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 .
Specification
The title of the invention is not descriptive. A new title is required that is clearly indicative of the invention to which the claims are directed.
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 1-2,7,10-11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Kin et al. (U.S. 2005/0169648).
Regarding claim 1, Kin et al. teach an image forming apparatus 1 (Fig.1) including a photosensitive drum 22, an exposure unit 6 to form an electrostatic latent image on the photosensitive drum by using an image signal, a developing unit 4 to develop the electrostatic latent image with a developer material (toner), a processing unit 11 which generates an image signal by performing halftone processing using a dithering method on an input signal (Fig.3, par.72-78). An obtainment unit (toner counter) 500 obtains a toner consumption amount on the basis of the counted pixels/toner dots (see Fig.19, par 161). The toner counter obtainment unit 500 obtains the toner consumption amount by counting the number of OFF pixel groups included in an image; the OFF pixel groups are constituted by consecutive OFF pixels (see Fig.20, par. 161-165). The toner consumption amount is performed per page which is considered the “size of the dither matrix”.
Regarding claim 2, the count value for all the OFF dots is added up and then subtracted from a constant value DC0 (which is the number of total dots per page, see par.165) to obtain the toner consumption for that one page). Thus, the value DC0 – (# of OFF dots) = consumption amount (# of ON dots).
Regarding claim 7, the toner consumption obtainment unit obtains a pixel count value of the ON pixels via subtracting the OFF pixel value from the total possible pixel value DC0; the toner consumption value is determined by multiplying the different pixel by coefficients K21-K29 which is considered giving a normalized consumption value (see par.164,166-167).
Regarding claims 10-11, the description of the toner consumption obtainment unit, described above, would also read on a control method / computer storage medium storing a program to execute the control method.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3-6,8-9 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.
Regarding claims 3-6,8 the toner consumption obtainment unit additionally obtaining a count value for consecutive number of ON pixels is not taught, suggested or rendered obvious by the prior art of record.
Regarding claim 9, the processing unit generating an image in which the generated pixels are partially thinned is not taught, suggested or rendered obvious by the prior art of record.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Konishi et al., Takamatsu et al., Gilliland et al., Kin et al. ‘059, and Toyoshima et al. (JP) all teach toner consumption obtainment units which are relevent to the claimed invention.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ROBERT B BEATTY whose telephone number is (571) 272-2130. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F from 7 to 3.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner's supervisor, Stephanie Bloss, can be reached on (571) 272-3555. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is (571) 273-2130.
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/ROBERT B BEATTY/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2852
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