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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement(s) (IDS) was/were submitted on 31 January 2025 and 29 December 2025. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement(s) is/are being considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
Claim 10 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
A broad range or limitation together with a narrow range or limitation that falls within the broad range or limitation (in the same claim) may be considered indefinite if the resulting claim does not clearly set forth the metes and bounds of the patent protection desired. See MPEP § 2173.05(c). In the present instance, claim 10 in its dependence on claim 2 recites the broad recitation “determining a second plurality of target sampling frames that come from the plurality of key frames based on the first quantity and the second quantity” (emphasis added), and the claim also recites “determining the second plurality of target sampling frames from the video frame sequence based on the first quantity” which is the narrower statement of the range/limitation. The claim(s) are considered indefinite because there is a question or doubt as to whether the feature introduced by such narrower language is (a) merely exemplary of the remainder of the claim, and therefore not required, or (b) a required feature of the claims.
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.
The factual inquiries 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.
Claim(s) 1-2, 9-12, and 19-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Chen et al. (US 2023/0370608 A1) in view of Waine et al. (US 2023/0034884 A1).
Regarding Claims 1, 11, and 20, Chen discloses a method performed via a CRM on a video decoding apparatus, comprising: at least one memory configured to store computer program code [Chen: ¶ [0135]]; and at least one processor configured to read the program code and operate as instructed by the program code, the program code comprising: video stream analysis code configured to cause at least one of the at least one processor to perform video stream analysis on a to-be-decoded video to obtain a frame data packet of a first plurality of video frames in the to-be-decoded video [Chen: FIG. 2: S201: Performing a scene switching detection operation on a current GOP of received video data], wherein the video stream analysis comprises parsing an encapsulated data packet that encapsulates video frame information in the to-be-decoded video [Chen: FIG. 2: received video data]; first determining code configured to cause at least one of the at least one processor to determine a plurality of frame types of the first plurality of video frames based on frame attribute information in the frame data packet, a frame type comprising a key frame and a non-key frame [Chen: FIG. 2: S201: In a case that scene switching frame is detected to be present in the current GOP, generating the scene switching marker for the current GOP]; second determining code configured to cause at least one of the at least one processor to determine a first plurality of target sampling frames from the to-be-decoded video based on a first quantity of a plurality of key frames, the first plurality of target sampling frames being a second plurality of video frames configured for providing rendering data when rendering the to- be-decoded video [Chen: ¶ [0051]; determine a target scene switching frame among a plurality of scene switching frames, such that the number of video frames, in the current GOP, encoded as the key frames is reduced, and thus the number of GOPs divided according to the target scene switching frame is decreased, which improve the compression rate of the video data; wherein the first plurality being equal to the second plurality].
Chen may not explicitly disclose the rendering data being stored in a plurality of frame buffers corresponding to the first plurality of target sampling frames; obtaining code configured to cause at least one of the at least one processor to obtain the rendering data from the plurality of frame buffers; and video decoding code configured to cause at least one of the at least one processor to perform video decoding on the to-be-decoded video based on the rendering data to obtain a decoded video corresponding to the to-be-decoded video.
However, Waine discloses the rendering data being stored in a plurality of frame buffers corresponding to the first plurality of target sampling frames [Waine: ¶ [0039]: In some embodiments, an i-Frame may be sent after a determined number of frames have been transmitted without an acknowledgement, such as five or more frames]; obtaining code configured to cause at least one of the at least one processor to obtain the rendering data from the plurality of frame buffers [Waine: ¶ [0038]: FIG. 4 illustrates an example video encoding pipeline 400 that can be used to transmit video data to at least one client device, or other such recipient, for presentation. It should be understood that such video data can include, or be associated with, audio data as well in at least some embodiments. In this example, pixel data for a current frame to be rendered can be received from a video source 402, such as a camera, media server, or online game host. In this example, the video data is received to a video encoder 404 that is configured to encode the data using a particular encoding format. For an initial frame, the encoder 404 can encode this frame as an i-Frame, or key frame, that can be passed to a stream server 408, or other such transmitter, to be transmitted across at least one network 410 to a client device 412 or other intended recipient. A receiver 414 of the client device can receive this video data, pass the data to a video decoder 416 to decode the video frame, and can then cause the decoded video frame to be presented via a display 420 or other such mechanism, such as a projector, monitor, or wearable display. In this example, the video decoder 416 can cause this frame to be stored to a reference buffer 418 as a confirmed frame that can be used as a reference for subsequent frames in this video stream. The video decoder 416 can also cause an acknowledgement to be sent back to the stream server 408, which can communicate the acknowledgement to the video encoder 404. The video encoder can have stored a copy of that i-frame in a reference buffer 406, and can designate that frame as a confirmed frame that can now be used as a basis for subsequent video frames on this stream]; and video decoding code configured to cause at least one of the at least one processor to perform video decoding on the to-be-decoded video based on the rendering data to obtain a decoded video corresponding to the to-be-decoded video [Waine: ¶ [0038]].
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to combine the well-known process of decoding and displaying via frame buffer of Waine with the processing of Chen in order to provide a decoder to an encoder, improving usability.
Regarding Claims 2 and 12, Chen in view of Waine disclose(s) all the limitations of Claims 1 and 11, respectively, and is/are analyzed as previously discussed with respect to those claims.
Furthermore, Chen in view of Waine discloses wherein the determining the first plurality of target sampling frames comprises: setting a second quantity of the first plurality of target sampling frames [Chen: ¶ [0035] During encoding the video data, a length of the GOP is predefined. That is, a GOP includes a specified number of video frames, and the current GOP is received in a case that the specified number of video frames are received during encoding. For example, the specified number is 15, and in a case that an encoder receives 15 video frames, the currently received 15 video frames are determined as the current GOP. In this case, a scene switching detection is performed on the current GOP. Scene switching occurring in two video frames refers to that a change amount between scene measurements of video contents of the two video frames is greater than a predefined threshold; and ¶ [0036]: In some embodiments, the scene measurement of the video content is carried out according to one of parameters such as brightness, histogram, inter-frame prediction cost, video frame similarity, and the like of the video frames. In detecting whether the scene switching occurs between two video frames, whether the scene switching occurs between a current video frame and a previous video frame is detected by calculating a brightness difference, a histogram difference, an inter-frame prediction cost, a video frame similarity, and the like between the current video frame and the previous video frame. In a case that the scene switching occurs between the current video frame and the previous video frame, the current video frame is determined as the scene switching frame. In some embodiments, whether the current video frame and the previous video frame of the current video frame are the scene switching frames is detected by a trained neural network. The way to determine whether the current GOP includes the scene switching frame is not limited herein]; and determining a second plurality of target sampling frames that come from the plurality of key frames based on the first quantity and the second quantity, or determining a third plurality of target sampling frames from the plurality of key frames and one or more non-key frames based on the first quantity and the second quantity [Chen: ¶ [0051]].
Regarding Claims 9 and 19, Chen in view of Waine disclose(s) all the limitations of Claims 1 and 11, respectively, and is/are analyzed as previously discussed with respect to those claims.
Furthermore, Chen in view of Waine discloses wherein the determining the frame type comprises: obtaining the frame attribute information in the frame data packet, the frame attribute information comprising a first frame type of a corresponding video frame [Chen: ¶ [0034]: The group of pictures (GOP) refers to a group of successive pictures in the video data. That is, the GOP is a picture set, a first video frame of the GOP shall be a key frame (an I frame), and a GOP includes a key frame (an I frame) and a plurality of prediction frames (P frames or B frames)]; and parsing the frame attribute information to obtain a second frame type of a video frame corresponding to the frame data packet [Chen: ¶ [0034]].
Regarding Claims 10, Chen in view of Waine disclose(s) all the limitations of Claim 2, respectively, and is/are analyzed as previously discussed with respect to those claims.
Furthermore, Chen in view of Waine discloses wherein the determining the second plurality of target sampling frames comprises: determining a video frame sequence formed by the plurality of key frames and the one or more non-key frames [Chen: ¶ [0034]] obtaining a frame index sequence corresponding to the video frame sequence [Waine: ¶ [0092]: one or more processor(s) 1102 are coupled with one or more interface bus(es) 1110 to transmit communication signals such as address, data, or control signals between processor 1102 and other components in system]; determining the second plurality of target sampling frames from the video frame sequence based on the first quantity [Chen: ¶ [0051]]; and determining a plurality of frame indexes of the second plurality of target sampling frames based on the frame index sequence [Chen: ¶ [0034]; and Waine: ¶ [0092]].
Claim(s) 3 and 13 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Chen in view of Waine as applied to claim 2 and 12 above, and further in view of Peng et al. (US 2023/0177871 A1).
Regarding Claims 3 and 13, Chen in view of Waine disclose(s) all the limitations of Claims 2 and 12, respectively, and is/are analyzed as previously discussed with respect to those claims.
Furthermore, Chen in view of Waine discloses wherein the setting the second quantity comprises: setting the second quantity based on a duration of the to-be-decoded video [Chen: ¶ [0051]; and Waine: ¶ [0038]].
Chen in view of Waine may not explicitly disclose determining an application scenario type of the decoded video.
However, Peng discloses determining an application scenario type of the decoded video [Peng: ¶ [0037]; An image-text matching task refers to using a representation feature output by downstream of a model to classify and judge whether an image-text pair input into the model matches, or whether an input text can describe an input picture. Image reconstruction refers to reconstructing an input complete image through an output vector of the downstream of the model; and ¶ [0064]: According to requirements of different industries and different application scenarios, a document image understanding task may include, for example, document information extraction, document content analysis, document comparison, etc.].
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to combine the process of Chen in view of Waine with the analysis of Peng in order to provide improved information to a system or user.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4-8 and 14-18 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.
The following is an examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance: While partitioning of video data for processing based on frame data, the specific processes based on the specific comparison and results of specific characteristics has not been found in the prior art.
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.”
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JONATHAN R MESSMORE whose telephone number is (571)272-2773. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 9-5 EST/EDT.
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/JONATHAN R MESSMORE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2482
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