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 .
Claims 1-2, 4-5, 7, 11, 13, and 18-19 have been amended. Claim 20 has been cancelled. Claim 21 has been added.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 04/10/2026 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, filed 01/22/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claims 1-2, 13, 16-17 under 35 U.S.C. 102 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of CHOI (US 20220060721 A1)
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.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-2, 13, 16-19 and 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by CHOI (US 20220060721 A1).
Regarding claim 1, CHOI teaches a method for video processing, comprising:
determining, during a conversion between a target video block of a video and a bitstream of the video, first information comprising at least one history-based information table, the at least one history-based information table comprising a history-based intra mode table; and performing the conversion based on the first information ([0250] According to an embodiment, for the default mode, an additional mode set may be configured in a manner that modes that have been used up to a current block in a current frame are counted and then intra prediction modes that are frequently selected are adaptively selected. Alternatively, the default mode may be selected by using a history about an intra prediction mode selected for a previous intra block of the current block in the current frame, or may be selected by applying priority numbers to modes of blocks adjacent to the current block.).
Regarding claim 2, CHOI teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the first information further comprises coding information of a neighbor coded block of the target video block,
wherein performing the conversion comprises: coding the target video block by using one of the following:
an affine merge coding tool,
an affine advanced motion vector predication (AMVP) coding tool,
a regular merge coding tool,
a subblock merge coding tool,
a combined inter and intra prediction (CIIP) coding tool,
a geometric partitioning mode (GPM) coding tool,
an AMVP-merge coding tool,
an intra coding tool, or
a variant of one of the above coding tools,
wherein the first information comprises at least one of:
an intra mode of the neighbor coded block,
an inter prediction coding tool of the neighbor coded block,
a motion vector of the neighbor coded block,
a reference index of the neighbor coded block,
a prediction direction of the neighbor coded block,
a coordinator of the neighbor coded block, or
a location of the neighbor coded block (, the additional mode set may differently include N or M (where, N and M are positive integers) modes, according to a type of an intra prediction mode of a neighboring block adjacent to a current block.).
Regarding claim 13, CHOI teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the at least one history-based information table is maintained for the target video block (mode may be selected by using a history about an intra prediction mode selected for a previous intra block of the current block in the current frame.).
Regarding claim 16, CHOI teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the conversion includes encoding the target video block into the bitstream (Fig. 1).
Regarding claim 17, CHOI teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the conversion includes decoding the target video block from the bitstream (Fig. 1).
Regarding claim 18, the apparatus for processing video data of claim 18 is reject under the same art and evidence used to reject the method of claim 1. Choi further teaches a processor and a non-transitory memory with instructions thereon, wherein the instructions upon execution by the processor ([0254])
Regarding claim 19, the non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 19 is reject under the same art and evidence used to reject the method of claim 1. Choi further teaches non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that cause a processor to perform a method performed by a video processing apparatus ([0254])
Regarding claim 21, the method for storing a bitstream of claim 21 is reject under the same art and evidence used to reject the method of claim 1.
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 3 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over CHOI in view of MAO (US 20190253709 A1).
Regarding claim 3, CHOI teaches the method of claim 2.
CHOI does not explicitly teach the following limitations, however, in an analogous art, MAO teaches determining a size or dimension of the neighbor coded block based on a size or dimension of a coding unit;
wherein the coding unit comprises one of:
a prediction unit (PU),
a transform unit (TU),
a coding unit (CU),
a subblock, or
a fixed granular unit,
wherein the fixed granular unit comprises one of:
a 4 times 4 unit,
an eight times eight unit, or
a sixteen times sixteen unit ([0083] A size of an adjacent block of the current coding unit is the same as a size of the current coding unit.).
It would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, to take the teachings of MAO and apply them to CHOI. One would be motivated as such to reduce an operation load and a complexity degree.
Claims 4-5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over CHOI in view of Wu (US 20160014415 A1).
Regarding claim 4, CHOI teaches the method of claim 1.
CHOI does not explicitly teach the following limitations, however, in an analogous art, Wu teaches wherein the first information further comprises coding information of a neighbor coded block of the target block, and
wherein the coding information comprises the coding information of a region of the neighbor coded block, the region comprises at least one of:
a set of rows of the neighbor coded block, or
a set of columns of the neighbor coded block ([0157] In some embodiments, the adjacent encoded block may include at least one of the following: encoded block(s) in n1 rows above the current block and encoded block(s) in n2 columns on the left of the current block. In this regard, n1 and n2 are positive integers.).
It would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, to take the teachings of Wu and apply them to CHOI. One would be motivated as such to improve coding quality.
Regarding claim 5, CHOI in view of Wu teaches the method of claim 4.
Wu teaches determining a first number of rows in the set of rows based on a first distance between a coding unit and a top boundary of a current coding tree unit (CTU) or between the coding unit and a top boundary of a current coding tree block (CTB); and
determining a first number of rows in the set of rows based on a second predefined constant (For example, encoding of any current encoding block (e.g., BKCUR) may need the encoded information of … a top neighboring encoded block (e.g., BKT), and a top-right neighboring encoded block (e.g., BKTR) ... In this example, the horizontal distance D12 between two current encoding blocks of neighboring block rows BKROW1 and BKROW2 is equal to two).
It would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, to take the teachings of Wu and apply them to CHOI. One would be motivated as such to improve coding quality.
Claims 11 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over CHOI in view of Deng (EE2-3.1-related: CIIP with template matching).
Regarding claim 11 CHOI teaches the method of claim 1.
CHOI does not explicitly teach the following limitations, however, in an analogous art, Deng teaches wherein the first information further comprises information regarding a template-based coding tool based on a position of the target video block, and wherein the information regarding a template-based coding tool comprises at least one of: whether to apply the template-based coding tool, or how to apply the template-based coding tool (how to apply template-based coding tool is disclosed).
It would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, to take the teachings of Deng and apply them to CHOI. One would be motivated as such to achieve BD-rate gains with negligible runtime change.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 6-10, 12, 14-15 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.
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 HESHAM K ABOUZAHRA whose telephone number is (571)270-0425. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8-5.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jamie Atala can be reached at 57127227384. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/HESHAM K ABOUZAHRA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2486
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