DETAILED ACTION
Notice of AIA Status
1. 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 § 103
2. 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.
31066.. Claims 1-6 and 7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yokozawa et al (US 20160243866) and in further view of Ochiai (US Pub: 2022/0318976).
Regarding claim 1, Yokozawa et al teaches: An image forming apparatus comprising: a reading device that reads, from a sheet, information related to the sheet; an identifier that identifies a type of the sheet, on a basis of the information related to the sheet [p0009].
Yokozawa et al does not set a threshold for image quality. In the same field of endeavor, Ochiai teaches: a determiner that determines a threshold for quality of an image, on a basis of the information related to the sheet, and the identified type of the sheet; and a decider that decides the quality of the image formed on the sheet, on a basis of the threshold [p0036, p0052]. Therefore, it would have been obvious for an ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of the two to determine quality of an image based on threshold assessed according to information related to a sheet and sheet type.
Regarding claim 2, the rationale applied to the rejection of claim 1 has been incorporated herein. Ochiai further teaches: The image forming apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising a storage device storing therein a reference threshold with respect to each type of the sheet, wherein the determiner determines the reference threshold, by retrieving from the storage device the reference threshold corresponding to the type of the sheet identified by the identifier [p0052, fig. 6].
Regarding claim 3, the rationale applied to the rejection of claim 1 has been incorporated herein. Yokozawa et al further teaches: The image forming apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the information related to the sheet includes a value indicating surface roughness of the sheet, and the identifier identifies the type of the sheet, on a basis of the value indicating the surface roughness of the sheet [p0009].
Regarding claim 4, the rationale applied to the rejection of claim 1 has been incorporated herein. Yokozawa et al further teaches: The image forming apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the identifier identifies the type of the sheet, on a basis of standard deviation of the value indicating the surface roughness of the sheet [p0103-p0105 (The luminance distribution values from diffuse reflection indicates surface roughness.)].
Regarding claim 6, the rationale applied to the rejection of claim 3 has been incorporated herein. Yokozawa et al further teaches: The image forming apparatus according to claim 3, wherein the identifier identifies the type of the sheet, by deciding whether the value indicating the surface roughness of the sheet is smaller than a threshold for surface roughness of a specific sheet [p0105].
Regarding claim 7, the rationale applied to the rejection of claim 6 has been incorporated herein. Yokozawa et al in view of Ochiai further teaches: The image forming apparatus according to claim 6, wherein the threshold for the surface roughness includes a first surface threshold, and a second surface threshold larger than the first surface threshold, the identifier decides whether the value indicating the surface roughness of the sheet is smaller than the first surface threshold, the identifier identifies the sheet as a first sheet, when the value indicating the surface roughness of the sheet is smaller than the first surface threshold, the identifier decides whether the value indicating the surface roughness of the sheet is smaller than the second surface threshold, when the value indicating the surface roughness of the sheet is not smaller than the first surface threshold, the identifier identifies the sheet as a second sheet, different from the first sheet, when the value indicating the surface roughness of the sheet is smaller than the second surface threshold, and the identifier identifies the sheet as a third sheet, different from the first sheet and the second sheet, when the value indicating the surface roughness of the sheet is not smaller than the second surface threshold [Yokozawa: p0120, p0121; Ochiai: p0052]. Yokozawa uses two thresholds (Th1 and Th2) on measured peak value of luminance histogram to separate sheet into multiple types, and uses threshold values stored for comparisons whereas Ochiai emphasizes that quality thresholds being adapted by sheet type and use proper sheet type to avoid false defect detection, it would have been obvious for an ordinary skilled in the art to combine the teaching of the two to apply threshold classification scheme to roughness for sheet classification for improving output quality.
41066.. Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yokozawa et al (US 20160243866) and Ochiai (US Pub: 2022/0318976); and in further view of Grohmann et al (Comparison of roving-window and search-window techniques for characterising landscape morphometry, 2009).
Regarding claim 5, the rationale applied to the rejection of claim 4 has been incorporated herein. Yokozawa et al in view of Ochiai does not specify dividing patch into tiles. In the same field of endeavor, Grohmann et al teaches: The image forming apparatus according to claim 4, wherein the identifier calculates the standard deviation, by clipping out the information related to the sheet in a form of a patch of a predetermined size, and dividing the patch into equal to or larger than a predetermined number of tiles [page 1: p03, p04]. Grohmann et al prescribes a way of calculating standard deviation by breaking a region into uniform subregions, it would have been obvious for an ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of all to apply Grohmann et al’s partitioned uniform subregions to calculate standard deviation for computation efficiency.
Contact
5. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to FAN ZHANG whose telephone number is (571)270-3751. The examiner can normally be reached on Mon-Fri 9:00-5:00.
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/Fan Zhang/
Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2682
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