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 . This Office Action is in response to the submission filed 2025-11-07 (herein referred to as the Reply) where claim(s) 1, 3-11, 13-15 are pending for consideration.
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 identified above has been entered.
35 USC §103 - Claim Rejections
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102 of this title, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or non-obviousness.
Claim(s) is/are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over LIU_768 (US20220217768) in view of DUDDA_588 (US20210112588)
Claim(s) 1, 11, 15
LIU_768 teaches
receiving, from a network, a configuration of a configured grant (CG), wherein the configured grant is related to grant resource of the sidelink <FIG(s). 2; para. 0016, 0024-0028, 0100-0103, 0120>.
a configured grant index and Configured grant is associated with a CG index. <FIG(s). 2; para. 0016, 0024-0028, 0100-0103, 0120>.
a maximum number of transmissions; sidelink data reaches a maximum quantity of transmissions <para. 0021, 0032, 0047, 0058, 0305>.
storing the configured grant as a sidelink grant, Configured is for sidelink (e.g. SL grant) <FIG(s). 2; para. 0016, 0024-0028, 0100-0103, 0120>.
wherein a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) process identifier (ID) corresponding to the sidelink grant is associated with a sidelink process; sidelink data and corresponding grant is associated with HARQ Process identifier. <FIG(s). 3, 4; para. 0028, 0128-0152; Claims 1-4>.
storing a media access control (MAC) protocol data unit (PDU) in a HARQ buffer of the sidelink process; SL uplink data is buffered in HARQ buffer <para. 0031-0032, 0046-0047, 0057-0058>.
transmitting, to a second wireless device, the MAC PDU on a resource indicated in the sidelink grant; Configured grant resource of the sidelink associated with the corresponding HARQ Process ID. <FIG(s). 2, 3, 4; para. 0016, 0024-0028, 0100-0103, 0120, 0128-0152; Claims 1-4>.
based on the number of transmissions of the MAC PDU reaching to the maximum number of transmissions, flushing the HARQ buffer of the sidelink process; When a quantity of transmissions of the sidelink data reaches a maximum quantity of transmissions, the terminal flushes a HARQ buffer of a HARQ process for transmitting the sidelink data. <para. 0032, 451-453>.
LIU_768 does not explicitly teach
receiving, from the network, a retransmission grant related to the HARQ process ID; and ignoring the retransmission grant.
However in a similar endeavor, DUDDA_588 teaches
receiving, from the network, a retransmission grant related to the HARQ process ID; and ignoring the retransmission grant. Ignoring the adaptive HARQ retransmission grant may include not delivering the received HARQ information from the adaptive HARQ retransmission grant to the current HARQ process <FIG(s). 6, 9; para. 0080-0081, 0094-0095>.
Before the effective filing date of the claim invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in art to have modified the system/techniques disclosed by LIU_768 with the embodiment(s) disclosed by DUDDA_588. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification in order to address technical issues that arise when a UE receives an adaptive HARQ retransmission grant triggered from the eNB after previously skipping a UL transmission <para. 0006-0007>.
Claim(s) 3, 13
LIU_768 teaches
wherein the CG is associated with a value of a CG timer. <para. 0451-0453>.
Claim(s) 4, 14
LIU_768 teaches
wherein the CG timer starts upon transmitting the MAC PDU by using the resource of the CG. Configured grant timer functions in accordance with 3GPP TS 38.321, which discloses the CG timer starting upon transmission. <para. 0451-0452>.
Claim(s) 4, 14
LIU_768 teaches
wherein the CG timer starts upon transmitting the MAC PDU by using the resource of the CG. Configured grant timer functions in accordance with 3GPP TS 38.321, which discloses the CG timer starting upon transmission. <para. 0451-0452>.
Claim(s) 5
LIU_768 teaches
wherein the CG is associated with a maximum number of HARQ process IDs for the CG. A HARQ process ID associated with each uplink grant on the CG resource, where a maximum range of the HARQ process ID ranges from 0 to 15. <para. 0140>.
Claim(s) 8
LIU_768 teaches
receiving, from the second wireless device, a positive acknowledgement for retransmission of the MAC PDU by using the retransmission resource. Upon successful transmission, the HARQ buffer is flushed. Successful transmission is indicated by receiving a positive acknowledgement of the HARQ process <FIG(s). 17; para. 0021, 0032-0033, 0047, 0059, 0307-0309, 0453-0457>.
Claim(s) 9
LIU_768 teaches
wherein the HARQ buffer in the sidelink process is flushed based on receiving the positive acknowledgement. Upon successful transmission, the HARQ buffer is flushed. Successful transmission is indicated by receiving a positive acknowledgement of the HARQ process <FIG(s). 17; para. 0021, 0032-0033, 0047, 0059, 0307-0309, 0453-0457>.
Claim(s) 10
LIU_768 teaches
wherein the first wireless device is in communication with at least one of
a mobile device, Terminals communicates between another terminal (which can be a mobile device) and/or network device. <FIG(s). 1, 9; para. 0086, 0089, 0170>.
a network, and/or Terminals communicates between another terminal (which can be a mobile device) and/or network device. <FIG(s). 1; para. 0086>.
Claim(s) is/are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over LIU_768 (US20220217768) in view of DUDDA_588 (US20210112588), and further view of SHIIZAKI_000 (US20100303000)
Claim(s) 6
LIU_768 teaches
receiving, from the second wireless device, a negative acknowledgement for transmission of the MAC PDU by using the resource of the CG; and NACK feedback in part of the disclosed HARQ process which includes an using the configured sidelink via a configured grant for carrying out the HARQ process. <FIG(s). 2, 3; para. 0016, 0024-0028, 0100-0103, 0120, 0128-0129, 0131>.
LIU_768 does not explicitly teach
forwarding, to the network, the negative acknowledgement.
However in a similar endeavor, SHIIZAKI_000 teaches
forwarding, to the network, the negative acknowledgement. Relay station receives NACK from terminal, the relay station relays and transmits the NACK to the base station. <FIG(s). 5; para. 0060-0061>.
Before the effective filing date of the claim invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in art to have modified the system/techniques disclosed by LIU_768 and DUDDA_588 with the embodiment(s) disclosed by SHIIZAKI_000. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification in order to improve throughput with in multi-node (e.g., relay) networks <para. 0031>.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim(s) is/are indicated as having allowable subject matter and objected to.
Claim(s) 7
The claim(s) is/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.
LIU_768 (US20220217768) in view of DUDDA_588 (US20210112588), and further view of SHIIZAKI_000 (US20100303000) does not teach a retransmission grant that is received from a network based previously forwarded NACK sent to the network by the first wireless device, the NACK being received from a second wireless device for a MAC PDU that was transmitted from the first to the second wireless device.
In addition to the explicit reasons given herein, allowability is also determined in view of the combination of references required for obviousness, the inter-relationship between other claimed limitations, and the claimed invention as a whole. Accordingly, amendments that do not incorporate the allowable claims into the base/intervening claims in its entirely, are not allowable. This includes amendments that incorporate the allowable claims into the base/intervening claims in part or in a non-narrowing manner (i.e., changing the scope of the subject matter).
Relevant Cited References
US20210385796
US20190253201
Response to Arguments
The Reply’s arguments with respect to the other matters have been considered but are moot because the arguments do not apply to the rejection(s), which was necessitated by the Applicant’s amendments, being used in the current rejection.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ANDRE TACDIRAN whose telephone number is 571-272-1717. The examiner can normally be reached on M-TH, 10-5PM EST. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jeffrey Rutkowski can be reached on 571-270-1215. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ANDRE TACDIRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2415