DETAILED ACTION
This action is responsive to the Amendments and Remarks received 08/25/2025 in which claims 2, 4, 7, 9, 10, 12, 14, 17, and 19 are cancelled, claims 1, 3, 5, 6, 8, 11, 13, 15, 16, 18, and 20 are amended, and no claims are added as new claims.
Response to Arguments
On page 10 of the Remarks, Applicant contends it would not have been obvious to verify HJIF. Examiner disagrees for the reasons stated, infra, with respect to the rejection of claim 1. As Applicant correctly points out, N00771 suggests JSON schema validation. Therefore, as often required in this art, the skilled artisan would have been led to combine the teachings of several standardization documents, such as those cited, because the standardization framework is advantageously aided by keeping discrete modular components on different development tracks. The documents themselves provide the motivation to combine their relevant teachings. Thus, Examiner is unpersuaded of error.
On page 11 of the Remarks, Applicant contends the prior art does not teach or suggest a first, second, and third reports. Examiner finds such an argument unreasonably demotes the level of the skilled artisan and fails to consider common sense when interpreting the references. Under obviousness rationale and given the level of skill in the art, the skilled artisan would have found it obvious to validate all sorts of constraints and rules represented in the standardization documents with any number of reports corresponding to those validation exercises. Simply claiming a first report for this and a second report for that, etc. does not amount to a nonobvious distinction over the cited prior art. Accordingly, Examiner is not persuaded of patentability.
Other claims are not argued separately. Remarks, 11–12.
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.
Claims 1, 3, 5, 6, 8, 11, 13, 15, 16, 18, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 3, “Text of ISO/IEC CD 23090-24 Conformance and reference software for scene description,” N00771, Feb. 3, 2023 (herein “N00771”) and ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 7, “Text for Committee Draft of ISO/IEC 23090-31: Haptics Coding,” N449, Oct. 27, 2022 (herein “N449”).
Regarding claim 1, the combination of N00771 and N449 teaches or suggests a method for decoding video data, the method being performed by at least one processor, the method comprising: receiving a media stream comprising data in one of a haptics interchange format and a haptics streaming format, the haptics interchange format is a Haptic JSON-based Interchange Format (HJIF), and the haptics streaming format is an MPEG-I Haptic Stream (MIHS) format (N449, Section 5.1: teaches that the haptics interchange format, .hjif, is based on JSON and that the data, for streaming purposes, can be compressed and packetized into a MPEG-I haptic stream (MIHS)); in a case that the data is in the haptics interchange format: obtaining schema, of an input document of the media stream, and a semantic of the input document (N00771, Section 5.2.2: teaches JSON schema validation wherein the validator takes in a file and compares it to a reference schema; Examiner notes the haptics interchange format, .hjif, is a JSON format as described in N449; see also N00771, Section 6 and Fig. 5: teaching MPEG-I Scene Description conformance and issuance of validation reports; N449, Section 8.1.1: teaches the semantics associated with syntax is available in the document for the haptics interchange format; Therefore, in combination, N00771 and N449 teach or suggest haptics interchange format schema validation); verifying the schema against a reference schema (As explained, supra, the combination of N00771 and N449 teaches or suggests haptics interchange format schema validation by comparison to a reference scheme; N00771, Section 5.1: teaches the conformance validation includes verifying that the file obeys rules defined in tables of other documents defining the MPEG extension); generating a first report based on verifying the schema against the reference schema, the first report indicating whether any of first items of the input document have failed verification against the reference schema (N00771, Fig. 3: teaches a conformance test that outputs a validation report; see also N00771, Section 6 and Fig. 5: teaching MPEG-I Scene Description conformance and issuance of validation reports; N00771, Section 5.2.2: teaches JSON schema validation wherein the validator takes in a file and compares it to a reference schema; Examiner notes the haptics interchange format, .hjif, is a JSON format as described in N449; N449, Section 8.1.1: teaches the semantics associated with syntax is available in the document for the haptics interchange format; Therefore, in combination N00771 and N449 teaches or suggests haptics interchange format schema validation); verifying the semantic against a rules table (As explained, supra, the combination of N00771 and N449 teaches or suggests haptics interchange format schema validation by comparison to a reference scheme; N00771, Section 5.1: teaches the conformance validation includes verifying that the file obeys rules defined in tables of other documents defining the MPEG extension; N449, Section 7.1 and 7.2 and Table 14: teaches the JSON based format of HJIF conforms to the haptics specification and schema as included in the Specification; see also N00771, Section 4.6: teaches, for the haptics extension, conformance of a semantics table; see also the plethora of semantics tables specific for haptics in N449 (e.g. N449, Section 8.11, Table 25)); generating a second report based on verifying the semantic against the rules table, the second report indicating whether any of the second items of the input document have failed verification against the rule table (N00771, Fig. 3: teaches a conformance test that outputs a validation report; see also N00771, Section 6 and Fig. 5: teaching MPEG-I Scene Description conformance and issuance of validation reports; see previous limitation); in a case that the data is in the haptics streaming format: decoding a bitstream from at least part of the media stream (Examiner notes streaming formats are obviously decoded; N449, Section 9.1: teaches decoding MIHS); verifying at least one of syntax and conditions of the bitstream against a haptics specification (N00771, Section 6.1: teaches conformance validation process checks for JSON syntax; N449, Section 9.2: teaches the syntax and semantics of the streaming format that must be followed; N449, Section 7.1 and 7.2 and Table 14: teaches the JSON based format of HJIF conforms to the haptics specification and schema as included in the Specification); generating a third report based on verifying the at least one of syntax and conditions of the bitstream against the haptics specification, the third report indicating whether the at least one of syntax and conditions failed verification against the haptics specification (N449, Section 7.1 and 7.2 and Table 14: teaches the JSON based format of HJIF conforms to the haptics specification and schema as included in the Specification; N00771, Fig. 3: teaches a conformance test that outputs a validation report; see also N00771, Section 6 and Fig. 5: teaching MPEG-I Scene Description conformance and issuance of validation reports; N00771, Section 5.1: teaches the conformance validation includes verifying that the file obeys rules defined in tables of other documents defining the MPEG extension; N449, Section 7.1 and 7.2 and Table 14: teaches the JSON based format of HJIF conforms to the haptics specification and schema as included in the Specification; see also N00771, Section 4.6: teaches, for the haptics extension, conformance of a semantics table; see also the plethora of semantics tables specific for haptics in N449 (e.g. N449, Section 8.11, Table 25)); and controlling decoding of the media stream based on any of verifying at least one of syntax and conditions of the bitstream and the at least one of verifying the schema against a reference schema and verifying the semantic against rules table (Obviously files or streams not in conformance with a specification cannot be decoded and thus would require the controlling of the decoding; For example, N449: teaches decoders shall skip packets with unknown MIHSPacketType, meaning the decoding is controlled for nonconforming packets of the stream).
One of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, would have been motivated to combine the elements taught by N449, with those of N00771, because both references are drawn to the same field of endeavor such that one wishing to code haptic information would be led to their relevant teachings, because the skilled artisan would have found it obvious to conduct validation testing on any data, but especially on JSON-based interchange format data as taught by N00771, and because, as described in N00771, combining N00771’s conformance validation for JSON-based interchange format data with N449’s JSON-based .hjif data, represents a mere combination of prior art elements, according to known methods, to yield a predictable result. Also, N449’s Section 10.1.3 explains combining HJIF files with MIHS streams is contemplated by the prior art. This rationale applies to all combinations of N00771 and N449 used in this Office Action unless otherwise noted.
Regarding claim 3, the combination of N00771 and N449 teaches or suggests the method according to claim 1, wherein the data is in the haptics interchange format, and wherein the rules table references a haptics specification (N449, Section 7.1 and 7.2 and Table 14: teaches the JSON based format of HJIF conforms to the haptics specification and schema as included in the Specification).
Regarding claim 5, the combination of N00771 and N449 teaches or suggests the method according to claim 3, wherein verifying the schema against the reference schema and also verifying the semantic against the rules table comprises verifying the schema against the reference schema before verifying the semantic against the rules table (It is obvious as a threshold issue to verify whether the schema is being followed according to JSON, otherwise the semantics in the JSON-based tabular data cannot be used for verification using a rules table).
Regarding claim 6, the combination of N00771 and N449 teaches or suggests the method according to claim 3, wherein verifying both the schema against the reference schema and also verifying the semantic against the rules table comprises verifying the semantic against the rules table in response to verifying the schema against the reference schema before (It is obvious as a threshold issue to verify whether the schema is being followed according to JSON, otherwise the semantics in the JSON-based tabular data cannot be used for verification using a rules table).
Regarding claim 8, the combination of N00771 and N449 teaches or suggests the method according to claim 1, wherein decoding the bitstream comprises decoding a plurality of MIHS units and packets of the media stream (N449, Section 5.1: teaches that the haptics interchange format, .hjif, is based on JSON and that the data, for streaming purposes, can be compressed and packetized into a MPEG-I haptic stream (MIHS)).
Claim 11 lists the same elements as claim 1, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 1 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 13 lists the same elements as claim 3, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 3 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 15 lists the same elements as claim 5, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 5 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 16 lists the same elements as claim 6, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 6 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 18 lists the same elements as claim 8, but in apparatus form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 8 applies to the instant claim.
Claim 20 lists the same elements as claim 1, but in CRM form rather than method form. Therefore, the rationale for the rejection of claim 1 applies to the instant claim.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 3, “WD of 23090-32 Carriage of haptics data,” N00806, Feb. 3, 2023 (herein “N00806”). One of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, would have been motivated to combine the elements taught by N00806, with those of N449, because both references are drawn to the same field of endeavor such that one wishing to practice Haptics in MPEG would be led to their relevant teachings and because N449’s Abstract explains that the JSON-based .hjif format can be compressed into a streamable bitstream while N00806’s Abstract explains that ISO/IEC 23090-31 (i.e. N449) specifies an MIHS stream format for haptics while N00806 explains MIHS formatted bitstreams can be incorporated into an ISO base media file. Thus, the two publications reference their interoperability with one another such that the skilled artisan would obviously be led to their combination. This rationale applies to all combinations of N00806 and N449 used in this Office Action unless otherwise noted.
Muthusamy et al., “Overview of Haptics Standardization,” Web3D 2022 – Paper #37, Nov. 3, 2022.
MPEG screen shot showing parts of ISO/IEC 23090.
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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 extension fee 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 Michael J Hess whose telephone number is (571)270-7933. The examiner can normally be reached Mon - Fri 9:00am-5:30pm.
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/MICHAEL J HESS/Examiner, Art Unit 2481
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