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 .
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 1-13 are 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.
Regarding claims 1 and 13, the phrase “either determination processing by the second determination unit or decisions made by the second determination unit” is vague and indefinite. The examiner interprets the phrase as determination processing by the second determination unit or decisions made by the second determination unit” for the purpose of examination.
Regarding claims 5-7, the phrase “even after the target period has passed, a decision similar to a decision made by the second determination unit” is vague and indefinite. It is unclear to what ‘even after a target period’ and ‘decision similar to a decision made’ refer to.
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) 1-3, 5, 8, 13-14 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee (2018/0146343) in view of Sanji (11027701).
Regarding claim 1, Lee discloses an area determination system (abstract) comprising: a detection unit, configured to detect, based on a received signal strength (RSSI) of a wireless signal being transmitted and received to/from a mobile device, location of the mobile device to acquire mobile device location information indicating a result of detection (para 12, estimating current location based on signal strength of signals received), a fist determination unit, configured to determine based on the mobile device location, whether a mobile device is present in a target area (para 56 as well as para 95-97, detection presence/absence information). Lee further discloses an obtaining unit configured to obtain the number of times of decisions of Prescence indicating a numerical number of times that the first determination unit has decided that the mobile device is present in the target area having a predetermined length (para 175, total number of times being determined present or absent), a second determination unit configured to decide when the number of decisions of presence is equal or greater than a predetermined number of times (para 183-187, use of N previous estimated locations to determine presence or absence, also para 204-207 thresholds and number of times to indicate presence). Lee also discloses a control unit configured to control using at least one selected from the group consisting of a time lag, the predetermined length, and the predetermined number of times from the determination processing by the second determination unit (para 175, total time span is a predetermined length for determination). Lee fails to disclose that the presence/absence is explicitly directed to a threshold.
However, Sanji teaches in an analogous art, that a determination unit decides presence or absence information based on the decisions being related to a threshold (Figure 8, use of average RSSI data is compared against a high level and low level threshold, also col. 14;40-60). In particular, the average signal strength is a predetermined number of measurements determines whether a mobile device is present or absent (outside or inside the vehicle). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to include thresholds as taught by Sanji to the system of Lee which uses previously stored RSSI data to provide accurate computation of presence/absence information.
Regarding claim 13, Lee discloses an area determination method comprising: : a detection step, including detecting, based on a received signal strength (RSSI) of a wireless signal being transmitted and received to/from a mobile device, location of the mobile device to acquire mobile device location information indicating a result of detection (para 12, estimating current location based on signal strength of signals received), a fist determination step, including determining based on the mobile device location, whether a mobile device is present in a target area (para 56 as well as para 95-97, detection presence/absence information). Lee further discloses an obtaining step including obtaining the number of times of decisions of Prescence indicating a numerical number of times that the first determination unit has decided that the mobile device is present in the target area having a predetermined length (para 175, total number of times being determined present or absent), a second determination step including deciding when the number of decisions of presence is equal or greater than a predetermined number of times (para 183-187, use of N previous estimated locations to determine presence or absence, also para 204-207 thresholds and number of times to indicate presence). Lee also discloses a control step including controlling using at least one selected from the group consisting of a time lag, the predetermined length, and the predetermined number of times from the determination processing by the second determination unit (para 175, total time span is a predetermined length for determination). Lee fails to disclose that the presence/absence is explicitly directed to a threshold.
However, Sanji teaches in an analogous art, that a determination unit decides presence or absence information based on the decisions being related to a threshold (Figure 8, use of average RSSI data is compared against a high level and low level threshold, also col. 14;40-60). In particular, the average signal strength is a predetermined number of measurements determines whether a mobile device is present or absent (outside or inside the vehicle). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to include thresholds as taught by Sanji to the system of Lee which uses previously stored RSSI data to provide accurate computation of presence/absence information.
Regarding claim 14, the combination of Lee and Sanji discloses a non-transitory computer medium storing a program designed to cause one or more processors to perform the area determination method of claim 13 (Lee, para 13-15 memory and processor and Sanji Col. 50;3-10). Therefore claim 14 is rejected for the same reasoning as given in the rejection of claim 13 above.
Regarding claims 2-3, Lee further discloses the mobile device includes of member selected from the group consisting of a transmitter to transmit wireless signal and a receiver configured to receive the wireless signal (communications unit 101, Figure 2) and the detection unit configured to detect via a terminal including the other member selected from a transmitter/receiver, the location based on the received signal strength of the wireless signal (Figure 5, step 500). Lee discloses the use of timestamp information (para 43-49, timestamps) indicating a point in time where RSSI information is detected and used to determine location and accumulating in association with the time stamp information, presence information (para 190, 204 use of previously stored # of location data).
Regarding claim 5, Lee further discloses the control unit is configured to extend the target period when the first determination period has made, even after a target period has passed, a decision similar to a decision made by the second determination unit in the target period (para 204-205, extending presence/absence threshold from 2 to 5 depending on the determination requirements.
Regarding claim 8, Lee further discloses that the control unit is configured to adopt, in a next target period, a weighted value, obtained by adding a weight to a value in the target period, with respect to at least one of the predetermined length or number of times depending on the decision made by the second determination unit (para 190-197, use of weights for the target periods depending on the terminal controller).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4, 6-7 and 9-12 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 closest prior art of record (Sanji and Lee) disclose the use of thresholds and weights to determine presence or absence of a mobile terminal as it moves throughout a wireless network. Tanaka and Wang disclose the use of weighted thresholds as well as adaptive thresholds for presence and absence information, but are the same assignee of record. None of the prior art of record discloses nor fairly suggests “when the number of times of decisions of presence is equal to or greater than the predetermined number of times, calculate a difference between two pieces of timestamp information corresponding to two pieces of presence information acquired during the target period which are adjacent to each other and obtain a maximum difference that is a maximum value of one or more differences thus calculated, and the control unit is also configured to, even when the number of times of decisions of presence is equal to or greater than the predetermined number of times but the maximum difference is greater than a threshold value, make the second determination unit decide that the mobile device be absent from the target area during the target period.,” “wherein the control unit is configured to postpone an end of the target period for a predetermined time when the first determination unit decides, within the predetermined time since the second determination unit has decided that the mobile device be present/absent in the target area;” or “wherein the control unit is configured to, when the second determination unit has decided that the mobile device be absent from the target area during the target period, adopt, in the next target period, at least one of a first weighted value with respect to the predetermined length or a second weighted value with respect to the predetermined number of times, the first weighted value being calculated by multiplying a value of the predetermined length in the target period by a weighting coefficient less than 1, the second weighted value being calculated by multiplying a value of the predetermined number of times in the target period by a weighting coefficient greater than 1.”
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Tanaka (WO 2022/163257 discloses the use of weights as well as signal strength measurements in determining presence and absence information.
Wang (11789109) discloses use of RSSI information to determine presence and absence information while using first and second estimation and determination steps.
Wang (11782123) discloses the use of thresholds in determining presence or absence information.
Koshy (2021/0051624) discloses location fingerprinting and comparison of received RSSI data to determine the location of a user.
Dupray (2012/019380) discloses the use of location fingerprints and pattern matching to determine a user’s location in a wireless tracking network.
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WILLIAM GEORGE TROST IV
Primary Patent Examiner
Art Unit 2641
/WILLIAM G TROST IV/Primary Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2641
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