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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 02/17/2026 has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1-20 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.
Claims 1, 13 and 15 have been amended.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Mighani (US 2011/0274156) in view of Pun (US 2006/0244819).
Regarding claim 1, Mighani discloses an electronic apparatus, comprising:
an input/output interface configured to receive digital image content that is not compressed (transmitter receives content from source; see at least paragraph 0020);
a communication device configured to transmit and receive data wirelessly (transmitter; see at least paragraph 0021);
at least one memory storing instructions (inherently to support the hardware and software component of the transmitter; see at least paragraph 0024); and
at least one processor configured to obtain packet data corresponding to the digital image content and control the communication device to transmit the packet data, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
separate video information, audio information, and meta information in the digital image content (control processor transmits audio data, video data and control data to encoder; see at least paragraph 0027);
based on the video information within a frame in the digital image content, perform encoding within the frame using the video information to obtain encoded video information (encoder encodes video and audio data; see at least paragraph 0028);
packetize each of the encoded video information, the audio information, and the meta information to obtain the packet data (packets; see at least paragraph 0035); and
control the communication device to wirelessly transmit the packet data to a display device (from transmitter, through network to receiver; see at least paragraphs 0021-0022 and 0030-0035).
Mighani discloses that the encoder may utilize any number of known encoding schemes and protocols; see at least paragraph 0028, but is not clear about based on video information in preset units of lines within a frame in digital image content being buffered, perform encoding in the preset units of lines within the frame using the buffered video information.
Pun discloses the above missing limitation; an encoder that encodes a composite frame that is stored in a composite image buffer. The encoder encodes the sub-frames that is stored in sections in the buffer, wherein each sub-frame is divided into a set of macroblocks, so that the encoding of each sub-frame does not depend on any other sub-frame; see at least paragraphs 0059-0061.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to modify Mighani by the teachings of Pun by having the above limitations so to be able to transmit data between video-conference participants efficiently; see at least paragraph 0003.
Regarding claim 2, Mighani in view of Pun disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
based on the video information in the preset units of lines among a plurality of video information constituting one frame in the digital image content being buffered video information, perform an encoding operation using the buffered video information in the preset units of lines (Mighani; encoder encodes video and audio data and the source can be storage; see at least paragraphs 0020 and 0028 and Pun’s encoding; see at least paragraphs 0059-0061).
Regarding claim 3, Mighani in view of Pun disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 2, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
store information on the one frame in the at least one memory when the encoding of the one frame in the digital image content is completed; and
perform the encoding operation using the video information in the preset units of lines and frame information corresponding to the preset units of lines in a stored previous frame (Mighani; encoder encodes video and audio data and the source can be storage; see at least paragraphs 0020 and 0028 in combination with Pun’s encoding; see at least the rejection of claim 1).
Regarding claim 4, Mighani in view of Pun disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 2, wherein the at least one processor comprises a plurality of encoding cores configured to perform the encoding in the preset units of blocks on a plurality of different lines (Mighani; encoder encodes video and audio data; see at least paragraph 0028 and Pun’s encoding; see at least paragraphs 0059-0061).
Regarding claim 5, Mighani in view of Pun disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 2, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
perform the encoding at a bit rate based on complexity of the video information during performing the encoding in the preset units of blocks (Mighani; encoder encodes video and audio data; see at least paragraph 0028 in combination with Pun’s encoding; see at least the rejection of claim 1).
Regarding claim 6, Mighani in view of Van Cao disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
separate data outside a preset section in a signal received from the input/output interface into image information (see at least the rejection of claim 1); and
confirm a packet type of a signal within the preset section to separate the meta information and the audio information (Mighani; from the encoding/network schemes and protocols; see at least paragraphs 0021-0022, 0028 and 0030-0035).
Regarding claim 7, Mighani in view of Pun disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
obtain a frame index based on a synchronization signal in a signal received from the input/output interface; and
add a header comprising the frame index to each of the encoded video information, the audio information, and the meta information (Mighani; from the encoding/network schemes and protocols; see at least paragraphs 0021-0022, 0028 and 0030-0035).
Regarding claim 8, Mighani in view of Pun disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
based on the audio information comprising an audio sample and a header corresponding to the audio sample:
merge a preset number of audio samples to obtain merged audio samples and obtain an audio payload;
obtain a header corresponding to the audio payload using headers of each of the merged audio samples; and
combine the audio payload and the header to obtain a wireless audio packet (Mighani; from the encoding/network schemes and protocols; see at least paragraphs 0021-0022, 0028 and 0030-0035).
Regarding claim 9, Mighani in view of Pun disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 8, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
obtain the header corresponding to the audio payload to comprise frame index information corresponding to a location of the audio information (Mighani; from the encoding/network schemes and protocols; see at least paragraphs 0021-0022, 0028 and 0030-0035).
Regarding claim 10, Mighani in view of Pun disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
merge the meta information in units of frames to obtain a meta payload;
obtain a meta header comprising frame index information corresponding to the meta information; and
combine the meta header and the meta payload to obtain a wireless meta packet (Mighani; from the encoding/network schemes and protocols; see at least paragraphs 0021-0022, 0028 and 0030-0035).
Regarding claim 11, Mighani in view of Pun disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
obtain the packet data comprising one of the encoded video information, the audio information, and the meta information and division information indicating a type of data in a data area (Mighani; from the encoding/network schemes and protocols; see at least paragraphs 0021-0022, 0028 and 0030-0035).
Regarding claim 12, Mighani in view of Pun disclose the electronic apparatus as claimed in claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:
control the communication device to transmit the packet data corresponding to the meta information among the packet data with a highest priority (Mighani; see at least paragraphs 0010-0011, 0027 and 0030).
Claim 13 is rejected on the same grounds as claim 1.
Claim 14 is rejected on the same grounds as claim 2.
Claim 15 is rejected on the same grounds as claim 1.
Claim 16 is rejected on the same grounds as claim 2.
Claim 17 is rejected on the same grounds as claim 3.
Claim 18 is rejected on the same grounds as claim 5.
Claim 19 is rejected on the same grounds as claim 6.
Claim 20 is rejected on the same grounds as claim 7.
Conclusion
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/YASSIN ALATA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2426
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