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 Objections
Applicant is advised that should claim 21 be found allowable, claim 23 will be objected to under 37 CFR 1.75 as being a substantial duplicate thereof. When two claims in an application are duplicates or else are so close in content that they both cover the same thing, despite a slight difference in wording, it is proper after allowing one claim to object to the other as being a substantial duplicate of the allowed claim. See MPEP § 608.01(m).
Claims 9, 18, and 20 objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 9 recites: “the determination in relation to an object and/or the object”. The object already has antecedent basis in claim 1, so the claim should be amended to read “the determination in relation to the object” or “the determination in relation to a second object”.
Claim 18 recites: “identifying at least one of the distance and separation along an identified pathway, and if not within a predetermined limit of separation, determining no interaction possible;” (emphasis added) and then also recites “optionally, identifying at least one of an offset and separation in offset from a reference line of the pathway, and if not within a predetermined limit of separation, determining no interaction” (emphasis added). The term “predetermined limit of separation” is given antecedent basis twice, and so it is not clear if the limit is the same for both limitations. The claim should be amended to clarify whether the limit is different between the limitations.
Claim 20 recites: “to take account of incline of the pathway”. The claim should be amended to read “to take account of an incline of the pathway” or similar.
Appropriate correction is required.
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 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 13, 21, 22, and 23 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Min (US 20200139194 A1; from applicant’s IDS) in view of Del Pero (US 20210403001 A1) and Kilgard (US 20110285741 A1).
Regarding claim 1:
Min teaches:
A method for determining at least one of a position and/or motion of at least one object moving along a pathway, the method comprising:
- providing, or establishing, at least one pathway (Min: The road is shown as a straight path, but may vary in both height and curve in different cases. [0059])
- determining at least one of the position and/or motion of the object (Min: For example, if a cyclist in a virtual world or digital world is cycling “up” a virtual hill with a nine percent grade, then the resistance applied by the trainer 111A would be increased to simulate that nine percent grade [0020]; see Note 1A and Note 1B).
Note 1A: In order to determine that the virtual cyclist is on a hill, the system must inherently determine the position of the virtual cyclist.
Note 1B: The system also determines a motion of the virtual cyclist: “The data generation/integration 214 receives information about player movement and exertion on the physical exercise device (e.g. a trainer, treadmill, or rowing machine) and translates that information into movement of a digital avatar within the digital world” [0043].
Min fails to teach:
- dividing the at least one pathway into a series of pathway elements along the at least one pathway; and, in which at least one pathway element(s) comprises a circular arc; for at least one object moving on a path on the at least one pathway:
- associating with the object a pathway identifier for the path the object is moving on;
- associating with the object a pathway element identifier for the path the object is moving on;
- using the pathway identifier and pathway element identifier as, respectively, first and second co-ordinates of the object moving on the pathway; and
- determining at least one of the position and/or motion of the object with respect to the at least one pathway using the first and second coordinates.
Del Pero teaches:
A method for determining at least one of a position and/or motion of at least one object moving along a pathway (Del Pero: performing an analysis of the identified set of derived vehicle trajectories to determine where vehicles are most commonly positioned as they traverse the road-network element, [0060]), the method comprising:
- providing, or establishing, at least one pathway (Del Pero: One particular type of pre-processed information about the world may take the form of information about the geospatial geometry of the road lanes within a geographic region (i.e., geospatial lane data) [0046]);
- dividing the at least one pathway into a series of pathway elements along the at least one pathway (Del Pero: At a high level, this may involve breaking down the road network within the geographic region into individual elements (e.g., segments and/or nodes) [0060]); for at least one object moving on a path on the at least one pathway:
- associating with the object a pathway identifier for the path the object is moving on (Del Pero: In this respect, each lane has a respective lane identifier that can be used to reference each lane when used for various applications [0156]; see Note 1C);
- associating with the object a pathway element identifier for the path the object is moving on (Del Pero: The data defining each segment may include an identifier of the segment [0069]; see Note 1D);
- using the pathway identifier and pathway element identifier as, respectively, first and second co-ordinates of the object moving on the pathway (Del Pero: The data defining each segment may include […] data indicating a location of each endpoint node of the segment [0068] Del Pero: As shown, the segment 211 is positioned between the node 212 and the node 213 [0069]); and
- determining at least one of the position and/or motion of the object with respect to the at least one pathway using the first and second coordinates (Del Pero: performing an analysis of the identified set of derived vehicle trajectories to determine where vehicles are most commonly positioned as they traverse the road-network element, [0060]; see Note 1E).
Note 1C: The Examiner interprets the lane identifier to be analogous to the claimed path identifier because the specification of the present application teaches: “which pathway (e.g. road in a road network) it is on using a pathway identifier” (Pg. 16).
Del Pero associates the lane with the vehicle, because Del Pero teaches in [0043] that: “an on-board computing system of a vehicle may be configured to […] use other data encoded within the map to help establish a baseline understanding of the real-world environment in which the vehicle is located, such as […] semantic data that provides information about the semantic elements within the real-world environment in which the vehicle is located (e.g., lanes”.
Note 1D: The Examiner interprets the identifier of the segment to be analogous to the claimed pathway element identifier because the specification of the present application teaches: “how far along that pathway (e.g. road) it is (e.g. as measured along the centre line of the road) using a pathway element identifier” (Pg. 16).
Del Pero associates the nodes with the vehicle, because in paragraph [0069] Del Pero teaches: “the segment 211 may represent a road segment and the nodes 212 and 213 may represent intersections in which a vehicle can transition from the road segment that is represented by the segment 211 to another road segment (or vice versa)”.
Note 1E: The “road network element” as described in paragraph [0060] of Del Pero may be a segment or node: “this may involve breaking down the road network within the geographic region into individual elements (e.g., segments and/or nodes),” [0060]. In paragraph [0069], Del Pero teaches that a segment is composed of two nodes: “As shown, the segment 211 is positioned between the node 212 and the node 213”. Therefore, when Del Pero determines a vehicle position based on the vehicle trajectories, the determination would be based on the first and second nodes or coordinates.
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Del Pero with Min. Utilizing identifiers to determine position/motion of the object, as in Del Pero, would benefit the Min teachings by enabling prediction/pre-computation of the location of the object: “It should be understood that pre-processed information about the world (or perhaps other geographically-associated information) may be used in various other areas of technology as well. As such, there is a need for techniques that are capable of generating accurate, up-to-date information about the world that can be used for these applications” (Del Pero, [0001]).
Min in view of Del Pero fails to teach:
dividing the at least one pathway into a series of pathway elements along the at least one pathway, in which at least one pathway element(s) comprises a circular arc;
Kilgard teaches:
dividing the at least one pathway into a series of pathway elements along the at least one pathway (Kilgard: a path is decomposed into quadratic Bezier path segments or segments of lower complexity, e.g., arcs, line segments, and the like [0099]), in which at least one pathway element(s) comprises a circular arc (Kilgard: This technique describes a path as consisting of a sequence of connected path segment commands for line segments, Bezier segments, and partial elliptical arcs [0093] (emphasis added));
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Kilgard with Min in view of Del Pero. Dividing the at least one pathway into a series of pathway elements along the at least one pathway, in which at least one pathway element(s) comprises a circular arc, as in Kilgard, would benefit the Min in view of Del Pero teachings because “The boundaries of stroked paths are actually substantially higher order than the third-order segments. The offset curve of non-rational (second-order) quadratic and (third-order) Bezier curves are eighth- and tenth-order curves respectively. This high order makes exact determination and evaluation of the resulting offset curves for such Bezier segments intractable for use in direct rendering. In other words, it is quite unreasonable to try to determine exactly the boundary representation of such offset curves and then simply fill them. For this reason, various techniques have been developed to approximate offset curves with sequences of Bezier, arc, or line segments. These approximate stroke boundaries may then be filled using significantly less complex techniques.” (Kilgard, [0025])
Regarding claim 2:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 1 (as shown above) in which the pathway has a finite width and comprises a reference line defining the trajectory of the pathway (Del Pero: Fig. 3L, see Note 2A); and, in which
- the step of dividing the at least one pathway into a series of pathway elements comprises:
- dividing the reference line of the pathway into a series of pathway elements along the reference line of the pathway (Del Pero: Turning to FIG. 3L, at block 311, the example pipeline may next define a set of lane boundaries for the first lane [0140]; see Note 2A), in which at least one pathway element comprises a circular arc (Kilgard: This technique describes a path as consisting of a sequence of connected path segment commands for line segments, Bezier segments, and partial elliptical arcs [0093] (emphasis added)).
Note 2A: Figure 3L (as well as 3K) of Del Pero showcases multiple segments composing a “fitted path” down the middle of the boundary of the lane: “As shown in FIG. 3K, the example pipeline has fit a line 336 to the centroids 327, 332, 333, 334, and 335 that were previously identified for the first lane, and this fitted line 336 may then be defined as the centerline of the first lane.” [0138]. The lane is depicted with finite width.
When the teachings of Del Pero are combined with Min and Kilgard, it would be obvious to utilize circular arcs to represent the segments of the reference line.
Regarding claim 3:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 2 (as shown above) comprising:
- establishing an offset of the at least one object from the reference line (Del Pero: the example pipeline may function to adjust the elevation information […] by an offset that reflects an expected height above ground level of the sensor that was used to capture the sensor data from which the trajectory was derived [0197]);
- using the offset of the object from the reference line as a third co-ordinate of the at least one object moving on the pathway (Del Pero: the example pipeline may function to adjust the elevation information that is incorporated into each identified trajectory by an offset that reflects an expected height above ground level of the sensor that was used to capture the sensor data [0197]); and
- determining the position and/or motion of the at least one object with respect to the at least one pathway using the first, second, and third coordinates (see Note 3A).
Note 3A: In Note 2A, it was discussed that a reference line was derived (shown in Figures 3K and 3L). Del Pero showcases that block 310 is associated with 3K and block 311 is associated with 3L. Del Pero further teaches: “As part of the function of defining the geometry of the lane based on the identified clusters at blocks 310-311, the example pipeline may define elevation data for the lane, which may then be included within the geospatial lane data for the given segment along with the other lane data described above” [0198]. In other words, alongside the first and second coordinates (nodes) defining the segment, a vertical offset may also be included that defines the elevation of the vehicle. The Examiner therefore analogizes the elevation information to the third coordinates.
Regarding claim 4:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 2 (as shown above) in which the reference line is a centre line of the pathway (Del Pero: determining the geospatial geometry of the given lane may comprise, based at least on the geospatial positions of the first and second clusters, defining a centerline for the given lane and/or boundaries for the given lane. [0012]).
Regarding claim 6:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to any preceding claim 1 (as shown above) in which the step of dividing the at least one pathway into a series of pathway elements comprises:
- modelling the at least one pathway as one or more Bezier curves (Kilgard: The path is divided into cubic Bezier path segments that are each classified and further divided into simple cubic Bezier path segments. [0093]); and
- dividing each Bezier Curve into a series of pathway elements (Kilgard: The path is divided into cubic Bezier path segments that are each classified and further divided into simple cubic Bezier path segments. [0093]).
Regarding claim 8:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 1 (as shown above) in which two or more objects are provided (Min: an example of a display screen showing two digital avatars of participants in a digital world is shown. In this example, two participants 460, 462 are shown cycling through a digital world [0059]).
Regarding claim 9:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 1 (as shown above) comprising:
- delivering position and/or motion information derived from the determination in relation to an object and/or the object to a local controller operable by a user (Min: For example, if a cyclist in a virtual world or digital world is cycling “up” a virtual hill with a nine percent grade, then the resistance applied by the trainer 111A would be increased to simulate that nine percent grade [0020]; see Note 9A), the local controller associated with said object (Min: The trainer 111A is an electromagnetic, wind-resistance, or similarly based device that provides controlled resistance to a cycle or portion of a cycle that is connected to the trainer 111A for purposes of simulating lifelike resistance that occurs as a cyclist moves throughout the world [0020]).
Note 9A: In Note 1E, it was discussed that Del Pero teaches determining the position/trajectory of a vehicle based on at least two nodes of a segment. In Note 1A, paragraph [0020] of Min was cited where the virtual location of a bike (e.g., on a hill) results in a signal sent to the trainer to apply resistance.
Del Pero similarly teaches determining inclines based on “elevation information” (for more information, see Note 3A): “elevation information can be used by an on-board computing system of a vehicle to better control the vehicle (e.g., the on-board computing system can cause the vehicle to accelerate before an inclining part of the road)” [0199]. It follows that when the teachings of Min are combined with Del Pero and Kilgard, it would be obvious to deliver position information to the local controller or “trainer” in order to accurately simulate a biking experience.
Regarding claim 10:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 1 (as shown above) in which the or each pathway is divided into a series of pathway elements comprising a series of circular arcs (Kilgard: The path is divided into cubic Bezier path segments that are each classified and further divided into simple cubic Bezier path segments. [0093]; see Note 10A).
Note 10A: Kilgard uses the term elliptical arc (or simply “arc”) interchangeably with Bezier paths as seen in paragraphs [0023], [0024], and [0093].
Regarding claim 13:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 1 in which the pathway element identifier comprises an identifier in a sequence (Del Pero: creating a data element that identifies the first and second segment lanes as the pairwise combination of associated segment lanes for the trajectory, which may comprise an ordered sequence of segment lane identifiers. [0175]).
Regarding claim 21:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to any preceding claim 1 (as shown above) comprising:
- delivering control signals to a local controller of a or the object (Min: The player integration 226 receives data from all players or competition participants via the client API 222 and integrates it so that combined data may be passed back to each setup 210, 215 for display [0048]).
Regarding claim 22:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A system (Min: system 100; [0019]) for determining at least one of a position and motion of at least one object moving along a pathway; the system comprising:
- a machine (Min: In rowing, the trainer 111A may be a rowing machine, or a device that tracks the speed and power of strokes from one or both sides of a fixed rowing machine [0026]), the machine having a moving user interface (Min: The game engine 213 may comprise multiple pieces of software, including an application responsible for providing the user interface [0042]) operably movable by a user in a manner controllable by a user and by a local controller (Min: controls may be on-screen (e.g. a touchscreen of an iPad®) or may be an external controller as is common to video game consoles or a keyboard commonly used with personal computers [0040]);
- a microprocessor (Del Pero: the processor of on-board computing system 502 may comprise one or more processor components, each of which may take the form of a general-purpose processor (e.g., a microprocessor) [0209]) configured to receive a plurality of input signals representing variables associated with at least one of position and motion of at least one object on at least one pathway, and configured to deliver these to the local controller of the machine;
- at least one storage medium associated with the microprocessor comprising instructions for carrying out the method (Del Pero: program instructions stored on the non-transitory computer-readable medium that are executable by the at least one processor [0015]) of claim 1 (as shown above).
Regarding claim 23:
Claim 23 is substantially similar to Claim 21, because it claims the limitations of claim 21 in independent form. “Claims in dependent form shall be construed to include all the limitations of the claim incorporated by reference into the dependent claim.” See MPEP 608.01(i). Therefore, claim 23 is rejected for the same reasons described in the rejection of claim 21.
Claim 14 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Min (US 20200139194 A1; from applicant’s IDS) in view of Del Pero (US 20210403001 A1), Kilgard (US 20110285741 A1) and ESRI (NPL: Multiple linear referencing methods).
Regarding claim 14:
Del Pero in view of Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 1 (as shown above)
Del Pero in view of Kilgard fails to teach:
in which the pathway element identifier comprises at least one of: an integral portion identifier, a fractional portion identifier.
ESRI teaches:
in which the pathway element identifier comprises at least one of: an integral portion identifier, a fractional portion identifier (ESRI: referent LRMs are almost always described as referent plus or minus distance (for example, 3+0.6 or 4-0.4), Pg. 2, par. 3; see Note 14A).
Note 14A: The specification of the present application teaches: “In one or more embodiments, the identifier includes an integral number portion, and a fractional number portion e.g. 4.5, 6.2, 7.257434 etc, the integral number indicating an arc number e.g. in a sequence of arcs numbers, and the fractional portion indicating how far along that arc, e.g. 0.5 of the way along arc number 4 (for a pathway element identifier of 4.5)” (Pg. 8, ln. 29 – Pg. 9, ln. 2).
ESRI teaches that a point on a line segment may be identified using linear referencing method (LRM) containing an integral and fractional portion: “referent LRMs are almost always described as referent plus or minus distance (for example, 3+0.6 or 4-0.4).” (Pg. 2, par. 3) and that “Referent LRMs determine location by measuring a discrete distance along a route from an existing known location” (Pg. 1, par. 4), similar to the identifier method described in the present specification. Therefore, the Examiner understands ESRI to teach (or at least suggest) the integral/fractional identifier described in the specification.
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of ESRI with Del Pero in view of Kilgard. Determining a distance of at least one object along a pathway by adding the lengths of pathway elements together, as in ESRI, would benefit the Del Pero in view of Kilgard teachings because the identifier is consistent and simple to use: “Positions, on the other hand, are discrete points on the ground and have no direct relationship to a route. Positions do not change when the route changes” (ESRI, Pg. 1, par. 2).
Claim 15 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Min (US 20200139194 A1; from applicant’s IDS) in view of Del Pero (US 20210403001 A1), Kilgard (US 20110285741 A1) and Dawkins (NPL: Arc Length).
Regarding claim 15:
Del Pero in view of Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 1 (as shown above) comprising
Del Pero in view of Kilgard fails to teach:
determining a distance of at least one object along a pathway by at least one of: adding the lengths of pathway elements together, adding the lengths of circular arcs.
Dawkins teaches:
determining a distance of at least one object along a pathway by at least one of: adding the lengths of pathway elements together, adding the lengths of circular arcs together (see Note 15A).
Note 15A: When the teachings of Del Pero are combined with Kilgard, the pathway elements (“segments” in Del Pero) may be elliptical arcs: “This technique describes a path as consisting of a sequence of connected path segment commands for line segments, Bezier segments, and partial elliptical arcs” (Kilgard, [0093]).
Dawkins teaches that the arc length of a curve may be determined by:
PNG
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66
153
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Where |Pi-1 Pi| is the “length of each […] line segment”.
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media_image2.png
250
360
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Example curve from Dawkins.
It would be obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to determine the distance of a point along the curve using the formula above to determine the arc length from the start of the pathway to an object, because Dawkins teaches “estimate[ing] the length of the curve” (Pg. 1) by dividing the curve into subintervals and adding their lengths. In other words, one of ordinary skill in the art would recognize that, for example, the distance of point P3 on the curve above could be calculated by adding the lengths of the segments |P0 P1|, |P1 P2|, |P2 P3| as described by Dawkins’ equation.
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Dawkins with Del Pero in view of Kilgard. Determining a distance of at least one object along a pathway by adding the lengths of pathway elements together, as in Dawkins, would benefit the Del Pero in view of Kilgard teachings by simplifying the calculation and providing a close estimation of the distance.
Claim 17 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Min (US 20200139194 A1; from applicant’s IDS) in view of Del Pero (US 20210403001 A1), Kilgard (US 20110285741 A1), Dawkins (NPL: Arc Length) and Wikipedia (NPL: Euclidean distance).
Regarding claim 17:
Del Pero in view of Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 1 (as shown above) comprising
Del Pero in view of Kilgard fails to teach:
determining a separation of at least two objects on a pathway by at least one of: adding the lengths of circular arcs, subtracting the lengths of circular arcs.
Dawkins teaches:
determining a separation of at least two objects on a pathway by at least one of: adding the lengths of circular arcs (see Note 15A above),
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Dawkins with Del Pero in view of Kilgard. Determining a distance of at least one object along a pathway by adding the lengths of pathway elements together, as in Dawkins, would benefit the Del Pero in view of Kilgard teachings by simplifying the calculation and providing a close estimation of the distance.
Del Pero in view of Kilgard and Dawkins fails to explicitly teach:
determining a separation of at least two objects on a pathway by at least one of: subtracting the lengths of circular arcs.
Del Pero in view of Kilgard, Dawkins, and Wikipedia teaches:
determining a separation of at least two objects on a pathway by at least one of: subtracting the lengths of circular arcs (see Note 17A).
Note 17A: In Note 15A, it was shown that the distance of points on the curve above could be calculated by adding the lengths of segments. Wikipedia teaches: “The distance between any two points on the real line is the absolute value of the numerical difference of their coordinates, their absolute difference.” Therefore, determining a separation of at least two objects on a pathway would necessarily comprise adding the lengths of circular arcs (determining the location of points on the curve) and subtracting the lengths of circular arcs (determining the distance between points based on their locations).
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Wikipedia with Del Pero in view of Kilgard and Dawkins. Determining a distance of at least one object along a pathway by subtracting the lengths of pathway elements together, as in Wikipedia, would improve the Del Pero in view of Kilgard and Dawkins teachings by simplifying the calculation and providing a close estimation of the separation between objects.
Claims 18 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Min (US 20200139194 A1; from applicant’s IDS) in view of Del Pero (US 20210403001 A1), Kilgard (US 20110285741 A1), Blackburn (US 8175796 B1; see attachment for paragraph numbers), Morotomi (US 20180265083 A1), and Sherony (US 20130335213 A1).
Regarding claim 18:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 1 (as shown above) comprising determining interactions between objects by:
- identifying objects as close enough to interact, and establishing or determining an interaction (Min: The player integration 226 may also involve the relative positions of the various players, such as a player immediately in front of another player in a cycle race [0048])
- delivering control signals reflective of the interaction (Min: an “aerodynamic draft” effect that enables easier riding for the rider behind [0048]).
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard fails to teach:
- identifying the pathway and if not same, determining no interaction possible;
- identifying at least one of the distance and separation along an identified pathway, and if not within a predetermined limit of separation, determining no interaction possible;
- optionally, identifying at least one of an offset and separation in offset from a reference line of the pathway, and if not within a predetermined limit of separation, determining no interaction;
Blackburn teaches:
- identifying the pathway and if not same, determining no interaction possible (Blackburn: Each vehicle communicates to the RLM network that they are traveling in the direction indicated in different lanes. There is no collision potential between vehicles 630 and 632 in this configuration. (69));
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Blackburn with Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard. Identifying the pathway and if not same, determining no interaction possible, as in Blackburn, would benefit the Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teachings by preventing unnecessary collision checking.
Min in view of Del Pero, Kilgard, and Blackburn fails to teach:
- identifying at least one of the distance and separation along an identified pathway, and if not within a predetermined limit of separation, determining no interaction possible;
- optionally, identifying at least one of an offset and separation in offset from a reference line of the pathway, and if not within a predetermined limit of separation, determining no interaction;
Morotomi teaches:
- identifying at least one of the distance and separation along an identified pathway, and if not within a predetermined limit of separation, determining no interaction possible (Morotomi: The collision possibility determination unit 12 determines that there is no collision possibility between the host vehicle M and the oncoming vehicle N in a case where the distance Lp between the intersection point P and the coordinate origin G is equal to or greater than a distance threshold. [0092]);
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Morotomi with Min in view of Del Pero, Kilgard, and Blackburn. Identifying at least one of the distance and separation along an identified pathway, and if not within a predetermined limit of separation, determining no interaction possible, as in Morotomi, would benefit the Min in view of Del Pero, Kilgard, and Blackburn teachings by preventing unnecessary collision checking: “The present disclosure provides a collision avoidance device capable of suppressing execution of unneeded collision avoidance control.” (Morotomi, [0005])
Min in view of Del Pero, Kilgard, Blackburn, and Morotomi still fails to teach:
- optionally, identifying at least one of an offset and separation in offset from a reference line of the pathway, and if not within a predetermined limit of separation, determining no interaction;
Sherony teaches:
- optionally, identifying at least one of an offset and separation in offset from a reference line of the pathway (Sherony: By calculating the distance to the lane markers from a point of reference (e.g., the location of the lane detection sensor 115), the vehicle system may determine whether the vehicle 100 is near the center of the lane [0034]; see Note 18A), and if not within a predetermined limit of separation, determining no interaction (see Note 18B);
Note 18A: The Examiner interprets “separation” in claim 18 to refer to the separation between the objects, because the specification teaches that: “For example, when calculating how far apart two objects are along a road this sum can be quickly and accurately computed in the arc spline coordinate system and gives a more relevant value than calculating how far apart they are ‘as the crow flies’. If one object is at (r1.θ1) + (r2.θ2) + (r3.θ3) and another is at (r1.θ1) + (r2.θ2), then their separation is the difference, namely (r3.θ3).” (Pg. 20, ln. 12-17). Therefore, the examiner interprets “separation in offset” to refer to the distance between objects that are offset from the reference line.
Note 18B: In paragraph [0092] cited above, Morotomi teaches determining no collision possible when two objects are separated by a distance greater than a threshold. Sherony teaches determining the offset from the center of the lane, which the examiner interprets to be analogous to a reference line because the specification of the present application teaches: “In one or more embodiments the reference line is a centre line of the pathway.” [0050].
When the teachings of Del Pero, Kilgard, Blackburn, Morotomi, and Sherony are combined with Min, it would be obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to identify at least one of an offset and separation in offset from a reference line of the pathway, and determine no interaction if not within a predetermined limit of separation.
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Sherony with Min in view of Del Pero, Kilgard, Blackburn, and Morotomi. Identifying an offset from a reference line of the pathway, as in Sherony, would benefit the Min in view of Del Pero, Kilgard, Blackburn, and Morotomi teachings by enabling the system to automatically adjust the vehicle to stay within or on a certain path: “Devices, systems, and methods discussed herein relate to a lane departure warning/assistance system ("the system") that warns the driver when the vehicle is beginning to drift towards the lane markers (i.e., to guard against unintentionally drifting out of the current lane and into an adjacent lane)” (Sherony, [0007]).
Regarding claim 19:
Min in view of Del Pero, Kilgard, Blackburn, Morotomi, and Sherony teaches:
A method according to claim 18 comprising:
- using the determined interaction to adjust the motion of a or the object (Min: an “aerodynamic draft” effect that enables easier riding for the rider behind [0048]; see Note 19A).
Note 19A: In other words, when the aerodynamic draft is enabled, the easier riding will enable the rider to move faster and/or more easily.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5 and 20 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
Regarding claim 5:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 2 (as shown above) comprising:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard fails to teach:
- determining a lateral offset from the reference line by at least one of adding and subtracting an offset from a radius of at least one circular arc.
Del Pero describes a vertical offset instead of the claimed lateral offset, as discussed in Note 3A. Furthermore, Del Pero does not determine the offset by adding or subtracting the radius of the arc.
Baranovskiy (US 20240412431 A1) teaches adjusting a radius of a circular arc: “the digital arc design system 106 determines a modified arc path segment by modifying the radius of a first circular arc segment to determine a modified circular arc segment 760” [0080]. However, Baranovskiy does not explicitly determine a lateral offset based on the adjustment and does not explicitly add and subtract from the radius, instead, the radius is determined by equations that depend on two-dimensional coordinates and a “destination point” p2:
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Equations for the radius from paragraph [0075] of Baranovskiy.
None of the other prior art searched or on the record teaches, suggests, or renders obvious the limitations of claim 5.
Regarding claim 20:
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard teaches:
A method according to claim 1 (as shown above), in which the pathway element identifier is associated with parameters comprising at least one of pitch and roll of at least one circular arc with respect to a horizontal plane, and
Min in view of Del Pero and Kilgard fails to teach:
the method further comprises adjusting at least one of pitch and roll of the circular arc to take account of incline of the pathway.
Del Pero teaches sensor data that is incorporated into the trajectory predictions: “sensor system 501 may include one or more state sensors 501c that are each configured capture sensor data that is indicative of aspects of the vehicle's current state, such as the vehicle's current position, current orientation (e.g., heading/yaw, pitch, and/or roll)” [0205] (emphasis added). However, Del Pero fails to teach “adjusting at least one of pitch and roll of the circular arc to take account of incline of the pathway” as claimed.
None of the other prior art searched or on the record teaches, suggests, or renders obvious the limitations of claim 20.
Conclusion
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/VINCENT ALEXANDER PROVIDENCE/Examiner, Art Unit 2617 /KING Y POON/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2617
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