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 Interpretation
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(f):
(f) Element in Claim for a Combination. – An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The claims in this application are given their broadest reasonable interpretation using the plain meaning of the claim language in light of the specification as it would be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art. The broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim element (also commonly referred to as a claim limitation) is limited by the description in the specification when 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is invoked.
As explained in MPEP § 2181, subsection I, claim limitations that meet the following three-prong test will be interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
(A) the claim limitation uses the term “means” or “step” or a term used as a substitute for “means” that is a generic placeholder (also called a nonce term or a non-structural term having no specific structural meaning) for performing the claimed function;
(B) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is modified by functional language, typically, but not always linked by the transition word “for” (e.g., “means for”) or another linking word or phrase, such as “configured to” or “so that”; and
(C) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is not modified by sufficient structure, material, or acts for performing the claimed function.
Use of the word “means” (or “step”) in a claim with functional language creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim limitation is to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. The presumption that the claim limitation is interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is rebutted when the claim limitation recites sufficient structure, material, or acts to entirely perform the recited function.
Absence of the word “means” (or “step”) in a claim creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim limitation is not to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. The presumption that the claim limitation is not interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is rebutted when the claim limitation recites function without reciting sufficient structure, material or acts to entirely perform the recited function.
Claim limitations in this application that use the word “means” (or “step”) are being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, except as otherwise indicated in an Office action. Conversely, claim limitations in this application that do not use the word “means” (or “step”) are not being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, except as otherwise indicated in an Office action.
This application includes one or more claim limitations that do not use the word “means,” but are nonetheless being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, because the claim limitation(s) uses a generic placeholder that is coupled with functional language without reciting sufficient structure to perform the recited function and the generic placeholder is not preceded by a structural modifier. Such claim limitation(s) is/are:
“a determining unit” in claim 8, the corresponding structure is defined in Figure 9 and 10, specification paragraph [0173-0180], “the interface rendering apparatus 400 may be the electronic device 100 shown in FIG. 1 or FIG. 2, or the interface rendering apparatus 400 may be a chip or a circuit in the electronic device 100 shown in FIG. 1 or FIG. 2……as shown in FIG. 9, the interface rendering apparatus 400 includes a determining unit 410 ……The determining unit 410 is configured to determine a plurality of target regions that are on a target interface and that correspond to a plurality of change controls ……As shown in FIG. 10, the electronic device 500 includes one or more processors 510 and one or more memories 520. The one or more memories 520 store one or more computer programs, and the one or more computer programs include instructions.”
“a rendering unit” in claim 8, the corresponding structure is defined in Figure 9 and 10, specification paragraph [0173-0180], “the interface rendering apparatus 400 may be the electronic device 100 shown in FIG. 1 or FIG. 2, or the interface rendering apparatus 400 may be a chip or a circuit in the electronic device 100 shown in FIG. 1 or FIG. 2……as shown in FIG. 9, the interface rendering apparatus 400 includes …… a rendering unit 420…… The rendering unit 420 is configured to: render and draw a plurality of groups of target controls to obtain a rendering and drawing result ……As shown in FIG. 10, the electronic device 500 includes one or more processors 510 and one or more memories 520. The one or more memories 520 store one or more computer programs, and the one or more computer programs include instructions.”
Because this/these claim limitation(s) is/are being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, it/they is/are being interpreted to cover the corresponding structure described in the specification as performing the claimed function, and equivalents thereof.
If applicant does not intend to have this/these limitation(s) interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, applicant may: (1) amend the claim limitation(s) to avoid it/them being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph (e.g., by reciting sufficient structure to perform the claimed function); or (2) present a sufficient showing that the claim limitation(s) recite(s) sufficient structure to perform the claimed function so as to avoid it/them being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph.
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 (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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 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.
Claim(s) 1-3, 5-6, 8-10, 12-14, 16-17 ad 19-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang et al. (CN 112698904 A), hereinafter as Wang, in view of Chua et al. (US 20040075657 A1), hereinafter as Chua. The original and a machine translation of Wang are provided by the examiner. The paragraphs of the machine translation of Wang start with both number and letter ‘n’.
Regarding claim 1, Wang teaches An interface rendering method (Wang paragraph [n0005] “The purpose of this application is to provide a UI rendering method that can, to some extent, solve the technical problem of how to improve the efficiency of UI rendering.”), comprising: determining a plurality of target regions of a target interface and that correspond to a corresponding plurality of change controls, wherein each change control comprises a control that changes in a next frame of the target interface relative to a current frame (Wang teaches change information as change controls from current frame to next frame, further teaches determining target dirty regions based on the change information, paragraph [n0079] “The first acquisition submodule is used to acquire change information of the target interface. The types of change information include button state changes, dragging sliders, and text input.”, paragraph [n0084-n0085] “The first determining unit is used to determine the initial dirty region in the pixel table based on the change information; The first processing unit is used to process the initial dirty regions to obtain non-overlapping target dirty regions.”), ……;
rendering and drawing a plurality of groups of target controls to obtain a drawing instruction, wherein the target control comprises a control of the current frame and that intersects the target region (Wang teaches determining the hierarchical relationship of the target control as the drawing instruction, paragraph [n0058] “a target dirty region can be determined, the overlapping region between the target dirty region and the control can be determined, and the target control corresponding to the overlapping region can be rendered. This realizes the rendering of the control on a region-by-region basis, and thus the rendering of the interface.”, paragraph [n0087] “The second determination submodule is used to determine the hierarchical relationship of the target controls on the canvas of the target interface”);
and rendering and drawing the plurality of groups of target controls on the target interface based on the drawing instruction to obtain the next frame (Wang paragraph [n0088] “The first rendering submodule is used to render the target control based on the hierarchical relationship, in the order of the upper layer to the lower layer, and obtain the rendering result.”).
Wang is not relied on for the below claim language ……and the target region is a minimum bounding rectangular region of a region occupied by the change control on the target interface; Chua teaches ……and the target region is a minimum bounding rectangular region of a region occupied by the change control on the target interface (Chua teaches deciding minimum bounding box as the target dirty region in Figure 2c and 2d, paragraph [0037-0039] “The present method defines the minimum area that the graphics software needs to render so as to reduce the fill rate requirement for an interactive experience. This minimum area is hereinafter referred to as the Aggregate Region…… A function is provided that computes the 2D bounding box of the projection of an object to the screen (a rectangular enclosure for the object). The method concatenates all the bounding boxes of the objects that have been changed during the processing stage. This resulting area is hereinafter referred to as the Object Region……The Object Region includes the bounding boxes of all the objects which have been changed, the bounding boxes surrounding the new position of the objects. In order to establish the minimum area in which rendering is needed, it is necessary to include not only the bounding boxes of new object data but also bounding boxes for the old.”).
Wang and Chua are in the same field of endeavor, namely user interface rendering based on dirty regions. Chua teaches defining a minimum bounding area for regions need to updated to improve efficiency (paragraph [0037] “The present method defines the minimum area that the graphics software needs to render so as to reduce the fill rate requirement for an interactive experience.”). Therefore, it would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Chua with the method of Wang to improve efficiency.
Regarding claim 2, Wang in view of Chua teach The method according to claim 1, and further teach wherein a sum of areas of the plurality of target regions is not equal to an area of a common region, and the common region is a minimum bounding rectangular region of a region occupied by the plurality of change controls on the target interface (Wang teaches deciding overlapping area between target dirty regions and control regions on target interface, Chua teaches the idea of forming minimum bounding area for multiple rectangle areas, it would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to apply the teaching of Chua to the common region of change controls, paragraph [n0053] “during the rendering of the interface, it is necessary to render the corresponding controls on the interface. The target dirty region is the area to be rendered in the target interface. Therefore, the overlapping area between the target dirty region and the controls in the target interface is the area that actually needs to be rendered. So, in order to ensure the accuracy of the interface rendering, after determining the target dirty region to be rendered in the target interface, we can determine the overlapping area between the target dirty region and the controls in the target interface so that the interface can be rendered based on the overlapping area.”).
Wang and Chua are in the same field of endeavor, namely user interface rendering based on dirty regions. Chua teaches defining a minimum bounding area for regions need to updated to improve efficiency (paragraph [0037] “The present method defines the minimum area that the graphics software needs to render so as to reduce the fill rate requirement for an interactive experience.”). Therefore, it would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Chua with the method of Wang to improve efficiency.
Regarding claim 3, Wang in view of Chua teach The method according to claim 1, and further teach wherein the sum of the areas of the plurality of target regions is less than an area of the target interface (Chua teaches an aggregated dirty regions ARB in an area inside the buffer in Figure 2c and 2d, paragraph [0057] “Object A then moves to a position denoted by A<3 >and since the object flag is set, a bounding box is calculated and added to ORB. Step 130 ORB is added to ARB' to form the final ARB, shown in phantom lines as an enlarged bounding box including ARB' and ORB. Rendering is now performed within the region ARB only”).
Wang and Chua are in the same field of endeavor, namely user interface rendering based on dirty regions. Chua teaches defining a minimum bounding area for regions need to updated to improve efficiency (paragraph [0037] “The present method defines the minimum area that the graphics software needs to render so as to reduce the fill rate requirement for an interactive experience.”). Therefore, it would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Chua with the method of Wang to improve efficiency.
Regarding claim 5, Wang in view of Chua teach The method according to claim 1, and further teach wherein one group of target controls comprises a plurality of target controls (Wang paragraph [n0055] “It should be noted that the target control corresponding to the overlapping area refers to the target control whose position matches that of the overlapping area. In this process, the target control may contain all of several controls, or only a part of the target control, etc. It can be determined according to actual needs, that is, only the part of the control that needs to be rendered needs to be rendered; the type of rendering result can also be determined according to actual needs.”).
Regarding claim 6, Wang in view of Chua teach The method according to claim 1, and further teach wherein the target control comprises a control that is in the current frame and that intersects a target region obtained through removing, the method further comprising: removing a same target region from the plurality of target regions (Wang teaches avoiding overlapping target dirty regions, paragraph [n0061] “during the process of determining the target dirty region in the pixel table based on change information, in order to avoid overlapping of target dirty regions and to avoid subsequent operations on overlapping target dirty regions multiple times, an initial dirty region can be determined in the pixel table based on change information; the initial dirty region is then processed to obtain non-overlapping target dirty regions. In this way, each target dirty region only needs to perform the subsequent steps of determining the overlapping area between the target dirty region and the controls in the target interface once, which improves the efficiency of the interface rendering method.”)
Regarding claim 8, Wang teaches An interface rendering apparatus (Wang paragraph [0001] “This application discloses an interface rendering method, system, device, and computer readable storage medium, which involves determining a target dirty region to be rendered in a target interface”), comprising:
a determining unit configured to determine a plurality of target regions of a target interface and that correspond to a corresponding plurality of change controls, wherein each of the plurality of change controls comprise a control that changes in a next frame of the target interface relative to a current frame (Wang teaches the first determining unit 101 as the determining unit, change information as change controls from current frame to next frame, further teaches determining target dirty regions based on the change information, paragraph [n0079] “The first acquisition submodule is used to acquire change information of the target interface. The types of change information include button state changes, dragging sliders, and text input.”, paragraph [n0084-n0085] “The first determining unit is used to determine the initial dirty region in the pixel table based on the change information; The first processing unit is used to process the initial dirty regions to obtain non-overlapping target dirty regions.”), ……;
and a rendering unit configured to render and draw a plurality of groups of target controls to obtain a drawing instruction, wherein each of the target control comprises a control of the current frame and that intersects the target region (Wang teaches first rendering module as the rendering unit, determining the hierarchical relationship of the target control as the drawing instruction, paragraph [n0058] “a target dirty region can be determined, the overlapping region between the target dirty region and the control can be determined, and the target control corresponding to the overlapping region can be rendered. This realizes the rendering of the control on a region-by-region basis, and thus the rendering of the interface.”, paragraph [n0087] “The second determination submodule is used to determine the hierarchical relationship of the target controls on the canvas of the target interface”), wherein the rendering unit is further configured to render and to draw the plurality of groups of target controls on the target interface based on the drawing instruction to obtain the next frame (Wang paragraph [n0088] “The first rendering submodule is used to render the target control based on the hierarchical relationship, in the order of the upper layer to the lower layer, and obtain the rendering result.”).
Wang is not relied on for the below claim language …… and the target region is a minimum bounding rectangular region of a region occupied by the change control on the target interface; Chua teaches …… and the target region is a minimum bounding rectangular region of a region occupied by the change control on the target interface (Chua teaches deciding minimum bounding box as the target dirty region in Figure 2c and 2d, paragraph [0037-0039] “The present method defines the minimum area that the graphics software needs to render so as to reduce the fill rate requirement for an interactive experience. This minimum area is hereinafter referred to as the Aggregate Region…… A function is provided that computes the 2D bounding box of the projection of an object to the screen (a rectangular enclosure for the object). The method concatenates all the bounding boxes of the objects that have been changed during the processing stage. This resulting area is hereinafter referred to as the Object Region……The Object Region includes the bounding boxes of all the objects which have been changed, the bounding boxes surrounding the new position of the objects. In order to establish the minimum area in which rendering is needed, it is necessary to include not only the bounding boxes of new object data but also bounding boxes for the old.”).
Wang and Chua are in the same field of endeavor, namely user interface rendering based on dirty regions. Chua teaches defining a minimum bounding area for regions need to updated to improve efficiency (paragraph [0037] “The present method defines the minimum area that the graphics software needs to render so as to reduce the fill rate requirement for an interactive experience.”). Therefore, it would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Chua with the method of Wang to improve efficiency.
Regarding claim 9, claim 9 has similar limitations as claim 2, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 2.
Regarding claim 10, claim 10 has similar limitations as claim 3, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 3.
Regarding claim 12, claim 12 has similar limitations as claim 5, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 5.
Regarding claim 13, claim 13 has similar limitations as claim 6, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 6.
Regarding claim 14, Wang teaches An electronic device comprising: a memory storing instructions; and a central processing unit CPU connected to memory and configured to execute instructions that cause the electronic device to (Wang paragraph [n0097] “This application provides an interface rendering device, including a memory 201 and a processor 202. The memory 201 stores a computer program, and the processor 202 executes the computer program to perform the following steps:”):
determine a plurality of target regions that are on a target interface and that correspond to a plurality of change controls, wherein each change control comprises a control that changes in a next frame of the target interface relative to a current frame (Wang teaches change information as change controls from current frame to next frame, further teaches determining target dirty regions based on the change information, paragraph [n0079] “The first acquisition submodule is used to acquire change information of the target interface. The types of change information include button state changes, dragging sliders, and text input.”, paragraph [n0084-n0085] “The first determining unit is used to determine the initial dirty region in the pixel table based on the change information; The first processing unit is used to process the initial dirty regions to obtain non-overlapping target dirty regions.”), …… ;
and render and draw a plurality of groups of target controls to obtain a drawing instruction, wherein the target control comprises a control of the current frame and that intersects the target region (Wang teaches determining the hierarchical relationship of the target control as the drawing instruction, paragraph [n0058] “a target dirty region can be determined, the overlapping region between the target dirty region and the control can be determined, and the target control corresponding to the overlapping region can be rendered. This realizes the rendering of the control on a region-by-region basis, and thus the rendering of the interface.”, paragraph [n0087] “The second determination submodule is used to determine the hierarchical relationship of the target controls on the canvas of the target interface”, paragraph [n0088] “The first rendering submodule is used to render the target control based on the hierarchical relationship, in the order of the upper layer to the lower layer, and obtain the rendering result.”).
Wang is not relied on for the below claim language …… and the target region is a minimum bounding rectangular region of a region occupied by the change control on the target interface; Chua teaches …… and the target region is a minimum bounding rectangular region of a region occupied by the change control on the target interface (Chua teaches deciding minimum bounding box as the target dirty region in Figure 2c and 2d, paragraph [0037-0039] “The present method defines the minimum area that the graphics software needs to render so as to reduce the fill rate requirement for an interactive experience. This minimum area is hereinafter referred to as the Aggregate Region…… A function is provided that computes the 2D bounding box of the projection of an object to the screen (a rectangular enclosure for the object). The method concatenates all the bounding boxes of the objects that have been changed during the processing stage. This resulting area is hereinafter referred to as the Object Region……The Object Region includes the bounding boxes of all the objects which have been changed, the bounding boxes surrounding the new position of the objects. In order to establish the minimum area in which rendering is needed, it is necessary to include not only the bounding boxes of new object data but also bounding boxes for the old.”).
Wang and Chua are in the same field of endeavor, namely user interface rendering based on dirty regions. Chua teaches defining a minimum bounding area for regions need to updated to improve efficiency (paragraph [0037] “The present method defines the minimum area that the graphics software needs to render so as to reduce the fill rate requirement for an interactive experience.”). Therefore, it would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Chua with the method of Wang to improve efficiency.
Regarding claim 16, claim 16 has similar limitations as claim 2, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 2.
Regarding claim 17, claim 17 has similar limitations as claim 3, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 3.
Regarding claim 19, claim 19 has similar limitations as claim 5, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 5.
Regarding claim 20, claim 20 has similar limitations as claim 6, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 6.
Claim(s) 4, 11 and 18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang et al. (CN 112698904 A), hereinafter as Wang, in view of Chua et al. (US 20040075657 A1), hereinafter as Chua, further in view of Zheng et al. (US 20210375235 A1), hereinafter as Zheng. The original and a machine translation of Wang are provided by the examiner. The paragraphs of the machine translation of Wang start with both number and letter ‘n’.
Regarding claim 4, Wang in view of Chua teach The method according to claim 1, wherein the rendering and drawing a plurality of groups of target controls comprises: but are not relied on for the below claim language when a sum of areas of the plurality of target regions is less than a first threshold, rendering and drawing the plurality of groups of target controls. Zheng teaches when a sum of areas of the plurality of target regions is less than a first threshold, rendering and drawing the plurality of groups of target controls (Zheng teaches computing percentage of dirty regions in the whole display region, and uses it to compute a similarity score, if the score is less than a threshold, the dirty regions will be rendered, paragraph [0069-0071] “ A calculation formula of a model for a similarity between two frames is established according to the calculated percentage p of the dirty region and the similarity s, i.e.: Similarity(p,s)=α*p+β*s (1). In the formula (1), p represents the percentage of the dirty region in the whole display region, s represents the similarity between the dirty regions in the previous and next frames, a is a weight parameter of p, β is a weight parameter of s, and α+β=1. Values of a and β may be regulated as required. At S34, a similarity Similarity(p, s) between image data of the dirty regions in the previous and next image frames is calculated according to the similarity algorithm introduced above at an interval of a period T. A similarity threshold value £ is set, and magnitudes of the similarity Similarity(p, s) and the threshold value £ are compared. When Similarity(p, s) is less than or equal to £, the similarity between the previous and next image frames is relatively low, namely the previous and next image frames are greatly different, such that a Vsync signal is not processed and is normally distributed and transmitted to a SurfaceFlinger for normal layer composition and updating.”).
Wang, Chua and Zheng are in the same field of endeavor, namely user interface rendering based on dirty regions. Zheng teaches a method of deciding similarity between dirty regions of two frames to decide whether to redraw the dirty region, in order to improve performance (paragraph [0071] “thereby achieving the purpose of reducing the power consumption during running of a GPU and a CPU to reduce the influence brought to the power consumption by UI redrawing during running of the electronic device and further improve the overall performance of the electronic device.”). Therefore, it would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Zheng with the method of Wang and Chua to improve performance.
Regarding claim 11, claim 11 has similar limitations as claim 4, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 4.
Regarding claim 18, claim 18 has similar limitations as claim 4, therefore it is rejected under the same rationale as claim 4.
Claim(s) 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang et al. (CN 112698904 A), hereinafter as Wang, in view of Chua et al. (US 20040075657 A1), hereinafter as Chua, further in view of Dang et al. (CN 111611031 A), hereinafter as Dang. The original and a machine translation of Wang and Dang are provided by the examiner. The paragraphs of the machine translation of Wang start with both number and letter ‘n’.
Regarding claim 15, Wang in view of Chua teach The electronic device according to claim 14, but are not relied on for the below claim language further comprising a graphics processing unit (GPU), wherein: execution of the instructions by the CPU further causes the CPU to send the drawing instruction to the GPU; and the GPU renders and draws the plurality of groups of target controls on the target interface based on the drawing instruction to obtain the next frame. Dang teaches further comprising a graphics processing unit (GPU) (Dang paragraph [0141] “the processor 110 integrates a CPU and a GPU”), wherein: execution of the instructions by the CPU further causes the CPU to send the drawing instruction to the GPU; and the GPU renders and draws the plurality of groups of target controls on the target interface based on the drawing instruction to obtain the next frame (Dang paragraph [0141] “The above processes (1)-(4) can
be executed by the CPU, and process (5) can be executed on the GPU. That is, the process of rendering textures for the view is executed by the GPU. Specifically, when the CPU finishes executing process (4), it can send an instruction to the GPU, which is used to instruct the GPU to execute process (5).”, paragraph [0139] “(5) hwui determines which views need to be updated and which views do not need to be
updated…… Hwui sends the rendered texture of view3 and other views (view1 and view2) to WMS. WMS combines the other views (view1 and view2) and the re-rendered texture of view3 into a GUI, which is then sent to the display driver via surfaceflinger. The display screen 194 displays this GUI.”).
Wang, Chua and Dang are in the same field of endeavor, namely user interface rendering based on dirty regions. Dang teaches a CPU and GPU combined approach to update user interface to improve efficiency (paragraph [0105] “This application provides a graphics drawing method. In this method, when some views in the GUI need to be updated while others do not, the mobile phone 100 can only render the texture of the views that need to be updated, which helps to save power consumption and
improve efficiency.”). Therefore, it would have been obvious for a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Dang with the method of Wang and Chua to improve efficiency.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 7 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 7, the closest prior art of Dang teaches constructing a view tree based on the target display interface in Figure 7 (paragraph [0150] “the graphics drawing instructions include the display area included in the GUI (i.e., the target graphic) to be drawn. Therefore, the mobile phone 100 can construct a view tree based on the display area included in the target graphic, where each view corresponds to a display area.”). However, Dang fails to teach the combined limitation below as a whole “adding a new array for a node of each control in a control tree of the target interface to record and manage a target region reported by a child node of the control; traversing each control to obtain attribute information of the target region corresponding to the change control in the control; and storing the attribute information in an array corresponding to a root node of the change control and clearing an array corresponding to a node other than the array corresponding to the root node, wherein the array corresponding to the root node comprises the target regions corresponding to all the change controls on the target interface”. Furthermore, no prior art of record either alone or in combination teaches the above limitation as a whole. Therefore, claim 7 is considered to allowable.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Radhakrishnan et al. (US 20170032764 A1) teaches a method for deciding dirty region based on positional and content change between various layers, further discusses cases when full frame composition is needed (paragraph [0067] “FIG. 3B illustrates the case where full mobile display processor (MDP) composition with partial update does not function well when a frame's geometry changed in a draw cycle (e.g., in the case of displacement of any layer, removal of any layer, etc.). Therefore, to avoid resulting in a composed image frame that is corrupted, in some cases, processor 12 may instruct display processor 18 to perform full frame composition on frame N+1, rather than just update part of frame N+1, even though only a small portion needs to be updated.”).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to XIAOMING WEI whose telephone number is (571)272-3831. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:00-5:00.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Kee Tung can be reached at (571)272-7794. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/XIAOMING WEI/Examiner, Art Unit 2611
/KEE M TUNG/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2611
Prosecution Insights