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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted is considered by the examiner.
Claim Objections
Claims 5, 8, 13 are objected to because of the following informalities, Appropriate correction is required.
Regarding claim 5: Claim 5 recites the limitation "wherein the predetermined window is the next entry down sorted listed in the sorted order" in line 1. According to the specification in para. [0022], In embodiments, the predetermined window may be the next entry down sorted list in the sorted order. It is not clear if “the next entry” is implying to a new entry or an existing entry down the sorted list. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Regarding claim 8: Claim 8 recites the limitation “wherein the edge qualifier of each edge comprises an identified of a first vertex of the edge and an identified of the second vertex of the edge”. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Applicant can amend claim 8 to: “wherein the edge qualifier of each edge comprises an identified of a first vertex of the edge and an identified of a second vertex of the edge”.
Regarding claim 13: Claim 13 recites the limitation “the method of claim 1, comprising causing the modelled environment to be rendered on a display device”. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Applicant can amend claim 13 to: “the method of claim 1, a modelled environment to be rendered on a display device”, to overcome the objection.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 6 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 6 recites the limitation “selecting, as said one of the matched groups, the subset with the lowest total edge BVSA”. It is not clear if it is implying to the candidate subset or just another subset but not one of the candidate subset of the plurality of candidate subsects. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
If
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-20 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: the prior arts made of record, Pankratz et al. (US Patent Number 12,437,465 B2) disclosed a technique for performing ray tracing operations. The technique includes identifying triangles to include in a compressed triangle block; storing data common to the identified triangles as common data of the compressed triangle block; and storing data unique to the identified triangles as unique data of the compressed triangle block. Laine et al. (US Publication Number 2020/0051314 A1) disclosed a hardware-based traversal coprocessor provides acceleration of tree traversal operations searching for intersections between primitives represented in a tree data structure and a ray. The primitives may include triangles used in generating a virtual scene. The hardware-based traversal coprocessor is configured to properly handle numerically challenging computations at or near edges and/or vertices of primitives and/or ensure that a single intersection is reported when a ray intersects a surface formed by primitives at or near edges and/or vertices of the primitives. McCombe et al. (US Patent Number 10,217,267 B2) disclosed systems and methods for producing an acceleration structure provide for subdividing a 3-D scene into a plurality of volumetric portions, which have different sizes, each being addressable using a multipart address indicating a location and a relative size of each volumetric portion. Brokenshire et al. (US Publication Number 2004/0051715 A1) disclosed the present invention renders a triangular mesh for employment in graphical displays. The triangular mesh comprises triangle-shaped graphics primitives. The triangle-shaped graphics primitives represent a subdivided triangular shape. Each triangle-shaped graphics primitive shares defined vertices with adjoining triangle-shaped graphics primitives. These shared vertices are transmitted and employed for the rendering of the triangle-shaped graphics primitives.
However, the prior arts made of record do not teach “sorting the entries in the input list by edge BVSA then by edge qualifier, thereby resulting in a sorted list in which the entries have a sorted order from an entry representing an edge with greatest edge BVSA to an entry representing an edge with lowest edge BVSA; traversing the list in the sorted order seeking groups of matched edges within a predetermined window of list entries of one another in the sorted order, each edge in a matched group having a matching edge BVSA and matching edge qualifier with another of the edges in the matched group from a different triangular primitive, wherein each time a group of matched edges is found whose triangular primitives have not yet been designated as part of a cluster of adjoining primitives, designating the triangular primitives of the matched edges in the group of matched edges as a cluster of adjoining primitives; and for each of the designated clusters of adjoining primitives, processing the cluster of adjoining primitives together as a group as part of a ray tracing process performed in software and/or hardware on a graphics processing unit”, (in combination with the other claimed limitations and/or features), as claimed in independent claims 1, 14, 16-20.
Dependent claims 2-13 would be allowable as they depend from an allowable base independent claim 1.
Dependent claim 15 would be allowable as it depends from an allowable base independent claim 14.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communication from the examiner should be directed to Hilina K Demeter whose telephone number is (571) 270-1676.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, King Y. Poon could be reached at (571) 270- 0728. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from either Private PAIR or Public PAIR. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only. For more information about PAIR system, see http://pari-direct.uspto.gov. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative or access to the automated information system, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/HILINA K DEMETER/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2617
Prosecution Insights