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
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 1/7/2026 has been entered.
Response to Amendment
This communication is considered fully responsive to the Arguments/Remarks filed on 1/7/2026.
Claims 1 and 15 have been amended.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim(s) 1-6, 9, 11, 15-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Cao et al. (US 2021/0105104, hereinafter “Cao”) in view of Hoang et al. (US 2019/0306835, hereinafter “Hoang”) and further in view of Yasukawa et al. (US 2021/0345298, hereinafter “Yasukawa”).
For claims 1 and 15, Cao discloses A method for determining a resource availability (see Cao Figs. 2-4), the method comprising:
selecting a plurality of resources from a resource selection window (a sensing UE determines a resource selection window, and then selects the resources within the resource selection window; see Cao par. 0062, 0080; a sensing UE may select a transmission pattern among a transmission pattern pool or select a TFRP among a TFRP pool. The sensing UE may need to select all the transmission resources for a TB at the same time. The sensing UE can select a TFRP within the resource selection window; see Cao par. 0272, 0279, 0285, 0311);
Cao does not explicitly disclose determining a sensing window based on the plurality of resources selected. Hoang discloses determining a sensing window based on the selected plurality of resources (The WTRU may determine a sensing evaluation window [T1, T2] when it evaluates the sensing result; see Hoang par. 0106, 0109, 0113, 0121, 0124); and determining an availability of the plurality of resources based on a sensing result in the sensing window (the WTRU may determine channel availability based on a sensing result. Channel availability may include the availability of one or more time and/or frequency resources. The WTRU may interpret results of a sensing event to determine whether a channel is available or unavailable; see Hoang par. 0102; The WTRU may report availability of resources over the sensing report window to a network. The WTRU may use the same or a similar report window as the resource selection window used by autonomous-scheduled WTRUs. The WTRU may determine the availability of resources within a window.; see Hoang par. 0121, 0128-0129). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Hoang's arrangement in Cao's invention to avoid a potential collision with forward booking resources of the WTRU (see Hoang par. 0106).
Cao does not explicitly disclose receiving a set of resource reservation periods via a configured parameter; and determining availability of the plurality of resources based on a sensing result in the sensing window, wherein the sensing result includes sensing, in a plurality of time intervals that is based on a set of resource reservation periods, when a resource reservation request is received. Yasukawa discloses receiving a set of resource reservation periods via a configured parameter (in the resource selection mode (mode 1-1) and the resource selection mode (mode 1-2), the transmission interval (resource reservation period), which can be selected by the user equipment UE, may be limited. For example, the transmission interval may be limited to a period combination in which a relatively great reservation period can be divided into small reservation periods such as 100 ms, 200 ms, and 1000 ms; see Yasukawa par. 0098); wherein the sensing result includes sensing, in a plurality of time intervals that is based on the set of resource reservation periods (The selection unit 104 includes a function of selecting a resource candidate with which the D2D signal can be transmitted on the basis of the reservation situation, which is grasped by the sensing unit 103, of the future resource. In addition, the selection unit 104 includes a function of selecting one more resource candidates, with which a signal can be transmitted, in a selection window subsequent to the sensing window on the basis of a sensing result and a transmission interval of the D2D signal that is transmitted by the user equipment UE…; see Yasukawa par. 0124-0127), when a resource reservation request is received (The signal reception unit 102 includes a function of wirelessly receiving various signals from another user equipment UE or the base station eNB, and acquiring a signal of a further higher layer from a signal of a physical layer which is received… The sensing unit 103 performs sensing in the sensing window to grasp a reservation situation of future resources; see Yasukawa par. 0122). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Yasukawa's arrangement in Cao's invention to provide a technology capable of suppressing signal collision in a mode of selecting a resource for signal transmission on the basis of a sensing result (see Yasukawa par. 0016).
Specifically for claim 15, Cao discloses An apparatus for wireless communication, comprising: a at least one memory; and at least one processor coupled with the at least one memory and configured to cause the apparatus to: (The UE 654a includes a communication subsystem 670a, two antennas 672a and 674a, a processor 676a, and a memory 678a. The UE 654a also includes a communication module 680a. The communication module 680a is implemented by the processor 676a when the processor 676a accesses and executes a series of instructions stored in the memory 678a, the instructions defining the actions of the communication module 680a. When the instructions are executed, the communication module 680a causes the UE 654a to perform the actions described herein in relation to establishing and participating in a UE group; see Cao par. 0334 and Fig. 6).
For claims 2 and 16, Cao does not explicitly disclose The method of Claim 1, wherein the sensing window comprises a first sensing window for partial sensing and a second sensing window for full sensing. Hoang discloses The method of Claim 1, wherein the sensing window comprises a first sensing window for partial sensing and a second sensing window for full sensing (The WTRU may receive a sensing request from the network. The sensing request may indicate whether the WTRU may perform either partial or full sensing. The WTRU may receive a sensing request which may include a sensing resource indication. For example, the sensing resource indication may include a starting subframe, a number of subframes, subchannel indices, etc. The sensing request may take the form of an RRC reconfiguration sent by the network to the WTRU which may tum sensing on or off for a specific WTRU and/or may configure specific parameters associated with sensing and/or reporting. The WTRU may receive a configuration for sensing via RRC and may receive a MAC CE or DCI message to turn sensing on or off; see Hoang par. 0091). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Hoang's arrangement in Cao's invention to avoid a potential collision with forward booking resources of the WTRU (see Hoang par. 0106).
For claims 3 and 17, Cao does not explicitly disclose The method of Claim 1, wherein the sensing window comprises a first sensing window and a second sensing window both for full sensing. Hoang discloses The method of Claim 1, wherein the sensing window comprises a first sensing window and a second sensing window both for full sensing (The WTRU may be configured to perform full sensing. The WTRU may monitor resources in the sensing pool except the subframes where the WTRU is transmitting. For example the WTRU may monitor all resources in the sensing pool in full sensing; see Hoang par. 0088). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Hoang's arrangement in Cao's invention to avoid a potential collision with forward booking resources of the WTRU (see Hoang par. 0106).
For claims 4 and 18, Cao does not explicitly disclose The method of Claim 1, wherein the sensing window comprises a first sensing window and a second sensing window both for partial sensing. Hoang discloses The method of Claim 1, wherein the sensing window comprises a first sensing window and a second sensing window both for partial sensing (A WTRU may be configured to perform partial sensing. The WTRU may perform sensing in a subset of the frequency resources and in a subset of the subframes in the sensing pool. FIG. 2 shows an example of partial sensing; see Hoang par. 0089). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Hoang's arrangement in Cao's invention to avoid a potential collision with forward booking resources of the WTRU (see Hoang par. 0106).
For claim 5, Cao does not explicitly disclose The method of Claim 2, wherein the second sensing window is determined based on the plurality of resources selected and a set of resource reservation periods of a resource pool. Hoang discloses The method of Claim 2, wherein the second sensing window is determined based on the plurality of resources selected and a set of resource reservation periods of a resource pool (A WTRU may select a value of P Resvp_Tx based on a configured reservation period of SPS. The reservation period may be determined based on the logical channel of the data in the buffer. The reservation period may be determined based on the configured SPS time of the WTRU. The value of P Resvp_Tx may be determined based on a lowest possible configured reservation period of the configured SPS resource. For example, the lowest possible configured reservation period of the configured SPS resource may be 20 ms; see Hoang par. 0110; WTRU determining a sensing period corresponding to a sensing report window based on a preconfigured set of t_resv, which may be used to indicate the reservation period of a resource. The WTRU in FIG. 4 may process the sensing result of the determined sensing resource; see Hoang par. 0124). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Hoang's arrangement in Cao's invention to avoid a potential collision with forward booking resources of the WTRU (see Hoang par. 0106).
For claim 6, Cao does not explicitly disclose The method of Claim 5, wherein a starting time of the first sensing window is determined based on a maximum value of the set of resource reservation periods, and an ending time of the first sensing window is determined based on a trigger of resource selection. Hoang discloses The method of Claim 5, wherein a starting time of the first sensing window is determined based on a maximum value of the set of resource reservation periods (A WTRU may determine the expected RSRP or RSSI of a resource by calculating the weighted average of the RSRP or RSSI of the resource during the sensing time. For example, the WTRU may determine the expected RSRP or RSSI of the resource at time t by taking the weighted average of the RSRP or RSSI in time t-k*t_period, where k=l, 2, ... , K. The value of t_period may be determined by the reservation period of a packet in the resource, which may be configured (e.g., pre-configured) or signaled to the WTRU via RRC/SIB. The value of K may be preconfigured and may indicate a maximum number of t_resv intervals the WTRU make look back. The weighted values may decrease when k increases; see Hoang par. 0125), and an ending time of the first sensing window is determined based on a trigger of resource selection (The window may be denoted as [n+T1, n+T2 ]. n may indicate the symbol/slot/subframe for a timing reference for sensing. The timing reference for sensing may indicate when the WTRU receives a sensing request. The timing reference for sensing may indicate when the WTRU performs reporting. The timing reference for sensing may indicate the end of the sensing period. T 1 and T 2 may indicate the start and end time of the window. The value of T1 may be determined by the WTRU's capability and/or the frame/slot structure configuration of the system. The value of T 2 may be determined by the delay requirement of the packet for which the WTRU is transmitting a sensing result to the network or the radio activity of the resource pool. The report of [n+T1, n+T2] may be most applicable to event-triggered sensing where the WTRU sends sensing results along with BSR and therefore may know the delay requirements of the packet; see Hoang par. 0121). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Hoang's arrangement in Cao's invention to avoid a potential collision with forward booking resources of the WTRU (see Hoang par. 0106).
For claim 9, Cao does not explicitly disclose The method of Claim 5, wherein sensing in the second sensing window can be omitted if it is determined, based on the set of resource reservation periods, that no resource reservation request will be received in the second sensing window. Hoang discloses The method of Claim 5, wherein sensing in the second sensing window can be omitted if it is determined, based on the set of resource reservation periods, that no resource reservation request will be received in the second sensing window (The WTRU may receive a sensing request from the network. The sensing request may indicate whether the WTRU may perform either partial or full sensing. The WTRU may receive a sensing request which may include a sensing resource indication. For example, the sensing resource indication may include a starting subframe, a number of subframes, subchannel indices, etc. The sensing request may take the form of an RRC reconfiguration sent by the network to the WTRU which may tum sensing on or off for a specific WTRU and/or may configure specific parameters associated with sensing and/or reporting. The WTRU may receive a configuration for sensing via RRC and may receive a MAC CE or DCI message to turn sensing on or off. A WTRU may perform event-triggered sensing; see Hoang par. 0091-0092). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Hoang's arrangement in Cao's invention to avoid a potential collision with forward booking resources of the WTRU (see Hoang par. 0106).
For claim 11, Cao does not explicitly disclose The method of Claim 2, wherein the availability of the plurality of resources is determined after the second sensing window and before the plurality of resources. Hoang discloses The method of Claim 2, wherein the availability of the plurality of resources is determined after the second sensing window and before the plurality of resources (A WTRU may determine a resource pool to perform sensing based on packet QoS parameters. The WTRU may determine its intended sensing resources ( e.g., which may be referred to as preferred resources) to perform sensing and/or monitoring based on one or more of the following factors. The WTRU may determine its intended sensing resources based on the QoS of the transmission packet. The transmission packet may be associated with the WTRU side link service type. The WTRU may determine its intended sensing resources based on subsets of the available resource broadcast by the network. The WTRU may determine its intended sensing resources based on resources from previous transmissions. The WTRU may determine its intended sensing resources based on resources from a past sensing result. For example, the resources from the past sensing result may include resources with CBR and/or channel occupation ratio (CR) statistics that meet a pre-configured threshold; see Hoang par. 0094-0099). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Hoang's arrangement in Cao's invention to avoid a potential collision with forward booking resources of the WTRU (see Hoang par. 0106).
Claim(s) 12 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable Cao, Hoang and Yasukawa, and further in view of Hui et al. (US 2021/0235328, hereinafter “Hui”).
For claims 12 and 19, the combination of Cao, Hoang and Yasukawa does not explicitly disclose The method of Claim 1, wherein an ending time of the sensing window is determined based on a starting time of the plurality of resources selected. Hui discloses The method of Claim 1, wherein an ending time of the sensing window is determined based on a starting time of the plurality of resources selected (FIG. 19 shows an example of timing for a resource selection procedure. A wireless device may perform the resource selection procedure to select radio resources for a sidelink transmission. A sensing window 1901 of the resource selection procedure may start at time (n-T0), for example, as shown in FIG. 19. The sensing window 1901 may end at time (n-Tproc.o)- The wireless device may receive new data for the sidelink transmission at time (n-Tproc.o)- The time period Tproc.o may be a processing delay of the wireless device to determine to trigger the resource selection procedure. The wireless device may determine to trigger the resource selection procedure at time n to select the radio resources for the new data arrived at time (n-Tproc.o)- The wireless device may complete the resource selection procedure at time (n+T1). The wireless device may determine the parameter Tl, for example, based on a capability of the wireless device. The capability of the wireless device may be based on a processing delay of a processor of the wireless device. A selection window 1902 of the resource selection procedure may start at time (n+ T1). The selection window 1902 may end at time (n+T2). The time (n+ T2) may indicate/define the ending of the selection window; see Hui par. 0220). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Hui's arrangement in Cao's invention to provide various advantages, such as improved resource efficiency, reduced processing latency, reduced power consumption, and/or greater resource availability for resource selection (see Hui par. 0228).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 7, 8, 10, 13 and 21 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
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
-Shin et al. (KR20210145562).
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to CHAE S LEE whose telephone number is (571)272-8236. The examiner can normally be reached 8:30AM - 5:00PM.
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/CHAE S LEE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2415