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 .
DETAILED ACTION
This Office Action is sent in response to Applicant’s Communication received 15 October 2024 for application number 18/916,567. The Office hereby acknowledges receipt of the following and placed of record in file: Specification, Drawings, Abstract, Oath/Declaration, Claims.
Claims 1-12 are presented for examination.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on the following dates are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97 and are being considered by the Examiner: 10/15/24; 4/2/25.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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.
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.
(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 12 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being unpatentable by Roswarne et al. (US 2015/0016542).
A bit stream generated by a method, the method comprising… is a product by process claim limitation where the product is the bit stream and the process is the method steps to generate the bitstream. MPEP §2113 recites “Product-by-Process claims are not limited to the manipulations of the recited steps, only the structure implied by the steps”. Thus, the scope of the claim is the storage medium storing the bitstream (with the structure implied by the method steps). The structure includes the information and samples manipulated by the steps.
“To be given patentable weight, the printed matter and associated product must be in a functional relationship. A functional relationship can be found where the printed matter performs some function with respect to the product to which it is associated”. MPEP §2111.05(I)(A). When a claimed “computer-readable medium merely serves as a support for information or data, no functional relationship exists. MPEP §2111.05(III). The storage medium storing the claimed bitstream in claim 12 merely services as a support for the storage of the bitstream and provides no fictional relationship between the stored bitstream and storage medium. Therefor the bitstream, which scope is implied by the method steps, is non-functional descriptive material and given no patentable weight. MPEP §2111.05(III). Thus, the claim scope is just a storage medium storing data and is anticipated by Roswarne which recites a storage medium storing a bitstream (par. 82; figure 2a).
The examiner suggests that the applicant amend the claim to include some types of hardware.
Claim 12 can be amended as followed:
A non-transitory computer readable recording medium storing a bitstream which is generated by a method of encoding an image, wherein the method includes: instructions for encoding, wherein, when the instructions are executed by one or more processors, the instructions are configured to cause the one or more processors to perform:
deriving a temporal motion vector of a current block;
determining, based on the temporal motion vector of the current block, a position of a co-located block within a co-located picture, the position of the co-located block being determined based on a central position of the current block; and
determining a representative motion vector based on motion information of the co-located block,
wherein, based on whether the representative motion information of the co-located block is available or not, an availability of whether a motion vector of the current block is derived in units of sub-blocks is determined,
wherein, in response to deriving the motion vector of the current block in units of sub-blocks being available, a sub-block motion vector of the sub-block included in the current block is derived based on a co-located sub-block corresponding to the sub-block, and
wherein, in response to motion information of the co-located sub-block corresponding to the sub-block being unavailable, the sub-block motion vector of the sub-block is determined as the representative motion vector.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-11 are allowed.
The following is an examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance:
Regarding claims 1-10, none of the references, alone or in combination, discloses a method of decoding an image, the method comprising: determining whether a sub-block merge mode is applied to a current block or not; in response that the sub-block merge mode being applied to the current block, deriving a temporal motion vector of the current block; determining, based on the temporal motion vector of the current block, a position of a co-located block within a co-located picture, the position of the co-located block being determined based on a central position of the current block; and determining a representative motion vector based on motion information of the co-located block, wherein, based on whether the motion information of the co-located block is available or not, an availability of whether a motion vector of the current block is derived in units of sub-blocks is determined, wherein, in response to deriving the motion vector of the current block in units of sub-blocks being available, a sub-block motion vector of the sub-block included in the current block is derived based on a co-located sub-block corresponding to the sub-block, and wherein, in response to motion information of the co-located sub-block corresponding to the sub-block being unavailable, the sub-block motion vector of the sub-block is determined as the representative motion vector.
Regarding claim 11, none of the references, alone or in combination, discloses a method of encoding an image, wherein the method comprising: deriving a temporal motion vector of a current block; determining, based on the temporal motion vector of the current block, a position of a co-located block within a co-located picture, the position of the co-located block being determined based on a central position of the current block; and determining a representative motion vector based on motion information of the co-located block, wherein, based on whether the representative motion information of the co-located block is available or not, an availability of whether a motion vector of the current block is derived in units of sub-blocks is determined, wherein, in response to deriving the motion vector of the current block in units of sub-blocks being available, a sub-block motion vector of the sub-block included in the current block is derived based on a co-located sub-block corresponding to the sub-block, and wherein, in response to motion information of the co-located sub-block corresponding to the sub-block being unavailable, the sub-block motion vector of the sub-block is determined as the representative motion vector.
Any comments considered necessary by applicant must be submitted no later than the payment of the issue fee and, to avoid processing delays, should preferably accompany the issue fee. Such submissions should be clearly labeled “Comments on Statement of Reasons for Allowance.”
Prior Art not relied upon: Please refer to the references listed in attached PTO-892, which are not relied upon for the claim rejections, since these references are pertinent to the disclosure.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to NGUYEN T TRUONG whose telephone number is (571)272-5262. The examiner can normally be reached on Mon - Fri, 6AM - 2PM.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, JAMIE ATALA can be reached on 571-272-7384. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/NGUYEN T TRUONG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2486