DETAILED ACTION
This action is in response to the application filed on 9/24/2024.
Claims 16-3 are pending.
Acknowledgment is made of a claim for foreign priority. All of the certified copies of the priority documents have been received.
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 references listed on the Information Disclosure Statement submitted on 1/21/2025 and 12/3/2025 has/have been considered by the examiner (see attached PTO-1449).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. The claim(s) does/do not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter because the claims 30-35 are not clearly limited to the non-transitory medium. The specification also does not clearly define the claimed "computer program product" as being limited to a non-transitory medium.
Note the following description in the specification of the present invention.
Claim Mapping Notation
In this office action, following notations are being used to refer to the paragraph numbers or column number and lines of portions of the cited reference.
In this office action, following example notations are being used to refer to the paragraph numbers or column number and lines of portions of the cited reference.
[0005] (Paragraph number [0005])
C5 (Column 5)
Pa5 (Page 5)
S5 (Section 5)
Furthermore, unless necessary to distinguish from other references in this action, “et al.” will be omitted when referring to the reference.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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 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.
The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied for establishing a background for determining obviousness under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 103(a) are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claims 16-17, 21-24, 28-31 and 35 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Budagavi (US10,708,622) in view of Wouters (US 8,301,451).
Regarding the claim 1, Budagavi discloses the invention substantially as claimed.
Budagavi discloses,
16. An apparatus, comprising at least one processor, memory including computer program code, the memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to perform at least the following
C8 “The video encoder component 506 and the video decoder component 512 may be implemented in any suitable combination of software, firmware, and hardware, such as,
for example, one or more digital signal processors (DSPs), microprocessors, discrete logic, application specific integrated circuits (AS I Cs), field-programmable gate arrays
(FPGAs ), etc.”
…
obtaining a set of input samples;
obtaining…a cross-correlation vector and a scaling vector by utilizing the set of input samples;
C3 “In general, in adaptive loop filtering (ALF), symmetric 2D finite impulse response (FIR) filters are applied to blocks of a reconstructed picture to minimize the error between the original input blocks and the reconstructed blocks. The shape of a filter may be diamond, circle, star, cross, or any other general shape bounded by a (2V+1)×(2H+1) rectangle where V is the vertical dimension of the filter and H is the horizontal dimension of the filter. In practice, the filter shape or shapes to be used are defined by the video code standard, e.g., HEVC. The coefficients of the filters to be applied to each reconstructed picture are determined by the encoder and signaled to the decoder.”
determining predicted sample values for a block of samples based on the filter coefficient vector.
C3 “In general, in adaptive loop filtering (ALF), symmetric 2D finite impulse response (FIR) filters are applied to blocks of a reconstructed picture to minimize the error between the original input blocks and the reconstructed blocks. The shape of a filter may be diamond, circle, star, cross, or any other general shape bounded by a (2V+1)×(2H+1) rectangle where V is the vertical dimension of the filter and H is the horizontal dimension of the filter. In practice, the filter shape or shapes to be used are defined by the video code standard, e.g., HEVC. The coefficients of the filters to be applied to each reconstructed picture are determined by the encoder and signaled to the decoder.”
determining a filter coefficient vector…
C3 “In general, in adaptive loop filtering (ALF), symmetric 2D finite impulse response (FIR) filters are applied to blocks of a reconstructed picture to minimize the error between the original input blocks and the reconstructed blocks. The shape of a filter may be diamond, circle, star, cross, or any other general shape bounded by a (2V+1)×(2H+1) rectangle where V is the vertical dimension of the filter and H is the horizontal dimension of the filter. In practice, the filter shape or shapes to be used are defined by the video code standard, e.g., HEVC. The coefficients of the filters to be applied to each reconstructed picture are determined by the encoder and signaled to the decoder.”
Budagavi does not disclose,
…a triangular matrix…
determining an intermediate vector with a first back-substitution using the triangular matrix and the cross-correlation vector;
scaling the intermediate vector using the scaling vector to obtain a scaled
intermediate vector;
determining…coefficient vector with a second back-substitution using the triangular matrix and the scaled intermediate vector; and
Wouters discloses,
…a triangular matrix…
C10 “A state of the art algorithm to solve Equation (3) employs the LDL decomposition. The matrix A.sup.T W.sub.j.sup.TW.sub.j A is cast as the product of a lower triangular matrix L, a diagonal matrix D, and an upper triangular matrix L.sup.T that is the transpose of L. Then an intermediate solution Z.sub.j is found via forward substitution of L Z.sub.j=A.sup.TW.sub.j.sup.TW.sub.j X.sub.j and finally Y.sub.j is found via backward substitution of L.sup.T Y.sub.j=D.sup.-1Z.sub.j.”
determining an intermediate vector with a first back-substitution using the triangular matrix and the cross-correlation vector;
C10 “A state of the art algorithm to solve Equation (3) employs the LDL decomposition. The matrix A.sup.T W.sub.j.sup.TW.sub.j A is cast as the product of a lower triangular matrix L, a diagonal matrix D…”
scaling the intermediate vector using the scaling vector to obtain a scaled
intermediate vector;
C10 “A state of the art algorithm to solve Equation (3) employs the LDL decomposition. The matrix A.sup.T W.sub.j.sup.TW.sub.j A is cast as the product of a lower triangular matrix L, a diagonal matrix D, and an upper triangular matrix L.sup.T that is the transpose of L. Then an intermediate solution Z.sub.j is found via forward substitution of L Z.sub.j=A.sup.TW.sub.j.sup.TW.sub.j X.sub.j and finally Y.sub.j is found via backward substitution of L.sup.T Y.sub.j=D.sup.-1Z.sub.j.”
Note: In the reference, the scaling of the intermediate vector occurs through application of the diagonal matrix.
determining…coefficient vector with a second back-substitution using the triangular matrix and the scaled intermediate vector; and
C10 “…an upper triangular matrix L.sup.T that is the transpose of L. Then an intermediate solution Z.sub.j is found via forward substitution of L Z.sub.j=A.sup.TW.sub.j.sup.TW.sub.j X.sub.j and finally Y.sub.j is found via backward substitution of L.sup.T Y.sub.j=D.sup.-1Z.sub.j.”
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to utilize the teachings of Wouters and apply them on the teachings of Budagavi to incorporate the LDL decomposition of Wouters when performing prediction of video samples in Budagavi as taught by Wouters.
One would have been motivated for the benefit of efficiently deriving filter coefficients.
Unless stated otherwise, the same explanation for the rationale for the following dependent claims applies as given for the independent claim.
17. The apparatus according to claim 16, wherein the apparatus upon execution is further caused to perform determining the triangular matrix and the scaling vector by decomposing an autocorrelation matrix at least into the triangular matrix and the scaling vector,
Budagavi C3 “In general, in adaptive loop filtering (ALF), symmetric 2D finite impulse response (FIR) filters are applied to blocks of a reconstructed picture to minimize the error between the original input blocks and the reconstructed blocks. The shape of a filter may be diamond, circle, star, cross, or any other general shape bounded by a (2V+1)×(2H+1) rectangle where V is the vertical dimension of the filter and H is the horizontal dimension of the filter. In practice, the filter shape or shapes to be used are defined by the video code standard, e.g., HEVC. The coefficients of the filters to be applied to each reconstructed picture are determined by the encoder and signaled to the decoder.”
Wouters C10 “A state of the art algorithm to solve Equation (3) employs the LDL decomposition. The matrix A.sup.T W.sub.j.sup.TW.sub.j A is cast as the product of a lower triangular matrix L, a diagonal matrix D, and an upper triangular matrix L.sup.T that is the transpose of L. Then an intermediate solution Z.sub.j is found via forward substitution of L Z.sub.j=A.sup.TW.sub.j.sup.TW.sub.j X.sub.j and finally Y.sub.j is found via backward substitution of L.sup.T Y.sub.j=D.sup.-1Z.sub.j.”
wherein the autocorrelation matrix is calculated using a set of reference samples in a determined neighborhood of the block of samples.
Budagavi C9 “…The intra-prediction estimation component 624 (IPE) performs intra-prediction estimation in which tests on CUs in an LCU based on multiple intra-prediction modes, PU sizes, and TU sizes are performed using reconstructed data from previously encoded neighboring CU s stored in a buffer…”
Budagavi C6 “…RP is the auto-correlation of p,(x,y) and Rpr is the crosscorrelation
of p, with r (the original signal). N+l is the number of filter taps. For example, for the filter of FIG. 4,..”
21. The apparatus according to claim 16, wherein the set of input samples comprise one or more of the following: luminance sample values: functions of luminance sample values: or bias parameters.
Budagavi C3 “In general, in adaptive loop filtering (ALF), symmetric 2D finite impulse response (FIR) filters are applied to blocks of a reconstructed picture to minimize the error between the original input blocks and the reconstructed blocks. The shape of a filter may be diamond, circle, star, cross, or any other general shape bounded by a (2V+1)×(2H+1) rectangle where V is the vertical dimension of the filter and H is the horizontal dimension of the filter. In practice, the filter shape or shapes to be used are defined by the video code standard, e.g., HEVC. The coefficients of the filters to be applied to each reconstructed picture are determined by the encoder and signaled to the decoder.”
Note: One of ordinary skilled in the art understands that HEVC processes luminance samples.
22. The apparatus according to claim 16, wherein the apparatus upon execution is further caused to perform encoding the set of input samples and/or decoding the encoded set of samples.
Budagavi C3 “In general, in adaptive loop filtering (ALF), symmetric 2D finite impulse response (FIR) filters are applied to blocks of a reconstructed picture to minimize the error between the original input blocks and the reconstructed blocks. The shape of a filter may be diamond, circle, star, cross, or any other general shape bounded by a (2V+1)×(2H+1) rectangle where V is the vertical dimension of the filter and H is the horizontal dimension of the filter. In practice, the filter shape or shapes to be used are defined by the video code standard, e.g., HEVC. The coefficients of the filters to be applied to each reconstructed picture are determined by the encoder and signaled to the decoder.”
Regarding the claims 23-24, 28-29, 30, 31 and 35, they recite elements that are at least included in the claims 16, 17, 21, 22, 16, 17 and 21 above but in a different claim form. Therefore, the same rationale for the rejection of the claims 16, 17, 21, 22, 16, 17 and 21 applies.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 18-20, 25-27 and 32-34 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:
Regarding the claims 18-20, 25-27 and 32-34, applicants uniquely claimed distinct features, which are not found in the prior art, either singularly or in an obvious combination of all the limitation of the claim, the distinct features being… perform scaling the autocorrelation matrix and the cross-correlation vector based on a bit depth of the block of samples.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Hu et al. (US 20240106517 A1) and Wouters (US 20100057467 A1) disclose relevant art related to the subject matter of the present invention.
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/JAE N NOH/
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 2481