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 .
This office action is in response to applicant’s amendment dated 7/4/2024, claims 1-16 are currently pending in the application.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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 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.
Claim(s) 1-10, 12-16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Visser et al. (US 20120224456 A1) hereinafter Visser.
Regarding claim 1, Audio device (D800 in Fig. 35) comprising an interface (U10 and U20 in Fig. 35), a memory, one or more processors comprising a signal processor (“A processor may also be implemented as a combination of computing devices, e.g., a combination of a DSP and a microprocessor, a plurality of microprocessors, one or more microprocessors in conjunction with a DSP core, or any other such configuration. A software module may reside in a non-transitory storage medium such as RAM (random-access memory), ROM (read-only memory), nonvolatile RAM (NVRAM) such as flash RAM, erasable programmable ROM (EPROM), electrically erasable programmable ROM (EEPROM), registers, hard disk, a removable disk, or a CD-ROM; or in any other form of storage medium known in the art” in ¶[0182]), one or more speakers (SP10 and SP20 in Fig. 35), one or more microphones (MC10 to MC40 in Fig. 35), and an ultrasound device (UE10 in Fig. 35), wherein the audio device is configured to: output an output ultrasound signal via the ultrasound device; obtain an input ultrasound signal via the ultrasound device (“active ranging using ultrasound energy, which is imperceptible by humans. Such ranging may include emitting an ultrasound ranging pulse, detecting the echo caused by reflection of the pulse from the object to be ranged (i.e., the source)” in ¶[0093]); obtain an audio input signal via the one or more microphones; determine, based on the audio input signal, a direction of arrival of the audio input signal (“It may be desirable to configure device D10 to estimate a direction of arrival of a sound component received by the multimicrophone array from a directional sound source, such as audible source AS1. Such DOA estimation may be useful” in ¶[0065]); determine, based on the input ultrasound signal and the output ultrasound signal, position data including first position data indicative of a first position of a first moving object (“One such approach is active ranging using ultrasound energy, which is imperceptible by humans. Such ranging may include emitting an ultrasound ranging pulse, detecting the echo caused by reflection of the pulse from the object to be ranged (i.e., the source), and calculating a range (e.g., the distance between the sound source and the detector) based on the time-of-flight from emission of the pulse to detection of the reflected echo” in ¶[0093]); determine whether the direction of arrival satisfies a position criterion based on the first position data (“An ultrasonic ranging operation may be combined with one or more directional discrimination methods (e.g., DOA estimation from audible sound)” in ¶[0095]); and process the audio input signal based on whether the direction of arrival satisfies the position criterion for provision of an audio output signal (“Comparator 200 is configured to indicate a state of a relation between the estimated range and a threshold value (e.g., by performing an implementation of task T200 as described herein). Passive DOA estimator 300 is configured to produce an estimated direction of arrival DE10 of an audio-frequency component of channels S10-1 and S10-2 of a multichannel signal, based on the indicated state of the relation (e.g., by performing an implementation of task T300 as described herein). Detected ultrasound signal SU10 may be a channel of the multichannel signal” in ¶[0142]).
Regarding claim 2, Visser teaches the device of claim 1, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein to process the audio input signal comprises, in accordance with the direction of arrival satisfying the position criterion, to target an audio source associated with the direction of arrival (“It may be desirable to use such information to track the position over time of a moving directional source, such as a human speaker, relative to the audio sensing device. Examples of applications for source localization include but are not limited to the following: steering of a directional microphone; steering of a beam of a multi-microphone array” in ¶[0091]).
Regarding claim 3, Visser teaches the device of claim 1, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein the first position data comprises a first distance and a first direction of the first moving object (“One such approach is active ranging using ultrasound energy, which is imperceptible by humans. Such ranging may include emitting an ultrasound ranging pulse, detecting the echo caused by reflection of the pulse from the object to be ranged (i.e., the source), and calculating a range (e.g., the distance between the sound source and the detector) based on the time-of-flight from emission of the pulse to detection of the reflected echo” in ¶[0093]).
Regarding claim 4, Visser teaches the device of claim 3, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein to determine whether the direction of arrival satisfies the position criterion comprises to determine whether the direction of arrival is within a first direction range associated with the first direction and whether the first distance is within a distance range (“Ultrasound ranging may also be more accurate than other approaches at a typical distance range of such an audio processing application (e.g., distances of from one to five meters). FIG. 1C shows an example in which both a direction of arrival and a range RS1 are associated with a desired source AS1” in ¶[0094]).
Regarding claim 5, Visser teaches the device of claim 1, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein the position data comprises second position data indicative of a second position of a second moving object, wherein the second position data comprise a second distance and a second direction of the second moving object (“FIG. 21A shows a plot of a signal produced by ultrasonic detector UD10 in response to a pulse emitted by ultrasonic emitter UE10, in response to an echo ES1 caused by reflection of the pulse from an audible source AS1, and in response to an echo EO1 caused by reflection of the pulse from another object O1 (e.g., a wall, a piece of furniture, another person, etc.). As noted above, the time-of-flight (TOF) of each reflection indicates the range of the corresponding reflecting object” in ¶[0119]).
Regarding claim 6, Visser teaches the device of claim 5, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein to determine whether the direction of arrival satisfies the position criterion comprises to determine whether the direction of arrival is within a second direction range associated with the second direction (“It may be desirable to apply a respective detection threshold value to the output of each masking function, such that a DOA corresponding to that sector is not selected as a DOA estimate for the segment unless the masking function output is above (alternatively, is not less than) the corresponding detection threshold value” in ¶[0084]) and whether the second distance is within a distance range (“Task T200 indicates a state of a relation between the estimated range and a threshold value” in ¶[0099]).
Regarding claim 7, Visser teaches the device of claim 5, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein the ultrasound device comprises one or more ultrasound transducers including a first ultrasound transducer and a second ultrasound transducer, and wherein the first ultrasound transducer is configured to output ultrasound signals having a first frequency and the second ultrasound transducer is configured to output ultrasound signals having a second frequency (“Range estimator 120 may be implemented to include more than one instance of range calculator 102, each corresponding to a different channel of a multichannel instance of detected ultrasound signal SU10” in ¶[0151]).
Regarding claim 8, Visser teaches the device of claim 1, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein the audio device is configured to determine one or more audio sources of interest based on the determination of whether the direction of arrival satisfies the position criterion (“It may be desirable in certain applications to localize the position of each of one or more directional sound sources relative to an audio sensing device. In addition to DOA estimation, for example, it may be desirable to obtain information regarding the range (i.e., distance) of each directional sound source relative to the microphone array” in ¶[0091]), and wherein to process the audio input signal comprises to process the audio input signal based on the one or more audio sources of interest (“It may be desirable to use such information to track the position over time of a moving directional source, such as a human speaker, relative to the audio sensing device. Examples of applications for source localization include but are not limited to the following: steering of a directional microphone; steering of a beam of a multi-microphone array” in ¶[0091] and “For applications in which voice recording (e.g., for communications) occurs in a noisy environment, it may be desirable to separate a desired speech signal from background noise.” in ¶[0005]).
Regarding claim 9, Visser teaches the device of claim 3, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein the audio device is configured to determine the position criterion based on the first distance and the first direction (“It may be desirable in certain applications to localize the position of each of one or more directional sound sources relative to an audio sensing device. In addition to DOA estimation, for example, it may be desirable to obtain information regarding the range (i.e., distance) of each directional sound source relative to the microphone array” in ¶[0091]).
Regarding claim 10, Visser teaches the device of claim 5, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein the processing of the audio input signal is based on the first position data and/or the second position data (“FIG. 21A shows a plot of a signal produced by ultrasonic detector UD10 in response to a pulse emitted by ultrasonic emitter UE10, in response to an echo ES1 caused by reflection of the pulse from an audible source AS1, and in response to an echo EO1 caused by reflection of the pulse from another object O1 (e.g., a wall, a piece of furniture, another person, etc.). As noted above, the time-of-flight (TOF) of each reflection indicates the range of the corresponding reflecting object” in ¶[0119]).
Regarding claim 12, Visser teaches the device of claim 7, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein each of the one or more ultrasound transducers have a dedicated detection range, and wherein the position criterion is based on the respective detection ranges of the one or more ultrasound transducers (“Range estimator 120 may be implemented to include more than one instance of range calculator 102, each corresponding to a different channel of a multichannel instance of detected ultrasound signal SU10” in ¶[0151]).
Regarding claim 13, Visser teaches the device of claim 1, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein to determine position data comprises to determine a first region indicative of no movement (“For a case in which the audio sensing device is to remain stationary during use, it may be desirable to perform a range initialization operation to characterize the space in which the source DOA is to be estimated (e.g., an area in front of the array) in the absence of the source. Such an operation may create a baseline range map,” in ¶[0121]), and wherein the position criterion is based on the first region (“by storing the ranges of the echoes in the unoccupied space (e.g., from walls and furniture), such that echoes indicating these ranges may be ignored during use of the device to process sound received from an audible source” in ¶[0121]).
Regarding claim 14, Visser teaches the device of claim 1, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein to determine position data comprises to determine one or more environment dimension parameters (“Ultrasound ranging may also help to identify other aspects of the environment, such as room dimensions” in ¶[0095]), and wherein the position criterion is based on the one or more environment dimension parameters (“An ultrasonic ranging operation may be combined with one or more directional discrimination methods (e.g., DOA estimation from audible sound), as typically the only range of interest is the range of an object in a particular direction (i.e., as opposed to the ranges of all nearby objects)” in ¶[0095]).
Regarding claim 15, Visser teaches the device of claim 1, Visser further teaches the device further comprising one or more ultrasound transducers (“FIG. 1D shows an example of an implementation D20 of device D10 that may be configured to perform an implementation of method M100 as described herein. Device D20 includes an ultrasonic emitter UE10 and an ultrasonic detector UD10.” in ¶[0063]).
Regarding claim 16, claim is rejected for being method comprising at least the same elements and performing at least the same functions performed by the device of rejected claim 1 (see rejection of claim 1 above).
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 (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claim(s) 11 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Visser et al. (US 20120224456 A1) hereinafter Visser in view of Janssens (US 20160020697 A1) hereinafter Janssens.
Regarding claim 11, Visser teaches the device of claim 5, Visser further teaches the device further comprising wherein the position criterion is based on the detection range (“wherein the ultrasound device has a detection range dependent on an output power of the ultrasound device, and wherein the position criterion is based on the detection range” in ¶[0010]) Visser does not specifically disclose the device further comprising wherein the ultrasound device has a detection range dependent on an output power of the ultrasound device however,
Since it is known in the art as evidenced by Janssens for a device to further comprise wherein the ultrasound device has a detection range dependent on an output power of the ultrasound device in (“In ultrasonic park assist applications, a higher transmit power is achieved with increases the range distance and improves drawbacks encountered in the distance versus battery voltage life” in ¶[0083]),
An ordinary skilled in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Visser with the teachings of Janssens for the benefit of saving power resources, therefore it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Visser with Janssens.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to AMMAR T HAMID whose telephone number is (571)272-1953. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9-5, Eastern time.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Vivian Chin can be reached at (571) 272-7848. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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AMMAR T. HAMID
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 2695
/AMMAR T HAMID/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2695