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 .
Response to Amendment
The preliminary amendment filed on 7/24/2024 has been accepted and entered.
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority based on an application filed in China on Jan. 29, 2022.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 11/4/24 is being considered by the examiner.
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 1-3, 5-11, 13-19 and 21-23 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.
Independent claims 1, 9 and 17 cite limitation “a) resolution of the second frame buffer is less than resolution of the first frame buffer, and resolution of a color attachment and resolution of a depth attachment of the second frame buffer are less than or equal to the resolution of the second frame buffer”. Here, it seems that claim language compares the resolution of the second frame buffer with the resolution of the second frame buffer. Claim 2-3, 5-8, 10-11, 13-16, 18-19 and 21-23 are dependent claims and rejected under the similar rationale.
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 of this title, 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 1-3, 5-6, 9-11, 13-14, 17-19 and 21-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhang et al. (WO2020/156264 A1, using US 2021/0358192 A1 as translation) in view of Liu et al. (US 2022/0222778 A1).
As to Claim 1, Zhang teaches A method for image rendering, comprising:
determining, based on a graphics application programming interface (API) instruction, that a first render pass used to render to-be-rendered data meets a preset condition, wherein the preset condition comprises determining that the first render pass is one of render passes comprised in a render pass trustlist (Zhang discloses “For example, the first identification information and the second identification information may be correspondingly written into a rendering list, to indicate that the render pass of the first frame buffer identified by the first identification information is redirected to the second frame buffer corresponding to the second identification information” in [0016]; “In a possible implementation, the determining the relationship between the first frame buffer and the second frame buffer includes: When the first description information and the second description information meet a preset condition, the CPU determines that the render pass of the first frame buffer may be redirected to the second frame buffer” in [0018]; rendering API in [0058]; “In this case, the graphics engine 233 detects whether the application program needs a rendering procedure (that is, detects whether there is a rendering-related rendering instruction).” in [0101]; see also [0075].);
replacing a first frame buffer as a frame buffer bound to the first render pass with a second frame buffer, wherein at least one of the following is true: a) resolution of the second frame buffer is less than resolution of the first frame buffer, and resolution of a color attachment and resolution of a depth attachment of the second frame buffer are less than or equal to the resolution of the second frame buffer, or b) a size of storage space occupied by a single pixel in the second frame buffer is less than a size of storage space occupied by a single pixel in the first frame buffer (Zhang discloses “For example, the first identification information and the second identification information may be correspondingly written into a rendering list, to indicate that the render pass of the first frame buffer identified by the first identification information is redirected to the second frame buffer corresponding to the second identification information” in [0016]; “If the optimization module 2331 determines that the description information of the first frame buffer and the description information of the second frame buffer meet the preset condition, it is determined that the first frame buffer can be cut, and a render pass of the first frame buffer may be redirected to the second frame buffer.” in [0075]; “in this embodiment of this application, the preset condition includes but is not limited to: An output of the first frame buffer is a color, that is, an attribute of the frame buffer is a color, an output texture map of the first frame buffer is an input texture map of the second frame buffer, and a resolution of the first frame buffer is greater than or equal to a resolution of the second frame buffer” in [0076]; depth and color attribute information in Table 3); and
rendering the to-be-rendered data by using a second render pass, and obtaining output data of a vertex shader in the second render pass, wherein the second render pass is a render pass obtained after the frame buffer bound to the first render pass is replaced with the second frame buffer (Zhang discloses “That is, when the description information of the first frame buffer and the description information of the second frame buffer meet the foregoing condition, it may be determined that the first frame buffer can be cut, and the render pass of the first frame buffer may be redirected to the second frame buffer” in [0076]. Here, the render pass on the second frame buffer refers to a second render pass. Zhang is silent on vertex shader. Liu further discloses “In at least one embodiment, graphics processor 1410 can execute different shader programs via separate logic, such that vertex processor 1405 is optimized to execute operations for vertex shader programs, while one or more fragment processor(s) 1415A-1415N execute fragment (e.g., pixel) shading operations for fragment or pixel shader programs” in [0160].)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the invention of Zhang with the teaching of Liu so that a graphic processor may execute different shader programs via separate logic, such as vertex shader, fragment or pixel shader etc. (Liu, [0160]).
As to Claim 2, Zhang in view of Liu teaches The method according to claim 1, wherein the resolution of the second frame buffer is 1x1, 1x2, 2x1 or 2x2, the resolution of the color attachment of the second frame buffer is 1x1, 1x2, 2x1 or 2x2, and the resolution of the depth attachment of the second frame buffer is 1x1, 1x2, 2x1 or 2x2 (Zhang discloses the resolution of frame buffer in Table 3 or 4. It is well-known that a resolution can be represented by NxM. For example, Liu discloses “In at least one embodiment, FIG. 2B illustrates a larger set 250 of pixels in an upscaled image. In at least one embodiment, each 2x2 pixel region will include one pixel corresponding to a sample location 206 from a lower resolution image” in [0053].)
As to Claim 3, Zhang in view of Liu teaches The method according to claim 1, wherein at least one of the following is true:
a size of storage space occupied by a color value of a single pixel in the color attachment of the second frame buffer is less than a size of storage space occupied by a color value of a single pixel in a color attachment of the first frame buffer, or a size of storage space occupied by a depth value of a single pixel in the depth attachment of the second frame buffer is less than a size of storage space occupied by a depth value of a single pixel in a depth attachment of the first frame buffer (Zhang discloses “in this embodiment of this application, the preset condition includes but is not limited to: An output of the first frame buffer is a color, that is, an attribute of the frame buffer is a color, an output texture map of the first frame buffer is an input texture map of the second frame buffer, and a resolution of the first frame buffer is greater than or equal to a resolution of the second frame buffer” in [0076]; depth and color attribute information in Table 3.)
As to Claim 5, Zhang in view of Liu teaches The method according to claim 1, wherein:
resolution of a viewport of the first render pass is not less than a preset resolution threshold; the frame buffer bound to the first render pass comprises a color attachment (Zhang discloses preset condition may include color, texture map or resolution of first frame buffer is greater than or equal to a resolution of the second frame buffer in [0022]. Here, it is obvious that a preset condition can be a preset resolution threshold.);
a shader program used by each draw call in the first render pass is optimizable, wherein the shader program corresponds to one fragment shader and one vertex shader (Zhang discloses each drawcall in the render pass in Fig 4; optimization module 2331 in [0059]. Liu further discloses “In at least one embodiment, graphics processor 1410 can execute different shader programs via separate logic, such that vertex processor 1405 is optimized to execute operations for vertex shader programs, while one or more fragment processor(s) 1415A-1415N execute fragment (e.g., pixel) shading operations for fragment or pixel shader programs” in [0160].); and
each draw call in the first render pass corresponds to a preset instruction (Zhang discloses “Drawcall is used to indicate a rendering instruction” in [0095], see also Fig 4.)
As to Claim 6, Zhang in view of Liu teaches The method according to claim 5, wherein the preset instruction comprises a point mode setting instruction and a vertex data write-back instruction, the point mode setting instruction indicates that a type of a to-be-rendered primitive is a point, and the vertex data write-back instruction is used to obtain and store output data of the vertex shader (Liu discloses “For example, in at least one embodiment, during a delay associated with a vertex shader operation, an execution unit can perform operations for a pixel shader, fragment shader, or another type of shader program, including a different vertex shader” in [0280]. Here, the pixel or fragment shader refers to a point mode.)
Claim 9 recites similar limitations as claim 1 but in an apparatus form. Therefore, the same rationale used for claim 1 is applied.
Claim 10 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 2.
Claim 11 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 3.
Claim 13 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 5.
Claim 14 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 6.
Claim 17 recites similar limitations as claim 1 but in a system form. Therefore, the same rationale used for claim 1 is applied.
Claim 18 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 2.
Claim 19 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 3.
Claim 21 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 5.
Claim 22 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 6.
Claims 7, 15 and 23 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhang in view of Liu and Urbach (US 8553028 B1).
As to Claim 7, Zhang in view of Liu teaches The method according to claim 5. The combination of Urbach further teaches wherein the fragment shader has only one output variable whose assigned value is a fixed color value or a constant; the fragment shader does not have an input variable; the fragment shader does not use a conditional statement; the fragment shader does not have a uniform variable and a uniform buffer object UBO; and the fragment shader does not use a texture modified by a two-dimensional sampler and does not use a sampler (Liu teaches fragment shader in [0160]. Urbach further discloses “a graphics processing unit may trace rays from a common origin to determine the distances between the origin and objects in the scene, using a fragment shader unit to compute the radiance at points visible from the origin. The render processing typically involves rasterizing the scene geometry and finding the first hits where the rays pass through the pixels” in C6L4-9.)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the invention of Zhang and Liu with the teaching of Urbach so that one type of fragment shader may be used to compute the radiance at points to generate a rendered representation of a scene corresponding to layered cube map (Urbach, C6L2-4).
Claim 15 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 7.
Claim 23 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 7.
Claims 8 and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhang in view of Liu and Boyd et al. (US 2005/0122334 A1).
As to Claim 8, Zhang in view of Liu teaches The method according to claim 5, wherein: the vertex shader comprises a plurality of input variables; the vertex shader further comprises a plurality of output variables; and the vertex shader further comprises a conditional statement (Boyd, Fig 8C and [0058-0065].)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the invention of Zhang and Liu with the teaching of Boyd so as to provide an example of vertex shader.
Claim 16 is rejected based upon similar rationale as Claim 8.
Conclusion
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/WEIMING HE/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2611
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