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 .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 06/12/2026 has been entered.
Response to Amendments
Submission dated 06/12/2026 amends claims 1, 9 and 21. Previously, claim 19 had been cancelled, claims 20-21 had been added, and claims 14-19 had been withdrawn from consideration per an election requirement. Claims 1-13 and 20-21 are being examined.
In view of the amendment to claim 21, the previously set forth 112 rejection has been withdrawn.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to independent claims have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
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 21 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 1 recites the limitation "the first image” in line 11. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. For the prior art purposes, the limitation has been interpreted as “a first image.”
Claim 9 recites the limitation "the digital image” in line 9. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. For the prior art purposes, the limitation has been interpreted as “a digital image.”
Claim 2 recite the limitation “one of the first and second images” in line 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for the second image of this limitation. For the prior art purposes, the limitation has been interpreted as “one of the first image and a second image.”
Claim 3 recite the limitation “the second image” in lines 2-3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation. For the prior art purposes, the limitation has been interpreted as “a second image.”
Claim Objections
Claim 1 is objected to because of the following informalities:
in lines 26-27, the claim 1 recites :
“character recognition match the identification inselecting a fixture from a plurality of fixtures, each fixture corresponding to a type of article; formation shown in the first image”.
The examiner believes that the underlined phrase “selecting a fixture from a plurality of fixtures, each fixture corresponding to a type of article;” should have been struck through and deleted. Appropriate correction is required.
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) 1-3, 7-9, 13 and 20-21 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Us patent application publication no. 2020/0175294 to Ichikawa in view of us patent no. 8879783 to Wang et al. (hereinafter Wang), us patent application publication no. 2025/0321241 to Shenoy et al. (hereinafter Shenoy) and us application publication no. 2014/0263654 to Davis et al. (hereinafter Davis).
For claim 1, Ichikawa as applied teaches a system, the system comprising:
a digital camera (see, e.g., pars. 101-104, which teach obtaining the image data with an OCR device; the examiner interprets the cited paragraphs to at least implicitly teach or suggests a digital camera because they teach using an OCR device, which digitizes an image of physical documents, to obtain a digital image);
a computer including a processor communicatively coupled to the digital camera (see, e.g., pars. 71 and 102-104 and FIG. 1, which teach that a cpu acquires the character image data); and
a monitor to display a graphical user interface provided by the computer (see, e.g., par. 71 and FIG. 1, which teach a display device), wherein the processor is configured to execute an application stored in a memory that is communicatively coupled to the processor (see, e.g., par. 71 and FIG. 1, which teach a RAM and a ROM coupled to the cpu), the application, when executed, causing the processor to:
command the digital camera to capture a first image of identification information marked on an article (see, e.g., pars. 103-104 and FIG. 6, which teach acquiring the character image data),
perform optical character recognition of the first image to identify characters of the identification information and create therefrom a second image (see, e.g., pars. 103-104 and FIG. 6, which teach acquiring the recognized character data from the character image data using an OCR device),
display, via the graphical user interface, the first image and results of the optical character recognition (see, e.g., pars. 118-121, 135, and 141-142 and FIG. 8, which teach displaying, via the GUI, the character image data and the recognized character data next to one another on the work screen so that the displayed data can be easily compared and verified).
receive, via the graphical user interface, user input indicating whether the results of the optical character recognition match the identification information shown in the first image (see, e.g., pars. 43 and 141-144 and FIGS. 8 and 10, which teach receiving a user input indicating whether the recognized character data match the character image data).
While Ichikawa as applied does not explicitly teach, Wang in the analogous art teaches, in response to the user input indicating a mismatch, selectively (i) commanding the digital camera to capture another image of the identification information or (ii) receiving user edits to the results of the optical character recognition (see, e.g., lines 27-58 on col. 15 and FIG. 2 of Wang, which teach, when the mismatch is identified, requesting and receiving a corrected information from the user).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa to process the match/mismatch as taught by Wang because doing so would yield predictable results of allowing the operator to take the corrective action while comparing the data so that no future modification is necessary (see, e.g., lines 51-58 on co. 15 of Wang and MPEP 2143(I)(D)).
While Ichikawa in view of Wang does not explicitly teach, Shenoy as applied teaches:
a fixture configured to hold an article such that identification information on the article is positioned within a field of view of the digital camera (see, e.g., pars. 35-36 and 52-57 and FIGS. 1-3 and 4A-B, which teach positioning a carrier holding a sample container with a label within a view of an imaging sensor);
the fixture is one of a plurality of fixtures, each fixture corresponding to a respective type of article and configured to position the identification information of the respective type of article at a predetermined location relative to the digital camera (see, e.g., pars. 35-39 and 52-57 and FIGS. 1-3 and 4A-B, which teach that there are multiple carriers, each holding a respective sample container, and they are moved around the track to the quality check module, where they are imaged);
wherein the predetermined location corresponds to a region of the article containing the identification information such that the identification information is centrally located in the first image (see, e.g., pars. 52-57, 60-66 and FIGS. 4-7, which teach that the carriers are positioned and rotated within the quality check module such that the labels of the sample containers are centrally located in the images);
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang to use the imaging set-up of Shenoy because doing so would provide the optimal viewpoint and improve the accuracy of the final analysis (see par. 92 of Shenoy).
While Ichikawa in view of Wang and Shenoy does not explicitly teach, Davis in the analogous art teach creating a machine-readable code representing the identification information after acceptance of the results (see, e.g., pars. 7, 24-25, 27, 31, 38, and 40 and Fig. 4 of Davis, which each printing a barcode representing the identification data after the verification).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang and Shenoy to encode the identifier information into a barcode because doing so would yield predictable results of allowing easier and faster access to the relevant information about an article by simply scanning a single code (see, e.g., pars. 9-10 of Davis and MPEP 2143(I)(D)).
For claim 2, Ichikawa in view of Wang, Shenoy and Davis teaches that at least one of the first and second images is a digital image (see, e.g., par. 103-104 of Ichikawa, which teach digitally, e.g., using an OCR, obtaining the recognized character data).
For claim 3, Ichikawa in view of Wang, Shenoy and Davis teaches that the application further causes the processor to accept an input from a user wherein the input includes instructions for editing the second image (see, e.g., pars. 34-35, 43, 113, and 117-121 of Ichikawa, which teach shifting into the input screen where the operator start the verification of the recognized character data).
For claim 7, while Ichikawa in view of Wang and Shenoy does not explicitly teach, Davis in the analogous art teaches that the machine-readable code is a barcode (see, e.g., pars. 7, 24-25, 27, 31, 38, and 40 and Fig. 4 of Davis, which teach creating a barcode representing the identification information).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa to encode the identifier information into a barcode as taught by Davis because doing so would yield predictable results of allowing easier and faster access to the relevant information about an article by simply scanning a single code (see, e.g., pars. 9-10 of Davis and MPEP 2143(I)(D)).
For claim 8, while Ichikawa in view of Wang and Shenoy does not explicitly teach, Davis in the analogous art teaches that the machine-readable code is displayed on the monitor (see, e.g., par. 27 and FIGS. 3-4 of Davis, which verifying the barcode on verification screen on display).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa to verify the code on a screen as taught by Davis because doing so would yield predictable results of previewing and doing a quality check before actual printing of the code (see, e.g., par.27 of Davis and MPEP 2143(I)(D)).
For claim 9, Ichikawa as applied teaches a method, the method comprising:
capturing a digital image of identification information marked on an article (see, e.g., pars. 103-104 and FIG. 6, which teach acquiring the character image data);
performing optical character recognition of the digital image to identify characters of the identification information (see, e.g., pars. 103-104 and FIG. 6, which teach acquiring the recognized character data from the character image data using an OCR device);
displaying the digital image and results of the optical character recognition via a graphical user interface on a monitor (see, e.g., pars. 118-121, 135, and 141-142 and FIG. 8, which teach displaying, via the GUI, the character image data and the recognized character data next to one another on the work screen so that the displayed data can be easily compared and verified);
via the graphical user interface, receiving user input indicating whether the results of the optical character recognition match the identification information shown in the digital image (see, e.g., pars. 43 and 141-144 and FIGS. 8 and 10, which teach receiving a user input indicating whether the recognized character data match the character image data).
While Ichikawa as applied does not explicitly teach, Wang in the analogous art teaches, in response to receiving the user input indicating that the results does not match, selectively: (i) capturing another image of the identification information and performing another optical recognition or (ii) receiving user edits to the results of the optical character recognition (see, e.g., lines 27-58 on col. 15 and FIG. 2 of Wang, which teach, when the mismatch is identified, requesting and receiving a corrected information from the user).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa to process the match/mismatch as taught by Wang because doing so would yield predictable results of allowing the operator to take the corrective action while comparing the data so that no future modification is necessary (see, e.g., lines 51-58 on co. 15 of Wang and MPEP 2143(I)(D)).
While Ichikawa in view of Wang does not explicitly teach, Shenoy as applied teaches:
selecting a from a plurality of fixtures, each fixture corresponding to a type of article (see, e.g., pars. 35-39 and 52-57 and FIGS. 1-3 and 4A-B, which teach that there are multiple carriers, each holding a respective sample container, and each is moved around the track to the quality check module);
placing the article in the selected fixture such that identification information of the article is positioned at a predetermined location relative to the digital camera (see, e.g., pars. 35-36 and 52-57 and FIGS. 1-3 and 4A-B, which teach positioning a carrier holding a sample container with a label within a view of an imaging sensor);
wherein the predetermined location positions the identification information at a central region of the digital image (see, e.g., pars. 52-57, 60-66 and FIGS. 4-7, which teach that the carriers are positioned and rotated within the quality check module such that the labels of the sample containers are centrally located in the images);
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang to use the imaging set-up of Shenoy because doing so would provide the optimal viewpoint and improve the accuracy of the final analysis (see par. 92 of Shenoy).
While Ichikawa in view of Wang and Shenoy does not explicitly teach, Davis in the analogous art teach creating a machine-readable code representing the identification information after acceptance or correction of the results (see, e.g., pars. 7, 24-25, 27, 31, 38, and 40 and Fig. 4 of Davis, which each printing a barcode representing the identification data after the verification ).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang and Shenoy to encode the identifier information into a barcode because doing so would yield predictable results of allowing easier and faster access to the relevant information about an article by simply scanning a single code (see, e.g., pars. 9-10 of Davis and MPEP 2143(I)(D)).
For claim 13, Ichikawa in view of Wang, Shenoy and Davis teaches comparing, by the user, the digital image and results of the optical character recognition (see, e.g., pars. 118-121, 135, and 141-142 and FIG. 8 of Ichikawa, which teach displaying, via the GUI, the character image data and the recognized character data next to one another on the work screen so that the displayed data can be easily compared and verified).
For claim 20, while Ichikawa in view of Wang and Davis does not explicitly teach, Shenoy in the analogous art teaches a fixture holding device (see, e.g., pars. 35 and 38-40 and FIG. 1, which teach using a track that supports and transports multiple carriers);
the fixture holding device is configured to hold a plurality of fixtures (see, e.g., pars. 35 and 38-40 and FIG. 1, which teach using a track that supports and transports multiple carriers);
wherein the fixture holding device can be adjusted to place any one of the plurality fixtures in alignment with the digital camera such that a device placed within that fixture can be captured by the digital camera (see, e.g., pars. 38-40, 52-57 and FIGS. 1-3 and 4A-B, which teach using a track to place the carrier in the quality check module, where they are imaged).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang and Davis to use the imaging set-up of Shenoy because doing so would provide the optimal viewpoint and improve the accuracy of the final analysis (see par. 92 of Shenoy).
For claim 21, while Ichikawa in view of Wang and Davis does not explicitly teach, Shenoy in the analogous art teaches selecting a fixture from one of a plurality of fixtures (see, e.g., pars. 35-39 and 52-57 and FIGS. 1-3 and 4A-B of Shenoy, which teach that there are multiple carriers, each being moved around the track to the quality check module);
wherein the fixture corresponds to a type of article to be placed therein (see, e.g., pars. 35-39 and 52-57 and FIGS. 1-3 and 4A-B of Shenoy, which teach that there are multiple carriers, each holding a respective sample container).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang and Davis to use the imaging set-up of Shenoy because doing so would provide the optimal viewpoint and improve the accuracy of the final analysis (see par. 92 of Shenoy).
Claim(s) 4, 10 and 11 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy and further in view of us patent application publication no. 2016/0019439 to Wang et al. (hereinafter Wang2).
For claim 4, while Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy does not explicitly teach, Wang2 in the analogous art teaches validating a format of the identification information (see, e.g., par. 117 and FIG. 8 of Wang2, which teach validating the format of the identification number based on the stored configuration data).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy to validate the identification information as taught by Wang2 because doing so would allow determining the most accurate location of the identification information (see, e.g., pars. 118-119 of Wang2).
For claim 10, while Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy does not explicitly teach, Wang2 in the analogous art teaches validating a format of the identification information (see, e.g., par. 117 and FIG. 8 of Wang2, which teach validating the format of the identification number based on the stored configuration data).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Davis and Shenoy to validate the identification information as taught by Wang2 because doing so would allow determining the most accurate location of the identification information (see, e.g., pars. 118-119 of Wang2).
For claim 11, while Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy does not explicitly teach, Wang2 in the analogous art teaches that the format of the identification information is predetermined based on the article (see, e.g., par. 117 and FIG. 8 of Wang2, which teach that the format of the identification number is predicted based on the card type).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy to predict the format of the identification information as taught by Wang2 because doing so would allow accessing information about the specific article (see, e.g., par. 117 of Wang2).
Claim(s) 5 and 12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy and further in view of us patent application publication no. 2021/0232814 to Schultz et al. (hereinafter Schultz).
For claim 5, while Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy does not explicitly teach, Schultz in the analogous art teaches that the application further causes the processor to, via the graphical user interface, allow the user to cause the processor to command the digital camera to capture another image of the identification information marked on the article and perform another optical character recognition of the digital image to identify the characters of the identification information (see, e.g., pars. pars. 38 and 48 and FIG. 4 of Schultz, which teach recommending the user to capture another image of the object and perform another round of OCR).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Smith to recommend taking another picture for another round of OCR as taught by Schultz because doing so would improve the accuracy of text determined by OCR (see, e.g., pars. 38, 41 and 48 of Schultz).
For claim 12, while Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy does not explicitly teach, Schultz in the analogous art teaches via the graphical user interface, allowing the user to (iii) cause capturing another image of the identification information marked on the article and performing another optical character recognition of the digital image to identify the characters of the identification information (see, e.g., pars. pars. 38 and 48 and FIG. 4 of Schultz, which teach recommending the user to capture another image of the object and perform another round of OCR).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy to recommend taking another picture for another round of OCR as taught by Schultz because doing so would improve the accuracy of text determined by OCR (see, e.g., pars. 38, 41 and 48 of Schultz).
Claim(s) 6 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy and further in view of us patent application publication no. 2008/0267504 to Schloter et al. (hereinafter Schloter).
For claim 6, while Ichikawa in view of Davis does not explicitly teach, Schloter in the analogous art teaches that the article is a mobile device (see, e.g., pars. 78-81 of Schloter, which teach detecting OCR tag on a laptop computer).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ichikawa in view of Wang, Davis and Shenoy to capture a tag on an article such as a laptop as taught by Schloter because doing so would constitute a simple substitution of one known element for another to obtain predictable results (see, e.g., MPEP 2143(I)(B)).
Additional Citations
The following table lists several references that are relevant to the subject matter claimed and disclosed in this Application. The references are not relied on by the Examiner, but are provided to assist the Applicant in responding to this Office action.
Citation
Relevance
Breu et al. (us pat. pub. No. 2024/0278952)
Describes a computer-implemented method for automatically orienting product containers. In one embodiment, the method includes acquiring a reference product label image associated with a batch of product containers on a production line and using a trained deep learning model to compute a perceptual center of the reference product label image based on perceptually relevant label features of the reference product label image. A production line camera acquires an image slice of the respective product label of individual product containers in the batch of product containers. A rotation angle for rotating an individual product container is computed based on the acquired image slice of the respective product label and a label center determined based on the computed perceptual center of the reference product label image. The computed rotation angle is communicated to a controller to effect a rotation of the individual product container.
Kimura et al. (us pat. pub. No. 2021/0124991)
Describes an information processing apparatus. In one embodiment, the apparatus includes a processor configured to acquire a first recognition result and a first recognition probability on target data from a first recognizer, acquire a second recognition result and a second recognition probability on the target data from a second recognizer, execute checking of the first recognition result and the second recognition result, and execute first control in a case where the first recognition result and the second recognition result match each other as a result of the checking. The first control is control for executing either of first processing or second processing on the matched recognition result and outputting a processing result based on at least one of the first recognition probability or the second recognition probability. A human workload for the first processing is smaller than a human workload for the second processing.
Chen et al. (us pat. pub. No. 2021/0124991)
Describes a robot arm, including a pedestal, a support arm on the pedestal and configured to support a substrate, a driving system configured to drive the support arm to move, and a substrate alignment device connected to the support arm. The substrate alignment device includes a first position information collection unit configured to acquire first position information of the substrate when the substrate is on the support arm at a first position; a deviation information acquisition unit configured to acquire position deviation information of the substrate in accordance with the first position information and second position information of the substrate in the case that the substrate is located at a standard position, and an adjustment unit configured to generate control information in accordance with the position deviation information, thereby driving the support arm by the driving system to place the substrate at a target position.
Table 1
Conclusion
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/WOO C RHIM/Examiner, Art Unit 2676
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