Detailed Action
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
The Office Action is in response to claims filed on 5/27/2025 where claims 1-20 are pending and ready for examination.
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.
Claims 4-7 and 12-15 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 § 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.
Claims 1, 8-9, 16-17 and 20 are rejected under 35 USC 103 as being unpatentable over Davey (US 20230064652) in view of Gullford (US 2018009576)
Regarding claim 1, Davey discloses an information synchronization method performed by a computer device, the method comprising:
obtaining absolute pose information of a virtual object in a virtual scene at a current moment, the absolute pose information at the current moment being pose information determined based on a reference object at the current moment (Davey; Davey teaches obtaining for the virtual world being rendered when the client joins (i.e. virtual scene), the virtual object’s transform component defining its position and orientation in virtual world coordinates, thereby obtaining the object’s absolute pose at that current rendering moment. Davey further applies a hierarchical relationship in which movement , rotation, or scaling of a parent virtual object causes the related child virtual object to correspondingly change . Accordingly, the child virtual object’s absolute poste at the current moment is determined based on the parent/reference object’s transform at that same current moment ;
see e.g. Davey [0030], [0059]);
determining a serialization mechanism for the absolute pose information (Davey; Davey teaches the utilization of serialization with respect to the absolute pose information;
see e.g. [0018] As will be described in more detail below, prioritized replications of virtual worlds described herein may be accomplished in various ways, including by serializing data about each asset of the virtual world (e.g., each virtual object, object attribute, or other entity associated with the world) and by transmitting this serialized data in a prioritized manner (e.g., with more important or relevant assets first) to connected client devices over a network (e.g., using User Datagram Protocol (UDP), Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), or another suitable network transfer protocol as may serve a particular implementation). As will be detailed below, serialized data replicated in this way may contain information about the appearance, pose, interactivity, and various other relevant information for a given virtual object, and may be used by the client device to recreate the virtual world and present the world to a user of the client device.
The Examiner notes that Davey’s serialized “pose” information identified above because the pose defines the virtual object’s position and orientation within the virtual world coordinate system [0059]));
when the serialization mechanism has the following value change characteristic:
a data volume of data obtained by performing serialization on pose information by using the serialization mechanism is positively correlated with a value of the corresponding pose information, obtaining relative pose information of the virtual object at the current moment based on the value change characteristic of the serialization mechanism; and
writing the obtained relative pose information into a property synchronization data stream corresponding to a client by using the serialization mechanism, to transmit the property synchronization data stream to the client (Davey; Davey teaches the utilization of serialization to write virtual object property data, including pose information, into serialized virtual -world replication data transmitted to connected client devise so that each client can recreate the virtual world. Davey further transmits subsequent updates to the replicated virtual world ,thereby updating the corresponding virtual-object properties maintained at the client. Thus the obtained relative pose information identified above is written, using the serialization mechanism, into the stream of serialized virtual object updates corresponding to the client. Because that stream communicates successive pose-property updates to maintain the client’s replicated virtual object state, the stream constitutes the claimed property synchronization data stream, which Davey transmits to the client; [0018], [0019])
Davey does not expressly disclose:
when the serialization mechanism has the following value change characteristic:
a data volume of data obtained by performing serialization on pose information by using the serialization mechanism is positively correlated with a value of the corresponding pose information, obtaining relative pose information of the virtual object at the current moment based on the value change characteristic of the serialization mechanism;
The Examiner notes the above limitation is a contingent limitation (MPEP 2111.04) and although the limitation has been addressed it is not a requirement.
Gullford discloses:
a serialization mechanism having a value change characteristic in which the data volume produced by serializing object information is positively correlated with the corresponding value of that object information (Gullford; Gullford serializes an object’s integer information as variable length integers occupying between one and ten bytes depending on the value being written; therefore increased information value requires additional serialized bytes and produces an increased serialized data stream ;[0022] – [0024], [0028]
see e.g. [003] “... The term “serializing” refers to converting structured data to a byte stream, usually either for storage or for communication ...”)
Therefore it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate Gullford’s serialization scheme. The motivation being the combined solution provides for implanting a known technique resulting in increased efficiencies of rendering virtual scenes.
Davey in view of Gullford discloses:
a data volume of data obtained by performing serialization on pose information by using the serialization mechanism is positively correlated with a value of the corresponding pose information, obtaining relative pose information of the virtual object at the current moment based on the value change characteristic of the serialization mechanism (The combined solution provides for serializing the relative pose information using Gullford’s value change serialization scheme, wherein the serialized data volume varies according to the corresponding information value. Thus, larger values produce a greater serialized data volume, while smaller values produce a lesser serialized data volume);
Regarding claim 8, Davey in view of Gullford disclose The method according to claim 1, wherein the obtained relative pose information is configured for indicating a difference between the absolute pose information of the virtual object at the current moment and absolute pose information of the virtual object at a previous moment, and the absolute pose information at the previous moment is pose information determined based on the reference object at the previous moment(Davey ([0059]) provides the reference based pose relationship and relative location of the virtual object, Applying that relationship at successive moments provides an absolute pose at the previous moment and an absolute pose at the current moment, each determined with respect to the reference/parent object at the corresponding moment. The relative pose information can therefore indicate the different between those successive absolute poses).
Regarding claim 9, claim 9 comprises the same and/or similar subject matter as claim 1 and is considered an obvious variation; therefore it is rejected under the same rationale.
Regarding claim 16, claim 16 comprises the same and/or similar subject matter as claim 8 and is considered an obvious variation; therefore it is rejected under the same rationale.
Regarding claim 17, claim 17 comprises the same and/or similar subject matter as claim 1 and is considered an obvious variation; therefore it is rejected under the same rationale.
Regarding claim 20, claim 20 comprises the same and/or similar subject matter as claim 8 and is considered an obvious variation; therefore it is rejected under the same rationale.
Claims 2-3 , 10-11, and 18-19 are rejected under 35 USC 103 as being unpatentable over Davey in view of Gullford and in further view of Saucedo (US 10,661,169)
Regarding claim 2, Davey in view of Gullford disclose The method according to claim 1, further comprising:
obtaining status information of the virtual object at the current moment (Davey’s current transform/pose information – position, orientation, and other current virtual object attributes – is information describing the virtual object’s present status per Independent claim 1);
when the virtual object has the status condition, performing the operation of obtaining relative pose information of the virtual object at the current moment based on the value change characteristic of the serialization mechanism (The combined solution per Independent claim 1 provides the underlying operation of obtaining relative pose information based on the value-change characteristic); and
when the virtual object does not have the status condition, writing the absolute pose information of the virtual object at the current moment into the property synchronization data stream corresponding to the client by using the serialization mechanism (The combined solution provides that, when the virtual object does not have the status condition per Davey as Davey’s absolute pose is the virtual object’s position/orientation in virtual-world coordinates, and Davey serializes that pose/property information into the client replicatin/synchronization data transmitted to the client. The new matter is that this operation occurs when the status condition is not satisfied)
Davey in view of Gullford does not expressly disclose:
determining a status condition that the virtual object is required to have when the relative pose information of the virtual object at the current moment is used
Saucedo discloses:
Determining a condition that object information is required to satisfy when relative/delta information is used (Saucedo; Saucedo teaches determining a condition that must be satisfied for relative object information to be used, namely whether the difference between the previous and current object information values is representable using the allocated delta bits;
See e.g. Column 15, Lines 28 – 48)
Therefore it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate Saucedo’s scheme. The motivation being the combined solution provides for implementing a known technique resulting in increased efficiencies of transmitting data.
Davey in view of Gullford and in further view of Saucedo disclose:
determining a status condition that the virtual object is required to have when the relative pose information of the virtual object at the current moment is used (The combined solution per Saucedo’ scheme provides for determining from the current virtual object status information, whether the object satisfies the condition for using relative pose information. When that condition is satisfied, the relative pose representation is used)
Therefore it would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate Gullford’s serialization scheme. The motivation being the combined solution provides for implanting a known technique resulting in increased efficiencies of rendering virtual scenes.
Regarding claim 3, Davey in view of Gullford and in further view of Saucedo disclose the method according to claim 2, wherein the relative pose information of the virtual object at the current moment comprises at least one of the following: a relative velocity and a relative location (The combined solution per Davey ([0059]). One of ordinary skill in the art is readily able to derive relative velocity from successive location samples by determining the change in relative position over the known time interval between frames e.g. based on the frame rate)
the status information comprises at least one of the following: a status identifier configured for indicating whether the virtual object is attached to another virtual object, and a status identifier configured for indicating whether the virtual object is in physics simulation (Davey does not expressly disclose if the virtual object is or is/not attached to another virtual object. However the Examiner takes Official Notice that said feature is well known and conventional in the art, and it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to utilize said feature in order increase efficiencies of rendering scenes); and
the status condition comprises at least one of the following: the virtual object is not attached to another virtual object, and the virtual object is not in the physics simulation (Davey does not expressly disclose if the virtual object is or is/not attached to another virtual object. However the Examiner takes Official Notice that said feature is well known and conventional in the art, and it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to utilize said feature in order increase efficiencies of rendering scenes).
Regarding claim 10, claim 10 comprises the same and/or similar subject matter as claim 2 and is considered an obvious variation; therefore it is rejected under the same rationale
Regarding claim 11, claim 11 comprises the same and/or similar subject matter as claim 3 and is considered an obvious variation; therefore it is rejected under the same rationale
Regarding claim 18, claim 18 comprises the same and/or similar subject matter as claim 2 and is considered an obvious variation; therefore it is rejected under the same rationale
Regarding claim 19, claim 19 comprises the same and/or similar subject matter as claim 3 and is considered an obvious variation; therefore it is rejected under the same rationale
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the Examiner should be directed to TODD L. BARKER whose telephone number is (571) 270 0257. The Examiner can normally be reached on Monday through Friday, 7:30am to 5:00pm.
If attempts to reach the Examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the Examiner's supervisor Vivek Srivastava can be reached on (571) 272 7304.
/TODD L BARKER/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2449
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