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 .
DETAILED ACTION
Claims 1–14 have been submitted for examination.
Claims 1–4, 7–11, and 14 have been examined and rejected.
Claims 5–6 and 12–13 are objected to.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5–6 and 12–13 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.
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.
Claim 8 recites the limitation "configured to to control" in line 3. For purposes of examination the limitation will be interpreted as “configured to control”. Appropriate correction is required.
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.
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 of this title, 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 1, 7–8, and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Marchand et al. (US 2021/0194945) in view of Senapati (US 10,341,598).
Regarding claims 1 and 8, Marchand discloses:
A display device comprising: a display; (Marchand, ¶ [0005], “received data corresponding to a video are generally decoded, then rendered via the terminal in the form of a display of the corresponding video with its associated soundtrack. Below, for the sake of simplification, the digital content will be considered to be a video and the rendition by the terminal, or consumption by the user of the terminal, will be considered to be viewing of this video on the screen of the terminal.”) and a controller configured to control the display, (Marchand, ¶ [0016], “A navigation interface showcases selectable contents, and allows various live television channels to be accessed via a list of contents that is called a VZL (Virtual Zapping List). The navigation interface in question may be displayed concomitantly with a multimedia content, called the main content, being broadcast and streamed in HAS mode.”) wherein the controller is configured to: (Marchand, ¶ [0015], “Such an apparatus is conventionally plugged into the HDMI port of a television set and communicates, via a Wi-Fi® connection, with another apparatus of the home communication network (residential gateway, computer, smart phone, tablet, etc.) that is connected to a wide-area communication network such as the Internet, with a view to rendering, on the television set, the multimedia content received by a compatible software application. Below, such apparatuses will be referred to as HDMI keys.”) when a connection of a first external device is recognized, set the first external device to be controlled via an input means, control the display to output a video, (Marchand, ¶ [0016], “The quality of the video delivered to the client terminal will therefore continuously adapt to constraints on its access bandwidth, creating competition with all the other services that consume bandwidth and in particular navigation interfaces. A navigation interface showcases selectable contents, and allows various live television channels to be accessed via a list of contents that is called a VZL (Virtual Zapping List). The navigation interface in question may be displayed concomitantly with a multimedia content, called the main content, being broadcast and streamed in HAS mode.”)
Marchand does not explicitly teach “check a status of the video to recognize a connection of a second external device, and set the second external device to be controlled via the input means.”.
In a similar field of endeavor Senapati teaches:
check a status of the video to recognize a connection of a second external device, and set the second external device to be controlled via the input means. (Senapati, col. 3, ln. 25–45, “As an example, upon detecting that the multimedia device 30 is providing signals of multimedia content during presentation of the desired multimedia content by the multimedia device 20, the television 10 may display “Device connected to HDMI 2 is in ON state but not used for watching. Device can be put on standby to save power”, thereby notifying the user to turn off the unused device or put the unused device in a standby mode for saving power. In one embodiment, the television 10 may further issue a command that conforms to the HDMI-CEC (HDMI-consumer electronics control) specification to the multimedia device 30 through the HDMI connector “HDMI_2” for putting the multimedia device 30 in a standby mode, but this disclosure is not limited in this respect.”)
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to combine the system for a communication link between a stream reader terminal and a restitution terminal as taught by Marchand with the system for putting an inactive device into standby as taught by Senapati, the motivation is “to achieve the objective of saving power” as taught by Senapati (col. 3, ln. 45–55).
Regarding claims 7 and 14, the combination of Marchand and Senapati teaches:
The display device of claim 8, wherein the first external device is a sound bar, and the second external device includes at least one of a set-top box and a game console.
Claims 2–4 and 9–11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Marchand et al. (US 2021/0194945) in view of Senapati (US 10,341,598), and further in view of Park (US 2009/0049205).
Regarding claims 2 and 9, the combination of Marchand and Senapati teaches:
The display device of claim 8,
The combination does not explicitly teach “wherein the second external device is connected only to the first external device and not to the display device.”.
In a similar field of endeavor Park teaches:
wherein the second external device is connected only to the first external device and not to the display device. (Park, ¶ [0039], “The respective external devices 200 and 300 are connected with one or two external devices 400, 500 and 600.”)
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to combine the system for a communication link between a stream reader terminal and a restitution terminal as taught by Marchand with the system for putting an inactive device into standby as taught by Senapati further with the HDMI network topology as taught by Park, the motivation is “ the display apparatus 100 may be connected with a plurality of external devices in a chain. The address setting unit 20 sets the physical address and the logical address to separately control a video signal or an audio signal inputted by the plurality of external devices.” as taught by Park (¶ [0039]).
Regarding claims 3 and 10, the combination of Marchand, Senapati, and Park teaches:
The display device of claim 9, wherein the display device and the first external device, and the first external device and the second external device are respectively connected (Park, ¶ [0039], “The respective external devices 200 and 300 are connected with one or two external devices 400, 500 and 600.”) via HDMI. (Park, ¶ [0042], “The external device interfaces 11 and 12 according to the present embodiment are HDMI, and the method or process of setting the addresses apply to known HDMI standards.”)
Regarding claims 4 and 11, the combination of Marchand, Senapati, and Park teaches:
The display device of claim 10, wherein the controller is configured to: when additional HDMI-CEC information as a result of the video status check is received, perform an operation for automatically recognizing the second external device based on the additional HDMI-CEC information. (Park, ¶ [0043], “The UI generator 30 provides UI information on the external device control to a user according to a control of the controller 50. If the display apparatus 100 is connected with the external devices 200 to 700, the UI generator 30 displays various UI information on the display unit 40 so that a user controls the external devices 200 to 700 through the CEC channel. As shown in FIG. 4, the UI information generated by the UI generator 30 includes an external device menu window I and an external device control window II to select or set the external devices 200 to 700.”)
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MICHAEL B PIERORAZIO whose telephone number is (571)270-3679. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday - Thursday, 8am - 5pm.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Nasser Goodarzi can be reached on 5712704195. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MICHAEL B. PIERORAZIO/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2426
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