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 .
Application, submitted on 09/20/2024, has been received, entered, and made of record. Currently, claims 1-10 remain pending in the application.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on 09/20/2024 and 09/18/2025 were filed in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97 and 1.98. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the examiner as indicated. However, Applicant has not provided an explanation of relevance of cited documents.
Claim Objections
Claim 1 is objected to because of the following informalities: claim, in line 9, should recite “information processing apparatus” instead of “processing apparatus.” Appropriate correction is required for the claim to have consistent term.
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)(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.
Claims 1, 5, 7, 9 and 10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C.102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Kishida (US 2012/0257233 A1).
Referring to claim 1, Kishida discloses a non-transitory storage medium (fig.1B, external memory 121) storing an extension program (fig.1B, scan process-related programs 124) readable by a computer (fig.1B, CPU 111) of an information processing apparatus (fig.1B, information processing apparatus 101), an operating system (fig.1B, operating system 122) of the information processing apparatus having general-purpose scanning functions (fig.1B, OS/general scanner driver 127), a scanning device (fig.1B, scanner device 102) being connectable with the information processing apparatus through a communication interface (fig.1B, network I/F 118 and network I/F 145), and the extension program being a program for extending the general-purpose scanning functions of the operating system and being corresponding to the scanning device ([0038]-[0039]), wherein the extension program, when executed by the computer, causes the information processing apparatus to:
when the operating system of the processing apparatus receives a scan job for executing a scanning using the scanning device (fig.10, S1016 and [0085]) (Note: when the scan button 803 has been pressed, the scanner device 102 transmits a push scan event (scan job) to the information processing apparatus),
transmit a specific scan command job to the scanning device through the communication interface, based on the received scan job (fig.10, S1020 and [0086]) (Note: the information processing apparatus transmits a scan command to the scanner device 102 based on the received push scan event (scan job)); and
receive a read result from the scanning device through the communication interface, the scanning device being configured to read a document in response to receipt of the specific scan command transmitted from the information processing apparatus (fig.10, S1022 and [0085]-[0086]) (Note: the information processing apparatus receives, from the scanner device 102, an image data (read result) read from an original (document) in response to receipt of the scan command transmitted from the information processing apparatus).
Referring to claim 5, Kishida discloses the non-transitory storage medium according to claim 1, wherein the scanning device complies with a first scanning protocol, and the operating system of the information processing apparatus complies with a second scanning protocol different from the first scanning protocol ([0091] and [0106]) (Note: the system setting application 125 acquires protocol information from the hardware information loaded into the RAM 112 handling scanner protocols used by the scanner device 102, and determines whether or not the general scanner driver supports the protocol. Therefore, the scanning device complies with a first scanning protocol, and the operating system of the information processing apparatus complies with a second scanning protocol different from the first scanning protocol).
Referring to claim 7, Kishida discloses the non-transitory storage medium according to claim 1, wherein the scanning device complies with a second scanning protocol, and the operating system of the information processing apparatus complies with the second scanning protocol ([0090]-[0091]) (Note: If a plurality of scanner protocols are supported, Protocol #1 is preferentially used. The priority order according to which the protocols are to be used can be changed by a user operation).
Referring to claim 9, Kishida discloses the non-transitory storage medium according to claim 1, wherein an extended function of the general-purpose scanning functions extended by the extension program includes a push scan function ([0052]-[0053]).
Referring to claim 10, Kishida discloses the non-transitory storage medium according to claim 1, wherein the extension program is configured to be registered in the operating system ([0039] and fig.5) (Note: the OS 122 performs an OS/general scanner driver update installation operation in the information processing apparatus 101 when the scan process-related programs 124 are not initially stored in the external memory 121 of the information processing apparatus 101).
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.
Claims 2 and 4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kishida in view of Prabhu et al. (hereinafter referred to as Prabhu, US 6128013 A).
Referring to claim 2, Kishida discloses the non-transitory storage medium according to claim 1, except wherein the extension program, when executed by the computer, further causes the information processing apparatus to: when the information processing apparatus receives the read result from the scanning device through the communication interface before transmitting the specific scan command to the scanning device, store the received read result into a memory area managed by the extension program.
However, in the same field of endeavor of information processing apparatus art, Prabhu discloses a concept wherein the program, when executed by the computer, further causes the information processing apparatus to: when the information processing apparatus receives the read result from the scanning device through the communication interface before transmitting the scan command to the scanning device, store the received read result into a memory area managed by the program (figs.4d-5, and Col.4, L.65-Col.5, L.44) (Note: the information processing apparatus (host computer 10) receives a preview image (read result) from the scanner 14 (and obviously stored in a memory) for correction, and all parameters are set to the user's satisfaction, then the start scan button 82 is clicked and the high resolution scan is initiated).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention by the applicant to modify the information processing apparatus of Kishida with the concept as taught by Prabhu. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been to allow user to reuse a scanned image.
Referring to claim 4, Kishida discloses the non-transitory storage medium according to claim 1, except wherein the extension program, when executed by the computer, further causes the information processing apparatus to: correct the read result received from the scanning device through the communication interface; and output the corrected read result as scanned data.
However, in the same field of endeavor of information processing apparatus art, Prabhu discloses a concept wherein the program, when executed by the computer, further causes the information processing apparatus to: correct the read result received from the scanning device through the communication interface; and output the corrected read result as scanned data (figs.4d-5, and Col.4, L.65-Col.5, L.44).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention by the applicant to modify the information processing apparatus of Kishida with a program, when executed by the computer, further causes the information processing apparatus to: correct the read result received from the scanning device through the communication interface; and output the corrected read result as scanned data as taught by Prabhu. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been to improve the quality of a resultant image.
Claim 3 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kishida in view of Prabhu, and further in view of Kataoka (US 6947165 B1).
Referring to claim 3, Kishida in view of Prabhu discloses the non-transitory storage medium according to claim 2, except wherein the extension program, when executed by the computer, further causes the information processing apparatus to: when the operating system receives the scan job, when the read result is not stored in the memory area, transmit the specific scan command to the scanning device through the communication interface, based on the received scan job, and when the read result is stored in the memory area, output scanned data based on the read result stored in the memory area to the operating system without transmitting the specific scan command to the scanning device through the communication interface.
However, in the same field of endeavor of information processing apparatus art, Kataoka discloses a concept wherein when the read result is not stored in the memory, transmitting the scan command to the scanning device, and when the read result is stored in the memory area, outputting scanned data based on the read result stored in the memory without transmitting the scan command to the scanning device (fig.2; Col.5, LL.51-63; Col.6, LL.14-16 and Col.5, LL.2-5) (Note: when it is determined the scanned image is not stored in a memory, user can transmit a scan command to the scanner for obtaining an image of the document, and when the scanned image is stored in the memory, the scanned image is output without transmitting the scan command to the scanner).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention by the applicant to modify the information processing apparatus of Kishida in view of Prabhu with the concept as taught by Kataoka to obtain the claimed invention. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been to quickly obtain a copy of a document without relying on the information processing apparatus’ internal memory.
Claims 6 and 8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kishida in view of Rimola (US 9762755 B1).
Referring to claim 6, Kishida discloses the non-transitory storage medium according to claim 5, except wherein the second scanning protocol is Internet Printing Protocol.
However, in the same field of endeavor of scanning system art, Rimola discloses a concept wherein the second scanning protocol is Internet Printing Protocol (Col.3, L.28-Col.4, L.3) (Note: the reference discloses Internet Printing Protocol as scanning protocol among a plurality of protocols).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention by the applicant to modify the scanning system of Kishida with a concept wherein the second scanning protocol is Internet Printing Protocol as taught by Rimola. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been to obtain current status of job processing and more detailed information about the scanner.
Referring to claim 8, the same ground of rejection provided for claim 6 is applicable herein.
Conclusion
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/MOUSTAPHA DIABY/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2683
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