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 Objections
Claim 23 is objected to because of the following informalities: “wherein interpolate” should say “wherein interpolating” Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 25 and 29 are 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.
Claim 25 recites the limitation “the encoder of claim 24". There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. Claim 24 is a cancelled claim that can no longer be depended upon. Further correction is required. Examiner suggests changing to “the encoder of claim 23”.
Claim 25 is rejected for being indefinite as a result of being dependent on a canceled claim. Further correction is required. Examiner suggests changing to “the encoder of claim 23”.
Claim 29 recites the limitation “the encoder method of claim 19” when claim 19 refers to just the encoder itself. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. Examiner suggests changing to “the encoder of claim 19”.
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.
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.
Claims 1, 9, 11-12, 19, 27, and 29-31 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gibbs (US 20120316885 A1) in view of Atti et al. (hereinafter Atti) (WO 2017030705 A1) (see attached copies for page numbers).
Regarding claim 1, Gibbs discloses:
interpolating the full band input frame to an intermediate frame (Gibbs, P[0010]: "interpolator 403, resampler 404, decimater 405, spectral reversal circuitry 406, decimator 407, and spectral shaping circuitry 408 server to generate high band speech signals." Gibbs uses interpolation/resampling in generating a high band signal. EVS supplies the conventional frame-to-frame resampling implementation for converting a source buffer having one number of samples into a destination buffer having another number of samples);
performing a reversal of a spectrum of the intermediate frame to produce a spectrally reversed intermediate frame (Gibbs, P[0011]: "The spectral reversal operation may be implemented by multiplying the signal with the function e.sup.jn.pi. or the sequence (-1)n", multiplying successive samples by alternating signs reverses the spectrum, thus, producing the claimed spectrally reversed intermediate signal);
interpolating the spectrally reversed intermediate frame to match a sampling frequency of a low pass filter and decimation process (Gibbs, P[0010]: "interpolator 403, resampler 404, decimater 405, spectral reversal circuitry 406, decimator 407", (Gibbs teaches sample rate changing interpolation/resampling, spectral reversal, and downstream decimation in the same high-band-generation architecture; applying the known interpolation/resampling operation to place the reversed signal at the sampling rate required by the downstream filtering/decimation stage predictably provides the claimed rate matching.); and
performing a low pass filtering (Gibbs, P[0011]: "The spectral shaping operation may be implemented as a lowpass filter", supplies low pass filtering in the high-band processing chain)
Gibbs does not explicitly disclose:
A method performed in an encoder,
the method comprising:
receiving a full band input frame
and decimation of the interpolated spectrally reversed intermediate frame to produce a band width extension, BWE, target signal However, Atti discloses:
A method performed in an encoder (Atti, Abstract: "receiving, at an encoder, an input signal having a low-band portion and a high-band portion.", Atti performs the disclosed high-band target-generation method at an encoder, reading on the claimed method being performed in an encoder), the method comprising:
receiving a full band input frame (Atti: "the techniques described with respect to the present disclosure may also be applicable to Super Wideband signals (e.g., a signal having a frequency range between 0 Hz and 16 kHz) and Full Band signals", Atti states its input-audio processing applies to full band signals as the encoder processes incoming audio in analysis frames, thus, reading on receiving a full-band input frame);
and decimation of the interpolated spectrally reversed intermediate frame to produce a band width extension, BWE, target signal (Atti, P[0051]: "decimate the spectrally flipped signal by a factor of four to generate the high-band target signal 126. The high-band target signal 126", Atti generates the high-band/BWE target by decimating the spectrally flipped signal)).
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Gibbs in view of Atti. Doing so would have brought the interpolation, spectral reversal, filtering, and decimation techniques of Gibbs (Gibbs, Abstract, P[0010]-P[0013]) with the generation of a high-band target signal of Atti (Atti, Abstract, P[0043], P[0051]) because Atti teaches using spectral flipping and decimation to generate a target representing the high frequency portion of an input signal, thus, predictably generating a BWE target signal using Gibb’s interpolation, spectral reversal, filtering, and decimation operations.
Regarding claim 9, the combination of Gibbs and Atti discloses the method of claim 1. The combination further discloses:
PNG
media_image1.png
197
500
media_image1.png
Greyscale
(Gibbs, P[0011]: "The spectral reversal operation may be implemented by multiplying the signal with the function e.sup.jn.pi. or the sequence (-1)n, whose values alternate between -1 and -1.", directly performing applicant's intended even/odd sign reversal, starts alternating sequence with the opposite global polarity produces the alternative claimed even/odd convention while accomplishing the same spectral reversal.)
Regarding claim 11, the combination of Gibbs and Atti discloses the method of claim 1.
The combination further discloses: further comprising selecting a cut-off frequency of the low pass filtering to be substantially near a middle of the spectrum (Gibbs, P[0011]: "The spectral shaping operation may be implemented as a lowpass filter configured to shape the signal to obtain a desired overall filter response.", for decimation by two, the anti alias low pass boundary is conventionally located at approximately one-half of the pre-decimation Nyquist range, thus, placing the cutoff substantially near the middle of the spectrum).
Regarding claim 12, the combination of Gibbs and Atti discloses the method of claim 11.
The combination further discloses:
wherein performing the low pass filtering and decimation of the reversed spectrum to produce the BWE target signal comprises performing the low pass filtering and decimation to align the BWE target signal in a lower half of the spectrum ((Atti, P[0051]: "decimate the spectrally flipped signal by a factor of four to generate the high-band target signal 126", Atti decimates the spectrally reversed/flipped signal to form the claimed BWE/high-band target, Atti, P[0051]: "The high-band target signal 126 may be a baseband signal spanning from 0 Hz to 2 kHz").
Regarding claim 19, claim 19 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 1 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Regarding claim 27, claim 27 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 9 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Regarding claim 29, claim 29 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 11 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Regarding claim 30, claim 30 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 12 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Regarding claim 31, the combination of Gibbs and Atti discloses the encoder of claim 30.
Gibbs further discloses:
PNG
media_image2.png
133
533
media_image2.png
Greyscale
(Gibbs, P[0011]: “the same functional block may be used to perform the operations of decimation by to 12.8 kHz (402) and decimation by 5/11 to 16 kHz (407)”, P[0041]: “the 16 kHz signal is decimated by 2 via decimator 407”, Gibbs teaches decimating a signal such that its sampling frequency is reduced according to the decimation ratio. For a frame having an unchanged temporal duration, the number of samples is proportional to its sampling frequency, such that Ninter/finter = Ndec/fdec, rearranging gives Ndec = Ninter(fdec/finter), as claimed).
Claims 2-4, and 20-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gibbs (US 20120316885 A1) (see attached copies for page numbers) in view of Atti et al. (hereinafter Atti) (WO 2017030705 A1) and in further view of ETSI (ETSI TS 126 445 V14.2.0 (2018-01)) (see attached copies for page numbers).
Regarding claim 2, the combination of Gibbs and Atti discloses the method of claim 1.
The combination doesn’t not explicitly disclose:
further comprising:
determining (610, 1201) an intermediate length of the intermediate frame Ninter However, ETSI discloses:
further comprising:
determining (610, 1201) an intermediate length of the intermediate frame Ninter (ETSI, Page 416: "Buffer resampling with linear interpolation", EVS performs buffer resampling between source and destination sample counts, which necessarily establishes the new/intermediate frame length used by the resampling operation)
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Gibbs in view of Atti and ETSI. Doing so would have brought the linear interpolation of efficient resampling of a signal buffer between different sample counts of ETSI (ETSI, Page 416) with the interpolation, spectral reversal, filtering, and decimation techniques of Gibbs (Gibbs, Abstract, P[0010]-P[0013]) and with the generation of a high-band target signal of Atti (Atti, Abstract, P[0043], P[0051]) thus, predictably providing appropriately sized intermediate samples/frames for generating the BWE target signal.
Regarding claim 3, the combination of Gibbs, Atti, and ETSI discloses the method of claim 2.
The combination further discloses:
wherein determining the intermediate length comprises rescaling a length of an input frame N in an input sampling frequency finput until an upper limit of a target band matches a Nyquist frequency in the intermediate frame (Gibbs, p[0013]: "a sample rate which corresponds to precisely twice the upper frequency of the band to be coded.", a sampling frequency exactly twice the upper band edge places that upper edge at the Nyquist frequency, fs / 2. Gibbs therefore teaches the claimed target-band-upper-edge/Nyquist relationship).
Regarding claim 4, the combination of Gibbs, Atti, and ETSI discloses the method of claim 2.
The combination further discloses:
PNG
media_image3.png
167
508
media_image3.png
Greyscale
(ETSI, Page 416, "5.4.4.4: Buffer resampling with linear interpolation", this section includes resampling a fixed duration source buffer from one sample/count rate to another, for unchanged frame duration) (Gibbs, P[0013]: "a sample rate which corresponds to precisely twice the upper frequency of the band to be coded.", Gibbs teaches setting the sampling rate equal to twice the target-band upper frequency, directly corresponding to finter = 2fhi, " the required sampling rate is 28.8 kHz to code the highband with an upper frequency of 14.4 kHz.", Gibbs identifies the upper frequency of the target high band and corresponding sampling rate, while EVS supplies the finite input/output frame lengths used during resampling, together these identify the claimed quantities in the equation.)
Regarding claim 20, claim 20 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 2 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Regarding claim 21, claim 21 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 3 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Regarding claim 22, claim 22 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 4 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Claims 8 and 26 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gibbs (US 20120316885 A1) in view of Atti et al. (hereinafter Atti) (WO 2017030705 A1) (see attached copies for page numbers) and in further view of Disch et al. (hereinafter Disch) (WO 2016142336 A1) (see attached copies for page numbers).
Regarding claim 8, the combination of Gibbs and Atti discloses the method of claim 1.
The combination does not explicitly disclose:
w herein receiving the full band input frame comprises receiving a full band down-mix signal generated by a discrete Fourier transform, DFT, synthesis However, Disch discloses:
w herein receiving the full band input frame comprises receiving a full band down-mix signal generated by a discrete Fourier transform, DFT, synthesis (Disch, Page 7 Top: "Input to the linear prediction domain encoder 6 is the downmix signal 14", supplies downmix signal as the signal input to the encoder, Page 9 Top: "an oversampled DFT with a low overlapping region is employed.", Page 9 top: "a synthesis filterbank after LPD decoding", Disch supplies a downmix signal as the signal input to the encoder. It performs DFT-domain stereo/downmix processing followed by synthesis back toward the time domain signal, supplying the claimed DFT synthesis origin of the downmix).
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Gibbs in view of Atti and Disch. Doing so would have brought Disch’s DFT-synthesized downmix signal (Disch, Abstract, Pages 7-9) with the interpolation, spectral reversal, filtering, and decimation techniques of Gibbs (Gibbs, Abstract, P[0010]-P[0013]) and with the generation of a high-band target signal of Atti (Atti, Abstract, P[0043], P[0051]) thus, predictably enabling generation of the BWE target from a SFT-synthesized full-band downmix signal.
Regarding claim 26, claim 26 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 8 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Claims 14-17 and 32-35 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gibbs (US 20120316885 A1) in view of Atti et al. (hereinafter Atti) (WO 2017030705 A1) (see attached copies for page numbers) and in further view of ETSI (ETSI TS 126 445 V14.2.0 (2018-01)) (see attached copies for page numbers) and Disch et al. (hereinafter Disch) (WO 2016142336 A1) (see attached copies for page numbers).
Regarding claim 14, the combination of Gibbs and Atti discloses the method of claim 1.
The combination further discloses:
further comprising inputting the BWE target signal to a BWE encoder (Atti, P[0037]: "high-band target signal that is used to estimate an LP spectral envelope of the high-band and to estimate temporal gain parameters of the high- band.", Atti supplies generated high band target to high band/BWE analysis and coding operations, reading on inputting BWE target to the BWE encoder)
The combination does not explicitly disclose:
via a BWE target buffer,
where the BWE encoder and BWE target buffer are part of an encoder operating on at least two frequency bands
However, ETSI discloses:
via a BWE target buffer (ETSI, Page 221, "High band target signal generation", ETSI stores the generated high-band target samples in high band target-signal buffers used by time-domain bandwidth extension analysis, reading on providing the BWE target through a target buffer to the BWE encoder)
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Gibbs in view of Atti and ETSI. Doing so would have brought the linear interpolation of efficient resampling of a signal buffer between different sample counts of ETSI (ETSI, Page 416) with the interpolation, spectral reversal, filtering, and decimation techniques of Gibbs (Gibbs, Abstract, P[0010]-P[0013]) and with the generation of a high-band target signal of Atti (Atti, Abstract, P[0043], P[0051]) thus, predictably providing appropriately sized intermediate samples/frames for generating the BWE target signal.
The combination of Gibbs, Atti, and ETSI does not explicitly disclose:
where the BWE encoder and BWE target buffer are part of an encoder operating on at least two frequency bands
However, Disch discloses:
where the BWE encoder and BWE target buffer are part of an encoder operating on at least two frequency bands (Disch, Page 4: "The downmix signal has a low band and a high band", Abstract: "linear prediction domain core encoder (16) is configured to apply a bandwidth extension processing for parametrically encoding the high band", Disch's encoder operates on low and high frequency bands And includes BWE processing of the high band).
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Gibbs in view of Atti, ETSI, and Disch. Doing so would have brought Disch’s DFT-synthesized downmix signal (Disch, Abstract, Pages 7-9) with the linear interpolation of efficient resampling of a signal buffer between different sample counts of ETSI (ETSI, Page 416) with the interpolation, spectral reversal, filtering, and decimation techniques of Gibbs (Gibbs, Abstract, P[0010]-P[0013]) and with the generation of a high-band target signal of Atti (Atti, Abstract, P[0043], P[0051]) thus, predictably providing buffered BWE target processing within a multi-band downmix encoder supporting selectable encoding modes and parametric stereo.
Regarding claim 15, the combination of Gibbs, Atti, ETSI, and Disch discloses the method of claim 14.
The combination further discloses:
wherein the BWE encoder and the BWE target buffer are part of a down-mix encoder of the encoder (Disch, Page 6 Bottom: "Input to the linear prediction domain encoder 6 is the downmix signal 14", Disch, Page 6 Bottom: "a time domain bandwidth extension processor 36 may parametrically encode a band of a portion of the downmix signal 14, which is removed from the downsampled downmix signal 34 which is input into the ACELP processor 30. The time domain bandwidth extension processor 36 may output a parametrically encoded band 38 of a portion of the downmix signal 14.", Disch places BWE processing directly within the encoder processing the downmix signal; EVS's high-band target buffer would predictably be incorporated into that BWE analysis.
Regarding claim 16, the combination of Gibbs, Atti, ETSI, and Disch discloses the method of claim 15.
The combination further discloses:
wherein the down-mix encoder of the encoder comprises at least two encoding modes, wherein at least one of the at least two encoding modes has the BWE encoder (Disch, Page 8, middle-bottom: "The downmix is further coded by a switchable mono ACELP/TCX core that is supported by either TD-BWE or IGF modules.", switchable ACELP/TCX core provides at least two alternative encoding modes for the downmix).
Regarding claim 17, the combination of Gibbs, Atti, ETSI, and Disch discloses the method of claim 16.
The combination further discloses:
wherein the encoder operates on a down-mix signal in a parametric stereo encoder (Disch: Page 6 Bottom: "Input to the linear prediction domain encoder 6 is the downmix signal 14 downmixed by downmixer 12.", Disch operates the encoder on the downmix signal, Disch, Page 8: "The parametric stereo coding is performed by the "LPD stereo parameter coding" block 18", Disch performs parametric stereo coding in same LPD/downmix encoding architecture, reading on claimed encoder operating on the downmix signal in a parametric stereo encoder)).
Regarding claim 32, claim 32 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 14 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Regarding claim 33, claim 33 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 15 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Regarding claim 34, claim 34 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 16 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Regarding claim 35, claim 35 recites the encoder associated with the method of claim 17 and is rejected for the same reasons as above.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5, 23, and 25 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. Claims 5 and 25 refer to using linear interpolation to stretch or compress a frame of length N to a frame of Length N2 in accordance with the piecewise interpolation equations below:
PNG
media_image4.png
319
517
media_image4.png
Greyscale
No combination of prior art could be found that would render obvious the specific limitations above regarding claimed fractional-point calculation and offset relationship. In particular the prior art of record does not teach or suggest the claimed interpolation scheme including the boundary extrapolation conditions for ifrac > N1 – 1, together with the recited determination of ifrac, ifloor, and ioffset.
Claim 25 is likewise allowable by virtue of its dependency on claim 23 and therefore includes all of the limitations of allowable claim 23 and if the 35 U.S.C. 112b issues are rectified as mentioned above with the Examiner suggestion in the 112b rejection section.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SHASHIDHAR S MANOHARAN whose telephone number is (571)272-6772. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:00-4:00.
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, Andrew Flanders can be reached at 571-272-7516. 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.
/SHASHIDHAR SHANKAR MANOHARAN/Examiner, Art Unit 2655
/ANDREW C FLANDERS/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2655
Prosecution Insights