Detailed Action
1. The Office Action is in response to the Applicant’s communication filed on 01/12/2026. In virtue of this communication, claims 21-35 are currently pending in this Office Action.
Terminal Disclaimer
2. The terminal disclaimer filed on 01/12/2026 disclaiming the terminal portion of any patent granted on this application which would extend beyond the expiration date of 11297470 and 12156104 has been reviewed and is accepted. The terminal disclaimer has been recorded.
Response to Arguments
3. In Remarks, the amended claim limitations “the alert message to a second device that is separate from the first device, wherein the alert message, based on at least one preference of the user, includes a notification received from the first device”
In accordance with MPEP 2111 and in light of specification, the amended claim limitation “one reference of the user …” is reasonably interpreted as a user’s setting for forwarding an alert, a message or a notification to a second device or a third device. It could be seen in the newly cited prior art. See greater details in the claim rejection section set forth below.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
4. 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.
5. 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 35 U.S.C. 103 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.
6. Claims 21-24, 26-29 and 31-35 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sloo et al. Pub. No.: US 2015/0097683 A1 in view of Sookman et al. Patent No.: US 8,890685 B1, Salvin et al. Pub. No.: US 2010/0289644 A1 and Frank et al. Pub. No.: US 2016/0100292 A1.
Claim 21
Sloo discloses a method (fig. 1-8 for generating customized hazard notification based on user activity) of providing an alert (customized alert based on user activity in fig. 8) to a user in an environment (smart home environment 100 in fig. 1) with multiple devices (smart devices in fig. 1 and par. 0034-0035), comprising:
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receiving, at an apparatus (computer server system in fig. 5), a first indication of a location associated with a first device (524 in fig. 5 for determining the location of activity based on activity data from monition detecting device and mobile device) that is a wireless communication device (mobile device 508-512 in fig. 5);
producing, at the apparatus, an alert message (530 in fig. 5 generates a customized notification and par. 0058 explains that the notification is customized based on the user activity, see fig. 7-8); and
sending, from the apparatus, the alert message (par. 0060, the notification could be sent to the user or user specified emergency contacts; see fig. 7-8 and par. 0070, each of whom, wife, husband and child, have registered their mobile devices with the computer server system).
Although Sloo does not explicitly show: “a second indication of the location associated with the first device based at least in part on the first indication of the location associated with the first device; and sending, from the apparatus, the alert message to a second device that is separate from the first device, wherein the alert message, based on at least one preference of the user, includes a notification received from the first device”, the claim limitations are considered obvious.
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Firstly, to consider the obviousness of the claim limitation “a second indication of the location associated with the first device based at least in part on the first indication of the location associated with the first device”, initially, Sloo depicts fig. 8 for describing the garage relative to the wife or the child and in the other embodiment, the location can specify coordinates (par. 0057-0058 and fig. 5). Since claim does not specifically define what the second indication is, Sloo in fig. 5 for locating mobile device own by wife and indicating wife’s location in fig. 8 could be considered as a second indication of the location associated with the wife’s mobile device. And thus, the teaching from Sloo could have rendered the addressing claim limitation obvious. However, to advance the prosecution, the second indication could be other indication, e.g., coordinate, of the location of the mobile device and the evidence could be seen in Sookman. In particular, Sookman teaches that a location could be indicated by coordinates, latitude and longitude (fig. 2).
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Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify smart-home hazard detection system for providing context-based user notifications of Sloo by providing emergency notification using indoor positioning as taught in Sookman. Such a modification would have provided a notification system to determine a physical indoor location of a user device so that the immediate instructions could be sent to the user for reducing the potential threats as suggested in lines 60-67of col. 3 and lines 1-11 of col. 4 in Sookman.
Secondly, to address the obviousness of the claim limitation “sending, from the apparatus, the alert message to a second device that is separate from the first device”, recall that Sloo mentions generating customized notification (530 in fig. 5 in view of fig. 6) and Sookman discloses identifying user contact for notifying as to claimed second device (718 in fig. 7) and the indication coordinate or longitude and latitude of a mobile device location (fig. 2). It means the combined prior art could have send the first device location to a second device. Such evidence could be seen in Slavin. In particular, Slavin teaches monitoring system for sending the location of the mom’s phone to the dad’s phone (fig. 10; see fig. 1).
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Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify context-based user notifications of Sloo in view of Sookman by providing moving asset location tracking as taught in Slavin. Such a modification would have included a monitoring system to track the geographic data for the one or more mobile assets associated with a fixed property so that a security breach could be reported with an alert along with a geographic location or a map for taking necessary precaution as suggested in par. 0003, 0005-0006 of Slavin.
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Lastly, to address the obviousness of the amended claim limitation “wherein the alert message, based on at least one preference of the user, includes a notification received from the first device”, recall that Sloo in view of Sookman and Slavin discloses customized notification (Sloo, 530 in fig. 5 and fig. 6) and contact for notification (718 in fig. 7). In fact, the combined prior art would have rendered the amended claim obvious as claim does not specifically define what are involved in the preference. For instance, Salvin depicts fig. 10 in which Dad’s phone and Mom’s phone received alert for smoke alarm in the family room. It could be because of the preference from mom or dad or both or Emergency Notification in real time refers to the user preference. To advance the prosecution, further evidence is provided herein. In particular, Frank teaches user’s preference for selecting contact to send alerting information based on the location (fig. 6 and 720 in fig. 7; see also fig. 22).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify context-based user notifications of Sloo in view of Sookman and Slavin by providing location based alerting as taught in Frank to obtain the claimed invention as specified in the claim. Such a modification would have included a location alerting mechanism to send the location information to a mobile device based on user’s preference so that a network could have delivered the service or product the user wanted without abusing the privacy as suggested in par. 0003-0005 of Frank.
Claim 22
Sloo, in view of Sookman, Slavin and Frank, discloses the method of claim 21, further comprising receiving, at the apparatus from the second device, a location request for the location associated with the first device (Sookman, location request in lines 30-34 of col. 17 and fig. 12; Slavin, 820 in fig. 8 or tracking Son on Dad’s phone in 1056 in fig. 10), wherein producing the alert message comprises producing the alert message in response to receiving the location request (Sloo, fig. 5 and fig. 8; Sookman, alert in fig. 7-13; Slavin, 870 in fig. 8; accordingly, the combined prior art renders the claim obvious).
Claim 23
Sloo, in view of Sookman, Slavin and Frank, discloses the method of claim 21, wherein the second indication of the location associated with the first device includes a latitude value and a longitude value (Sloo, fig. 8; Sookman, see fig. 2 for latitude 208 and longitude 210; and thus, the combined prior art meets the claim requirement).
Claim 24
Sloo, in view of Sookman, Slavin and Frank, discloses the method of claim 21, wherein the second indication of the location associated with the first device includes an east value and a north value (Sloo, fig. 8; Sookman, see fig. 2 for coordinates values 212 and coordinates could be represented by X-Y or X-Y-Z, let’s assume for 2 coordinates system then, it’s intrinsic to describe with north value and east value; see evidence for such representing coordinates system to see par. 0074 in Janardhanan et al. Pub. No.: US 2012/0136573 A1; for these reasons, one of ordinary skill in the art would have expected the combined prior art to perform equally well to the claim).
Claim 26-29
Claims 26-29 are the apparatus claims corresponding to method claims 21-24. All of the limitations in claims 26-29 are found reciting for the structures of the same scopes of the respective limitations of claims 21-24. Accordingly, claims 26-29 are considered obvious by the same rationales applied in the rejection of claims 21-24 respectively set forth above. Additionally, Sloo discloses an apparatus (computer server system in fig. 5 and see fig. 12) comprising: a memory (random access memory 1270 & non-volatile storage drive 1280 in fig. 12); at least one transceiver (communication interface 1250 in fig. 12); and at least one processor (processor 1260 in fig. 12) communicatively couple to the memory and at least one transceiver (as depicted in fig. 12, processor, random access memory 1270, communication interface 1250 and non-volatile storage drive 1280 are communicatively connected via a bus 1290).
Claim 31-34
Claims 31-34 are the computer product claims corresponding to method claims 21-24. All of the limitations in claims 31-34 are found reciting for the same scopes of the respective limitations of claims 21-24. Accordingly, claims 31-34 are considered obvious by the same rationales applied in the rejection of claims 21-24 respectively set forth above.
Allowable Subject Matter
7. Claims 25, 30 and 35 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
8. Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Contact Information
9. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SAN HTUN whose telephone number is (571)270-3190. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Thursday 7 AM - 5 PM.
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/SAN HTUN/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2643