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 .
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-3 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. Reasons for allowance will be provided in the event the application becomes in condition for allowance.
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 4 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.
Regarding claim 4, the claim recites “wherein the processor is configured to use as the threshold a lower value as a dot gain of a printer printing the image data corrected by the information processing system is higher”. It is unclear what the claim is requiring to be “higher”. Consequently, claim 4 is indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter regarded as the invention. While this appears to be an unintentional drafting or typographical error, the intended meaning of the claim in its current form is unclear and the claim cannot currently be examined for the purposes of prior art rejection.
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, 5, and 6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Metcalfe et al. (U.S.P.G. Pub. No. 2022/0084211) in view of Horikawa (U.S.P.G. Pub. No. 2012/0099008).
Regarding claim 1, Kurita et al. (U.S. Patent No. 8,384,805) discloses:
An information processing system comprising:
a processor (column 6, lines 9-17 and column 7, line 61 through column 8, line 13) configured to:
perform a weighting operation to weight, about image data on white pixels and color pixels (see, for example, column 8, lines 26-55), color pixels surrounding a pixel of interest within a predetermined region in a manner such that a lower weight is attached to each of the color pixels as the color pixel is farther from the pixel of interest (column 5, lines 27-51, the system assigns weights to the reference pixels in the region, with a larger weight set for a reference pixel close to a pixel to be corrected); and
correct the pixel of interest according to a sum of weights of the color pixels surrounding the pixel of interest (column 5, lines 27-51, the pixel is corrected according to the summation)
Kurita et al. does not explicitly disclose:
Wherein the correction of the pixel of interest regards whether a sum of weights of the color pixels surrounding the pixel of interest is lower than a threshold
Loce (U.S. Patent No. 6,381,372) discloses:
perform a weighting operation to weight, about image data on white pixels and color pixels (see, for example, column 17, lines 52-67), color pixels surrounding a pixel of interest within a predetermined region (column 5, lines 17-28, the pixels in a windowed neighborhood surrounding a pixel of interest are observed) and
correct the pixel of interest if a sum of weights of the color pixels surrounding the pixel of interest is lower than a threshold (column 5, lines 29-43, if the sum of the weights of the neighborhood exceeds a threshold, that pixel is included in a look-up table for conversion/modification; exceeding a threshold is mathematically equivalent to being lower than a threshold under an order-reversing transformation and the decision to use “lower than a threshold” consequently amounts to design choice)
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine the system of Loce with the system of Kurita such that the correction of the pixel of interest regarded whether a sum of weights of the color pixels surrounding the pixel of interest is lower than a threshold as described in Loce. The suggestion/motivation would have been in order to implement a system capable of “provid[ing] an optimized design…for applications such as resolution conversion, resolution enhancement, image restoration, and the like” (column 4, lines 64-67 of the Loce reference).
Regarding claim 5, arguments analogous to claim 1 are applicable. The computer readable medium is explicitly taught as evidenced by column 6, lines 9-17 of Kurita.
Regarding claim 6, the structural elements of apparatus claim 1 perform all of the steps of method claim 6. Thus, claim 6 is rejected for the same reasons discussed in the rejection of claim 1.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JOHN R WALLACE whose telephone number is (571)270-1577. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday from 8:30-5 PM.
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/JOHN R WALLACE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2682
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