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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see page 6, filed 2/2/26, with respect to claims 17-20 have been fully considered and are persuasive. The 35 U.S.C. 101 rejection has been withdrawn.
Applicant's arguments filed 2/2/26 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Regarding applicant’s argument for claim 1, on pages 6 and 7, that Sakai does not teach a page level instruction set of the inspection regions, examiner disagrees. Figure 6D discloses specific coordinates of different detected regions within the context a page (pixel coordinates would make no sense in the context of multiple pages), while figure 6A and figure 10 disclose a single page analyzed for inspection regions. Examiner further notes that identified distinct regions inspected accordingly is a “template”. Therefore the argument is overcome and the previous rejection remains.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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.
1) Claim(s) 1-3, 7, 9-11, 13-15 and 17-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by U.S. patent application publication 2023/0061533 by Sakai.
2) Regarding claim 1, Sakai teaches a system comprising: at least one physical memory device to store inspection template generation logic and one or more processors coupled with the at least one physical memory device to execute the inspection template generation logic (figure 2; various memories and a CPU) to: receive one or more page images of a processed print job (figure 4, item S401; paragraph 50; image data is received); analyze the page images to identify print objects and determine corresponding inspection regions in the corresponding page images at which the print objects are located (figure 5; paragraph 73; objects are identified and coordinate locations stored); and generate an inspection template comprising a page level instruction set (Figure 6D; discloses specific coordinates of different detected regions within the context a page [pixel coordinates would make no sense in the context of multiple pages], while figure 6A and figure 10 disclose a single page analyzed for inspection regions) including the inspection regions, wherein the inspection regions comprise regions to be inspected during document inspection of the printed print job (figure 8; paragraphs 86-88; settings for inspection are collected [i.e. a template] and inspection occurs as detailed in figure 11).
3) Regarding claim 2, Sakai teaches the system of claim 1, wherein analyzing the page images further comprises determining boundaries of the inspection regions including coordinates within the corresponding page images (paragraphs 73 and 116; coordinates of object regions for inspection are determined).
4) Regarding claim 3, Sakai teaches the system of claim 2, wherein analyzing the page images further comprises identifying one of a plurality of print object types for each of the identified print objects (figure 5; paragraphs 70 and 71; barcodes and characters are at least two object types determined; paragraph 57 discloses determination of a photo object; figure 6D).
5) Regarding claim 7, Sakai teaches the system of claim 1, wherein the inspection template generation logic generates an inspection template based on an occurrence rate of the one or more inspection regions (figure 4; template created includes each detected object [e.g. figure 6C, items 604-606] therefore the template is based upon each occurrence of a detected region to inspect [i.e. if 3 objects are detected as in figure 6C, then 3 inspection regions are added to the template]).
6) Regarding claim 9, Sakai teaches the system of claim 1, wherein the inspection template generation logic further to transmit the inspection template (figure 3, item 309; inspection settings are transmitted through the bus 310 to the UI [e.g. figure 10]).
7) Regarding claim 10, Sakai teaches the system of claim 9, further comprising a printer to print the print job on a print medium (figure 2, item 101; a printer).
8) Regarding claim 11, Sakai teaches the system of claim 10, further comprising an inspection system to receive the inspection template and perform inspection of the one or more inspection regions in captured images of the printed print job using the inspection template (paragraph 53; inspection settings are applied to a print job that is output and then scanned for inspection).
9) Claims 13-15 are taught in the same manner as described in the rejection of claims 1-3 above, respectively.
10) Claims 17-19 are taught in the same manner as described in the rejection of claims 1-3 above, respectively.
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.
11) Claim(s) 4-6, 16 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. patent application publication 2023/0061533 by Sakai as applied to claims 3, 15 and 19 above, and further in view of U.S. patent application publication 2021/0081732 by Manabe.
12) Regarding claim 4, Sakai teaches the system of claim 3, wherein the plurality of print object types comprise a barcode (paragraph 73; object is detected as a barcode), a control mark (examiner interprets a barcode as a more specific kind of “control mark”, as barcodes provide instruction/ID information used to perform a process) and an optical character recognition pattern (paragraphs 69 and 92; character patterns are recognized as detailed to determine a character region).
Sakai does not specifically teach print object types comprise a logo.
Manabe teaches print object types comprise a logo (paragraph 45; print objects such as a logo can be detected and have a particular quality requirement assigned to it for inspection process [figure 7]).
Sakai and Manabe are combinable because they are both from the print quality inspection field of endeavor.
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was effectively filed to combine Sakai with Manabe to add logos as an object type. The motivation for doing so would have been to make a sure a printed corporate logo was of sufficient quality. Therefore it would have been obvious to combine Sakai with Manabe to obtain the invention of claim 4.
13) Regarding claim 5, Sakai teaches the system of claim 4, wherein the inspection template generation logic analyzes the print objects to determine print object type as one of a plurality of types of the barcode and includes the one of the plurality of barcode types in the inspection template (paragraph 120; figure 16; particular orientation of a barcode [i.e. different orientation being different types] is determined and stored to the inspection settings).
14) Regarding claim 6, Sakai teaches the system of claim 4, wherein for the one or more inspection regions, the boundaries and the print object types within the one or more inspection regions are included in the inspection template (paragraphs 73 and 116; coordinates of particular object type regions for inspection are determined and stored).
15) Claims 16 and 20 are taught in the same manner as described in the rejection of claim 4 above.
16) Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. patent application publication 2023/0061533 by Sakai as applied to claim 2 above, and further in view of U.S. patent application publication 2024/0202911 by Miyazawa.
Sakai does not specifically teach the system of claim 2, wherein the inspection template generation logic comprises a trained neural network and the one or more processors execute the trained neural network to analyze the page images.
Miyazawa teaches the system of claim 2, wherein the inspection template generation logic comprises a trained neural network and the one or more processors execute the trained neural network to analyze the page images (paragraph 47; trained model can be utilized for object type detection within images to be inspected).
Sakai and Miyazawa are combinable because they are both from the print quality inspection field of endeavor.
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was effectively filed to combine Sakai with Miyazawa to add a trained neural network. The motivation for doing so would have been to determine abnormalities on label sheets from a printer (paragraph 4). Therefore it would have been obvious to combine Sakai with Miyazawa to obtain the invention of claim 8.
17) Claim 12 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. patent application publication 2023/0061533 by Sakai as applied to claim 2 above, and further in view of U.S. patent application publication 2024/0319931 by Kawabe et al.
Sakai does not specifically teach the system of claim 1, wherein the inspection template generation logic generates high resolution page images from the one or more page images and performs post-processing of the high resolution page images to extract meta parameters from the high resolution page images.
Kawabe teaches the system of claim 1, wherein the inspection template generation logic generates high resolution page images from the one or more page images and performs post-processing of the high resolution page images to extract meta parameters from the high resolution page images (paragraph 34; figure 7; object regions are determined [i.e. a “meta parameter”] and higher resolutions are specified for particular objects).
Sakai and Kawabe are combinable because they are both from the print inspection field of endeavor.
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was effectively filed to combine Sakai with Kawabe to add. The motivation for doing so would have been to detect a smaller difference in quality (paragraph 34). Therefore it would have been obvious to combine Sakai with Kawabe to obtain the invention of claim 12.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to BENJAMIN O DULANEY whose telephone number is (571)272-2874. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Fri 10-6.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Abderrahim Merouan can be reached at (571)270-5254. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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BENJAMIN O. DULANEY
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 2676
/BENJAMIN O DULANEY/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2683
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