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 .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1 and 8 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by PARK [US20230211223].
Regarding claim 1, PARK discloses a sensing device for sensing movement of a golf ball (Fig. 2) comprising:
a light emitting assembly that is provided on one side of a path through which the golf ball moves according to the user's putting and including a plurality of light emitters each of which is irradiate light to the other side (Fig. 2, “an emitting unit (100)”);
a light receiving assembly that is provided on the other side of the path through which the golf ball moves and including a plurality of light receivers for receiving the light emitted by each of the plurality of light emitters (Fig. 2, “a light receiving unit (200)”); and
a controller that determines movement characteristic information of the golf ball using results detected by each of the plurality of light receivers as the moving golf ball passes while blocking light from each of the plurality of light emitters to each of the plurality of light receivers, wherein the controller is configured to set a distance from a center of the golf ball to a line of the light as an effective radius at the point in time when a sensing condition preset for the light receiver to detect the golf ball is met, and obtain the movement characteristic information of the golf ball by geometric analysis, taking the point in time when each of the light receivers detects the golf ball as the point in time when an effective circle with the effective radius comes into contact each of the light lines (Fig. 3, abstract, “a calculation control unit (500) for performing calculations in order to detect the initial position value of the golf ball (1) as measured by the position measuring unit (400) and the movement speed (Vb) and the moving distance (Hb) of the golf ball (1) as measured by the speed detecting unit (300)” and [0013], “a position measuring unit (400) for measuring the position of the golf ball (1) by checking the moment that the golf ball passes when the light receiving unit (200) receives the light emitted from the emitting unit (100) and the golf ball (1) is putted” --- without any specific limitation on “a sensing condition preset,” any condition associated with any circle with a radius that can sense the golf ball passing from light emitting and receiving units can read on this limitation).
Regarding claim 8, please refer to the claim rejection of claim 1.
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) 2 and 3 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over PARK.
Regarding claim 2, PARK discloses the sensing device according to claim 1, wherein the light emitting assembly includes: a first light emitter and a second light emitter that irradiate light substantially in parallel to sense a speed of the golf ball; and a first cross-light emitter and a second cross-light emitter irradiate light in an X shape, respectively, and the light receiving assembly includes: a first light receiver that receives the light from the first light emitter; a second light receiver that receives the light from the second light emitter; a first cross-light receiver that receives the light from the first cross-light emitter; and a second cross-light receiver that receives the light from the second cross-light emitter (Fig. 4).
The difference between PARK and the instant invention is PARK does not explicitly specify that the first cross-light emitter and the second cross-light emitter are provided between the first light emitter and the second light emitter.
Applicant’s specification does not disclose that the specifically claimed arrangement is for any particular purpose or to solve any stated problem that distinguishes it from the other possible arrangements. The specification therefore lacks disclosure of the criticality required by the Courts in providing patentability to the claimed arrangement(s).
Because Applicant fails to disclose that the claimed arrangement(s) provides a criticality to the invention that separates it from the other possible ranges can be achieved by the prior art, it would therefore have been obvious for one of ordinary skill to discover the optimum workable arrangement(s) of claim 2 by normal optimization procedures known in the art.
Regarding claim 3, PARK discloses the sensing device according to claim 2, wherein the light emitting assembly is configured to include: a first light emitting hole through which the light of the first light emitter passes to form a first light beam; a second light emitting hole through which the light from the second light emitter passes to form a second light beam; a first cross-light emitting hole for passing through which the light of the first cross-light emitter passes to form a first cross-light beam; and a second cross-light emitting hole through which the light of the second cross-light emitter passes to form a second cross-light beam, and the light receiving assembly is configured to include: a first light receiving hole for passing the first light beam to the first light receiver; a second light receiving hole for passing the second light beam to the second light receiver; a first cross-light receiving hole for passing the first cross-light beam to the first cross- light receiver; and a second cross-light receiving hole for passing the second cross-light beam to the second cross-light receiver (Fig. 4).
Claim(s) 7 and 12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over PARK, in view of CHOI [US20170209764].
Regarding claim 7, PARK discloses the sensing device according to claim 1. However, PARK does not disclose the sensing device further comprising an effective radius measuring device for measuring the effective radius of a golf ball used by the user for putting, and wherein the controller is configured to set a value measured by the effective radius measuring device for the golf ball moving as the user putts as the effective radius so as to obtain the movement characteristic information of the golf ball using the set effective radius.
Nevertheless, CHOI teaches in a like invention, using measured golf ball size as the effective radius of a golf ball used by the user for putting, and wherein the controller is configured to set a value measured by the effective radius measuring device for the golf ball moving as the user putts as the effective radius so as to obtain the movement characteristic information of the golf ball using the set effective radius ([0045], “since the size of the golf ball is also known, when a center point of a shadow, which is generated when the golf ball passes through the light screen formed by each sensor, is measured, spatial coordinates of the golf ball passing through each sensor plane, may be obtained. When points on the spatial coordinates obtained in this way are connected, a flying vector of the golf ball in space may be obtained”).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the time the invention was effectively filed to have modified the sensing device disclosed by PARK, to have used the measured size of the golf ball for calculation of the movement characteristic information, as taught by CHOI, in order to have the movement characteristic information calculated more accurately.
Regarding claim 12, please refer to the claim rejection of claim 7.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4-6 and 9-11 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.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to YINGCHUAN ZHANG whose telephone number is (571)272-1375. The examiner can normally be reached 8:00 - 4:30 M-F.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Nicholas Weiss can be reached at (571) 270-1775. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/YINGCHUAN ZHANG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3711
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