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 .
This communication is in response to Application 18/583,028 filed on 21 February, 2024. This Application claims priority from Japanese Patent Application No. 2023-028984 filed on February 27, 2023.
Claims 1-11 are pending.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1, 10 and 11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Haapanen et al (US 2023/0291642).
Regarding claim 1, Haapanen teaches a system (fig.1) comprising:
a plurality of devices each connected to a network, the plurality of devices including a first device and a second device (Haapanen fig.1 110-114, 120-124);
and a server comprising a storage device, the server being configured to communicate over the network (Haapanen fig.1 140-144), the second device being configured to perform:
confirming, in a state where the second device has completed a connection with the server, whether each of one or more devices of the plurality of devices other than the second device has completed a connection with the server, the one or more devices including the first device (Haapanen [0021]- [0024] “…automatically by mediation service when it initially detects a connection to the local network; or (c) based on receiving a request from CBMS 140. The use and frequency of a network search may be configurable in order to comply with the enterprise's IT security policies and to minimize the network traffic. Examples of data that a network search discovers pertaining to an output device include an IP address of the output device and a type of the output device, such as a printer, scanner, etc. After the discovery of one or more output devices, the mediation service reports the newly discovered output devices to CBMS 140”);
and transmitting, when the first device is in a specific state in which the first device has not completed a connection with the server, first device identification information and first status information to the server, the first device identification information being identification information for identifying the first device, the first status information indicating a status of the first device (Haapanen [0041]-[0044] “For each discovered output device that has not been assigned a mediation service, CBMS 140 determines an active (or primary) mediation service for that output device based on the list of potential mediation services identified in the previous step. The active mediation service for each output device may be randomly selected. However, this may result in an imbalance of the number of output devices assigned to each mediation service. For example, three output devices might be assigned to a first mediation service, eight output devices may be assigned to a second mediation service, and nineteen output devices may be assigned to a third mediation service”), the server being configured to perform:
storing, in response to acquiring the first device identification information and the first status information which are transmitted from the second device in the transmitting, the acquired first device identification information and the acquired first status information in the storage device in association with administrator identification information associated with the second device, the administrator identification information associated with the second device being identification information for identifying an administrator associated with the second device (Haapanen [0023]).
Regarding claim 10, this claim contains limitations found within those of claim 1, and the same rationale of rejection applies, where applicable.
Regarding claim 11, this claim contains limitations found within those of claim 1, and the same rationale of rejection applies, where applicable.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-9 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.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure: Kouno et al (US 2017/0093985), Takahashi et al (US 2019/0012123).
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/I.R/Examiner, Art Unit 2459
/SCHQUITA D GOODWIN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2459