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 .
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.
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.
Claims 5 and 6 are 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.
Claim 5 recites “based on the determining, performing the assigning of the at least one processing task to the at least one available node during the current portion of the video game associated with the level of interactivity”. The underlined portion of the limitation is indefinite because after “during” there should be an event or time period but the limitation doesn’t have any such event or time period.
Claim 6 recites “ further comprising: identifying a plurality of 3D portions of the media asset, wherein the plurality of 3D portions comprise at least one of 3D objects or 3D scene elements; determining a first subset of the plurality of 3D portions are likely to interact amongst each other but not likely to interact with a second subset of the plurality of 3D portions; and determining that the second subset of the plurality of 3D portions are likely to interact amongst each other but not likely to interact with the first subset of the plurality of 3D portions; wherein assigning the selected at least one processing task comprises: causing the at least one node to render the first subset of the plurality of 3D portions to the at least one node; and rendering, by the server, the second subset of the plurality of 3D portions”. Thes “likely “ and “not likely” are not definite terms and specification doesn’t define what definite meaning applicant wants to mean by phrases “likely “ and “not likely”.
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) 1-6, 8, 15 and 17-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kavallierou (US Pat. Pub. No. 20200346109 “Kavallierou”) in view of JUSTICE et al. (US Pat. Pub. No. 20170274284 “Justice”).
Regarding claim 17 Kavallierou teaches A system comprising: control circuitry (Fig. 1) configured to:
receive, at a server from a client device, a request to access a media asset (“[0065] The cloud gaming system 600 also comprises a games unit operable to receive, via a communications network, player inputs and game state information from the client devices 602 participating in a video game session. In FIG. 6, the games unit corresponds to a game server 604”),
wherein the server is configured to perform a first processing task related to causing the media asset to be displayed at the client device (“[0030]……. The game server receives and processes each player's input and generates an authoritative source of events occurring within the video game”);
identify a processing capacity and a latency associated with at least one available node, wherein the at least one available node is in a different geographic location than the server (“[0049]….. The cloud game client may comprise a pool of an instance of hardware available on the network (forming part of ‘the cloud’) having more powerful CPU and GPU capabilities than the client device. [0050] The cloud game client may be configured to create a gameplay session for those game clients that are about to experience a low frame rate (or visual fidelity) experience”. As CGC is connected through network so it is in a different geographic location);
select, based on the identified processing capacities and latencies, the at least one available node to perform at least one processing task related to the media asset, to assist the server in causing the media asset to be displayed at the client device (“[0049]……. Hence, allocating the cloud game client may involve identifying one or more cloud devices (forming the cloud gaming service) having greater CPU and or GPU resources available for rendering the video game instance than the client device(s) identified at step S503”);
assign the selected at least one processing task to the selected at least one available node, wherein the first processing task creates a first processing result and the at least one processing task creates at least one processing result (“[0051] At step S506, the method comprises rendering, based on the obtained game state information and player inputs provided to the cloud game client, the video game instance for the identified client device. This rendering may involve generating a video stream for outputting at a display associated with the identified client device”.
[0030]…… The game server receives and processes each player's input and generates an authoritative source of events occurring within the video game”);
However Kavallierou is silent about wherein the at least one processing task comprises rendering an interactive three-dimensional (3D) object;
Justice teaches at least one processing task comprises rendering an interactive three-dimensional (3D) object (“[0004]….. An embodiment of the present invention processes and renders some or all of a character's interactions with game objects on the client device associated with the character. A character is associated with a client device when control input associated with the character is received from a user of the client device. [0081]….. A depth camera 410 generates three-dimensional image data that is able to capture the player's 430 movement”);
Justice and Kavallierou are analogous art as both of them are related to image processing.
Therefore it would have been obvious for an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing date of claimed invention to have modified Kavallierou by having at least one processing task that comprises rendering an interactive three-dimensional (3D) object as taught by Justice.
The motivation for the above is to generate an enjoyable game by having active avatar or a character in a game.
Kavallierou modified by Justice teaches cause the first processing result and the at least one processing result to be merged, at the client device, into a merged processing result corresponding to the media asset; and cause the merged processing result corresponding to the media asset to be displayed on the client device (Justice “[0004] Embodiments of the present invention split game processing and rendering between a client and a game server. A rendered video game image is received from a game server and combined with a rendered image generated by the game client to form a single video game image that is presented to a user”).
Claim 1 is directed to a method and its steps are similar in scope and functions of the elements of the device claim 17 and therefore claim1 is rejected with same rationales as specified in the rejection of claim 17,
Regarding claims 2 and 18 Kavallierou modified by Justice teaches wherein the at least one available node comprises the client device (Justice “[0004]….. An embodiment of the present invention processes and renders some or all of a character's interactions with game objects on the client device associated with the character”).
Regarding claims 3 and 19 Kavallierou modified by Justice teaches, wherein the processing capacity comprises a graphics processing capability of the at least one available node, and selecting the client device is based on determining that the graphics processing capability of the client device exceeds a threshold processing capability (Kavallierou “[0055] Determining that an identified client device is no longer likely to render its video game instance at a quality that is below the threshold quality may be determined by one or more of the game server, monitoring server, or the identified client device. In the latter case, it may be that the identified client device is able to determine this based on game state information obtained from the game server. [0056] In response to such a determination, the corresponding video game instances may no longer be rendered at the cloud game client. This may involve, for example, transmitting an instruction to the identified client devices, instructing them to revert to rendering their own respective video game instances”).
Regarding claims 4 and 20 Kavallierou modified by Justice teaches, wherein the server is a first server, and the at least one available node comprises a second server at the different geographic location than the first server (Kavallierou “[0049]……. Hence, allocating the cloud game client may involve identifying one or more cloud devices (forming the cloud gaming service) having greater CPU and or GPU resources available for rendering the video game instance than the client device(s) identified at step S503”. Here CGC is claimed server).
Regarding claim 5 Kavallierou modified by Justice teaches, wherein the media asset is a video game, the method further comprising: determining that a current portion of the video game being provided by the server to the client device is associated with a level of interactivity that is below a threshold; and based on the determining, performing the assigning of the at least one processing task to the at least one available node during the current portion of the video game associated with the level of interactivity (Justice determines some portion of the game with low interactivity being provided by the server and at the same time assigns high interactive portion to the client device for processing “[0083]……. The server-rendered image 510 includes both foreground and background images that are not part of player interactions with game objects in the illustrated game. The server-rendered image 510 includes the background area 528, virtual game objects 524, and remote player avatar 526. Virtual game objects 524 are manipulated based on actions taken by the player locally and the second player remotely”).
Regarding claim 6 Kavallierou modified by Justice teaches, identifying a plurality of 3D portions of the media asset, wherein the plurality of 3D portions comprise at least one of 3D objects or 3D scene elements; determining a first subset of the plurality of 3D portions are likely to interact amongst each other but not likely to interact with a second subset of the plurality of 3D portions; and determining that the second subset of the plurality of 3D portions are likely to interact amongst each other but not likely to interact with the first subset of the plurality of 3D portions; wherein assigning the selected at least one processing task comprises: causing the at least one node to render the first subset of the plurality of 3D portions to the at least one node; and rendering, by the server, the second subset of the plurality of 3D portions (Justice “[0084] The avatar 522 is rendered by the client along with ball 525. The ball 525 is rendered by the client because it is being delivered in response to an interaction with avatar 522. The avatar 522 is client rendered because its movements directly affect interactions with the game objects, such as the ball 525. [0100]….. In another embodiment, the game character 810 and/or rifle 820 may also be rendered on the client as part of the game interaction features. The alien 830, and 832 are server rendered along with the brick wall 840 and spaceship 836”).
Regarding claim 8 Kavallierou modified by Justice teaches, wherein the at least one available node is the client device, and wherein the media asset is a video game comprising a background and an avatar of a user associated with the client device, wherein assigning the selected at least one processing task comprises: causing the client device to render the avatar of the video game; rendering, by the server, the background of the video game (Justice “[0083]…..The server-rendered image 510 includes both foreground and background images that are not part of player interactions with game objects in the illustrated game. [0084] The avatar 522 is rendered by the client along with ball 525”).
Regarding claim 15 Kavallierou modified by Justice teaches, further comprising causing one or more of the first processing result or the at least one processing result to be transferred directly between nodes in the selection of nodes (Kavallierou Fig. 6 shows game video stream is transferred directly between client and CGC).
Claim(s) 10 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kavallierou modified by Justice as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Ray (US Pat. Pub. No. 20080039058 “Ray”).
Regarding claim 10 Even though Kavallierou modified by Justice teaches wherein the at least one node comprises the client device, the method further comprising: causing the client device to download a 3D model associated with the media asset (Justice “[0060] The game data store 324 stores downloaded games and partially downloaded games. Games may be downloaded in playable blocks”) but is silent about causing the client device to transmit the 3D model to another client device accessing the media asset, wherein the processing capacity of the client device is greater than a processing capacity of the other device.
Ray teaches client device downloading media asset; causing the client device to transmit the media asset to another client device accessing the media asset, wherein the processing capacity of the client device is greater than a processing capacity of the other device (“[0047] According to one aspect, requested media files are delivered/downloaded to the temporary storage wireless communication device, as opposed to the device that requested the files. In many instances, the temporary storage wireless device may be a higher-end device characterized by greater processing power and larger memory capacity. [0096] At Event 420, the first wireless communication device directs the media content service to deliver the media content file to a temporary storage wireless communication device based on the insufficiency of the delivery attribute. [0097] At Event 430, the first wireless communication device retrieves the media content from the temporary storage device when the delivery attribute is sufficient to allow delivery”)
Ray and Kavallierou modified by Justice are analogous art as both of them are related to image processing.
Therefore it would have been obvious for an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing date of claimed invention to have modified Kavallierou modified by Justice by causing the client device to transmit the 3D model to another client device accessing the media asset, wherein the processing capacity of the client device is greater than a processing capacity of the other device similar to downloading media asset; causing the client device to transmit the media asset to another client device accessing the media asset, wherein the processing capacity of the client device is greater than a processing capacity of the other device as taught by Ray.
The motivation for the above is to avoid prolonged download session and make the file available whenever needed (Ray [0009]).
Claim(s) 11 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kavallierou modified by Justice as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Mann et al. (US Pat. Pub. No. 9313242 “Mann”).
Regarding claim 11 Kavallierou modified by Justice doesn’t expressly teach causing the client device to generate a value indicative of a reference time at the client device; receiving, at the server, the value, wherein the value is transmitted to the server, and to the at least one available node, based on a user input received at the client device; embedding, at the server, the value in a first portion of the media asset generated by a processing task performed by the server; causing the at least one available node to embed the value in a second portion of the media asset generated by the at least one processing task assigned to the at least one available node, wherein the client device synchronizes display of the first portion and the second portion based on the value embedded in the first and second portions.
Mann teaches causing a device to generate a value indicative of a reference time at the device; receiving, at the server, the value, wherein the value is transmitted to the server, based on a user input received at the device; embedding, at the server, the value in a first portion of the media asset generated by a processing task performed by the server; causing the at least one available node to embed the value in a second portion of the media asset generated by the at least one processing task assigned to the at least one available node, wherein client device synchronizes display of the first portion and the second portion based on the value embedded in the first and second portions (“Col 2 lines 50-col 3 lines 2 The video server can deliver multiple time-synchronized video streams corresponding to video data for a requested ROI and a surrounding area. The video server can receive a request for video data for a ROI, and can deliver that ROI along with video data of adjacent regions. The video data can have georeferenced coordinates and time synchronization information embedded therein. This can allow the video server to retrieve multiple spatially-adjacent video streams and deliver those video streams such that the frames are synchronized in time. As an example of time synchronization, the video server can deliver two video streams to a computing device that are spatially-adjacent or that contain imagery of regions that are near one another, adjacent to one another, or overlapping. The first and second video streams can each contain a plurality of video frames, wherein each video frame or a subset of the plurality of video frames have time synchronization information embedded therein. The time synchronization information can be used by a display system receiving the video streams to display the video frames from the two video streams at appropriate times relative to one another”);
Mann and Kavallierou modified by Justice are analogous art as both of them are related to image processing.
Therefore it would have been obvious for an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing date of claimed invention to have modified Kavallierou modified by Justice by causing the client device to generate a value indicative of a reference time at the client device; receiving, at the server, the value, wherein the value is transmitted to the server, and to the at least one available node, based on a user input received at the client device; embedding, at the server, the value in a first portion of the media asset generated by a processing task performed by the server; causing the at least one available node to embed the value in a second portion of the media asset generated by the at least one processing task assigned to the at least one available node, wherein the client device synchronizes display of the first portion and the second portion based on the value embedded in the first and second portions similar to causing a device to generate a value indicative of a reference time at the device; receiving, at the server, the value, wherein the value is transmitted to the server, based on a user input received at the device; embedding, at the server, the value in a first portion of the media asset generated by a processing task performed by the server; causing the at least one available node to embed the value in a second portion of the media asset generated by the at least one processing task assigned to the at least one available node, wherein client device synchronizes display of the first portion and the second portion based on the value embedded in the first and second portions as taught by Mann.
The motivation for the above is that client device control the timing of video from different rendering devices.
Claim(s) 12 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kavallierou modified by Justice and Mann as applied to claim 11 above, and further in view of Agrawal et al. (US Pat. Pub. No. 20180145969 “Agrawal”).
Regarding claim 12 Kavallierou modified by Justice and Mann is silent about authenticating each node in the selection of nodes, wherein authenticating each node in the selection of nodes comprises assigning a trust level to each node in the selection of nodes and wherein assigning the at least one processing task is further based on the assigned trust levels.
Agrawal teaches authenticating each node in selection of nodes, wherein authenticating each node in the selection of nodes comprises assigning a trust level to each node in the selection of nodes and wherein assigning the at least one processing task is further based on the assigned trust levels (“[0006]…… Additionally in such embodiments, assigning the backup task to the backup server may include (i) determining that the security level of the initial signed certificate is not appropriate for the sensitivity level of the backup task assigned to the backup server, (ii) identifying an additional security characteristic of the backup server that indicates the backup server meets an additional trust level that is appropriate for the sensitivity level of the backup task (where the additional trust level is higher than the initial trust level) and then (iii) deploying an additional signed certificate on the backup server that has a security level corresponding to the additional trust level.
[0007] In some examples, deploying the signed certificate on the backup server may include storing, within the signed certificate, the security characteristic of the backup server. In these examples, the backup client may facilitate performing the secure backup operations by authenticating the backup server based on the security characteristic within the signed certificate”);
Agrawal and Kavallierou modified by Justice and Mann are analogous art as both of them are related to data processing.
Therefore it would have been obvious for an ordinary skilled person in the art before the effective filing date of claimed invention to have modified Kavallierou modified by Justice and Mann by authenticating each node in selection of nodes, wherein authenticating each node in the selection of nodes comprises assigning a trust level to each node in the selection of nodes and wherein assigning the at least one processing task is further based on the assigned trust levels as taught by Agrawal.
The motivation for the above is to assign rendering of sensitive data in a secure environment.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 7, 9, 13-14 and 16 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.
Claim 7 is objected as the combination of the best available prior arts fail to expressly teach the claim limitation.
Claim 9 is objected as the combination of the best available prior arts fail to expressly teach the claim limitation.
Claim 13 is objected as the combination of the best available prior arts fail to expressly teach the claim limitation.
Claim 14 is also objected by virtue of dependency.
Claim 16 is objected as the combination of the best available prior arts fail to expressly teach the claim limitation.
Conclusion
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/SAPTARSHI MAZUMDER/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2612
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