DETAILED ACTION
Summary
This office action for US Patent application 19/029942 is responsive to communications filed on 05/13/2025. Currently, claims 1-20 are pending are presented for examination.
Claim Objections
Claim 20 is/are objected to because the term “the sample position” does not have its antecedent basis.
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 obviousness-type 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); and 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 a nonstatutory double patenting ground provided the conflicting application or patent either is shown to be commonly owned with this application, or claims an invention made as a result of activities undertaken within the scope of a joint research agreement.
Effective January 1, 1994, a registered attorney or agent of record may sign a terminal disclaimer. A terminal disclaimer signed by the assignee must fully comply with 37 CFR 3.73(b).
Claims 1-19 provisionally rejected on the ground of nonstatutory obviousness-type double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1, 3, 6-8 of copending application 18/628446.
Claims 1, 8, 15 inprovisionally rejected on the ground of nonstatutory obviousness-type double patenting as being unpatentable over claim 1 of copending Application No 17/682893, now U.S Patent No. 11,968,363. Although the conflicting claims are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because it is merely in the terminology used in both sets of claims.
This is an inprovisional and provisional obviousness-type double patenting rejection because the conflicting claims have in fact been patented and not patented. Below is a list of limitations that perform the same function. However different terminology is used in both sets to describe the limitations.
Conflicting Co-pending Application 18/628446
Instant Application—19/029942
1.A method for splitting an image into coding units, the method comprising:
subdividing the image into coding tree units (CTUs) including a non-boundary CTU with a predetermined size and a boundary CTU having a portion within the image delimited by an image boundary, the portion having a size smaller than the predetermined size in a direction perpendicular to the image boundary; and
partitioning the non-boundary CTU and the boundary CTU hierarchically into respective coding units,
wherein the hierarchical partitioning of the boundary CTU includes multi-type splitting with a maximum boundary multi-type partition depth (ExtdMaxBTTDepth),
wherein ExtdMaxBTTDepth=BTTBPDepth+MaxBTTDepth, and
wherein BTTBPDepth denotes an adaptive boundary multi-type partition depth,and MaxBTTDepth denotes a predefined multi-type partition depth, wherein the adaptive boundary multi-type partition depth is increased by one when there is one layer of binary tree (BT) boundary partitioning (BP).
Claim 1, 3, 1, 6, 7, 8
Claim 1, 1, 3, 1, 6, 7, 8
Claim 1, 1, 3, 1, 6
1.A method for splitting an image into coding units, the method comprising:
subdividing the image into coding tree units (CTUs) including a non-boundary CTU with a predetermined size and a boundary CTU having a portion within the image delimited by an image boundary, the portion having a size smaller than the predetermined size in a direction perpendicular to the image boundary; and partitioning the boundary CTU hierarchically into respective coding units,
wherein the hierarchical partitioning of the boundary CTU includes multi-type splitting with a maximum boundary multi-type partition depth, the maximum boundary multi-type partition depth is determined based on an adaptive boundary multi-type partition depth and a predefined multi-type partition depth, and wherein the predefined multi-type partition depth is included in a sequence parameter set (SPS) of a bitstream.
Claims 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
Claims 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14
Claims 15, 16, 17, 18, 19
Conflicting Co-pending Application 17/682893
Instant Application-19/029942-
1. An apparatus for splitting an image into coding units, the apparatus including:
a memory configured to store computer-executable instructions; and a processing circuitry configured to execute the computer-executable instructions, which cause the processing circuitry to carry out: subdividing the image into coding tree units (CTUs) including a non-boundary CTU with a size in a horizontal direction and a vertical direction and a boundary CTU having a portion within the image delimited by a horizontal or vertical image boundary, the portion having a size smaller than the size in a direction perpendicular to the horizontal or vertical image boundary; and
partitioning the non-boundary CTU and the boundary CTU hierarchically into respective coding units, wherein: the hierarchical partitioning of the non-boundary CTU includes multi- type splitting with a maximum non-boundary multi-type partition depth, multi- type splitting being splitting with the splitting direction being either the vertical direction or the horizontal direction, and the hierarchical partitioning of the boundary CTU includes multi-type splitting with a maximum boundary multi-type partition depth, wherein the maximum boundary multi-type partition depth is a sum of an adaptive boundary multi-type partition depth and a predefined multi-type partition depth.
Claim 1
11.A method for splitting an image into coding units, the method comprising:
subdividing the image into coding tree units (CTUs) including a non-boundary CTU with a predetermined size and a boundary CTU having a portion within the image delimited by an image boundary, the portion having a size smaller than the predetermined size in a direction perpendicular to the image boundary; and partitioning the boundary CTU hierarchically into respective coding units,
wherein the hierarchical partitioning of the boundary CTU includes multi-type splitting with a maximum boundary multi-type partition depth, the maximum boundary multi-type partition depth is determined based on an adaptive boundary multi-type partition depth and a predefined multi-type partition depth, and wherein the predefined multi-type partition depth is included in a sequence parameter set (SPS) of a bitstream.
Claims 1, 8, 15
Although the conflicting claims are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because claims 1-20 are generic to all that is recited in claims of co-pending applications. That is, claims 1-20 are anticipated by claims of co-pending applications.
Claims 1-20 rejected on the ground of nonstatutory obviousness-type double patenting as being unpatentable over claims of copending applications.
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.
Claim 15-20 is rejected under 35 U.S.C 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by the DVD® optical disc “Anatomy of a Murder” (Columbia TriStar Home Video, 2000)’.
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 computer readable 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 claims 15-20 merely services as a support for the storage of the bitstream and provides no functional relationship between the stored bitstream and storage medium. Therefore, the structure 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 any computer-readable medium recording medium storing a bitstream of image data in use or on sale before the effective filing date is considered prior art. Considering this, any computer-readable recording medium storing a bitstream of encoded image data in use or on sale before its priority date is considered prior art.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-20 is/are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory obviousness-type double patenting. However, these claims would be allowable if the obvious-type double patenting is overcome and the bitstream issue is addressed.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications form the examiner should be directed to Nam Pham, whose can be contacted by phone at (571)270-7352. The examiner can normally be reached on Mon—Thurs.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner's supervisor, CZEKAJ DAVID, can be reached on (571)272-7327.
Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from either Private PAIR or Public PAIR. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only. For more information about the PAIR system, see http://pair-direct.uspto.gov. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) AT 866-217-9197 (too free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative or access to the automated information system, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/NAM D PHAM/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2487