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 .
Status of Claims
Claims 1-10 are currently pending in this application.
Claim Objections
Claim 4 is objected to because of the following informality: A comma “,” is missing after the phrase “The supervision device according to claim 3”. 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.
The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied 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 1 and 5-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Fumey et al. (EP-3470986-B1) in view of Duguid et al. (US 2023/0333552-A1).
With respect to claim 1, Fumey teaches a supervision device (electronic device 24, fig.1) configured for communicating with an onboard edge computation device onboard an aircraft (for monitoring an avionics software application 14 of an electronic avionics system 10, fig.1, onboard an aircraft, p.3-4), the onboard edge computation device (the electronic avionics system 10, fig.1) configured for executing software applications related to at least one onboard electronic device with certified operation (a platform 16 capable of executing each avionics software application 14 of an electronic avionics system 10 onboard the aircraft, fig. 1 and p.3-4; each avionics software application 14 installed, which has been the subject of a separate qualification, is associated with one or more WCET values corresponding to functional chains for which guarantees must be provided as part of the certification, p.7), the supervision device (electronic device 24, fig.1) being configured for receiving observability signals from the edge computation device, the observability signals comprising data relating to local computing resources of the onboard edge computation device and information relating to the execution of at least one of the software applications (the second monitoring module 28 {of the electronic device 24, fig.1} is configured to monitor the behavior of the avionics software application 14, via the verification, at the expiration of a predefined monitoring time Tf, of the detection of at least one application event of the avionics software application, p.6; event providing information on the state of the avionics software application 14, the event then being described as application, an event generally being something observable at a given time on the platform 16, p.7), the supervision device (the electronic device 24, fig.1) comprising at least one computing processor (processor 32, fig.1 and p.5) configured for: computing a state of operation of the edge computation device and a state of execution of the at least one software application from the received observability signals (diagnose an overrun of the first predefined execution time T1, for one or more corresponding software processing operations or for the avionics software application 14… monitor the execution time of an avionics software application 14 with respect to a normal time, established in compliance with the rules of the platform, that is to say with respect to a field of use of the avionics software application 14, p.8).
With respect to claim 1, Fumey does not teach of a human-machine interface and displaying the state of operation and the state of execution on said human-machine interface.
However, it is known by Duguid to teach a human-machine interface (Duguid: HMI, [0044]) and displaying the state of operation and the state of execution on said human-machine interface (Duguid: HMI Computer to send a series of start-up commands while performing safety checks, [0072]; necessary information provided by the HMI may enable vehicle operation without overburdening the pilot, [0073]).
Because Duguid teaching is also directed to an aircraft (Duguid: [0014]; Fumey: an aircraft, p.3-4), it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to incorporate the teaching of a human-machine interface and displaying the state of operation and the state of execution on said human-machine interface as taught by Duguid with the supervision device of Fumey for the purpose of allowing for the creation of an improved human-machine interaction (Duguid: [0014]).
With respect to claim 5, Fumey and Duguid combined teaches configured for performing the computing and the displaying either substantially in real-time, at the reception of the observability signals from the onboard computation device, or subsequent thereto (Duguid: an immersive display screen and/or head-mounted virtual reality display, one or more real-time sources of information from onboard the vehicle (e.g., aircraft), abstract).
With respect to claim 6, Fumey and Duguid combined teaches configured for implementing a digital twin of the aircraft (Duguid: digital twin of the aircraft, [0093]).
With respect to claim 7, Fumey and Duguid combined teaches an electronic software application execution system (fig.1) comprising: an onboard computation system on an aircraft (Fumey: an electronic avionics system 10, fig.1, onboard an aircraft, p.3-4), comprising: at least one onboard electronic device (Fumey: avionics electronic systems 22 of the aircraft, fig.1 and p.3) with certified operation according to an avionics certification standard (Fumey: each avionics software application 14 installed, which has been the subject of a separate qualification, is associated with one or more WCET values corresponding to functional chains for which guarantees must be provided as part of the certification, p.7); and an edge computation device (Fumey: electronic device 24, fig.1); and at least one remote computation system located on the ground, comprising a supervision device (Fumey: the monitoring device 24 is, for example separate from the platform 16, and comprises an information processing unit 30 formed for example by a processor 32, fig.1 and p.5).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-4 and 8-10 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: The prior art of record, taken alone or in combination, fails to disclose or render obvious, which makes the following claims allowable over the prior art:
With respect to claim 2/1, configured, for a mission of executing a plurality of software applications on a path of the aircraft, for displaying on said human-machine interface a plurality of path portions, each path portion corresponding to a state of operation of the edge computation device and/or the onboard electronic devices.
With respect to claim 3/2, further configured for displaying an information item relating to each path portion, indicating the state of operation and a root cause of the state of operation.
With respect to claim 4/3/2, wherein the root cause is received from the onboard edge device or calculated by the supervision device based on the observability signals and supplementary information including information on the environment and information on connectivity.
With respect to claim 8/7, wherein said onboard edge computation device comprises: a first communication interface configured for communicating, according to a first communication protocol, with said at least one onboard electronic device; and a second radio communication interface, configured for communicating, according to a second radio communication protocol, with said at least one remote computation system, and wherein said edge computation device comprises: at least one electronic memory unit; and at least one computing processor forming local computing resources, the at least one computing processor being configured for implementing: a module for managing a plurality of software applications stored in said at least one electronic memory, each software application being suitable for providing at least one control parameter and/or for receiving at least one datum from said at least one onboard electronic device; a module for activating the execution of at least one of the stored software applications, configured for receiving at least one request for the execution of at least one software application from an external control device and/or for validating an activation condition for the execution of at least one software application; and a management module for an execution stack, configured for determining, for each software application to be executed, an allocation of local computing resources of said edge computation device, in order to execute all or part of the software application to be executed, and for launching the local execution of the part of the application to be executed and for requesting, in the case where a first part of the application is executed locally, a remote execution, by said at least one remote computation system, of a second part of the application to be executed, supplementary to the first part.
With respect to claim 9/8/7, wherein said supervision device is configured for displaying, following the determination of execution, for a software application, in two parts respectively, a first part executed by said edge computation device and a second part executed by said at least one remote computation system, for displaying an information item relating to the first and second parts.
With respect to claim 10/9/8/7, wherein said supervision device is further configured for displaying a root cause of the determination of a two-part execution.
Conclusion
The additional prior arts made of record and have not been relied upon are considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure as follows: EP-3680779-B1, WO-2016065519-A1, and FR_2946769_A1.
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/HIEN D KHUU/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2116 February 10, 2026