DETAILED ACTION
This Office Action is in response to Application 18/593,967 filed on 03/03/2024.
In the instant application, claims 1 and 12 are independent claims; Claims 1-12 have been examined and are pending. This action is made non-final.
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 .
Drawings
The drawings submitted on 03/03/2024 are acceptable.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 03/03/2024 was filed before the mailing date of the first office action on the merits. The submissions are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the examiner.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-7 and 9-11 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected based claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
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 of this title, 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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned at the time any inventions covered therein were effectively filed absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned at the time a later invention was effectively filed in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1, 3, 6, 9, 10, 12, 15 and 18-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over MIYASAKA (“Miyasaka,” US 2019/0384549), published on December 19, 2019 in view of Hatanaka et al. (“Hatanaka,” US 2022/0303422), published on September 22, 2022.
Regarding claim 1, Miyasaka teaches An information processing system (Miyasaka: ¶0020 and Fig. 1; image processing system 1 includes an image processing device 10 and a printer 20) comprising:
a processor (Miyasaka: ¶0021 and Fig. 1; the image processing device 10 includes a first controller 11, display 13, operation receiver 14, and a first communication interface 15) configured to:
detect a state necessitating a setting change (Miyasaka: ¶0082-0085 and Fig. 6; the first controller 11 determines whether the acquired printer setting conforms to the acquired job-side layer information. Determines whether the printer settings and job-side layer information are compatible), and perform a process of highlighting a setting change menu on a web user interface (Miyasaka: ¶0097 and Fig. 8; the first controller 11 may report an error by superimposing a specific icon 50 indicating an error in the display area of the print job selected in the job list pane 31. The first controller 11 may display an error report by displaying a popup message 53 describing the content of the error in the user interface window 30. In this example, the message 53 contains text such as “The specific color (white) of ink included in the print job does not match the special color of ink in the print settings. Change the layer order in the basic settings.” The message 53 is an example of a prompt telling the user to change the print settings to content compatible with the print job) [in a case in which the web user interface is accessed after the detection of the state].
Miyasaka does not explicitly teach: in a case in which the web user interface is accessed after the detection of the state.
However Hatanaka teaches a method for setting items for executing an installed application. Hatanaka further teach: in a case in which the web user interface is accessed after the detection of the state (Hatanaka: ¶0081-0082 and Fig. 6A; a home screen 1000 displayed on the operation panel 815 of the MFP 10 includes an application site button and a widget 103. The widget 1003 is an example of a button including a display area for displaying the latest information of the MFP10. The widget 1003 indicates “New Software Update is available”. Note: that means the state change is detected prior to the home screen being accessed).
Accordingly, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art , before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, having the teachings of Hatakana and Miyasaka in front of them to include the notification of software update available as disclosed by Hatakana with the notification of error when executing a print job as taught by Miyasaka to improve the convenience of the user who sets the setting values of various setting items for using the installed application or firmware (Hatakana: 0093).
Regarding claim 8, Miyasaka and Hatakana teach the information system of claim 1,
Miyasaka and H33atakana also teach: wherein the processor is configured to detect, as the state, an occurrence of an error necessitating a setting change (Miyasaka: ¶0097 and Fig. 8; the first controller 11 may report an error by superimposing a specific icon 50 indicating an error in the display area of the print job selected in the job list pane 31. The first controller 11 may display an error report by displaying a popup message 53 describing the content of the error in the user interface window 30. In this example, the message 53 contains text such as “The specific color (white) of ink included in the print job does not match the special color of ink in the print settings. Change the layer order in the basic settings.” The message 53 is an example of a prompt telling the user to change the print settings to content compatible with the print job).
Regarding claim 12, the claim is directed to a non-transitory computer readable medium storing a program for executing the information processing system as claimed in claim 1; Claim 12 is similar scope to claim 1 and is therefore rejected under similar rationale.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record on form PTO-892 and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Applicant is required under 37 C.F.R. § 1.111(c) to consider these references fully when responding to this action.
It is noted that any citation to specific, pages, columns, lines, or figures in the prior art references and any interpretation of the references should not be considered to be limiting in any way. A reference is relevant for all it contains and may be relied upon for all that it would have reasonably suggested to one having ordinary skill in the art. In re Heck, 699 F.2d 1331, 1332-33,216 USPQ 1038, 1039 (Fed. Cir. 1983) (quoting In re Lemelson, 397 F.2d 1006,1009, 158 USPQ 275,277 (CCPA 1968)).
Inquiry
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Tam T. Tran whose telephone number is (571) 270-5029. The examiner can normally be reached M-F: 7:30 AM - 5:00 PM.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, William L. Bashore can be reached on 571-272-4088. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/TAM T TRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2174
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