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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 06/16/2026 has been entered.
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Response to Amendment
Applicant previously filed claims 1-15. Claim 1, 3, 7, 11, and 13-15 have been amended. Accordingly, claims 1-15 are pending in the current application.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 06/16/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Applicant’s arguments with respect to the claim(s) 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.
Applicant is reminded that although the claims are interpreted in light of the specification, limitations from the specification are not read into the claims. See In re Van Geuns, 988 F.2d 1181, 26 USPQ2d 1057 (Fed. Cir. 1993).
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.
Claim(s) 1-15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhang et al. (US 20180098072 A1) in view of Zhang et al. (US 20190158837 A1 hereinafter referred to as “Zhang 2”).
Claim(s) 1-15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102 (a)(1) as being anticipated by Zhang et al. (US 20180098072 A1) in view of Zhang et al. (US 20190158837 A1 hereinafter referred to as “Zhang 2”).
Regarding Claim 1, Zhang et al. teaches a method performed by a video decoding device for initializing a context model of a context-based adaptive binary arithmetic coding (Abstract; Paragraph 2), the method comprising:
determining whether an initialization method is a reference-based context initialization method (Paragraph 55-56; Paragraphs 67-68; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 167-171); and
when the initialization method is the reference-based context initialization method, initializing the context model in a current processing unit by using a context state at a predetermined location in a previously reconstructed reference picture (Paragraph 55-56; Paragraphs 67-68; Paragraph 101; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 167-171).
However, Zhang et al. does not explicitly teach wherein the previously reconstructed reference picture is located in a same temporal layer as a current picture.
Zhang 2, however, teaches wherein the previously reconstructed reference picture is located in a same temporal layer as a current picture (Paragraph 178; Paragraph 213; Paragraph 221).
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art at the time of the filing of the invention to have modified the video decoding method of Zhang et al. to include the temporal layer based processing as in Zhang 2, in order to provide improved coding efficiency (See Zhang 2 Paragraph 5).
Regarding Claim 2, Zhang et al. and Zhang 2 teach the method of claim 1, Zhang et al. further teaches wherein the current processing unit is the current picture, or a parallelization unit within the current picture, and wherein the parallelization unit is a slice, a tile, a Coding Tree Unit line (CTU line), or a Virtual Pipeline Data Unit (VPDU) within the current picture (Paragraph 206; Paragraph 220).
Regarding Claim 3, Zhang et al. and Zhang 2 teach the method of claim 1, Zhang et al. further teaches wherein determining whether the initialization method is the reference-based context initialization method comprises: decoding, from a bitstream, context initialization-enabling information that indicates whether to use a reference-based context initialization method for the context model in a current processing unit in a current picture (Paragraph 55-56; Paragraph 67; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 167-169);
determining an initialization method of the context model by using the context initialization-enabling information, wherein the initialization method is the reference-based context initialization method or a quantization parameter-based context initialization method (Paragraphs 67-68; Paragraphs 169-171);
checking whether the initialization method is the reference-based context initialization method (Paragraph 55-56; Paragraphs 67-68; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 167-171);
wherein the context initialization-enabling information is represented as a flag indicating whether to use the context initialization method, or an index indicating one of initialization methods (Paragraph 55-56; Paragraphs 60-69; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 167-171).
Regarding Claim 4, Zhang et al. and Zhang 2 teach the method of claim 2, Zhang et al. further teaches wherein initializing the context model includes: when the current processing unit is the current picture and when the initialization method is the reference-based context initialization method, initializing the context model in the current picture by using the context state at the predetermined location in the previously reconstructed reference picture (Paragraph 55-59; Paragraphs 67-68; Paragraph 101; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 167-171).
Regarding Claim 5, Zhang et al. and Zhang 2 teach the method of claim 2, Zhang et al. further teaches wherein initializing the context model includes: when the current processing unit is the parallelization unit and when the initialization method is the reference-based context initialization method, initializing a context model in a first parallelization unit in the current picture by using the context state at the predetermined location in the previously reconstructed reference picture (Paragraph 55-56; Paragraphs 67-68; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 167-171).
Regarding Claim 6, Zhang et al. and Zhang 2 teach the method of claim 2, Zhang et al. further teaches wherein initializing the context model includes: when the current processing unit is the parallelization unit and when the initialization method is the reference-based context initialization method, initializing the context model in the current processing unit with reference to a context state stored in the previously reconstructed reference picture at a specified position of a parallelization unit corresponding to the current processing unit (Paragraph 55-59; Paragraphs 67-68; Paragraph 101; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 167-171).
Regarding Claim 7, Zhang et al. and Zhang 2 teach the method of claim 3, Zhang et al. further teaches wherein initializing the context model includes: when the initialization method is the quantization parameter-based context initialization method, initializing the context model in the current processing unit by using a predetermined and quantization parameter-based context state (Paragraph 55-56; Paragraphs 62-68; Paragraph 92; Paragraph 101; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 167-171).
Regarding Claim 8, Zhang et al. and Zhang 2 teach the method of claim 1, Zhang et al. further teaches wherein the previously reconstructed reference picture is a reference picture that is being temporally closest to the current picture among reference pictures located in a same temporal layer with the current picture (Paragraph 55-56; Paragraphs 62-68; Paragraph 92; Paragraph 101; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 123-125; Paragraphs 167-171).
Regarding Claim 9, Zhang et al. and Zhang 2 teach the method of claim 1, Zhang et al. further teaches wherein initializing the context model includes: when a current Group of Pictures (current GOP), which contains the current picture, uses an open GOP that references a previous GOP and when a picture having a same temporal layer with the current picture is not included in the current GOP, referencing the context state from a previously reconstructed picture included in the previous GOP and having a same temporal layer with the current picture (Paragraph 55-56; Paragraphs 62-68; Paragraph 92; Paragraph 104; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 123-125; Paragraphs 167-171).
Regarding Claim 10, Zhang et al. and Zhang 2 teach the method of claim 1, Zhang et al. further teaches wherein initializing the context model includes: stopping from applying the reference-based context initialization method when the current picture is a non-reference picture (Paragraph 55-59; Paragraphs 67-68; Paragraph 101; Paragraph 116-120; Paragraphs 167-171).
Method claims 11-14 are drawn to the encoding method corresponding to the decoding method disclosed in claims 1-10 above, and have limitations that are substantially similar, merely performed in the inverse. Zhang et al. further teaches a method performed by a video encoding device for initializing a context model of a context-based adaptive binary arithmetic coding (Paragraph 27-28)
Claim 15 is drawn to a method of transmitting a bitstream, comprising generating a bitstream by a video encoding method corresponding to claim 11 above and the video encoding method of claim 11 is rejected as above. Zhang et al. further teaches a method of transmitting a bitstream, comprising generating a bitstream by a video encoding method (Paragraph 40; Paragraph 53; Paragraph 217).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to FARHAN MAHMUD whose telephone number is (571)272-7712. The examiner can normally be reached 10-7.
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/FARHAN MAHMUD/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2483
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