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 .
Claim Objections
Claims 13-14 are objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 13 recites limitation “in the process” in line 4. It seems to be a typographical error. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 14 is objected for the same reason indicated above.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1-9, 12-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over (3GPP TS 23.503 v16.4.1), hereinafter as “3GPP’503, in view of (3GPP TS 23.288 V16.3.0), hereinafter as 3GPP’288, further in view of Ronneke et al (US 2016/0205622).
Regarding claims 1, 13, 3GPP’503 teaches a policy determining method, comprising:
a communication interface configured to:
sending, by a first network device, a first request to a data analytics network device, wherein the first request is for requesting network performance information, and
receiving, by the first network device, first network performance information for a second area from the data analytics network device,
determining, by the first network device, a first policy based on the first network performance information (Section 6.1.2.4, “Afterwards, the PCF shall determine, based on the information provided by the AF, the analytics on "Network Performance" if available and other available information (e.g. network policy and existing background transfer policies) one or more background transfer policies”);
receiving, by the first network device, second network performance information from the data analytics network device, wherein the second network performance information is network performance information obtained by degrading the first network performance information (Section 6.1.2.4, below Note 7: “When the PCF knows that the network performance in the area of interest goes below the criteria set by the operator from the NWDAF as described in TS 23.288”);
determining, by the first network device, a second policy for the first area based on the second network performance information, wherein the second policy comprises one or more background data transfer policies (Section 6.1.2.4, below Note 7: “When the PCF knows, from the NWDAF as described in TS 23.288 [24], that the network performance in the area of interest goes below the criteria set by the operator, the PCF retrieves all the background transfer policies from the UDR, check the BDT policies that are not applicable due to the degradation of the network performance and calculates a list of new candidate BDT policies for the ASP to select”); and
3GPP’503 doesn’t explicitly teach that 1) the first request comprises information about a first area and information about a first time period; 2) the first network performance comprises one or both of first information for the second area in a second time period and a quantity of terminals in the second area in the second time period.
3GPP’288 teaches that 1) the first request comprises information about a first area and information about a first time period (Section 6.6.1: the network performance analytics is obtained by the PCF from the NWDAF using a request, wherein the request indicates an “area of interest” correspond to a first area and “Analytics target period” correspond to a first time period recited in the claim); 2)the first network performance comprises one or both of first information for the second area in a second time period and a quantity of terminals in the second area in the second time period (Section 6.6.1, it discloses that the NWDAF provides for an “area subset” network performance statistics or predictions, including the load in the Area of Interest and the number of UEs”).
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to utilize the teaching of 3GPP’288 in the system disclosed by 3GPP’503 for the purpose of optimizing network performance by analyzing real-time and historical data.
The aforementioned references do not explicitly teach that setting time information indicates a maximum response period of the requesting device.
Ronneke teaches that setting time information indicates a maximum response period of the requesting device ([0067], “the device in addition comprises in the request a new parameter ‘maximum response time’ (or ‘maximum delay’ or ‘maximum latency’ etc) to inform the network about the maximum acceptable response time decided by the application”).
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to utilize the teaching of Ronneke in the system disclosed by 3GPP’503 in view of 3GPP’288 for performance optimization which ensures systems respond within a reasonable timeframe.
Regarding claim 14, 3GPP’503 teaches a communication system comprising:
a policy determining apparatus comprising
a processor;
a non-transitory memory coupled to the processor and storing a program to be executed in the process; (Fig. 5.2.1-1a, see page 18, PCF inherently comprises a processor and memory) and
a communication interface configured to
send a first request to a data analytics network device, wherein the first request is for requesting network performance information, and the
receive first network performance information for a second area from the data analytics network device,
receive second network performance information from the data analytics network device, wherein the second network performance information is network performance information obtained by degrading the first network performance information (Section 6.1.2.4, below Note 7: “When the PCF knows that the network performance in the area of interest goes below the criteria set by the operator from the NWDAF as described in TS 23.288”):
wherein the program comprises instructions that when executed by the processor cause the policy determining apparatus to determine first policy based on the first network performance information, determine a second policy for the first area based on the second network performance information, wherein the second policy comprises one or more background data transfer policies, and
a data analytics network device that communicates with the policy determining apparatus, wherein the data analytics network device is configured to provide first network performance information of a network in a second area for the policy determining apparatus (Section 6.1.2.4: “The PCF may retrieve analytics on "Network Performance" from NWDAF in the area where the UEs of this ASP are expected to be located at a certain time period”, it’s noted that NWDAF stands for network performance analytics function),
3GPP’503 doesn’t explicitly teach that 1) the first request comprises information about a first area and information about a first time period; 2) the first network performance comprises one or both of first information for the second area in a second time period and a quantity of terminals in the second area in the second time period.
3GPP’288 teaches that 1) the first request comprises information about a first area and information about a first time period (Section 6.6.1: the network performance analytics is obtained by the PCF from the NWDAF using a request, wherein the request indicates an “area of interest” correspond to a first area and “Analytics target period” correspond to a first time period recited in the claim); 2)the first network performance comprises one or both of first information for the second area in a second time period and a quantity of terminals in the second area in the second time period (Section 6.6.1, it discloses that the NWDAF provides for an “area subset” network performance statistics or predictions, including the load in the Area of Interest and the number of UEs”).
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to utilize the teaching of 3GPP’288 in the system disclosed by 3GPP’503 for the purpose of optimizing network performance by analyzing real-time and historical data.
The aforementioned references do not explicitly teach that setting time information indicates a maximum response period of the requesting device.
Ronneke teaches that setting time information indicates a maximum response period of the requesting device ([0067], “the device in addition comprises in the request a new parameter ‘maximum response time’ (or ‘maximum delay’ or ‘maximum latency’ etc) to inform the network about the maximum acceptable response time decided by the application”).
Before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to utilize the teaching of Ronneke in the system disclosed by 3GPP’503 in view of 3GPP’288 for performance optimization which ensures systems respond within a reasonable timeframe.
Regarding claims 2, 15, the aforementioned references further teach that the second time period is the first time period (3GPP’288, Section 6.6.1, “Interest at the time indicated in the Analytics target period is requested or any UE”) or a sub-period of the first time period, and the second area is the first area or a subarea of the first area (3GPP’288, 6.6.3, “Area subset” in Table 6.6.3-1).
Regarding claims 3, 16, the aforementioned references further teach that the first information comprises an average value of one or more of the following information of a network in the second area in the second time period: a session creation success rate, a terminal handover success rate (3GPP’288, Table 6.6.3-1, Ratio of successful handover), a terminal registration success rate, resource usage of a base station (3GPP’288, Table 6.6.3-1, “Average usage of assigned resources (CPU, memory, disk”) or a core network device, a usage ratio of the base station or the core network device, and load of the base station or the core network device.
Regarding claims 4, 17, the aforementioned references further teach that the first policy is a first policy for the first area (3GPP’503, “Afterwards, the PCF shall determine, based on the information provided by the AF, the analytics on "Network Performance" if available and other available information (e.g. network policy and existing background transfer policies) one or more background transfer policies”), the first area comprises one or more second areas, there are one or more first areas (3GPP’288, 6.6.3, “Area subset” in Table 6.6.3-1), and the first policy for the first area comprises one or more background data transfer policies (3GPP’503, “Afterwards, the PCF shall determine, based on the information provided by the AF, the analytics on "Network Performance" if available and other available information (e.g. network policy and existing background transfer policies) one or more background transfer policies”).
Regarding claim 5, the aforementioned references further teach that when the first area comprises a plurality of second areas, the plurality of second areas comprised in the first area have same first network performance information (3GPP’288, 6.6.3, “Area subset” in Table 6.6.3-1).
Regarding claims 6, 18, the aforementioned references further teach that the method further comprises: determining, by the first network device, a first target background data transfer policy for the first area, wherein the first target background data transfer policy is one of the one or more background data transfer policies (3GPP’503, page 34, “the PCF shall provide the candidate list of background transfer policies or the selected background transfer policy to the AF via NEF together with the Background Data Transfer Reference ID”); and sending, by the first network device, the first target background data transfer policy and one or both of an identifier of the first target background data transfer policy and the information about the first area to a network storage network device (3GPP’503, page 34, “The selected background transfer policy is finally stored by the PCF in the UDR as part of the Policy Data Set”).
Regarding claim 7, the aforementioned references further teach that the determining, by the first network device, a first target background data transfer policy for the first area comprises: the first policy for the first area comprises one background data transfer policy, determining, by the first network device, the background data transfer policy as the first target background data transfer policy (3GPP’503, page 34, “The selected background transfer policy is finally stored by the PCF in the UDR as part of the Policy Data Set”).
Regarding claim 8, the aforementioned references further teach the method further comprises: receiving, by the first network device in the maximum response time period (Ronneke, [0067]), a second target background data transfer policy fed back by the requesting device, wherein the second target background data transfer policy is one of the plurality of one or more background data transfer policies comprised in the second policy; and sending, by the first network device, the second target background data transfer policy and one or both of an identifier of the second target background data transfer policy and the information about the first area to a network storage network device (3GPP’503, page 34, “AF received more than one background transfer policy, the AF shall select one of them and inform the PCF about the selected background transfer policy”).
Regarding claims 9, 19, the aforementioned references further teach that: determining, by the first network device, to delete a first target background data transfer policy that is for the first area; and sending, by the first network device, a first deletion message to a network storage network device, wherein the first deletion message is used to notify the network storage network device to delete the first target background data transfer policy that is for the first area (3GPP’503, page 35, “The PCF notifies the ASP on both the BDT policies that is not valid any longer and the candidate BDT policies via NEF if requested by the ASP. The PCF removes the BDT policy stored in the UDR for the corresponding background data transfer reference ID”).
Regarding claims 12,20, the aforementioned references further teach that: receiving, by the first network device, a second request from the requesting device, wherein the second request is for requesting a background data transfer policy corresponding to the first area, and the second request comprises the information about the first area and the information about the first time period (3GPP’503, Section 6.1.2.4, “The AF may contact the PCF via the NEF (and Npcf_BDTPolicyControl_Create service operation) to request a time window and related conditions for future background data transfer”, “The AF request shall contain an ASP identifier, the volume of data to be transferred per UE, the expected amount of UEs, the desired time window, the External Group Identifier and optionally, Network Area Information, request”); and sending, by the first network device, the first policy and one or both of the information about the first area and an identifier of the first policy to the requesting device (3GPP’508, page 34, “the PCF shall provide the candidate list of background transfer policies or the selected background transfer policy to the AF via NEF together with the Background Data Transfer Reference ID”).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 10-11 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.
Conclusion
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/SIMING LIU/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2411