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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement, filed August 16th, 2024, has been 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.
Claim 13 is 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.
In regards to claim 13, it is noted that the second limitation has been amended to state “a receiver to receive a data quality demanded from a receiver”. As “receiver” is introduced twice in this limitation, it is not clear if the receiver is receiving a request from itself, or from a secondary receiver. Clarification is required.
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) 13 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Bures et al. (US 2020/0322703).
In regards to claim 13, Bures discloses a sensor unit (fig. 1) comprising: a measuring element (120) to capture measured values with an associated available data quality indicating a quality for the measured values (⁋ 45 discloses that the measuring element can be controlled to have an associated data quality); a receiver (140) to receive a data quality demanded from a receiver (140 receives function calls from 160); a processing unit (140) to process the measured values according to the available data quality and the demanded data quality to form pre-processed sensor data; and a transmitter to transmit the pre-processed sensor data and the available data quality to the receiver (⁋ 21-22).
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) 1-8, and 10 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as anticipated by or, in the alternative, under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over Kloepper et al. (US 2019/0294998).
In regards to claim 1, Kloepper discloses a method for transmitting pre-processed sensor data, the method comprising: measuring values with a sensor unit (fig. 1, 200 ⁋ 19,47 “one or more sensors”) the measured values having an associated available data quality (⁋ 19, 48 low precision mode), indicating a quality for the measured values (⁋ 19, 48); processing the measured values according to the available data quality and the demanded data quality to form pre-processed sensor data (⁋ 19, 48, in LPM can be pre-processed); and transmitting the pre-processed sensor data and the available data quality to the receiver (100, ⁋ 20, 49 data is transmitted to the low precision machine learning model 120); receiving a response according to the available data quality from the receiver (⁋ 23, 50); processing the measured values according to the response to form further pre-processed sensor data (⁋ 37, 51 “it can change…the pre-processing”); and transmitting the further pre-processed sensor data and the available data quality to the receiver (⁋ 37, 53 reduced or raw data is transmitted to the complimentary computer for further processing in the HP model). Kloepper does not appear to explicitly disclose receiving a data quality demanded by a receiver, or in another words, having the low precision mode be demanded in the first place. However, it is disclosed that in normal operation, the monitoring system is operated in low precision mode (⁋ 48) and that instructions are given when switching to high precision mode (⁋ 50). Therefore, it would be either inherent or obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art that there would be instructions to receive a data quality demanded by a receiver, in order to put the system initially in normal mode operations.
In regards to claim 2, Kloepper discloses the method, as discussed above. Kloepper is silent to receiving a second response according to the available data quality from the receiver; and transmitting the measured values and the available data quality to the receiver. However, as discussed above, it is disclosed that the responses are received in response to an abnormal reading (⁋50) and that the monitoring system is normally operated in low precision mode (⁋ 48). As there are two main modes of operation (low precision LP/high precision HP), it would be obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to try to go back and forth between the modes based on a further response received in order to yield the predictable result of allowing the system to operate in normal LP mode, and then operate in HP mode when needed. Therefore, it would be obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to try receiving a second response according to the available data quality from the receiver; and transmitting the measured values and the available data quality to the receiver, in order to yield the predictable result of allowing this method to switch between the two modes.
In regards to claim 3, Kloepper discloses the method, as discussed above. Kloepper is silent to storing the measured values with the sensor unit. However, the examiner takes official notice that it is well known in the art of sensing to store collected data with a unit measuring the data, in order to allow later retrieval of older data, or to ensure data is not lost due to a communication drop between a sensor unit and a receiver. Therefore, it would be obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to storing the measured values with the sensor unit , in order to allow later retrieval of older data, or to ensure data is not lost due to a communication drop between a sensor unit and a receiver.
In regards to claim 4, the sensor unit and the receiver use matched communication protocol (⁋ 77).
In regards to claim 5, the sensor unit determines the available data quality (⁋ 51).
In regards to claim 6, the available data quality is determined by: an algorithm for anomaly detection and/or a machine learning algorithm (⁋ 52).
In regards to claim 7, the receiver comprises one of: a gateway device, a cloud server, a fog server, or an edge device (⁋ 52).
In regards to claim 8, the method further comprises retrieving desired transmission intervals from the receiver (⁋ 14).
In regards to claim 10, processing of the sensor data comprises: an aggregation and/or a filtering and/or a compression and/or a calculation of the root mean square value (RMS value) (claim 7).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 9 and 11 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including 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:
In regards to claim 9, the prior art neither teaches or renders obvious transmitting data resulting from the processing the measured values according to the available data quality and the demanded data quality along with the pre-processed sensor data, in combination with the rest of the limitations of the claim.
In regards to claim 11, the prior art neither teaches or renders obvious receiving a quality scale on the basis of which the data quality is scaled, in combination with the rest of the limitations of the claim.
Additional Prior Art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Briff et al. (US 2019/0191231) discloses a method for transmitting preprocessed sensor data, with different quality.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to KARA E GEISEL whose telephone number is (571)272-2416. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 10am-6pm.
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/KARA E. GEISEL/
Art Unit 2877
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