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 .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to a judicial exception (abstract idea) without significantly more.
Under Step 1 of the 2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance, the claims are directed to a process (claim 1, a method) or a machine (claim 12, an apparatus), which are statutory categories.
However, evaluating claim 1, under Step 2A, Prong One, the claim is directed
to the judicial exception of an abstract idea using the grouping of a mathematical relationship/mental process. The limitations include:
receiving time-based waveform data, wherein the time-based waveform data comprises waveform data corresponding to one or more waveform signals in a time domain, processing the time-based waveform data to convert the time-based waveform data into frequency-based waveform data, wherein the frequency-based waveform data comprises the waveform data in a frequency domain; packaging at least one of the frequency-based waveform data or the time-based waveform data into one or more spectrogram image files, wherein each spectrogram image file comprises two or more color channels indicating the waveform data; and displaying the one or more spectrogram image files.
The claim recites an abstract idea in the form of mathematical concepts and mental processes by receiving time-based waveform data, processing the waveform data to convert the time-based data into frequency-based waveform data, packaging the at least one of the frequency-based waveform data or time-based data into one or more spectrogram image files, and displaying the one or more spectrogram image files. Converting waveform data from the time domain to the frequency domain constitutes a mathematical calculation, while packaging the resulting data into image files and displaying the image files constitute collecting, organizing, manipulating, and presenting information.
Next, Step 2A, Prong Two evaluates whether additional elements of the claim “integrate the abstract idea into a practical application” in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on the judicial exception, such that the claim is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the exception. The claim does not recite additional elements that integrate the judicial exception into a practical application.
The additional elements of a processor device, waveform signals, spectrogram image files, and displaying the image files merely use generic computer technology as tools to perform the abstract idea and do not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application.
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because the remaining elements amount to no more than general purpose computer components programmed to perform the abstract ideas. As set forth in the 2019 Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 55 “merely include[ing] instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer” is an example of when an abstract idea has not been integrated into a practical application.
The claim does not recite controlling or improving the operation of a machine, improving signal acquisition, improving computer functionality, or otherwise effecting a technological improvement. Instead, the claimed processor merely receives data, performs mathematical processing, packages the processed data into image files, and displays the results.
Therefore, the claims are directed to an abstract idea.
At Step 2B, consideration is given to additional elements that may make the abstract idea significantly more. Under Step 2B, there are no additional elements that make the claim significantly more than the abstract idea.
The additional elements, individually and as an ordered combination, amount to no more than well-understood, routine, and conventional computer functions, including receiving data, performing mathematical operations, encoding data into image files, and displaying information using generic computer components.
Accordingly, the claim does not recite an inventive concept sufficient to transform the judicial exception into patent-eligible subject matter.
Dependent claims 2-11 do not add anything which would render the claimed invention a patent eligible application of the abstract idea. The claim merely recites additional conventional data processing, or data presentation limitations that neither integrate the abstract idea into a practical application nor provide significantly more than the judicial exception. Specifically, claims 2, 3, 8, 10, and 11 merely specify conventional image encoding features, including lossless compression, image axes, color channels, FFT stream encoding, color intensity scaling, and image metadata; claims 4-6 merely identify conventional sources of waveform data and associated sampling characteristics from known sensors such as accelerometers, microphones, strain gauges, and other sensors; claim 7 explicitly recites use of a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT), which is itself a mathematical algorithm; and claim 9 merely transmits the generated spectrogram image files to a semiconductor controller for subsequent image analysis without reciting any control of semiconductor equipment or improvement in semiconductor manufacturing. These additional limitations merely limit the abstract idea to a particular technological environment or add insignificant extra-solution activity and do not improve the functioning of a computer, the sensors, the signal-processing technique, or any other technology.
Accordingly, the dependent claims likewise fail to integrate the judicial exception into a practical application and fail to recite an inventive concept that amounts to significantly more than the abstract idea.
Claim 12 is rejected 35 USC § 101 for the same rationale as in claim 1.
The additional elements, “a memory” and “one or more processors” are recited at a high level of generality and are recited as performing generic computer functions routinely used in computer applications. Generic computer components recited as performing generic computer functions that are well-understood, routine and conventional activities amount to no more than implementing the abstract idea with a computerized system (Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank Int’l 573 U.S. __, 134 S. Ct. 2347, 110 U.S.P.Q.2d 1976 (2014)).
The limitations have been considered individually and as a whole and do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea itself.
Dependent claims 13-20 do not add anything which would render the claimed invention a patent eligible application of the abstract idea. The claim merely recites additional conventional data processing, or data presentation limitations that neither integrate the abstract idea into a practical application nor provide significantly more than the judicial exception. Specifically, claims 13, 14, and 19 merely specify conventional image encoding features, including lossless compression, image axes, color channels, FFT stream encoding, color intensity scaling, and image metadata; claims 15-17 merely identify conventional sources of waveform data and associated sampling characteristics from known sensors such as accelerometers, microphones, strain gauges, and other sensors; claim 18 explicitly recites use of a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT), which is itself a mathematical algorithm; and claim 20 merely transmits the generated spectrogram image files to a semiconductor controller for subsequent image analysis without reciting any control of semiconductor equipment or improvement in semiconductor manufacturing. These additional limitations merely limit the abstract idea to a particular technological environment or add insignificant extra-solution activity and do not improve the functioning of a computer, the sensors, the signal-processing technique, or any other technology.
Accordingly, the dependent claims likewise fail to integrate the judicial exception into a practical application and fail to recite an inventive concept that amounts to significantly more than the abstract idea.
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.
Claims 1, 3, 4, 6-10, 12, 14, 15, and 17-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as
being unpatentable over Ramaiah (Pub. No. US 2022/0180890) in view of Ozturk et al. (Pub. No. US 2022/0036741) (hereinafter Ozturk) and further in view of Waldo (Pub. No. US 2023/0258692).
As per claims 1, 3, 4, 7, 12, 14, 15 and 18, Ramaiah teaches receiving time-based waveform data, wherein the time-based waveform data comprises waveform data corresponding to one or more waveform signals in a time domain (see ¶¶ [0017]-[0019], i.e., a method performed by one or more processors for receiving time-based waveform data by recording operation of equipment with microphone, accelerometer, or probe to generate a raw audio file); processing the time-based waveform data to convert the time-based waveform data into frequency-based waveform data, wherein the frequency-based waveform data comprises the waveform data in a frequency domain (see ¶ [0020], i.e., processing the time-based waveform data by converting the raw audio file into image data, wherein the audio data is transformed into a mel spectrogram using a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT), the FFT being computed for successive windows to transform the signal from time domain to frequency domain (“The audio data of the audio file may be transformed into the image data of the mel spectrogram using a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) ... The FFT for each window may be computed to transform from the time domain to the frequency domain... The spectrogram may then be generated …”); Ramaiah further teaches generating spectrogram image data that is input into the machine learning model (see ¶ [0021], i.e., “The mel spectrogram may be input into the input layer with the extracted features”). Thus, Ramaiah teaches receiving time-based waveform data, processing the waveform data into frequency-based waveform data, and packaging the waveform information into a spectrogram image for subsequent processing.
However, Ramaiah fails to explicitly teach that each spectrogram image file comprises two or more color channels indicating the waveform data or displaying the one or more spectrogram image files.
Ozturk, however, teaches representing spectrograms as RGB images, explaining that “spectrograms reflect the power spectral densities of the signals. Since color depth preserves distinctive information, the spectrogram images are kept in an RGB format” (see ¶ [0018]) and that calculated power spectral densities are “mapped to three numbers in the [0-255] range representing red, green, and blue channels” (see ¶ [0035]), thereby teaching spectrogram image files comprising multiple color channels that represent waveform information.
Waldo teaches displaying generated spectrogram images. Specifically, ¶ [0022] discloses that a spectrogram is a “graphic image” generated from concatenated spectrum traces that allow “the user to visualize particular characteristics or qualities of the input waveform as it changes over time”, and further teaches that the spectrogram image is presented to the user for observing spectral activity. ¶ [0045], further teaches “A spectrogram display processor 1324 may generate the spectrogram displays to be shown on the display 1312, and may control updating the spectrogram display in real time or near-real time”, thereby explicitly teaching displaying one or more spectrogram image files.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to modify the spectrogram generation method of Ramaiah to encode the generated spectrogram as multi-channel RGB spectrogram image as taught by Ozturk and to display the generated spectrogram image as taught by Waldo, because representing spectrograms using multi color channels preserves additional spectral information while displaying the spectrogram enables visual inspection, interpretation, and verification of the processed waveform data by an operator, thereby improving the usefulness of signal-processing system for waveform analysis while employing only known image encoding and display techniques.
As per claims 6 and 17, the combination of Ramaiah, Ozturk, and Waldo, teaches the system as stated above except for assigning waveform data corresponding to different sensor axes to respective color channel. However, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to associate waveform data from the same or different sensor axes with separate color channels, because independent image color channels are conventionally used as separate data planes for storing different but spatially corresponding datasets, thereby enabling simultaneous representation and image-based processing of multiple sensor axis waveform signals within a single spectrogram image without increasing the number of image files.
As per claims 8 and 19, the combination of Ramaiah, Ozturk, and Waldo teaches the system as stated above except that the packaging further comprises encoding two or more FFT streams corresponding to the waveform data into the two or more color channels of the one or more spectrogram image files. However, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to encode multiple FFT output streams into corresponding color channels, because separate image color channels provide a well-known mechanism for storing multiple related numerical datasets within a single image while preserving the correspondence among those datasets, thereby facilitating efficient storage and simultaneous image based processing of multiple FFT streams using conventional image-processing techniques.
As per claims 9 and 20, the combination of Ramaiah, Ozturk, and Waldo teaches the system as stated above. Waldo further teaches communicating or transmitting the generated output of the instrument to a remote device, explaining that the instrument may send its output to a remote device or cloud device for storage or further processing (see ¶ [0044]).
As per claim 10, the combination of Ramaiah, Ozturk, and Waldo teaches the system as stated above. Waldo further teaches that the spectrogram is color coded to represent the amplitude or magnitude variations across the frequency span of the spectrum trace (see ¶ [0022]).
Claims 2, 5, 11, 13, and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being
unpatentable over Ramaiah in view of Ozturk and further in view of Waldo and further in view of Daily (Pub. No. US 2022/0383850).
As per claims 2 and 13, the combination of Ramaiah, Ozturk, and Waldo teaches the system as stated above except that each spectrogram image file is a lossless compressed image file.
Daily, however, teaches storing a spectrogram as a lossless compressed image. Specifically, ¶ [0009] teaches that “the voice data is compressed to generate a Mel spectrogram. A voice codec converts the spectrogram into a PNG file”. ¶ [0029] further teaches that “the Portable Network Graphic vector comprises a lossless gray scale Portable Network Graphic file”. ¶ [0038] likewise teaches that “the vocoder converting the spectrogram into a lossless grayscale Portable Network Graphic file having multiple pixel coordinates”, and ¶ [0100] also teaches “the Portable Network Graphic vector 700 comprises a lossless grayscale Portable Network Graphic file”. Thus, Daily explicitly teaches that the generated spectrogram is stored as a lossless compressed file.
Waldo further teaches that the spectrogram combines generated spectrum traces (see ¶ [0022], i.e., “where time is represented on the Y-axis of the spectrogram and frequency is represented on the X-axis of the spectrogram”, and further teaches that “The spectrogram may be color coded to represent the amplitude or magnitude variations across the frequency span of the spectrum trace”. ¶ [0026] further teaches that the spectrogram provides “a graphic display of the power or intensity of the input signal as it varies over time”. Accordingly, Waldo teaches a spectrogram image in which one axis represents frequency, another axis represents time, and the color intensity represents the magnitude (power) of the corresponding frequencies.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to modify the spectrogram image generated by the combination of Ramaiah, Ozturk, and Waldo to store the spectrogram as the lossless Portable Network Graphic (PNG) image taught by Daily, because lossless image compression preserves the spectral information represented in the spectrogram while reducing storage requirements and maintaining image fidelity for subsequent processing and analysis, thereby enabling efficient storage and transmission of the spectrogram image without degrading the waveform information represented therein.
As per claims 5 and 16, the combination of Ramaiah, Ozturk, and Waldo teaches the system as stated above. Daily further teaches that the waveform data is associated with a sampling rate. Specifically, ¶¶ [0070]-[0074] explain that the audio recording device samples the waveform at predetermined sampling rates, including 16 kHz, 44.1 kHz, and 48 kHz and ¶ [0074] further explains that the recording sample rates are used when converting the waveform into image data represented by pixel coordinates.
As per claim 11, the combination of Ramaiah, Ozturk, and Waldo teaches the system as stated above except that each of the one or more spectrogram image files comprises a header indicating at least one of: a spectrogram timestamp, a wafer identification (ID), or telemetric data.
Daily teaches Portable Network Graphic (PNG) spectrogram image includes metadata stored in the image header (see ¶ [0092], “Metadata=Header information and image details]”). It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to include a header in the spectrogram image file indicating at least a timestamp or other metadata, because image file headers conventionally store descriptive information associated with image files to facilitate subsequent identification, synchronization, and processing of the images, thereby improving management and subsequent use of the spectrogram image files without altering their underlying waveform information.
Prior art
The prior art made record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s
disclosure:
Alford et al. [‘697] discloses image or video capture via an optical sensor (camera) enable where images may be captured and transmitted or processed and analyzed locally on the multimodal sensor using image recognition algorithms. Image data may be compressed prior to transmission in lossless or ‘lossy’ formats. Analyzed images may be transmitted with full or reduced resolution. Metadata from the image analysis may be transmitted together or separately from image data.
Contact information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the
examiner should be directed to MOHAMED CHARIOUI whose telephone number is (571)272-2213. The examiner can normally be reached Monday through Friday, from 9 am to 6 pm.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Andrew Schechter can be reached on (571) 272-2302. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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Mohamed Charioui
/MOHAMED CHARIOUI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2857
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