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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1-6, 9-15 and 18-20 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.
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 on12/12/25 has been entered.
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.
The factual inquiries 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.
Claim(s) 1-3, 5, 6, 9-14, 18-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sehgal et al. (US 20230345361) (hereinafter Sehgal) in view of Bi (US20180091929).
Per claim 1, Sehgal discloses a method for wireless communication, comprising: configuring a
wireless offload engine to maintain a wireless connection on behalf of one or more circuits coupled to the wireless offload engine; determining that the one or more circuits are to enter a low-power state (paragraph 0026, i.e. For example, the BLE module 202 can cause other components to sleep [low-
power], turn off, or turn on [active]. These operations may involve other modules that have the power
interfaces for these other components. For example, the USB bridge 204 and the battery manager 206
may support various power commands for power management of the USB ports 208 and battery 210
respectively) ; and maintaining the wireless connection after the one or more circuits have entered the
low-power state (paragraph 0049, Fig 4B, i.e. the finite state machine 450 includes several states: device
off 452, active mode 454, low power mode 456, and ultra- low power mode 458. A variety of triggers,
numbered from (1) to (9), cause the wireless device to transition from one state to another) but fails to
explicitly disclose the wireless offload engine comprising a Bluetooth core, the Bluetooth core configured
to perform Bluetooth connectivity functions and to store one or more files associated with the one or more
circuits, Wi-Fi core configured to maintain the wireless connection based at least in part in the one or more files stored in the Bluetooth core and maintaining the wireless connection after the one or more circuits have entered the low- power state based at least in part on the one or more files stored by the Bluetooth core.
In an analogous field of endeavor, Bi discloses the wireless offload engine comprising a Bluetooth core, the Bluetooth core configured to perform Bluetooth connectivity functions and to store one or more files associated with the one or more circuits (paragraph 0016, i.e. By regulating Bluetooth traffic with a slot available mask scheme the overall weighted joint throughputs are increased. When system or device is actively using or seeks to actively use the Bluetooth and WiFi systems at the same time, the system collects Bluetooth and WiFi bandwidth requests and generates a local slot available mask map for the Bluetooth communication so that the slot available mask may be used to regulate its local Bluetooth traffic within the allocated slots), Wi-Fi core configured to maintain the wireless connection based at least in part in the one or more files stored in the Bluetooth core and maintaining the wireless connection after the one or more circuits have entered the low- power state based at least in part on the one or more files stored by the Bluetooth core (paragraph 0023, i.e. The coordinated scheduling may prevent a downward spiral of competition for airtime between the two systems. For example, in the above described wireless display and A2DP use case, if the WiFi system reports low throughput on its allocated airtime, the WiFi system might decide to squeeze the Bluetooth allocated airtime to increase the small WiFi throughput. In other words, the WiFi system may begin using some or all of the Bluetooth requested or allocated time and paragraph 0020, i.e. the coordinated scheduling approach also provides greater flexibility to adjust its operation to different use cases. For example, when both the WiFi system and the Bluetooth system are performing file transfers, the coordinated scheduling approach can achieve different respective WiFi and Bluetooth throughput performance levels by changing the amount of air time (changing the local slot available mask map) allocated to the Bluetooth system, as a result of which the WiFi system may take over the rest of the airtime not allocated to Bluetooth).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to have incorporated the teachings of Bi into the invention of
Sehgal, where Sehgal provides a wireless communication device is configured to transition between
power states to reduce power usage. The wireless communication device includes a power source, a first
transmitter, a second transmitter, and control circuitry and Bi discloses A method and apparatus for coordinating communications between a Bluetooth system and a WiFi system in a device. Requests for airtime are collected from the Bluetooth system and the WiFi system. A local slot availability mask is prepared showing time slots allocated to the Bluetooth system. The local slot availability mask is forwarded to the WiFi system so that the WiFi system may avoid sending and receiving WiFi wireless communications during time slots allocated for Bluetooth system use in order to provide better quality of service where coordinating the wireless communications may improve communication reliability of the transmitted information and saving power and increase efficiency, for example, since fewer packets fail to be successfully communicated, see Bi, paragraphs 0012, 0020 and 0023.
Per claim 2, the combination of Sehgal and Bi discloses the method of claim 1,
wherein Sehgal discloses the configuring comprises configuring the wireless offload engine to establish
the wireless connection on behalf of the one or more circuits ( paragraph 0017, i.e. the control circuitry
120 can include a power manager 124 for controlling the transitions between an active power mode, low
power mode, and/or ultra-low power mode. In the active power mode, the device has full functionally with
all or at least most components receiving full power. In the low power mode, several components,
including one transmitter are turned off and paragraph 0043, Fig 4a, i.e. alternatively, a (5) user connection from a client device can cause the wireless device to move from the low power mode 406 to the active mode 404 ).
Per claim 3, the combination of Sehgal and Bi discloses the method of claim 1,
wherein Sehgal discloses the configuring comprises configuring the wireless offload engine to perform
one or more authentication operations with one or more cloud servers on behalf of the one or more
circuits (paragraph 0029, i.e. the BLE module 202 is also responsible for managing and authenticating
users and client devices via a key exchange or other authentication scheme. Once a client device is
verified and connected to the BLE radio, the wireless device can switch to an active mode. In some
implementations of the active mode, the peripheral devices are on, but other controllers are still turned
off, such as the WLAN or USB controllers, see paragraph 0025, for data storage services where client
devices connected to network 130, such as a local area network (LAN), mesh network, Internet of Things
(loT) network and/or laptop computers, where the examiner interprets servers/computers are connected
for one or more authentication schemes) the one or more authentication operations performed based at least in part on the one or more files stored by the Bluetooth core (paragraph 0062, i.e. In some implementations, only verified client devices can turn on either the USB controller or the WLAN module based on commands sent over the Bluetooth radio, after authentication is performed by the Bluetooth module).
Per claim 5, the combination of Sehgal and Bi discloses the method of claim 1,
wherein Sehgal discloses the configuring comprises receiving the one or more files from the one or more
circuits, the one or more files corresponding to the wireless connection (paragraph 0065 and 0066, i.e.
the wireless device 100 transfers data wirelessly to a client device via a first transmitter 126 during an
active power state. The transfer may be initiated in response to a request by the client device. For
example, the client device may be requesting data from the wireless device 100, such as a data file or
sensor readings and the first transmitter 126 may also support receiving of data. For example, the first
transmitter 126 may be a WLAN radio that supports the various Wi-Fi protocols).
Per claim 6 the combination of Sehgal and Bi discloses the method of claim 5,
wherein t Sehgal discloses he one or more files correspond to an application configured to communicate
via the wireless connection (paragraph 0030 and 0031, i.e. the user may use an application (e.g., mobile
app) on a client device to change the mount setting, with the application then communicating the
authorization to the wireless device via the BLE radio and there is a possibility that a client device connected to the WLAN radio 212 during a data transfer may move out of the BLE range and disconnect
from the BLE radio).
Per claim 9, the combination of Sehgal and Bi discloses the method of claim 1, further
Sehgal discloses comprising: receiving a request for data via the maintained wireless connection;
determining, that the request is valid; directing the one or more circuits to exit the low-power state; and
responding to the request with the requested data (paragraph 0043 and 0044, i.e. user connection from a
client device can cause the wireless device to move from the low power mode 406 to the active mode
404. For example, a new client device may send a connection request to the wireless device. The (5)
user connection may cause the wireless device to transition to the active mode 404), Bi
discloses determining based on part on the one more files that the request is valid (paragraph 0023, The coordinated scheduling may prevent a downward spiral of competition for airtime between the two systems. For example, in the above described wireless display and A2DP use case, if the WiFi system reports low throughput on its allocated airtime, the WiFi system might decide to squeeze the Bluetooth allocated airtime to increase the small WiFi throughput. In other words, the WiFi system may begin using some or all of the Bluetooth requested or allocated time and paragraph 0020, i.e. For example, when both the WiFi system and the Bluetooth system are performing file transfers, the coordinated scheduling approach can achieve different respective WiFi and Bluetooth throughput performance levels by changing the amount of air time [changing the local slot available mask map] allocated to the Bluetooth system, as a result of which the WiFi system may take over the rest of the airtime not allocated to Bluetooth).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to have incorporated the teachings of Bi into the invention of
Sehgal, in order to provide better quality of service where coordinating the wireless communications may improve communication reliability of the transmitted information and saving power and increase efficiency, for example, since fewer packets fail to be successfully communicated, see Bi, paragraphs 0012, 0020 and 0023.
Per claim 10, the combination of Sehgal and Bi discloses the method of claim 9,
wherein Sehgal discloses responding to the request comprises capturing one or more images and
responding to the request with the captured one or more mages(paragraph 0011 and 0065, i.e.. the loT describes physical objects [or groups of such objects] that are embedded with sensors, processing ability, software, and other technologies that connect and exchange data with other devices and systems over the Internet or other communications networks and.the transfer may be initiated in response to a request by the client device. For example, the client device may be requesting data from the wireless device 100, such as a data file or sensor readings. In some embodiments, the client device and the wireless device may be part of the same network, such as a home automation network or local area network).
Per claim 11, the combination of Sehgal and Bi discloses the method of claim 9,
further Sehgal discloses comprising entering the low-power state at the one or more circuits after responding to the request with the requested data (paragraph 0037, i.e. where the WLAN radio is kept on
so that additional wireless requests can be received, before going back to the low power mode).
Per claim 12, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 1.
Per claim 13, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 2.
Per claim 14, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 3.
Per claim 18, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 9.
Per claim 19, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 11.
Per claim 20, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 1, see Sehgal, paragraph 0018 and 0019, storage medium.
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.
Claim(s) 4 and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sehgal and Bi in further view of Park et al. (US20210410107) (hereinafter Park)
Per claim 4, the combination of Sehgal and Bi discloses the method of claim 1, wherein Sehgal discloses the Wi-Fi core (paragraph 0015, WI-FI), by performing one or more Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) handshake operations to maintain the wireless connection (paragraph 0071, internet protocol address)but both references fails to disclose a lightweight internet protocol (lwlP) stack, wherein configuring the wireless offload engine comprises configuring the IwIP stack to maintain the wireless connection.
In an analogous field of endeavor, Park discloses comprising a lightweight internet protocol (IwlP)
stack, wherein configuring the wireless offload engine comprises configuring the IwIP stack to maintain
the wireless connection (paragraph 0188, LWIP)
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to have incorporated the teachings of Park into the invention of Sehgal and Bi, where Park provides RRC message may further comprise at least one of an rrc-transaction identifier information element (IE), a radio resource configuration dedicated IE comprising one or more radio resource configuration parameters, such as WLAN configuration parameters, WLAN offloading configuration parameters, LWA configuration parameters, LWIP configuration parameters in order to better quality of service by maintaining bearer requirements such as low latency and/or high reliability for data throughput., see Park, paragraphs 0187and 0188.
Per claim 15, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 4.
Conclusion
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/JOSEPH E DEAN, JR/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2647