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 .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
2. A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 04/13/2026 has been entered.
Response to Amendment
3. This communication is in response to the RCE filed on 04/13/2026. The Examiner has acknowledged the amended Claims 1, 11 and 16. No Claims have been cancelled and/or added. Claims 1-20 are pending and Claims 1-20 are rejected.
Response to Arguments
4. Applicant's Arguments (Remarks: Pages: 8-10) filed on 03/24/2026 have been fully considered and they are persuasive. However, applicant’s other arguments are now moot in view of the new reference applied (US 2015/0106447 Al, Hague). Applicant’s amendment necessitated a new grounds of rejection.
5. Applicant's arguments [Remarks Pages: 8-10] with respect to 35 USC 103 rejection have been fully considered and they are persuasive. However, applicant’s arguments are now moot in view of the new reference applied (US 2015/0106447 Al, Hague). Please see the 35 USC 103 rejection below.
Applicant’s arguments with respect to Claims 11 and 16 are based on applicant’s argument’s with respect to Claim 1 and are moot for the same reasons discussed with respect to Claim 1 above.
Applicant’s amendment necessitated a new grounds of rejection.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
6. 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.
7. 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.
8. This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
9. Claims 11, 12 and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hiniker (US 2013/0086195 A1, hereinafter Hiniker) in view of Hague (US 2015/0039752 A1, hereinafter Hague) and further in view of Hague (US 2015/0106447 A1, hereinafter Hague-R2).
Regarding Claim 11,
Hiniker discloses a method for reducing security risk on a building management system communication network (Hiniker: [Abstract] provides interoperability between automation devices communicating within a building automation system, ¶ [0006] a method of interfacing between two or more automation devices communicating within a building automation system, ¶ [0017], Fig. 1) comprising a Master-Slave/Token Passing (MS/TP) communication bus (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108a to 108f may be configured to communicate according to a wired BACnet MS/TP network protocol, See also Fig. 1—106), and a plurality of Building Automation Control network (BACnet) devices coupled to the MS/TP communication bus (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108 (individually identified as automation components 108a to 108, See Fig. 1 --108), the plurality of BACnet devices comprising a first BACnet device and a second BACnet device (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108a to 108f may be configured to communicate according to a wired BACnet MS/TP network protocol, ¶ [0018], See Fig. 1 –110, 108 (i.e. connected through 106 network)), the method comprising:
providing a bridge device coupled to the MS/TP communication bus and located between the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108 (individually identified as automation components 108a to 108f). The one or more automation devices 108a to 108f may be configured to communicate according to a wired BACnet MS/TP network protocol…, automation interface 200a may operate as an interface between the BACnet IP protocol configured automation devices 104, ¶ [0018] automation interfaces 200c and 200b provide a similar mechanism by which MS/TP compatible automation devices 108 and 110 can communicate), wherein the bridge device comprises a processing circuit (Hiniker: ¶[0019] The automation interface 200 includes the hardware, software and controls to facilitate communications and data exchange between automation devices operating according to different network protocols, ¶ [0020-0023] See Fig. 2, memory, processor);
receiving, by the processing circuit, a first MS/TP packet, using a BACnet protocol, from the first BACnet device (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108 (individually identified as automation components 108a to 108f). The one or more automation devices 108a to 108f may be configured to communicate according to a wired BACnet MS/TP network protocol, ¶[0040] the interface control routine 302 of the automation interface 200b is active and configured to exchange packets of data and information with the automation device 110a via the communication modules 212, 222 coupled along the data connection 214 (starts at step 402). The interface control routine 302, in response to receiving a BACnet MS/TP formatted packet from the automation device 110a via the communication module 212 and/or the communication driver 306);
identifying, by the processing circuit, Network Protocol Data Unit (NPDU) information or Application Protocol Data Unit (APDU) information from the first MS/TP packet (Hiniker: ¶ [0037] control routine 302 queries the routing table 312 based on the destination address contained within the data envelope to determine if there is a corresponding destination address, ¶ [0041] evaluates and removes the header and trailer information from the data
envelope portion of the packet (as well as the associated destination address) while leaving the BACnet message portion of the packet unchanged…, utilizes the removed data envelope information to verify that the remote network number stored in the BACnet portion of the routing table 312 corresponds to a destination BACnet ZigBee MAC address operable within a BACnet ZigBee network…, utilizing the combination of the network number and the unique MAC address, each device can address and communicate with another device on any of the networks 102, 106 and 114, ¶ [0045] verify that the destination network number associated with the destination address corresponds to the remote BACnet network
number (step 510)…, remote network information associated with the destination
BACnet network, ¶¶[0040, 0048]);
configuring, by the processing circuit, a first security configuration, wherein the first security configuration is based on the NPDU information or the APDU information (Hiniker: ¶ [0032] BACnet portion of the routing table 312 may, in turn, include entries that correspond to the entries of the VMAC portion. Accordingly, the BACnet portion, in this example, includes: a BACnet ZigBee short address; a BACnet ZigBee long address, a remote network number and a BACnet tunnel cluster endpoint, ¶ [0041] verify that the remote network number stored in the BACnet portion of the routing table 312); and
selectively forwarding, by the processing circuit, the first MS/TP packet, using the BACnet protocol, to the second BACnet device, based on the first security configuration (Hiniker: ¶ [0041] evaluates and removes the header and trailer information from the data envelope portion of the packet (as well as the associated destination address) while leaving the BACnet message portion of the packet unchanged (step 408)…, the combination of the network number and the unique MAC address, each device can address and communicate with another device on any of the networks 102,106 and 114 regardless of the network protocols implemented by the various devices (and networks), ¶[0042] the MS/TP network protocol portion of the packet formatted according to the BACnet standard may be replaced with the ZigBee network protocol. Upon completion of the conversion routine 310, the interface control routine 302 utilizes the communication driver 306 to wirelessly transmit the reformatted packet (including the original BACnet message) via the wireless transceiver 212b (step 424), ¶¶ [0035, 0040]).
Hiniker does not explicitly disclose:
configuring, by the processing circuit, a first security configuration, wherein the first security configuration is based on the NPDU information or the APDU information; and
selectively forwarding, by the processing circuit, the first MS/TP packet, using the BACnet protocol to the second BACnet device, based on the first security configuration.
However, Hague from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses a BACnet Router is configured to improve communications between BACnet devices by caching
the addresses and data parts of messages sent between the devices (Hague: [Abstract]), Advanced BACnet Router (ABR) for linking together multiple BACnet Networks in a BACnet Internetwork of BACnet devices communication with each other using the BACnet protocol…, one of a packet logging functional block, instrumentation electronics for measuring Network parameters, and a memory cache for storing at least one of messages, BACnet device information, and BACnet-protocol packets (Hague: ¶ [0006]), Each of the BACnet Networks 110, 120, 130 are assigned a unique Network Number…, (Hague: ¶ [0016]) BACnet Network 130, is similar to the second Network 120, but in this case it has been implemented as a BACnet/MSTP (Hague: ¶ [0017]), collecting Network topology information, which may include caching address/routing information of BACnet messages, which may include actively exploring the BACnet Networks using standard BACnet messages to build an internal map of the BACnet devices and their locations…, cache may be implemented in a BACnet Router, and may be configured to identify unauthorized or disconnected devices to allow the BACnet Router to prevent forwarding of messages to the unauthorized or disconnected device (Hague: ¶ [0010]), and a BACnet Internetwork requires that all Networks and devices have uniquely assigned Network Numbers, Device Instance Numbers and Device Object Names…, ABR allows aliasing, or reassigning, these parameters. This means that during the relay of BACnet packets, the above parameters are examined within the communications packets, and if there is a collision, the ABR re-allocates a new parameter before forwarding the packet (Hague: ¶ [0060], also see ¶¶ [0007, 0027, 0047, 0040-0042, 0051]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112,150 (Hague: ¶ [0040], also see ¶ [0047]).
Hiniker and Hague does not explicitly disclose:
selectively forwarding, by the processing circuit, the first MS/TP packet, using the BACnet protocol to the second BACnet device, based on the first security configuration.
However, Hague-R2 from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses that
links normally carry logic-level signals encoded to conform to a particular protocol, such as USB…, or BACnet MS/TP, which define a low level protocol and are collectively referred to herein as the Host Protocol. The controller device 100 may include only one type of link to support only one of the Host Protocols, or more than one protocol may be accommodated (Hague-R2: ¶ [0037]), BACnet Internetwork is a term defined by the ASHRAE BACnet standard to describe a collection of BACnet controller devices 1806, which are able to communicate with each other using the BACnet protocol over various physical networks 1802, 1804. Since the two physical networks have different BACnet Network Numbers, and are of different physical types, they need to be linked together by a BACnet Router 1803 (Hague-R2: ¶ [0128]), a BACnet Router 1803 is responsible to receive a packet from any one of the BACnet devices 1801, 1806 on the BACnet Internetwork 1807 and forward the packet to the final destination (Hague-R2: ¶ [0129]), and If the OEM were to choose logic level BACnet MS/TP for their host protocol, then by inserting the basic
communications Module 210 they would have a 100% BACnet MS/TP compliant system (Hague-R2: ¶ [0097], ¶¶ [0096, 0098]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague-R2 in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so to allow BAC devices on separate network segments to communicate without conversion and to lower the processing overhead of the router.
Regarding Claim 12,
Claim 12 is dependent on Claim 11, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, and Hague-R2 discloses all the limitations of Claim 11. Hiniker discloses automatically detecting, via the processing circuit, the plurality of BACnet devices (Hiniker: ¶ [0035] the communication routine 314 may access or query the routing address table 324 to determine a destination address for one or more of the automation devices 104, 108 and/or 110…, the destination address stored in the routing address table 324 will comply and provide the information necessary to identify an MS/TP compliant automation device, ¶ [0036]).
Regarding Claim 14,
Claim 14 is dependent on Claim 11, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague and Hague-R2 discloses all the limitations of Claim 11.
Hiniker further discloses wherein the bridge device is coupled to the MS/TP communication bus and located between the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device transparently, such that the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device are operationally unaware of the bridge device (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108a to 108f may be configured to communicate according to a wired BACnet MS/TP network protocol, See Fig. 1 –108 (i.e. connected through 106 network)).
Hiniker does not explicitly disclose discloses wherein the bridge device is coupled to the MS/TP communication bus and located between the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device transparently, such that the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device are operationally unaware of the bridge device.
Hague further discloses a BACnet Router is configured to improve communications between BACnet devices by caching the addresses and data parts of messages sent between the devices…, perform proxy functionality (Hague: [Abstract]), Advanced BACnet Router (ABR) for linking together multiple BACnet Networks in a BACnet Internetwork of BACnet devices communication with each other using the BACnet protocol (Hague: ¶ [0006]), ABR 214 includes additional functional blocks, such as a packet logging and diagnostic packet forwarding functional (Hague: ¶ [0027]), ABR can act as a proxy for these simple devices, polling for the data from the simple device in a controlled fashion (Hague: ¶ [0051], ¶ [0008]), and ABR e.g. 354, which interprets the received data and forwards the BACnet part of the message onto its local BACnet Internetwork 302. By this means, transparent connectivity between two similar sites, with conflicting Network numbers is achieved (Hague: ¶ [0061]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112,150 (Hague: ¶ [0040]).
10. Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hiniker (US 2013/0086195 A1, hereinafter Hiniker) in view of Hague (US 2015/0039752 A1, hereinafter Hague), in view of Hague (US 2015/0106447 A1, hereinafter Hague-R2), and further in view of Zhao (WO 2013/078776 A1, hereinafter Zhao).
Regarding Claim 13,
Claim 13 is dependent on Claim 11, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague and Hague-R2 discloses all the limitations of Claim 11. Hiniker further discloses automatically providing a second MS/TP packet to the first BACnet device responsive to the first MS/TP packet not being selectively forwarded to the second BACnet device (Hiniker: ¶ [0046] If no response or destination information is found at step 518, the packet is dropped by the interface control routine 302, which then sends an undeliverable message to the automation device 110a) based on the first security configuration, wherein the second MS/TP packet comprises: a rejection response; information to proxy the second BACnet device as a provider of the second MS/TP packet.
Hiniker does not explicitly disclose automatically providing a second MS/TP packet to the first BACnet device responsive to the first MS/TP packet not being selectively forwarded to the second BACnet device based on the first security configuration, wherein the second MS/TP packet comprises: a rejection response; information to proxy the second BACnet device as a provider of the second MS/TP packet.
However, Hague further discloses an Advanced BACnet Router (ABR) for linking together multiple BACnet Networks in a BACnet Internetwork of BACnet devices communication with each other using the BACnet protocol (Hague: ¶ [0006]), BACnet Network 130, is similar to the second Network 120, but in this case it has been implemented as a BACnet/MSTP (Hague: ¶ [0017]), ABR 214 includes additional functional blocks, such as …, diagnostic packet forwarding functional block 216 that is implemented as a software module, and performs…, packet forwarding (Hague: ¶ [0027]), cache may be implemented in a BACnet Router, and may be configured to identify unauthorized or disconnected devices to allow the BACnet Router to prevent forwarding of messages to the unauthorized or disconnected device (Hague: ¶ [0010], ¶ [0050]), and adding a new device or removing a device from a Network are also considered and accommodated (Hague: ¶ [0043]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112,150 (Hague: ¶ [0040]).
The combination of Hiniker, Hague and Hague-R2 does not explicitly disclose automatically providing a second MS/TP packet to the first BACnet device responsive to the first MS/TP packet not being selectively forwarded to the second BACnet device based on the first security configuration,
wherein the second MS/TP packet comprises:
a rejection response;
information to proxy the second BACnet device as a provider of the second MS/TP packet.
However, Zhao from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses a proxy server is provided in said network, a router and a proxy client device are provided on each area and routing table of each area is provided on said proxy server (Zhao: [Abstract]), and proxy device is the side receiving the proxy request…, the OSPF routings will be searched for matching routings…, if no matching routing is found, a failure response message will be returned to the side initiating the proxy request, which may include all information in the proxy request (source address, destination address and request type of said side) as well as the proxy calculation failure information (Zhao: [Page 19 Lines: 17-24]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Zhao in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so to improve the efficiency of the system by identifying non-existent or blocked destinations and to fix incorrect configurations of the destination address in the sender’s side to avoid potential failures.
11. Claim 15 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hiniker (US 2013/0086195 A1, hereinafter Hiniker), in view of Hague (US 2015/0039752 A1, hereinafter Hague), in view of Hague (US 2015/0106447 A1, hereinafter Hague-R2), and further in view of Heo (US 2015/0215277 A1, hereinafter Heo).
Regarding Claim 15,
Claim 15 is dependent on Claim 11, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague and Hague-R2 discloses all the limitations of Claim 11. Hiniker further discloses identifying, by the processing circuit, that the first MS/TP packet comprises a BACnet request (Hiniker: ¶ [0037] receives the BACnet messaging standard formatted packet from the communication module 212…, queries the routing table 312 based on the destination address contained within the data envelope to determine if there is a corresponding destination address…., broadcasted request may be a request for a specific address corresponding to a desired device).
The combination of Hiniker, Hague and Hague-R2 does not explicitly disclose wherein the bridge device further comprises a Network Answer Translation (NAT) interface coupled to the processing circuit, wherein the method further comprising:
configuring, by the NAT interface, a second security configuration;
providing, by the NAT interface, the second security configuration to the processing circuit; and
selectively forwarding, by the processing circuit, a second MS/TP packet from the second BACnet device to the first BACnet device based on the second security configuration,
wherein the second security configuration is configured such that the processing circuit does not selectively forward the second MS/TP packet unless the second MS/TP packet comprises a BACnet response to the BACnet request.
Heo from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses the NAT apparatus 20 performs network address translation between an inside network and an outside network when a client 10 and a server 30 communicate with each other. (Heo: ¶ [0039]), NAT apparatus 20
translates the inside IP address of a packet received from the client 10 into the outside IP address and transmits the outside IP address to the server 30 (Heo: ¶ [0041]), when the client 10B transmits a packet of <B, S, #cookie+request> to the NAT apparatus 20, the packet determining unit 231 of the NAT apparatus 20 determines that the received packet is not the cookie request packet or the cookie response packet (step S732) and performs the NAT operation (step S734) to transmit a packet of <C, S, #cookie+request>to the server 30 (Heo: ¶ [0115]), server 30 responds to the packet of the client 10B as <S, C, response>, and the NAT apparatus 20 also determines that the packet received from the server 30 does not correspond to the cookie request packet or the cookie response packet ( step S7 42) and performs the NAT operation (step S744) to provide a packet of <S, B, response> to the client 10B (Heo: ¶ [0116]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Heo in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so as a result security may be improved and a connection delay time may be reduced (Heo: ¶ [0117]).
12. Claims 1-6, 9-10, 16 and 18-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hiniker (US 2013/0086195 A1, hereinafter Hiniker) in view of Hague (US 2015/0039752 A1, hereinafter Hague), in view of Hague (US 2015/0106447 A1, hereinafter Hague-R2), and further in view of Minami et al. (US 2023/0007019 A1, hereinafter Minami).
Regarding Claim 1,
Hiniker discloses a building management system communication network configured to reduce security risk, the network comprising (Hiniker: [Abstract] automation interface device is disclosed that provides interoperability between automation devices communicating within a building automation system, ¶ [0017], Fig. 1):
a Master-Slave/Token Passing (MS/TP) communication bus (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108a to 108f may be configured to communicate according to a wired BACnet MS/TP network protocol, See also Fig. 1—106);
a plurality of Building Automation Control network (BACnet) devices coupled to the MS/TP communication bus (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108 (individually identified as automation components 108a to 108, See Fig. 1 --108), the plurality of BACnet devices comprising a first BACnet device coupled to the MS/TP communication bus (Hiniker: ¶ [0018] include automation devices 110 (individually identified by the reference numerals 110a to 110c) grouped or arranged to establish subnets 112a and 112b. The automation devices 110a to 110c may be, for example, temperature sensors, damper actuators, lighting control devices and VAY controllers. In one example, the individual automation devices 110 operate according to the BACnet MS/TP network protocol, See Fig. 1 –110(i.e. connected through 106 network)) and a second BACnet device coupled to the MS/TP communication bus (Hiniker: ¶[0017] one or more automation devices 108a to 108f may be configured to communicate according to a wired BACnet MS/TP network protocol, See Fig. 1);
a plurality of bridge devices coupled to the MS/TP communication bus (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108 (individually identified as automation components 108a
to 108f). The one or more automation devices 108a to 108f may be configured to communicate according to a wired BACnet MS/TP network protocol…, automation interface 200a may operate as an interface between the BACnet IP protocol configured automation devices 104, ¶ [0018] automation interfaces 200c and 200b provide a similar mechanism by which MS/TP compatible automation devices 108 and 110 can communicate
), the plurality of bridge devices comprising a first bridge device (Hiniker: ¶[0018] the automation interface 200b is directly coupled to the BACnet MS/TP protocol configured device 11 Oa to allow for wireless information and data exchange between the BACnet MS/TP protocol configured device 110a and each of the remaining the BACnet MS/TP protocol configure
devices 110b and 110c, Fig. 1 –200b), the first bridge device located on the MS/TP communication bus between the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device (Hiniker: ¶¶[0017, 0018], Fig. 1 –200c, 200b, 200a), the first bridge device comprising a processing circuit and a memory, the processing circuit configured to (Hiniker: ¶[0019] The automation interface 200 includes the hardware, software and controls to facilitate communications and data exchange between automation devices operating according to different network protocols, ¶ [0020-0023] See Fig. 2, memory, processor):
receive a first MS/TP packet, using a BACnet protocol, from the first BACnet device (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108 (individually identified as automation components 108a to 108f). The one or more automation devices 108a to 108f may be configured to communicate according to a wired BACnet MS/TP network protocol, ¶[0040] the interface control routine 302 of the automation interface 200b is active and configured to exchange packets of data and information with the automation device 110a via the communication modules 212, 222 coupled along the data connection 214 (starts at step 402). The interface control routine 302, in response to receiving a BACnet MS/TP formatted packet from the automation device 110a via the communication module 212 and/or the communication driver 306), and
selectively forward the first MS/TP packet, using the BACnet protocol, to the second BACnet device based on a first security configuration, the first security configuration comprising one or more configurable rules based on a type of BACnet communication between the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device (Hiniker: ¶[0042] the MS/TP network protocol portion of the packet formatted according to the BACnet standard may be replaced with the ZigBee network protocol. Upon completion of the conversion routine 310, the interface control routine 302 utilizes the communication driver 306 to wirelessly transmit the reformatted packet (including the original BACnet message) via the wireless transceiver 212b (step 424), ¶ [0016] first network 102 may be a network operable according to the BACnet IP network protocol. Similarly, the one or more automation devices 104 may be configured to communicate according to the BACnet IP network protocol, ¶ [0017] second network 106, in this exemplary embodiment, may be a network operable according to the Master Slave/Token-Passing (MS/TP) network protocol, ¶ [0018] See Fig. 1 different communication types among Bacnet networks, ¶¶ [0018, 0035, 0040-0041]).
Hiniker does not explicitly disclose selectively forward the first MS/TP packet, using the BACnet protocol, to the second BACnet device based on a first security configuration, the first security configuration comprising one or more configurable rules based on a type of BACnet communication between the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device.
However, Hague from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses a BACnet Router is configured to improve communications between BACnet devices by caching
the addresses and data parts of messages sent between the devices (Hague: [Abstract]), Advanced BACnet Router (ABR) for linking together multiple BACnet Networks in a BACnet Internetwork of BACnet devices communication with each other using the BACnet protocol (Hague: ¶ [0006]), BACnet Network 130, is similar to the second Network 120, but in this case it has been implemented as a BACnet/MSTP (Hague: ¶ [0017]), ABR 214 includes additional functional blocks, such as a packet logging and diagnostic packet forwarding functional block 216 that is implemented as a software module, and performs…, packet forwarding (Hague: ¶ [0027]), and cache may be implemented in a BACnet Router, and may be configured to identify unauthorized or disconnected devices to allow the BACnet Router to prevent forwarding of messages to the unauthorized or disconnected device (Hague: ¶ [0010], ¶ [0040-0042]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112,150 (Hague: ¶ [0040], also see ¶ [0047]).
The combination of Hiniker and Hague does not explicitly disclose:
selectively forward the first MS/TP packet, using the BACnet protocol, to the second BACnet device based on a first security configuration, the first security configuration comprising one or more configurable rules based on a type of BACnet communication between the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device.
Hague-R2 from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses that
links normally carry logic-level signals encoded to conform to a particular protocol, such as USB…, or BACnet MS/TP, which define a low level protocol and are collectively referred to herein as the Host Protocol. The controller device 100 may include only one type of link to support only one of the Host Protocols, or more than one protocol may be accommodated (Hague-R2: ¶ [0037]), BACnet Internetwork is a term defined by the ASHRAE BACnet standard to describe a collection of BACnet controller devices 1806, which are able to communicate with each other using the BACnet protocol over various physical networks 1802, 1804. Since the two physical networks have different BACnet Network Numbers, and are of different physical types, they need to be linked together by a BACnet Router 1803 (Hague-R2: ¶ [0128]), a BACnet Router 1803 is responsible to receive a packet from any one of the BACnet devices 1801, 1806 on the BACnet Internetwork 1807 and forward the packet to the final destination (Hague-R2: ¶ [0129]), and If the OEM were to choose logic level BACnet MS/TP for their host protocol, then by inserting the basic
communications Module 210 they would have a 100% BACnet MS/TP compliant system (Hague-R2: ¶ [0097], ¶¶ [0096, 0098]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague-R2 in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so to allow BAC devices on separate network segments to communicate without conversion and to lower the processing overhead of the router.
The combination of Hiniker, Hague and Hague-R2 does not explicitly disclose selectively forward the first MS/TP packet to the second BACnet device based on a first security configuration, the first security configuration comprising one or more configurable rules based on a type of BACnet communication between the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device.
Minami from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses that the detection-rule generating device 110 functions as a relay device that relays data between the Internet 106 and the LAN 107. For example, the detection-rule generating device 110 relays packets from the Internet 106 to the LAN 107 (Minami: ¶ [0027], ¶ [0033]), generates detection rules based on the packets fed from the relay unit 113. The detection-rule generating unit 114 stores the generated detection rules in the pre-selection rule storage (Minami: ¶ [0038]), the pre-selection detection rules are all detection rule candidates for selecting the detection rules to be included in a whitelist (Minami: ¶ [0040]), Building Automation and Control networking protocol (BACnet) communication packets will be described as an example (Minami: ¶ [0067]), extracts, from the BACnet communication packets, the source IP, the destination IP, the BACnet communication
command, and the BACnet communication device ID as features (Minami: ¶ [0068]), and Pre-selection detection rules are generated on the basis of the elements of predetermined features out of the features extracted in this way (Minami: ¶ [0069], See Fig. 5—detection rules), various commands flow through BACnet communication. In this example, BACnet commands are the elements of a predetermined feature (Minami: ¶ [0078]), and pre-selection detection rules are generated with the packets received in a predetermined period by a detection rule generating device 110, and the detection rule number or the number of detection rules involving corresponding commands (Minami: ¶ [0079], See Fig. 6-Command Types).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Minami in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so as having configurable rules based on specific features reduces unnecessary traffic in the network increasing efficiency and further provides granular control of traffic.
Regarding Claim 2,
Claim 2 is dependent on Claim 1, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 1. Hiniker further discloses wherein the processing circuit is further configured to automatically detect the plurality of BACnet devices (Hiniker: ¶ [0035] the communication routine 314 may access or query the routing address table 324 to determine a destination address for one or more of the automation devices 104, 108 and/or 110…, the destination address stored in the routing address table 324 will comply and provide the information necessary to identify an MS/TP compliant automation device, ¶ [0036]).
Regarding Claim 3,
Claim 3 is dependent on Claim 1, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 1. Hiniker does not explicitly disclose wherein the network further comprises a management device, the management device configured to provide the first security configuration to the memory.
Hague further discloses a BACnet Router is configured to improve communications between BACnet devices by caching the addresses and data parts of messages sent between the devices…, perform proxy functionality (Hague: [Abstract]), cache may be implemented in a BACnet Router, and may be configured to identify unauthorized or disconnected devices (Hague: ¶ [0010]), based on suitable configuration data provided to the ABR, for example from an operator work station or BACnet controller 112 or from a Diagnostic PC 224 (FIG. 2) (Hague: ¶ [0048], ¶¶ [0042, 0060]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112, 150 (Hague: ¶ [0040]).
Regarding Claim 4,
Claim 4 is dependent on Claim 3, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 3. Hiniker does not explicitly disclose wherein the management device is a user device comprising a user interface, the user interface configured to allow a user to configure the first security configuration.
Hague further discloses a BACnet Router is configured to improve communications between BACnet devices by caching the addresses and data parts of messages sent between the devices…, perform proxy functionality (Hague: [Abstract]), cache may be implemented in a BACnet Router, and may be configured to identify unauthorized or disconnected devices (Hague: ¶ [0010]), and based on suitable configuration data provided to the ABR, for example from an operator work station or BACnet controller 112 or from a Diagnostic PC 224 (FIG. 2) (Hague: ¶ [0010], ¶¶ [0042, 0060]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112,150 (Hague: ¶ [0040]).
Regarding Claim 5,
Claim 5 is dependent on Claim 1, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 1. Hiniker further discloses wherein: the first MS/TP packet comprises at least one of MS/TP address information; Network Protocol Data Unit (NPDU) information; or Application Protocol Data Unit (APDU) information (Hiniker: [Abstract] receives a packet comprising a data envelope including a first destination address, ¶ [0005] receive a packet comprising a data envelope including a first destination address configured according to a first network protocol and a message including data configured according to a BACnet standard, ¶ [0021]),
the processing circuit is configured to identify the at least one of MS/TP address information; NPDU information; or APDU information from the first MS/TP packet (Hiniker: ¶ [0037] control routine 302 queries the routing table 312 based on the destination address contained within the data envelope to determine if there is a corresponding destination
address, ¶ [0045] destination address and the BACnet message portion of the packet are retained once the header and trailer information has been removed from the packet by the conversion routine 310, ¶¶ [0007, 0035, 0041]).
Hiniker does not explicitly disclose the first security configuration is based on the at least one of MS/TP address information; NPDU information; or APDU information.
Hague further discloses a BACnet Router is configured to improve communications between BACnet devices by caching the addresses and data parts of messages sent between the devices…, perform proxy functionality (Hague: [Abstract]), Advanced BACnet Router (ABR) for linking together multiple BACnet Networks in a BACnet Internetwork of BACnet devices communication with each other using the BACnet protocol (Hague: ¶ [0006]), BACnet Network 130, is similar to the second Network 120, but in this case it has been implemented as a BACnet/MSTP (Hague: ¶ [0017]), ABR 214 includes additional functional blocks, such as a packet logging and diagnostic packet forwarding functional block 216 that is implemented as a software module, and performs…, packet forwarding (Hague: ¶ [0027]), and which may include caching address/routing information of BACnet messages, which may include actively exploring the BACnet
Networks using standard BACnet messages to build an internal map of the BACnet devices and their locations…, cache may be implemented in a BACnet Router, and may be configured to identify unauthorized or disconnected devices to allow the BACnet Router to prevent forwarding of messages to the unauthorized or disconnected device (Hague: ¶ [0010]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112,150 (Hague: ¶ [0040]).
Regarding Claim 6,
Claim 6 is dependent on Claim 1, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 1. Hiniker further discloses wherein: the first MS/TP packet comprises a BACnet request (Hiniker: ¶ [0035] the destination address stored in the routing address table 324 will comply and provide the information necessary to identify an MS/TP compliant automation device, ¶ [0041] Detection of the BACnet MS/TP formatted packet awaiting wireless transmission within the queue 313 causes the interface control routine 302 to activate the conversion routine 310…., conversion routine 310, in turn, evaluates and removes the header and trailer information from the data envelope portion of the packet (as well as the associated destination address)…, utilizes the removed data envelope information to verify that the remote network number stored in the BACnet portion of the routing table 312 corresponds to a destination, ¶ [0021]), the processing circuit is further configured to identify a BACnet service type from the BACnet request, and the first security configuration is based on the BACnet service type (Hiniker: ¶ [0035] the destination address stored in the routing address table 324 will comply and provide the information necessary to identify an MS/TP compliant automation device, ¶ [0005] a routing table stored in the memory, ¶ [0021]).
Hiniker does not explicitly disclose the processing circuit is further configured to identify a BACnet service type from the BACnet request, and the first security configuration is based on the BACnet service type.
Hague further discloses BACnet Network 130, is similar to the second Network 120, but in this case it has been implemented as a BACnet/MSTP (Hague: ¶ [0017]), Advanced BACnet Routers 214, 354, there is an opportunity to monitor the first Who-Is and the corresponding I-Am messages(i.e. protocol services used in BACnet) and store the pertinent information into an internal cache, such as the cache 222 shown in FIG. 2, for future reference …, subsequent Who-Is messages arrive from any device on any Network, the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately with an I-Am on behalf of the original device (Hague: ¶ [0040], See also ¶¶ [0041-0042] Read Property), and which may include caching address/routing information of BACnet messages…, cache may be implemented in a BACnet Router, and may be configured to identify unauthorized or disconnected devices to allow the BACnet Router to prevent forwarding of messages to the unauthorized or disconnected device (Hague: ¶ [0010]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112,150 (Hague: ¶ [0040]).
Regarding Claim 9,
Claim 9 is dependent on Claim 1, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 1. Hiniker further discloses wherein the first bridge device is coupled to the MS/TP communication bus transparently, such that the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device are operationally unaware of the first bridge device (Hiniker: ¶ [0017] one or more automation devices 108a to 108f may be configured to communicate according to a wired BACnet MS/TP network protocol, See Fig. 1 –108 (i.e. connected through 106 network)).
Hiniker does not explicitly disclose wherein the first bridge device is coupled to the MS/TP communication bus transparently, such that the first BACnet device and the second BACnet device are operationally unaware of the first bridge device.
Hague further discloses a BACnet Router is configured to improve communications between BACnet devices by caching the addresses and data parts of messages sent between the devices…, perform proxy functionality (Hague: [Abstract]), Advanced BACnet Router (ABR) for linking together multiple BACnet Networks in a BACnet Internetwork of BACnet devices communication with each other using the BACnet protocol (Hague: ¶ [0006]), ABR 214 includes additional functional blocks, such as a packet logging and diagnostic packet forwarding functional (Hague: ¶ [0027]), ABR can act as a proxy for these simple devices, polling for the data from the simple device in a controlled fashion (Hague: ¶ [0051], ¶ [0008]), and ABR e.g. 354, which interprets the received data and forwards the BACnet part of the message onto its local BACnet Internetwork 302. By this means, transparent connectivity between two similar sites, with conflicting Network numbers is achieved (Hague: ¶ [0061]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112,150 (Hague: ¶ [0040]).
Regarding Claim 10,
Claim 10 is dependent on Claim 1, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 1. Hiniker further discloses wherein the plurality of bridge devices are configured to communicate wirelessly with one another, such that the plurality of bridge devices form a point-to-point wireless network (Hiniker: ¶ [0035] ¶ [0026] automation interface 200 may be configured to receive an MS/TP formatted packet and reconfigure it into a second packet according to a ZigBee protocol such as a BACnet ZigBee protocol for communication via a wireless transceiver 212b, ¶ [0027] the communication module 212 may be modified and configured to communicate according to IEEE 802.11 (Wi-Fi), IEEE 802.16 (WiMAX), IEEE 802.20 (wireless broadband), IEEE 802.15.4 (ZigBee), Bluetooth, or other known radio communications protocol, via the wireless transceiver 212b, See also Fig. 1—200c and 200b wireless).
Regarding Claim 16,
Hiniker discloses a bridge device for reducing security risk on a building management system communication network (Hiniker: [Abstract] automation interface device is disclosed that provides interoperability between automation devices communicating within a building automation system, ¶¶ [0017-0018], Fig. 1), the bridge device comprising:
a first interface coupled to a first Master-Slave/Token Passing (MS/TP) network segment of an MS/TP communication bus (Hiniker: ¶[0018] the automation interface 200b is directly coupled to the BACnet MS/TP protocol configured device 110a to allow for wireless information and data exchange between the BACnet MS/TP protocol configured device 110a and each of the remaining the BACnet MS/TP protocol configure devices 110b and 110c, ¶ [0017], Fig. 1 –200b);
a second interface coupled to a second MS/TP network segment of the MS/TP communication bus (Hiniker: ¶[0018] automation interfaces 200c and 200b provide a similar mechanism by which MS/TP compatible automation devices 108 and 110 can communicate, ¶ [0017], See Fig. 1); and
a processing circuitry, the processing circuitry configured to (Hiniker: ¶[0019] The automation interface 200 includes the hardware, software and controls to facilitate communications and data exchange between automation devices operating according to different network protocols, ¶ [0020-0023] See Fig. 2, memory, processor):
receive a first MS/TP packet, using a BACnet protocol, from the first MS/TP network segment via the first interface (Hiniker: ¶[0040] the interface control routine 302 of the automation interface 200b is active and configured to exchange packets of data and information with the automation device 110a via the communication modules 212, 222 coupled along the data connection 214 (starts at step 402). The interface control routine 302, in response to receiving a BACnet MS/TP formatted packet from the automation device 110a via the communication module 212 and/or the communication driver 306, ¶ [0017]), and selectively forward the first MS/TP packet, using the BACnet protocol, to the second MS/TP network segment via the second interface based on a security configuration, the security configuration comprising one or more configurable rules based on a type of BACnet communication between a first BACnet device and a second BACnet device (Hiniker: ¶[0042] the MS/TP network protocol portion of the packet formatted according to the BACnet standard may be replaced with the ZigBee network protocol. Upon completion of the conversion routine 310, the interface control routine 302 utilizes the communication driver 306 to wirelessly transmit the reformatted packet (including the original BACnet message) via the wireless transceiver 212b (step 424), ¶¶ [0035, 0040-0041]).
Hiniker does not explicitly disclose selectively forward the first MS/TP packet, using the BACnet protocol, to the second MS/TP network segment via the second interface based on a security configuration, the security configuration comprising one or more configurable rules based on a type of BACnet communication between a first BACnet device and a second BACnet device.
However, Hague from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses a BACnet Router is configured to improve communications between BACnet devices by caching
the addresses and data parts of messages sent between the devices (Hague: [Abstract]), Advanced BACnet Router (ABR) for linking together multiple BACnet Networks in a BACnet Internetwork of BACnet devices communication with each other using the BACnet protocol (Hague: ¶ [0006]), BACnet Network 130, is similar to the second Network 120, but in this case it has been implemented as a BACnet/MSTP (Hague: ¶ [0017]), ABR 214 includes additional functional blocks, such as a packet logging and diagnostic packet forwarding functional block 216 that is implemented as a software module, and performs…, packet forwarding (Hague: ¶ [0027]), and cache may be implemented in a BACnet Router, and may be configured to identify unauthorized or disconnected devices to allow the BACnet Router to prevent forwarding of messages to the unauthorized or disconnected device (Hague: ¶ [0010], ¶¶ [0040-0042]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112,150 (Hague: ¶ [0040]).
The combination of Hiniker and Hague does not explicitly disclose:
selectively forward the first MS/TP packet, using the BACnet protocol, to the second MS/TP network segment via the second interface based on a security configuration, the security configuration comprising one or more configurable rules based on a type of BACnet communication between a first BACnet device and a second BACnet device
Hague-R2 from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses that
links normally carry logic-level signals encoded to conform to a particular protocol, such as USB…, or BACnet MS/TP, which define a low level protocol and are collectively referred to herein as the Host Protocol. The controller device 100 may include only one type of link to support only one of the Host Protocols, or more than one protocol may be accommodated (Hague-R2: ¶ [0037]), BACnet Internetwork is a term defined by the ASHRAE BACnet standard to describe a collection of BACnet controller devices 1806, which are able to communicate with each other using the BACnet protocol over various physical networks 1802, 1804. Since the two physical networks have different BACnet Network Numbers, and are of different physical types, they need to be linked together by a BACnet Router 1803 (Hague-R2: ¶ [0128]), a BACnet Router 1803 is responsible to receive a packet from any one of the BACnet devices 1801, 1806 on the BACnet Internetwork 1807 and forward the packet to the final destination (Hague-R2: ¶ [0129]), and If the OEM were to choose logic level BACnet MS/TP for their host protocol, then by inserting the basic
communications Module 210 they would have a 100% BACnet MS/TP compliant system (Hague-R2: ¶ [0097], ¶¶ [0096, 0098]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague-R2 in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so to allow BAC devices on separate network segments to communicate without conversion and to lower the processing overhead of the router.
The combination of Hiniker, Hague and Hague-R2 does not explicitly disclose selectively forward the first MS/TP packet, using the BACnet protocol, to the second MS/TP network segment via the second interface based on a security configuration, the security configuration comprising one or more configurable rules based on a type of BACnet communication between a first BACnet device and a second BACnet device.
Minami from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses that the detection-rule generating device 110 functions as a relay device that relays data between the Internet 106 and the LAN 107. For example, the detection-rule generating device 110 relays packets from the Internet 106 to the LAN 107 (Minami: ¶ [0027], ¶ [0033]), generates detection rules based on the packets fed from the relay unit 113. The detection-rule generating unit 114 stores the generated detection rules in the pre-selection rule storage (Minami: ¶ [0038]), the pre-selection detection rules are all detection rule candidates for selecting the detection rules to be included in a whitelist (Minami: ¶ [0040]), Building Automation and Control networking protocol (BACnet) communication packets will be described as an example (Minami: ¶ [0067]), extracts, from the BACnet communication packets, the source IP, the destination IP, the BACnet communication
command, and the BACnet communication device ID as features (Minami: ¶ [0068]), and Pre-selection detection rules are generated on the basis of the elements of predetermined features out of the features extracted in this way (Minami: ¶ [0069], See Fig. 5—detection rules), various commands flow through BACnet communication. In this example, BACnet commands are the elements of a predetermined feature (Minami: ¶ [0078]), and pre-selection detection rules are generated with the packets received in a predetermined period by a detection rule generating device 110, and the detection rule number or the number of detection rules involving corresponding commands (Minami: ¶ [0079], See also Fig. 6-Command Types).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Minami in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so as having configurable rules based on specific features reduces unnecessary traffic in the network increasing efficiency and further provides granular control of traffic.
Regarding Claim 18,
Claim 18 is dependent on Claim 16, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 16. The combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 18 as discussed in Claim 5. Therefore, Claim 18 is rejected using the same rationales as discussed in Claim 5.
Regarding Claim 19,
Claim 19 is dependent on Claim 16, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 16. The combination of Hiniker, Hague, and Hague-R2 does not explicitly disclose wherein the type of the BACnet communication indicates whether the first MS/TP packet provides a read command or a write command.
Minami further discloses Building Automation and Control networking protocol (BACnet) communication packets will be described as an example (Minami: ¶ [0067]), extracts, from the BACnet communication packets, the source IP, the destination IP, the BACnet communication command, and the BACnet communication device ID as features (Minami: ¶ [0068]), various commands flow through BACnet communication (Minami: ¶ [0078]), pre-selection detection rules are generated with the packets received in a predetermined period by a detection rule generating device 110, and the detection rule number or the number of detection rules involving corresponding commands (Minami: ¶ [0079], ¶¶ [0038, 0040], See Fig. 6, 8-Command Types), and the detection rules involving the command "writePropertyMultiple(REQ)" ranking at ninth are selected. In this case, if the detection rules involving the command "readRange(ACK)" ranking at tenth are selected (Minami: ¶ [0105]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Minami in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so as having configurable rules based on specific features reduces unnecessary traffic in the network increasing efficiency and further provides granular control of traffic.
13. Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hiniker (US 2013/0086195 A1, hereinafter Hiniker), in view of Hague (US 2015/0039752 A1, hereinafter Hague), in view of Hague (US 2015/0106447 A1, hereinafter Hague-R2), in view of Minami et al. (US 2023/0007019 A1, hereinafter Minami), and further in view of Heo (US 2015/0215277 A1, hereinafter Heo).
Regarding Claim 7,
Claim 7 is dependent on Claim 1, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 1. Hiniker further discloses wherein: the first MS/TP packet comprises a BACnet request (Hiniker: ¶ [0037] receives the BACnet messaging standard formatted packet from the communication module 212…, queries the routing table 312 based on the destination address contained within the data envelope to determine if there is a corresponding destination address…., broadcasted request may be a request for a specific address corresponding to a desired device), the first bridge device further comprises a Network Answer Translation (NAT) interface coupled to the processing circuit, the NAT interface configured to provide the processing circuit with a second security configuration, the processing circuit is further configured to selectively forward a second MS/TP packet from the second BACnet device to the first BACnet device based on the second security configuration, and the second security configuration is configured such that the processing circuit does not selectively forward the second MS/TP packet unless the second MS/TP packet comprises a BACnet response to the BACnet request.
The combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami does not explicitly disclose wherein: the first MS/TP packet comprises a BACnet request, the first bridge device further comprises a Network Answer Translation (NAT) interface coupled to the processing circuit, the NAT interface configured to provide the processing circuit with a second security configuration, the processing circuit is further configured to selectively forward a second MS/TP packet from the second BACnet device to the first BACnet device based on the second security configuration, and the second security configuration is configured such that the processing circuit does not selectively forward the second MS/TP packet unless the second MS/TP packet comprises a BACnet response to the BACnet request.
Heo from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses the NAT apparatus 20 performs network address translation between an inside network and an outside network when a client 10 and a server 30 communicate with each other. (Heo: ¶ [0039]), NAT apparatus 20
translates the inside IP address of a packet received from the client 10 into the outside IP address and transmits the outside IP address to the server 30 (Heo: ¶ [0041]), when the client 10B transmits a packet of <B, S, #cookie+request> to the NAT apparatus 20, the packet determining unit 231 of the NAT apparatus 20 determines that the received packet is not the cookie request packet or the cookie response packet (step S732) and performs the NAT operation (step S734) to transmit a packet of <C, S, #cookie+request>to the server 30 (Heo: ¶ [0115]), server 30 responds to the packet of the client 10B as <S, C, response>, and the NAT apparatus 20 also determines that the packet received from the server 30 does not correspond to the cookie request packet or the cookie response packet ( step S7 42) and performs the NAT operation (step S744) to provide a packet of <S, B, response> to the client 10B (Heo: ¶ [0116]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Heo in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so as a result security may be improved and a connection delay time may be reduced (Heo: ¶ [0117]).
14. Claims 8 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hiniker (US 2013/0086195 A1, hereinafter Hiniker), in view of Hague (US 2015/0039752 A1, hereinafter Hague), in view of Hague (US 2015/0106447 A1, hereinafter Hague-R2), in view of Minami et al. (US 2023/0007019 A1, hereinafter Minami), and further in view of Zhao (WO 2013/078776 A1, hereinafter Zhao).
Regarding Claim 8,
Claim 8 is dependent on Claim 1, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 1. Hiniker further discloses wherein: the processing circuit is further configured to automatically provide to the first BACnet device with a second MS/TP packet responsive to the first MS/TP packet not being selectively forwarded to the second BACnet device (Hiniker: ¶ [0046] If no response or destination information is found at step 518, the packet is dropped by the interface control routine 302, which then sends an undeliverable message to the automation device 110a) based on the first security configuration, and the second MS/TP packet comprises: a rejection response; information to proxy the second BACnet device as a provider of the second MS/TP packet.
Hiniker does not explicitly disclose wherein: the processing circuit is further configured to automatically provide to the first BACnet device with a second MS/TP packet responsive to the first MS/TP packet not being selectively forwarded to the second BACnet device based on the first security configuration, and the second MS/TP packet comprises: a rejection response;
information to proxy the second BACnet device as a provider of the second MS/TP packet.
However, Hague further discloses an Advanced BACnet Router (ABR) for linking together multiple BACnet Networks in a BACnet Internetwork of BACnet devices communication with each other using the BACnet protocol (Hague: ¶ [0006]), BACnet Network 130, is similar to the second Network 120, but in this case it has been implemented as a BACnet/MSTP (Hague: ¶ [0017]), ABR 214 includes additional functional blocks, such as …, diagnostic packet forwarding functional block 216 that is implemented as a software module, and performs…, packet forwarding (Hague: ¶ [0027]), cache may be implemented in a BACnet Router, and may be configured to identify unauthorized or disconnected devices to allow the BACnet Router to prevent forwarding of messages to the unauthorized or disconnected device (Hague: ¶ [0010], ¶ [0050]), and adding a new device or removing a device from a Network are also considered and accommodated (Hague: ¶ [0043]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Hague in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do as the system is able to examine this cache and respond immediately, therefore speeding up the response, reducing the Network bandwidth consumption, especially on the slow Networks such as BACnet/MSTP, and reducing the CPU load on the BACnet Devices 112,150 (Hague: ¶ [0040]).
The combination of Hiniker and Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami does not explicitly disclose: wherein: the processing circuit is further configured to automatically provide to the first BACnet device with a second MS/TP packet responsive to the first MS/TP packet not being selectively forwarded to the second BACnet device based on the first security configuration, and
the second MS/TP packet comprises:
a rejection response;
information to proxy the second BACnet device as a provider of the second MS/TP packet.
However, Zhao from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses a proxy server is provided in said network, a router and a proxy client device are provided on each area and routing table of each area is provided on said proxy server (Zhao: [Abstract]), and proxy device is the side receiving the proxy request…, the OSPF routings will be searched for matching routings…, if no matching routing is found, a failure response message will be returned to the side initiating the proxy request, which may include all information in the proxy request (source address, destination address and request type of said side) as well as the proxy calculation failure information (Zhao: [Page 19 Lines: 17-24]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Zhao in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so to improve the efficiency of the system by identifying non-existent or blocked destinations and to fix incorrect configurations of the destination address in the sender’s side to avoid potential failures.
Regarding Claim 20,
Claim 20 is dependent on Claim 16, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 16. The combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2, Minami and Zhao discloses all the limitations of Claim 20 as discussed in Claim 8. Therefore, Claim 20 is rejected using the same rationales as discussed in Claim 8.
15. Claim 17 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hiniker (US 2013/0086195 A1, hereinafter Hiniker) in view of Hague (US 2015/0039752 A1, hereinafter Hague), in view of Hague (US 2015/0106447 A1, hereinafter Hague-R2), in view of Minami et al. (US 2023/0007019 A1, hereinafter Minami), and further in view of Goehler et al. (US 2007/0036164 Al, hereinafter Goehler).
Regarding Claim 17,
Claim 17 is dependent on Claim 16, and the combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami discloses all the limitations of Claim 16. The combination of Hiniker, Hague, Hague-R2 and Minami does not explicitly disclose wherein: the bridge device further comprises a power component, and the power component is configured to convert a transmission of the first MS/TP packet into electrical power, such that the bridge device is powered by activity of the MS/TP communication bus.
However, Goehler from the same field of endeavor as the claimed invention discloses gateway interface is configured to communicate with an IP network, and includes a digital signal
processing unit storing programs for processing encoded data signals received from the IP network
(Goehler: [Abstract]), gateway 10 therefore acts like a bridge to the internet or LAN (Goehler: ¶ [0017]), Gateway 10 can be powered using the Power-over Ethernet (PoE) standard which can be employed in the PoE compliant network switches. This power source can, in one example, provide 13 watts of power for use in certain functions of the gateway 10…, gateway 10 can connect to a standard IP network using a RJ45 connection port using the extra CATS wires for the PoE (Goehler: ¶ [0018]), gateway also includes several circuits and ports for communicating (Goehler: ¶ [0020]), and gateway 10 is also capable of supporting both wireless and wired networks and support PoE (Power over Ethernet IEEE 802.3af) that will allow the gateway 10 to be powered from the switch to which it is connected (Goehler: ¶ [0021]).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teachings of Goehler in the teachings of Hiniker. A person having ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to do so as such devices can be installed in locations without existing power sources and can also be centrally managed.
Conclusion
16. The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
US-9100397-B2
US-20170054679-A1
US-11150620-B2
US-20090006611-A1
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SAMEERA WICKRAMASURIYA whose telephone number is (571)272-1507. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F 9:45am - 6:15pm.
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/SAMEERA WICKRAMASURIYA/
Examiner, Art Unit 2494
/JUNG W KIM/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2494
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