio from a computer (¶[0029], lines 24-25) mixed with microphone-based speech signals, such mix being a fetched audio signal.....¶[0043], lines 2-4) and an FEA signal (The microphone signals which are mixed with the program audio.....¶[0043], lines 2-4), wherein the fetched audio signal comprises a shared audio signal (The near end program audio) and the FEA signal (The microphone-based speech signals).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Gunawan and Sugimoto by Bryans to provide the benefit of preventing errors with audio routing (Bryans, ¶[0034], lines 7-14). Such modification would make obvious the feature(s) wherein the FEA data comprises a fetched audio signal and an FEA signal, wherein the fetched audio signal comprises a shared audio signal and the FEA signal.
Regarding claim 18, the functions recited are the same as claim 8, and are similarly taught by the combination of Gunawan and Sugimoto teaches.
Regarding the additional limitations, Gunawan teaches a system comprising: one or more processors; and one or more computer-readable storage media storing instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform the aforementioned operations (¶[0047]-¶[0049]).
This further combination fails to teach wherein the FEA data comprises a fetched audio signal and an FEA signal, wherein the fetched audio signal comprises a shared audio signal and the FEA signal.
Bryans teaches a conferencing system wherein FEA data may comprise a fetched audio signal (A signal to a far end (FEA data) includes a mix of near end program audio from a computer (¶[0029], lines 24-25) mixed with microphone-based speech signals, such mix being a fetched audio signal.....¶[0043], lines 2-4) and an FEA signal (The microphone signals which are mixed with the program audio.....¶[0043], lines 2-4), wherein the fetched audio signal comprises a shared audio signal (The near end program audio) and the FEA signal (The microphone-based speech signals).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Gunawan and Sugimoto by Bryans to provide the benefit of preventing errors with audio routing (Bryans, ¶[0034], lines 7-14). Such modification would make obvious the feature(s) wherein the FEA data comprises a fetched audio signal and an FEA signal, wherein the fetched audio signal comprises a shared audio signal and the FEA signal.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3, 9-17, and 19-20 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 following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: Search was conducted in the fields of audio conferencing and audio processing.
Regarding claim 3, while prior art was identified in which far end audio data is modified and evaluated, as explained in the rejections of claims 1, 8, and 18, and additional art could be located wherein a difference between two signals is minimized using a sum of absolute differences calculation (Ebenezer et al, US-PG-PUB No. 2004/0028217 (previously cited); Puntambekar et al, US-PG-PUB No. 2018/0077445; Sinha et al, US Patent No. 12,640,163), no teachings could be identified wherein generating modified far end audio data comprises determining a time-domain sum-of-absolute-difference from far end audio data data to minimize a difference between a fetched audio signal and an FEA signal (component signals of the FEA data). By contrast, the most relevant teaching (Ebenezer et al) seeks to minimize the difference between a single far end audio stream and a single near end audio which may contain an acoustic echo of said far end audio.
Regarding claims 9 and 19, while art was located in which a near-end audio is modified first in the time domain, then in the frequency domain (Mylylla, US-PG-PUB No. 2005/0063536 (previously cited)), and art was located in which a SAD is calculated in the time domain to affect a delay (Ebenezer et al, US-PG-PUB No. 2004/0028217 (previously cited)), and art was additionally located in which a SAD is calculated in the frequency domain to adjust a playback speed (Shires, US-PG-PUB No. 2007/0250311 (previously cited)), it would not have been obvious to combine these references with the references used in the rejections of claims 8 and 18 in such a way as to arrive at the claimed invention, nor could art be located which would have provided a more appropriate foundation for such a rejection.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Valin et al, US-PG-PUB No. 2008/0232353 teaches a conferencing system wherein audio is delayed via a jitter buffer, and wherein such delay may be modified based on comparison of the audio to a threshold.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SEAN M RINEHART whose telephone number is (571)272-2778. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 10:00 AM - 6:00 PM ET.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Fan Tsang can be reached on (571) 272-7547. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/SEAN RINEHART/Examiner, Art Unit 2694
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