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 .
DETAILED ACTION
This communication is in response to: Application filed on April 30th, 2024
Claims 1-20 are pending claims.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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 1-8 and 10-16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Blume, US PG PUB# 2004/0056900 A1 (hereinafter Blume) in view of Boss et al., US PG PUB# 2007/024256 A1 (hereinafter Boss).
As for independent claim 1:
Blume discloses a method of operating an electronic device with a display;
grouping multiple windows on the display into a window group (0015, 0016, Blume discloses window stack as grouping windows on the display. Blume further discloses multiple concurrent stacks and window groups in 0016);
setting at least one window of the multiple windows in the window group as a focused window for the window group and setting at least one remaining window of the multiple windows in the window group as a defocused window (0021, 0024, 0028, Blume discloses the window with focus is assigned the highest priority);
Blume does not disclose adjusting rendering of the defocused window relative to the focused window. Boss discloses adjusting rendering of the defocused window relative to the focused window in 0033, 0040-0042, 0058. In the cited sections Boss discloses adjusting the rendering of inactive windows relative to the active window by adjusting opacity, decreasing window size, and repositioning windows away from the active area. Accordingly it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a skilled artisan to modify the method of Blume to incorporate the teaching of Boss adjusting rendering of a window, thus allow showing a distinction of active and inactive window based on opacity and window size (Boss, 0046).
As for dependent claim 2:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 1, wherein adjusting the rendering of the defocused window relative to the focused window comprises rendering the defocused window at a lower frame rate than the focused window (Blume, 0040, discloses assigning priority according to the frequency of window update, such that high priority windows are updated at a higher frequency and vice versa).
As for dependent claim 3:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 2, wherein rendering the defocused window at the lower frame rate than the focused window comprises implementing window updates from a corresponding application less frequently for the defocused window than for the focused window (Blume, 0040, discloses assigning priority according to the frequency of window update, such that high priority windows are updated at a higher frequency and vice versa. Boss, 0046, discloses sending instruction to the application associated with the defocused window the limits the rate at which the app provides window updates. Accordingly it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a skilled artisan to modify the method of Blume to incorporate the teaching of Boss adjusting rendering of a window, thus allow showing a distinction of active and inactive window based on opacity and window size (Boss, 0046).
As for dependent claim 4:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 1, wherein adjusting the rendering of the defocused window relative to the focused window comprises performing an action selected from the group consisting of: rendering the defocused window at a lower opacity than the focused window, rendering the defocused window at a lower resolution than the focused window, and shutting down an application associated with the defocused window (Boss, 0040-0042, 0058, discloses adjusting the rendering of inactive windows relative to the active window by adjusting opacity, decreasing window size, and repositioning windows away from the active area than the focused window)
As for dependent claim 5:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 4, wherein adjusting the rendering of the defocused window relative to the focused window comprises displaying a static snapshot from the application at the defocused window (0046, see app is shutdown at the defocused window and snapshot by Boss).
As for dependent claim 6:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 1, wherein adjusting the rendering of the defocused window relative to the focused window comprises sending an instruction to an application associated with the defocused window that limits a rate for window updates by the application (Blume, 0048, see priority rendering and defocused window taught by Boss in 0046).
As for dependent claim 7:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 1, wherein adjusting the rendering of the defocused window relative to the focused window comprises sending an instruction to an application associated with the defocused window indicating that the application is using a defocused window (Blume, 0048, discloses priority parameter to the app routing responsible for rendering windows, window priority state. Boss, 0046, discloses instruction not an app associated with the defocused window. Accordingly it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a skilled artisan to modify the method of Blume to incorporate the teaching of Boss adjusting rendering of a window, thus allow showing a distinction of active and inactive window based on opacity and window size (Boss, 0046).
As for dependent claim 8:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 1, wherein adjusting the rendering of the defocused window relative to the focused window comprises sending an instruction to an application associated with the defocused window to reduce power consumption (Blume, 0057, discloses windows contain images that are the output of a computationally intensive computer graphics process. In these cases, providing the application software with the knowledge that a window can (and should) be drawn with low priority frees the application from performing all the difficult and time consuming operations that would be necessary to render a high quality (high priority) image for that window).
As for dependent claim 10:
Blume – Boss discloses the method of claim 1, wherein setting the at least one window of the multiple windows in the window group as the focused window comprises setting the at least one window of the multiple windows in the window group as the focused window in response to user input (Blume, 0019, 0041, discloses focus is established by mouse clicks or key press).
As for dependent claim 11:
Blume – Boss discloses the method of claim 1, wherein setting the at least one window of the multiple windows in the window group as the focused window comprises setting the at least one window of the multiple windows in the window group as the focused window in response to the at least one window being repositioned (Blume, 0020. Boss, 0059-0060. Accordingly it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a skilled artisan to modify the method of Blume to incorporate the teaching of Boss adjusting rendering of a window, thus allow showing a distinction of active and inactive window based on opacity and window size, Boss, 0046).
As for dependent claim 12:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 1, wherein setting the at least one window of the multiple windows in the window group as the focused window comprises setting the at least one window of the multiple windows in the window group as the focused window in response to the at least one window being resized (Blume discloses window update events, windows priority, focused assignment in 0020).
As for dependent claim 13:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 1,
wherein setting the at least one window of the multiple windows in the window group as the focused window comprises setting the at least one window of the multiple windows in the window group as the focused window based on a respective focus score for each one of the multiple windows (Blume, 0021-0022, 0038, discloses window priority. Blume further discloses algorithm for each window in a window stack, priority equals window level, highest priority reserved for the focused window in 0038-0039).
As for dependent claim 14:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 1, further comprising: grouping additional windows on the display into an additional window group; and setting at least one window of the additional windows in the additional window group as an additional focused window for the additional window group (Blume, 0016, 0039, discloses multiple top-level window may exit in multiple window stacks. Boss, 0041, discloses supporting managing multiple concurrent window groups with separate focused windows per group. Accordingly it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a skilled artisan to modify the method of Blume to incorporate the teaching of Boss adjusting rendering of a window, thus allow showing a distinction of active and inactive window based on opacity and window size (Boss, 0046).
As for independent claim 15:
Blume discloses a method of operating an electronic device with a display; simultaneously presenting multiple windows on the display, wherein the multiple windows include a first window for an application (0015-0016; while the first window is a focused window, rendering the first window using a first magnitude for a property (0046-0047);
Blume does not disclose in response to the first window changing from the focused window to a defocused window, rendering the first window using a second magnitude for the property that is different than the first magnitude. Boss discloses in response to the first window changing from the focused window to a defocused window, rendering the first window using a second magnitude for the property that is different than the first magnitude in 0043-0044, 0055-0058. In the cited sections Boss discloses adjusting the rendering of inactive windows relative to the active window by adjusting opacity, decreasing window size, and repositioning windows away from the active area. Accordingly it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a skilled artisan to modify the method of Blume to incorporate the teaching of Boss adjusting rendering of a window, thus allow showing a distinction of active and inactive window based on opacity and window size (Boss, 0046).
As for dependent claim 16:
Blume - Boss discloses the method of claim 15, wherein the property comprises a property selected from the group consisting of: a resolution, a transparency, and a rate of updates from the application (Blume discloses adjusting between active and inactive window states in 0046-0047. Boss discloses changing opacity and size between active and inactive states in 0033, 0040-0044. Accordingly it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a skilled artisan to modify the method of Blume to incorporate the teaching of Boss adjusting rendering of a window, thus allow showing a distinction of active and inactive window based on opacity and window size (Boss, 0046).
Claims 9 and 17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Blume, US PG PUB# 2004/0056900 A1 (hereinafter Blume) in view of Boss et al., US PG PUB# 2007/024256 A1 (hereinafter Boss) in view of Oliver et al., US PG PUB# 2010/0153399 A1 (hereinafter Oliver).
As for dependent claim 9:
Blume - Boss does not disclose the method of claim 1, further comprising: storing a graph data structure that represents overlap between the multiple windows on the display, wherein grouping the multiple windows on the display into the window group comprises grouping the multiple windows on the display into the window group using the graph data structure. Oliver discloses storing a graph data structure that represents overlap between the multiple windows on the display, wherein grouping the multiple windows on the display into the window group comprises grouping the multiple windows on the display into the window group using the graph data structure in 0047-0049. In the cited sections Oliver discloses building and storing a directed graph where each node represents a window and each directed edge represent a switch or transition between windows. Figures 4 and 8 show graph, group windows into clusters using graph data structure 0049. Accordingly it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a skilled artisan to modify the method of Blume and Boss to incorporate the teaching of Oliver graph based overlap tracking, thus efficient data structure for maintaining and updating window group membership as windows are added in 0048 and 0049).
As for dependent claim 17:Claim 17 contains substantial subject matter as claimed in claim 9 and is respectfully rejected along the same rationale.
Claims 18 - 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Blume, US PG PUB# 2004/0056900 A1 (hereinafter Blume) in view of Oliver et al., US PG PUB# 2010/0153399 A1 (hereinafter Oliver).
As for independent claim 18:
Blume discloses a method of operating an electronic device with a display (Blume, 0015-0016);
simultaneously presenting multiple windows on the display (Blume, 0015-0016);
adding a new window to the display (Blume, 0020, 0025);
determining whether the new window overlaps any of the multiple windows on the display (0060);
Blume does not disclose storing a graph data structure that represents overlap between the multiple windows on the display and updating the graph data structure to represent overlap between the new window and the multiple windows on the display. Oliver discloses storing a graph data structure that represents overlap between the multiple windows on the display and updating the graph data structure to represent overlap between the new window and the multiple windows on the display in 0021, 0025, 0047-0049, Figure 4. Accordingly it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a skilled artisan to modify the method of Blume and Boss to incorporate the teaching of Oliver graph based overlap tracking, thus efficient data structure for maintaining and updating window group membership as windows are added in 0048 and 0049).
As for dependent claim 19:
Blume - Oliver discloses the method of claim 18, further comprising: using the graph data structure, grouping the multiple windows into at least two window groups (Oliver, 0049, Figures 7 and 8).
As for dependent claim 20:
Blume - Oliver discloses the method of claim 19, further comprising: selecting one focused window for each window group of the at least two window groups (Oliver, 0027, 0040).
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)).
The Examiner notes MPEP § 2144.01, that quotes In re Preda, 401 F.2d 825,159 USPQ 342, 344 (CCPA 1968) as stating “in considering the disclosure of a reference, it is proper to take into account not only specific teachings of the reference but also the inferences which one skilled in the art would reasonably be expected to draw therefrom.” Further MPEP 2123, states that “a reference may be relied upon for all that it would have reasonably suggested to one having ordinary skill the art, including nonpreferred embodiments. Merck & Co. v. Biocraft Laboratories, 874 F.2d 804, 10 USPQ2d 1843 (Fed. Cir.), cert. denied, 493 U.S. 975 (1989).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DAVID PHANTANA ANGKOOL whose telephone number is (571) 272-2673. The examiner can normally be reached M-F, 7:00-3:30 PM.
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/David Phantana-angkool/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2172
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