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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
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.
Claims 1-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Krah et al. (US PGPub 2019/0286220) in view of Tan et al. (US PGPub 2019/0324572).
Regarding claim 1, Krah discloses an electrostatic input apparatus (fig. 1, computing system 100) comprising:
a sensor (fig. 1, touch sensor panel 124) configured to perform input detection ([0033], “Touch sensor panel 124 can include a capacitive sensing medium having row traces (e.g., drive lines) and column traces (e.g., sense lines)”);
a processor ([0032], “The touch controller 106 can also include power management logic 145, which can be used to manage power consumption by various components of the controller. The power management logic 145 can access the processor subsystem 102, the receive section 107, the demodulation section 109, the panel scan logic 110, the RAM 112, and the transmit section 114, autonomously receive data from and send data to these components via, for example, power management signals 146, and manage power consumption of these components”); and
a memory ([0036], “the functions described above can be performed, for example, by firmware stored in memory (e.g., one of the peripherals) and executed by the processor subsystem 102, or stored in the program storage 132 and executed by the host processor 128”) that includes instructions, which when executed, cause the processor to execute:
performing switching control between a regular mode and a low power consumption mode ([0126], “In the absence of a near touch or touch condition for more than idle period TIDLE[1], the system can transition into a ready mode state (1551)”), and determining presence or absence of an operation input based on a difference value obtained by subtracting a reference value from an output value of the sensor electrode ([0053], “Certain frequencies can produce higher noise amounts than others. The sense channels 207 can operate to reduce noise in the touch signal and to reduce noise contributions from the sense channel components themselves. Higher noise amounts can result in higher power consumption because the components can operate a higher level to reduce more noise. Conversely, lower noise amounts can result in lower power consumption because the components can operate at a lower level to reduce less noise. As a result, the components' power consumption can be affected by the frequency. Accordingly, power requirements can be determined for various frequencies associated with corresponding noise levels, thereby avoiding higher power consumption during lower noise conditions”);
updating the reference value based on the output value in an intermittent operation in the low power consumption mode ([0126], “FIG. 15 illustrates an exemplary state diagram for power management during operating modes of a system having touch controller power management according to various embodiments. In the example of FIG. 15, the touch system can be in an active state (1550) due to the presence of a near touch or touch condition. In the absence of a near touch or touch condition for more than idle period TIDLE[1], the system can transition into a ready mode state (1551) and after another idle period TIDLE[2] to other ready mode states (and so forth) with modified scan durations. The maximum scan durations can be a function of the particular application, e.g., an application in which touch images are acquired within a certain period without compromising the responsiveness and performance of the touch subsystem. In some applications, the scan duration in ready mode state N (1553) can be at a maximum, e.g., 50 ms, where N can be an integer. After the system has been idle for an extended time TIDLE[2+N], the system can transition into an auto-scan mode (1554) with progressively longer scan periods in states (1555) and can enter the final auto-scan mode state M (1556) in which the system can reside until a near touch or touch is detected, where M can be an integer. Any near touch or touch condition can cause the system to transition into active mode regardless of the current mode”); and
in a first determination of first determining the presence or absence of the operation input ([0060], “The bias current adjustments can be from low to high or any combination thereof, depending on the noise conditions and the noise reduction capabilities of the components. In some embodiments, there can be a noise threshold, for example at a given phase increment, which can define an upper limit of the amount of noise tolerable in the touch signal. As such, the bias current adjustments can be configured so as to allow noise to reach but not exceed that noise threshold. For example, it can be determined that the current to the bandpass filter can be adjusted to low for a given phase increment in order to reduce the filter's noise reduction operation while not exceeding the noise threshold”).
While Krah discloses a sensor panel including rows and columns of traces, it has been known to use sensor electrodes to perform the sensing function. Additionally, while Krah discloses switching from low power to regular power, it has been known to use the last updated value during the switching. In a similar field of touch input devices, Tan discloses wherein the sensor is a sensor electrode ([0030], “a plurality of sensing electrodes (e.g., 36 electrodes being shown in FIG. 1”); after switching from the low power consumption mode to the regular mode, determining the presence or absence by using the output value first acquired in the first determination of the presence or absence of the operation input and the reference value last updated in the low power consumption mode ([0010], “a parallel sensing technique is adaptable to both a normal mode and a low power mode, wherein the normal mode is referred to, for example, a mode for detecting the touch position, and the low power mode is referred to, for example, a mode for detecting a touch event to confirm whether to return to the normal mode. By using the parallel sensing technique in the normal mode, the multi-touch detection is facilitated and the detection sensitivity is improved. By using the parallel sensing technique in the low power mode, the scanning interval is shortened so as to reduce the total power consumption”).
In view of the teachings of Krah and Tan, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use the last updated reference value during switching from low to regular mode, as taught by Tan, within the system of Krah, for the purpose of reducing a total power consumption of a touch input device (Tan: [0010]).
Regarding claim 2, the combination of Krah and Tan further discloses wherein the instructions, which when executed, cause the processor to execute, in the first determination of the presence or absence of the operation input after switching from the low power consumption mode to the regular mode, determining the presence or absence of the operation input by comparing, to a predetermined threshold value, the difference value obtained by subtracting the reference value last updated in the low power consumption mode from the output value first acquired in the first determination of the presence or absence of the operation input (Krah: [0054], “The SNR headroom for external noise (NZ_HDRM) can be calculated as the internal SNR minus the maximum allowable total SNR of the sense channel. In this example, the total SNR can be 60 dB. As such, in the absence of external noise, the frequency (FT_1) and the bias current level (IB_1) can be selected because the external noise SNR of 0 would be lower than the SNR headroom of 3 dB at this frequency and bias current level. Similarly, if an SNR headroom of 5 dB is acceptable, the frequency (FT_2) and the bias current level (IB_2) can be selected because the acceptable SNR headroom would be lower than the SNR headroom of 6 dB at this frequency and bias current level”).
Regarding claim 3, the combination of Krah and Tan further discloses wherein the instructions, which when executed, cause the processor to execute determining the presence or absence of the operation input by using a plurality of the predetermined threshold values corresponding to a distance between the sensor electrode and an object to which the operation input is to be made (Krah: [0034], “This decrease can in turn cause a signal charge Qsig present at the pixels being touched to decrease, where Qsig can be the product of Csig multiplied by the stimulation signal amplitude. Therefore, the distance between a grounded object, such as a finger, and a touched pixel can be related to the level of Qsig”).
Regarding claim 4, the combination of Krah and Tan further discloses wherein the instructions, which when executed, cause the processor to execute updating the reference value based on the output value when the difference value is less than the predetermined threshold value and determining that there is no operation input (Tan: [0058], “When the detection interval T5 is entered, the first multiplexer MUXm is connected to the sensing electrode <6> and the second multiplexer MUXp is connected to the sensing electrodes <7>, and the differential operation cancels out the voltage change ΔV. When the detection interval T6 is entered, the first multiplexer MUXm is connected to the sensing electrodes <6> and <7>, and the differential operation causes the voltage change ΔV to become larger than 0. When the detection interval T7 is entered, the first multiplexer MUXm is connected to the sensing electrode <7>, and the differential operation causes the voltage change ΔV still be larger than 0. In detection intervals T8-T12, as there is no capacitance change on sensing electrodes <8> to <15>, the voltage change ΔV after the differential operation is 0. Detection intervals corresponding to the voltage change ΔV larger than a voltage threshold TH are used to indicate a touch location”).
Regarding claim 5, the combination of Krah and Tan further discloses wherein the instructions, which when executed, cause the processor to execute changing an update interval for updating the reference value in the intermittent operation according to a degree of change of the output value (Krah: [0126], “In the absence of a near touch or touch condition for more than idle period TIDLE[1], the system can transition into a ready mode state (1551) and after another idle period TIDLE[2] to other ready mode states (and so forth) with modified scan durations. The maximum scan durations can be a function of the particular application, e.g., an application in which touch images are acquired within a certain period without compromising the responsiveness and performance of the touch subsystem. In some applications, the scan duration in ready mode state N (1553) can be at a maximum, e.g., 50 ms, where N can be an integer. After the system has been idle for an extended time TIDLE[2+N], the system can transition into an auto-scan mode (1554) with progressively longer scan periods in states (1555) and can enter the final auto-scan mode state M (1556) in which the system can reside until a near touch or touch is detected, where M can be an integer. Any near touch or touch condition can cause the system to transition into active mode regardless of the current mode”).
Regarding claim 6, the combination of Krah and Tan further discloses wherein the instructions, which when executed, cause the processor to execute, in updating the reference value based on the output value in the intermittent operation in the low power consumption mode, refraining from updating the reference value by using the output value acquired in the intermittent operation, when an absolute value of a difference between the reference value before updating and the output value acquired in the intermittent operation is greater than or equal to a predetermined value (Krah: [0131], “Based on the LUT adjustments corresponding to the entries, the components to be adjusted can be identified (1720). The adjustments can be applied to the identified components to manage their power consumption (1725). If no entries are found to correspond to the determined operating conditions and/or operating modes, an interrupt flag can be set to notify an associated processor that no corresponding entries were found and the components can continue operating at current conditions and/or in the current modes (1730). Alternatively, the processor can intervene. In some embodiments, when no corresponding entries are found, the closest entries or default entries can be used”).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Srivastava et al. (US PGPub 2018/0188847) discloses “FIG. 8 is a timeline showing an example of the voltage on self capacitor Csrx1, in which charge is pumped to self capacitor Csrx1 over multiple pump cycles. As shown in FIG. 8, the voltage on self capacitor Csrx1 increases by a voltage step for each pump cycle. Although the voltage steps are shown as being uniform in FIG. 8 for simplicity, it is to be appreciated that this need not be the case. At the end of the pump cycles, the voltage on self capacitor Csrx1 is raised to voltage Vsrx1 in FIG. 8” ([0074]).
Ding et al. (US 12,487,699) discloses a method for calculating position information in a touchscreen (fig. 6).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to EMILY J FRANK whose telephone number is (571)270-7255. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Thursday 8AM-6PM.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Benjamin C Lee can be reached at (571)272-2963. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/EJF/
/BENJAMIN C LEE/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2629
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