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 .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 22 May 2026 has been entered.
Response to Amendment
The amendment filed 22 May 2026 has been accepted and considered in this office action. Claims 1, 6, 7, 9, 14, 17, and 22 have been amended claim 5, 10-12, and 18 cancelled, and claims 28 and 20 added.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to the claims have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
Claim(s) 1, 2, 7, 9, 13, 22, 23, and 26 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Oh et al. (US PAP 2015/0194158) in view of Shlomot et al. (US PAP 2022/0108708).
Consider claim 1, Oh teaches A method for encoding a signal, performed by an encoding end (abstract), comprising:
obtaining audio signals, wherein the audio signals comprise at least one object signal (Figure 5, input object signals OBJECT a-z);
performing a correlation analysis on the at least one object signal to determine cross- correlation parameter values between object signals (061-63, correlation between signals, i.e. cross-correlation can be used to determine object groupings)
obtaining at least one object signal set by classifying, based on cross-correlation parameter values between object signals, the at least one object signal, and determining a respective encoding mode corresponding to each object signal set based on a classification result, wherein the object signal set comprises one or more of the at least one object signal (figure 5, paragraph 0057, objects are grouped according to signal characteristics, and fed to separate encoders 520 and 540 based on the characteristics, 0062-63, different coding modes depending on how objects are grouped,0061-63, grouping audio object signals based on correlation, must analyze to determine correlation); and
obtaining at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information by encoding the one or more of the at least one object signal in each object signal set using the respective encoding mode (figure 5, paragraph 0057 objects coded and object parameters generated and sent to multiplexer ), writing the at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information to an encoding bitstream and sending the encoding bitstream to a decoding end (figure 5, paragraph 0057, object parameters are transmitted through the multiplexer and sent to decoder).
Oh does not specifically teach
obtaining at least one filtered signals by performing a high-pass filtering process on the at least one object signal to remove a component lower than a cutoff frequency from each object signal;
performing a correlation analysis on the at least one filtered signal to determine cross- correlation parameter values between filtered signals.
In the same field of multi-channel encoding, Shlomot teaches
obtaining at least one filtered signals by performing a high-pass filtering process on the at least one object signal to remove a component lower than a cutoff frequency from each object signal (0281 pre-processing each of the channels including high-pass filtering each of the channels);
performing a correlation analysis on the at least one filtered signal to determine cross- correlation parameter values between filtered signals (0285-87, cross-correlation calculations on the pre-processed channels).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of effective filing to high pass filter signals before cross-correlation as taught by Shlomot in the system of Oh in order to remove unwanted signal components that might degrade correlation calculations.
Consider claim 2, Oh and Shlomot teach the method of claim 1 further comprising:
preprocessing the at least one object signal set (Shlomot 0281 pre-processing each of the channels including high-pass filtering each of the channels);
wherein encoding the one or more of the at least one object signal in each object signal set using the respective encoding mode comprises:
encoding the one or more of at least one object signal in each object signal set after preprocessing using the respective encoding mode (Shlomot figure 5a-5b, prepressing occurs before encoding).
Consider claim 7, Oh teaches The method of claim 1, wherein the encoding mode corresponding to an object signal set comprises an independent encoding mode or a joint encoding mode (figure 5, 0057, audio objects are then jointly coded at waveform coder 560.);
wherein the independent encoding mode corresponds to a time domain processing manner or a frequency domain processing manner; (OPTIONAL LIMITATION AS INDENDPENDENT ENCODING MODE NOT REQUIRED DUE TO OR)
in response to each object signal in an object signal set being a speech signal or a speech- like signal, the independent encoding mode adopts the time domain processing manner (OPTIONAL LIMITATION AS INDENDPENDENT ENCODING MODE NOT REQUIRED DUE TO OR); or
in response to each object signal in an object signal set being an audio signal other than the speech signal and the speech-like signal, the independent encoding mode adopts the frequency domain processing manner (OPTIONAL LIMITATION AS INDENDPENDENT ENCODING MODE NOT REQUIRED DUE TO OR).
Consider claim 9, Oh teaches The method of claim 1, wherein encoding the one or more of the at least one object signal in each object signal set using the respective encoding mode comprises: encoding all of the at least one object signal set using respective encoding modes with a same encoding kernel (core coder 560, which may be AAC etc, see 0057.).
Consider claim 13, Oh teaches The method of claim 7, wherein encoding the one or more object signals in each object signal set using the respective encoding mode comprises: encoding different object signal sets using respective encoding modes with different encoding kernels (encoders 1 and 2, 520 and 540).
Consider claim 22, Oh teaches A communication device, comprising a processor and a memory a having computer program stored thereon (0145, RAM ROM, computer systems), wherein when the processor executes the computer program, the device is configured to:
obtain audio signals, wherein the audio signals comprise at least one object signal (Figure 5, input object signals OBJECT a-z);
perform a correlation analysis on the at least one object signal to determine cross-correlation parameter values between object signals (061-63, correlation between signals, i.e. cross-correlation can be used to determine object groupings)
obtain at least one object signal set by classifying, based on cross-correlation parameter values between object signals, the at least one object signal, and determining a respective encoding mode corresponding to each object signal set based on a classification result, wherein the object signal set comprises one or more of the at least one object signal (figure 5, paragraph 0057, objects are grouped according to signal characteristics, and fed to separate encoders 520 and 540 based on the characteristics, 0062-63, different coding modes depending on how objects are grouped,0061-63, grouping audio object signals based on correlation, must analyze to determine correlation); and
obtaining at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information by encoding the one or more of the at least one object signal in each object signal set using the respective encoding mode (figure 5, paragraph 0057 objects coded and object parameters generated and sent to multiplexer ), writing the at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information to an encoding bitstream and sending the encoding bitstream to a decoding end (figure 5, paragraph 0057, object parameters are transmitted through the multiplexer and sent to decoder).
Oh does not specifically teach
obtaining at least one filtered signals by performing a high-pass filtering process on the at least one object signal to remove a component lower than a cutoff frequency from each object signal;
performing a correlation analysis on the at least one filtered signal to determine cross- correlation parameter values between filtered signals.
In the same field of multi-channel encoding, Shlomot teaches
obtaining at least one filtered signals by performing a high-pass filtering process on the at least one object signal to remove a component lower than a cutoff frequency from each object signal (0281 pre-processing each of the channels including high-pass filtering each of the channels);
performing a correlation analysis on the at least one filtered signal to determine cross- correlation parameter values between filtered signals (0285-87, cross-correlation calculations on the pre-processed channels).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of effective filing to high pass filter signals before cross-correlation as taught by Shlomot in the system of Oh in order to remove unwanted signal components that might degrade correlation calculations.
Consider claim 23, Oh teaches A communication device, comprising a processor and a memory having a computer program stored thereon, wherein when the processor executes the computer program, the device is caused to perform the method of claim 14 (0145, RAM ROM, computer systems, see rejection of claim 14).
Consider claim 26, Oh teaches A non-transitory computer readable storage medium, for storing instructions, wherein when the instructions are executed, the method of claim 1 is performed (0145, computer readable media, computer systems, see rejection of claim 1).
Claim(s) 6 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Oh and Shlomot as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Uhlich et al. (US PAP 2023/0164510).
Consider claim 6, Oh and Shlomot teach The method of claim 5, wherein obtaining the at least one object signal set by classifying, based on the cross-correlation parameter values between the filtered signals, the at least one object signal, and determining the respective encoding mode corresponding to each object signal set based on the classification result comprises:
obtaining the at least one object signal set by classifying the at least one object signal based on the cross-correlation parameter values (Oh 0061-63, correlation between signals, i.e. cross-correlation can be used to determine object groupings)
determining the respective encoding mode based on a respective correlation degree corresponding to each of the at least one object signal set (Oh 0061-63, correlation between signals, i.e. cross-correlation can be used to determine object groupings).
Oh and Shlomot do not specifically teach
setting normalized correlation degree intervals based on correlation degrees; and
calculating the cross-correlation parameter values between the object signals and the normalized correlation degree intervals.
In the same field of audio coding, Uhlich teaches setting normalized correlation degree intervals based on correlation degrees (0102,setting normalized correlation interval to -1 to 1); and
calculating the cross-correlation parameter values between the object signals and the normalized correlation degree intervals (0102, cross-correlation calculation bounded within normalized interval).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of effective filing to use a normalized correlation as taught by Uhlich in the system of Oh and Shlomot in order to provide a more accurate level of comparison between the audio objects.
Claim(s) 14, 16, 17, and 27-29 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Oh in view of Shlomot and further in view of Eksler et al (US PAP 2022/0238127).
Consider claim 14, Oh teaches a method for decoding a signal (abstract, figure 6), performed by a decoding end, comprising:
receiving an encoding bitstream sent by an encoding end (receiving bitstream into demux 610, para 0058);
obtaining at least one decoded object signal set by decoding the encoding bitstream (figure 6, 0058, decoding object signals into decoded objects);
performing bitstream parsing on the encoding bitstream to obtain a classification side information parameter, a respective side information parameter corresponding to each object signal set, and at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information (figure 6, 0058, demux extracts object parameters, as well as grouping signals, 0065, grouping information may include information about how groups are formed and may be used by decoder);
wherein the classification side information parameter is configured to indicate a classification manner for object signals (Figure 5, paragraph 0057, object parameters and grouping information is transmitted through the multiplexer and sent to decoder), the classification manner comprises classifying at least one object signal based on cross-correlation parameter values between the at least one object signals (0061-63, grouping audio object signals based on correlation).
Oh does not specifically teach the side information parameter is configured to indicate an encoding mode corresponding to the object signal set.
In the same field of audio coding, Eksler teaches the side information parameter is configured to indicate an encoding mode corresponding to the object signal set (0149, coding mode may be encoded in a flag).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of effective filing to encode coding modes as taught by Eksler in the system of Oh in order to allow for decoder to properly decode the encoded audio signals.
Oh and Eksler do not specifically teach calculating the cross-correlation parameter values between filtered signals obtained after performing a high-pass filtering process on the at least one object signal to remove a component lower than a cutoff frequency from each object signal.
In the same field of multi-channel encoding, Shlomot teaches
calculating the cross-correlation parameter values between filtered signals obtained after performing a high-pass filtering process on the at least one object signal to remove a component lower than a cutoff frequency from each object signa (0281 pre-processing each of the channels including high-pass filtering each of the channels, 0285-87, cross-correlation calculations on the pre-processed channels).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of effective filing to high pass filter signals before cross-correlation as taught by Shlomot in the system of Oh and Eksler in order to remove unwanted signal components that might degrade correlation calculations.
Consider claim 16, Oh and Eksler teach the method of claim 14, wherein obtaining the at least one object signal set by decoding the encoding bitstream comprises:
determining a classification manner for the object signals based on the classification side information parameter (Oh, figure 5, 0058, grouping parameters );
determining a respective encoding mode corresponding to each encoded object signal parameter information based on the side information parameter (Oh 0058, parameters received for audio object decoding, Eksler 0149, coding mode may be encoded in a flag); and
decoding the at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information using respective decoding modes that are based on the classification manner for the object signals and the respective encoding modes corresponding to the at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information (0058, decoding audio objects using parameters provided by encoder)
Consider claim 17, Oh teaches The method of claim 16, wherein
decoding the at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information using the respective decoding modes that are based on the classification manner for the object signals and the respective encoding modes corresponding to the at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information comprises:
obtaining at least one decoded object signal set by decoding the at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information using respective decoding modes with a same decoding kernel that are based on the encoding modes of the at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information (Figure 6, 0058 decoding signals initially with waveform decoder 620);
wherein the method further comprises: performing post-processing on the at least one decoded object signal set (Figure 8, 0076, rendering objects into audio channels).
Consider claim 27, Oh teaches A non-transitory computer readable storage medium, for storing instructions, wherein when the instructions are executed, the method of claim 14 is performed (0145, computer readable media, computer systems, see rejection of claim 14).
Consider claim 28, On teaches the method of claim 1, wherein writing the at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information to the encoding bitstream and sending the encoding bitstream to the decoding end comprises:
determining a classification side information parameter, wherein the classification side information parameter is configured to indicate a classification manner for object signals (0057-58, figure 5, grouping information generated by grouping unit 550 may be sent to decoder, 0065, grouping information may include information about how groups are formed);
determining a respective side information parameter corresponding to each object signal set (figure 5, paragraph 0057 objects coded and object parameters generated); and
obtaining the encoding bitstream by perform a bitstream multiplexing on the classification side information parameter, the respective side information parameter corresponding to each object signal set, and the at least one piece of encoded object signal parameter information, and sending the encoding bitstream to the decoding end (Figure 5, paragraph 0057, object parameters and grouping information is transmitted through the multiplexer and sent to decoder).
Oh and Shlomot do not specifically teach, the side information parameter is configured to indicate an encoding mode corresponding to the object signal set.
In the same field of audio coding, Eksler teaches the side information parameter is configured to indicate an encoding mode corresponding to the object signal set (0149, coding mode may be encoded in a flag).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of effective filing to encode coding modes as taught by Eksler in the system of Oh and Shlomot in order to allow for decoder to properly decode the encoded audio signals.
Claim 29 contains similar limitations as claim 28 and therefore is rejected for the same reasons.
Conclusion
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DOUGLAS GODBOLD
Examiner
Art Unit 2655
/DOUGLAS GODBOLD/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2655
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