DETAILED ACTION
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements submitted on 05/21/2025 and 08/20/2025 have been considered by the Examiner and made of record in the application file.
Double Patenting
The nonstatutory double patenting rejection is based on a judicially created doctrine grounded in public policy (a policy reflected in the statute) so as to prevent the unjustified or improper timewise extension of the “right to exclude” granted by a patent and to prevent possible harassment by multiple assignees. A nonstatutory double patenting rejection is appropriate where the conflicting claims are not identical, but at least one examined application claim is not patentably distinct from the reference claim(s) because the examined application claim is either anticipated by, or would have been obvious over, the reference claim(s). See, e.g., In re Berg, 140 F.3d 1428, 46 USPQ2d 1226 (Fed. Cir. 1998); In re Goodman, 11 F.3d 1046, 29 USPQ2d 2010 (Fed. Cir. 1993); In re Longi, 759 F.2d 887, 225 USPQ 645 (Fed. Cir. 1985); In re Van Ornum, 686 F.2d 937, 214 USPQ 761 (CCPA 1982); In re Vogel, 422 F.2d 438, 164 USPQ 619 (CCPA 1970); In re Thorington, 418 F.2d 528, 163 USPQ 644 (CCPA 1969).
A timely filed terminal disclaimer in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(c) or 1.321(d) may be used to overcome an actual or provisional rejection based on nonstatutory double patenting provided the reference application or patent either is shown to be commonly owned with the examined application, or claims an invention made as a result of activities undertaken within the scope of a joint research agreement. See MPEP § 717.02 for applications subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA as explained in MPEP § 2159. See MPEP § 2146 et seq. for applications not subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . A terminal disclaimer must be signed in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(b).
The filing of a terminal disclaimer by itself is not a complete reply to a nonstatutory double patenting (NSDP) rejection. A complete reply requires that the terminal disclaimer be accompanied by a reply requesting reconsideration of the prior Office action. Even where the NSDP rejection is provisional the reply must be complete. See MPEP § 804, subsection I.B.1. For a reply to a non-final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.111(a). For a reply to final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.113(c). A request for reconsideration while not provided for in 37 CFR 1.113(c) may be filed after final for consideration. See MPEP §§ 706.07(e) and 714.13.
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Claims 1-20 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1-20 of U.S. Patent No. 12,204,985 B2. Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because the claims at issue are broader than the patented claims.
Independent claim 1 of the patented claims discloses all of the limitations of claim 1 of the instant claims and further discloses cropping the plurality of images to isolate the optical code of each of the plurality of images to form a plurality of modified images, wherein each modified image lacks at least one cropped out portion previously present in each respective image of the plurality of images; rotating the plurality of modified images to achieve a desired orientation for the optical code of each of the plurality of modified images; rectifying, after the cropping and the rotating, a perspective of each of the plurality of modified images to achieve a desired perspective angle for the optical code of each of the plurality of modified images; deblurring, after the rectifying, the plurality of modified images to reduce blurring in each of the plurality of modified images; binarizing, after the deblurring, the plurality of modified images to correct pixels of the optical code in each of the plurality of modified images; and performing, after the binarizing, an optical code reading process on the plurality of modified images to decode optical codes in the plurality of modified images.
Independent claim 6 of the patented claims discloses all of the limitations of claim 6 of the instant claims and further discloses modifying the second subset of the plurality of images, wherein each of the second subset of the plurality of images thereby lacks at least one cropped out portion previously present in each image prior to being cropped.
Independent claim 11 of the patented claims discloses all of the limitations of claim 11 of the instant claims and further discloses the cropping comprises modifying the second subset of the plurality of images, wherein each of the second subset of the plurality of images thereby lacks at least one cropped out portion previously present in each image prior to being cropped.
Instant Application No. 19/029,305 Patent No. 12,204,985 B2
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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 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.
Claim(s) 1, 5-6, 10-13, 17-18 and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Wu (US 2015/0363625 A1).
Consider claim 1, Wu discloses a non-transitory computer readable medium having instructions stored thereon that, upon execution by a computing device, cause the computing device to perform operations comprising:
receiving a plurality of images, wherein each of the plurality of images comprises an optical code (para [0072] - "system 10 captures images within a product facility, such as a retail store, with the image capture assembly 22 at a sequence of locations of the mobile base 20, extracts product-related data 26 (e.g., printed barcodes and/or text from the captured product price labels)");
cropping the plurality of images to isolate the optical code of each of the plurality of images (para [0069], [0109], claim 1 - "detect and crop candidate barcodes from the captured camera image"; "Crop and manipulate each sub-image/candidate-barcode-region via standard image processing techniques");
rotating the plurality of images to achieve a desired orientation for the optical code of each of the plurality of images (para [0114]-[0116], [0118], [0125] - "image analysis is performed on the acquired image to detect and. localize candidate barcode regions for further processing”, "a combination of average edge strength, average edge orientation, and morphological filtering are used for blob detection"; "for detection of 1-D barcode oriented horizontally"; "regions where B(x,y)=1 are regions that are likely to have 1-D barcode based on the-strength of edges and their orientation"; "skew/rotation correction can be applied to these detected auxiliary product information regions based on an estimated orientation of the corresponding detected barcode-region");
rectifying, after the cropping and the rotating, a perspective of each of the plurality of images to achieve a desired perspective angle for the optical code of each of the plurality of images (para [0076], [0089] - “pan capability allows movement of the field of view (FOV) relative to the base unit in the x direction; the tilt capability allows the field of view to move in the z direction as illustrated for camera 44-in FIG. 3; the zoom capability increases/decreases the field of view in the x, z plane (which may be measured in units of distance, such as inches or cm, as illustrated in FIG. 3,.or angle a, as ‘illustrated in FIG. 1)"; "translation stage controller 78 determines the translations of the translation stage to achieve desired camera positions");
deblurring, after the rectifying, the plurality of images to reduce blurring in each of the plurality of images (para [0099], claim 2 - “data processing component 82 receives the images acquired by the cameras and stores them in memory, such as memory 62, and may perform preliminary processing, such as adjustments for blur, color, brightness, etc");
binarizing, after the deblurring, the plurality of images to correct pixels of the optical code in each of the plurality of images (para [0116]-[01 18] - "An initial binary map is generated S408 indicating regions with sufficient edge strength and preferred orientation"; "To remove spurious noises in the binarization due to imperfect imaging, the binary map B(x,y) is refined using morphological filtering”); and
performing, after the binarizing, an optical code reading process on the plurality of images to decode optical codes in the plurality of images (para [0134] - “The final SKU information is determined based on a combination of the barcode recognition and auxiliary product information extraction for each candidate-barcode-region. For each candidate-barcode-region, if at least one barcode is recognized, the final result is from the barcode recognition step, i-e., detected location and decoded information”).
Consider claim 6, Wu discloses a system comprising:
a memory, storing computer instructions; and a processor coupled to the memory, when executing the computer instructions (para [0054)]), the processor is programmed to:
receive a plurality of images, wherein each of the plurality of images comprises an optical code (para [0072]);
perform a first optical code reading process on the plurality of images to decode optical cades of a first-subset of the plurality of images (para [0054], [0098], [0134] - “a processor operatively associated with the memory detecting and localizing one or more barcode candidate regions within the captured image"; "image capture assembly (iteratively) acquires images based on the requests by the: control unit and the camera parameters and (optionally) position parameters provided’);
crop a second subset of the plurality of images that were not decoded during the first optical code reading process (para [0054]-[0056], [0069], [0109}, claim 1 - "cropping the detected and localized one or more barcode candidate regions to generate one or more sub-images including images of the one or more barcode candidate regions; processing each sub-image-using two or more independent image quality improvement processes to generate modified versions of the barcode candidate regions; and processing the modified versions of the barcode candidate regions to decode readable barcodes included in the modified versions of the candidate barcode regions"; "processing each sub-image to decode readable barcodes included in the barcode candidate regions and identify barcode candidate regions including an unreadable barcode; processing all or a portion of the captured image of the product label associated with the unreadable barcode to determine all or part of the other product label information association with the unreadable barcode");
rotate the second subset of the plurality of images to achieve a desired orientation for each of the optical codes of the second subset of the plurality of images (para [0114] -[0116], [0118], [0125]);
rectify a perspective of each of the second subset of the plurality of images (para [0076], [0088]),
perform a second optical code reading process on the second subset of the plurality of images to decode optical codes of a third subset of the plurality of images (para [0054], [0098], [0134]);
deblur a fourth subset of the plurality of images that were not decoded during the first optical code reading process or the second optical code reading process (para [0054]-[0056], [0099], claim 2);
perform a third optical code reading process on the fourth subset of the plurality of images to decode optical codes of a fifth subset of the plurality of images (para [0054], [0098], [0134]);
binarize a sixth subset of the plurality of images that were not decoded during the first optical code reading process, the second optical code reading process, or the third optical code reading process to correct pixels of each of optical codes of the sixth subset of the plurality of images (para [0054]-{0056], [0116]-[0118]); and
perform a fourth optical code reading process on the sixth subset of the plurality of images to detected optical codes of a seventh subset of the plurality of images (para [0054], [0088], [0134]).
Consider claim 11, Wu discloses a method comprising:
receiving, by a processor of a computing device, a plurality. of images, wherein each of the plurality of images comprises an optical code (para [0072));
performing, by the processor, a first optical code reading process on the plurality of images to. decode a first subset of optical codes of a first subset of images of the plurality of images (para [0054], [0098}, [0134]);
cropping, by the processor,-a second subset of images of the plurality of images that remains unread after the first optical code reading process to isolate a second set of optical codes of the second subset of images of the plurality of images (para [0054]-[0056), [0069], [0109], claim 1);
rotating, by the processor, the second subset of images to achieve a desired orientation for each of the second subset of optical codes of the second subset of images (para [0114]-[0116], [0118], [0125]);
rectifying, by the processor, after the cropping and the rotating, a perspective of each of the second subset of images to achieve a desired perspective angle for each of the second subset of optical codes of the second subset of images (para [0076], [0088]);
performing, by the processor, after the rectifying, a second optical code reading process on the second subset of images to decode the second subset of optical codes of a third subset of images of the plurality of images (para [0054], [0098], [0134]);
deblurring, by the processor, after the second optical code reading process, a fourth subset of images of the plurality of images that remains unread after the first optical cade reading process or the second optical code reading process to reduce blurring in each of the fourth subset of images (para [0054]-[0056}, [0099], claim 2);
performing, by the processor after the deblurring, a third optical code reading process on the fourth subset of images to decode a fifth subset of optical codes of a fifth subset of images of the plurality of images (para [0054], [0098], [0134]);
binarizing, by the processor, after the third optical code reading process, a sixth subset of images of the plurality of images that remains unread after the first optical code reading process, the second optical cade reading process, or the third optical code reading process, to correct pixels of the sixth subset of optical codes of the sixth subset of images (para [0054]-[0056], [01 16]-[0118]); and
performing, by the processor, after the binarizing, a fourth optical code reading process on the sixth subset of images to decode a seventh subset of optical codes of a. seventh subset of images of the plurality of images (para [0054], [0098], [0134]).
Consider claims 5, 10 and 20, Wu discloses the claimed invention wherein performing an adaptive threshold binarization to determine a threshold value for a given pixel based on a predetermined region of pixels around the given pixel; and correcting the given pixel based on the threshold value. (para [0078], [0118], [0121])
Consider claim 12, Wu discloses the claimed invention wherein an eighth subset of images of the plurality of images remains unread after the first optical code reading process, the second optical code reading process, the third optical code reading process, or the fourth optical code reading process. (para [0054] – [0057])
Consider claim 13, Wu discloses the claimed invention except for wherein the eighth subset of images represents less than ten percent of the plurality of images. (para [0054]-[0057])
Consider claim 17, Wu discloses the claimed invention wherein the rectifying of the perspective of each of the second subset of images comprises locating a plurality of corner points of each of the second subset of optical codes of the second subset of images and using the plurality of corner points to correct an aspect ratio of the second subset of images. (para [0076], [0088], [0114]-[0119])
Consider claim 18, Wu discloses the claimed invention wherein the desired orientation of each of the optical codes of the second subset of images comprises a horizontal orientation. (para [0114]-[0119])
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
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.
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.
Claims 2-4, 7-9, 14-16 and 19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wu in view of Terman (US 2013/0021346 A1).
Consider claims 2, 7 and 14, Wu discloses the claimed invention except for wherein the optical code of each of the plurality of images comprises a stacked linear barcode.
In related art, Terman discloses the optical code of each of the plurality of images comprises a stacked linear barcode. (para [0143])
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to incorporate the teachings of Terman into the teachings of Wu to effectively provide an image processing method and system for recognizing barcodes capable of improved optical code recognition and decoding.
Consider claims 3, 8 and 16, Wu discloses the deblurring of the plurality of images comprises performing a scale iterative upscaling deblurring process on the plurality of images (para [009]-[0099], [0115], claim 2), but does not explicitly teach neural-network (SIUN).
In related art, Terman discloses neural-network (SIUN) (para [0090])
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to incorporate the teachings of Terman into the teachings of Wu to effectively provide an image processing method and system for recognizing barcodes capable of improved optical code recognition and decoding.
Consider claims 4, 9 and 19, Wu discloses further teaches wherein the optical code reading process is performed using a barcode scanning decoder (para [0094], [0121]-[0123]), but does not explicitly teach zebra crossing (Zxing).
In related art, Terman discloses zebra crossing (Zxing) (para [0143]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to incorporate the teachings of Terman into the teachings of Wu to effectively provide an image processing method and system for recognizing barcodes capable of improved optical code recognition and decoding.
Consider claim 15, Wu, as modified by Terman, discloses the claimed invention wherein
the stacked linear barcode is a portable data file 417 (PDF417) type barcode. (para [0143])
Conclusion
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/BOBBAK SAFAIPOUR/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2665
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