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 .
DETAILED ACTION
This Office Action is in response to the Applicants’ communication filed on 11/11/2025. In virtue of this communication, claims 1-4, 6-11, 13-18 and 20 are currently pending in the instant application.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 11/11/2025 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. Please see the revised rejection below in view of amendments argued. Further, Gu shows the comparison of attribute handles of two services when comparing the received attribute handles to a database of saved attribute handles (par. 0049-0051). Therefore, the rejections are maintained at this time.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-4, 6-11, 13-18 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Gu et al. (US 2017/0295539 A1).
Regarding Claim 1 Gu teaches the limitations "A control method of an electronic device, comprising: (see abstract);
wirelessly connecting to a first device; performing a service discovery to the first device to retrieve a plurality of attribute handles from the first device; (see fig. 3 (302 AND 304) AND par. 0047-0048);
storing the plurality of attribute handles of the first device into a database cache; (see Table 1 in par. 0058 and par. 0040 “The service database 218 stores a plurality of service characteristics associated with Bluetooth services. The service database 218 may be stored in a memory included in the Bluetooth hub 210”). Also see par. 0058 “the Bluetooth hub 400 may first establish a connection with the BLE device 510, e.g., using its first Bluetooth chip 410, to obtain service characteristics of the BLE device 510. For example, the Bluetooth hub 400 may scan for available Bluetooth devices via the first Bluetooth chip 410, detect the advertising packets transmitted by the BLE device 510, and store the data in the advertising packets. After a connection with the BLE device 510 is established, the Bluetooth hub 400 may retrieve the service characteristics of the BLE device 510 and store the retrieved service characteristics locally. An example of the retrieved service characteristics is illustrated in Table 1” and par. 0059 “ In Table 1, the first column represents the attribute handles of the service characteristics.”);
wirelessly connecting to a second device; determining whether the second device and the first device have the same attribute handles; and in response to the second device having the same attribute handles as the first device, directly using the plurality of attribute handles of the first device stored in the database cache, for using services of the second device" (see fig. 3 (306, 308 and 310) and par. 0049-0051 “At step 310, if each of the service characteristics of the Bluetooth device is included in the service database, the Bluetooth hub communicates with the Bluetooth device based on the received request from the client device and the service characteristics of the Bluetooth device. For example, the Bluetooth hub may establish a connection with the Bluetooth device and send a request to the Bluetooth device for performing the operation requested by the client device. The request sent to the Bluetooth device may be a read or write operation on a specific attribute of a specific service characteristic of the Bluetooth device.” Also see par. 0033 “when the client device 110 desires to operate an analyzable Bluetooth device (e.g., BLE lock 125) via the hub 120, the hub 120 may receive a control command from the client device 110 on an application interface, and transmit corresponding Bluetooth packets to the BLE lock 125 based on the service characteristics of BLE lock 125 previously retrieved by the hub 120.”);
wherein the electronic deice is a Bluetooth client, (see par. 0038 “the Bluetooth hub 210 provides an application interface for the smart phone 230 to operate the Bluetooth devices 240-280 and acts as a master device that controls the Bluetooth devices 240-280 based on information received from the smart phone 230.” Here, the Bluetooth hub provides interface on client device and acts as master to control devices, i.e. a Bluetooth client device) and both the first device and the second device are Bluetooth servers (see par. 0038 “The Bluetooth devices 240-280 may also be referred to as Bluetooth server devices that provide data access to or be controllable by a remote client device.”).
Claims 8 and 15 are rejected for the same reasons set forth above because the claims have similar limitations or have been addressed.
Regarding Claim 2 Gu teaches the limitations "The control method of claim 1, wherein the step of in response to the second device having the same attribute handles as the first device, directly using the plurality of attribute handles of the first device stored in the database cache, for using services of the second device comprises:
in response to the second device having the same attribute handles as the first device, directly using the plurality of attribute handles of the first device stored in the database cache, without performing the service discovery to the second device, for using services of the second device" (see par. 0060 “After the connection with the BLE device 510 is established, the second Bluetooth chip 420 may generate a Generic Attribute Profile (GATT) server using the same service characteristics as those in the BLE device 510. The second Bluetooth chip 420 may start advertising and include the same data in the advertising packets as those in the advertising packets transmitted by the BLE device 510. In doing so, a virtual BLE device 510 may be created by the Bluetooth hub 400 for connecting to a Bluetooth-enabled client device, such as the smart phone 520.”).
Claims 9 and 16 are rejected for the same reasons set forth above because the claims have similar limitations or have been addressed.
Regarding Claim 3 Gu teaches the limitations "The control method of claim 1, wherein the step of performing the service discovery to the first device to retrieve the plurality of attribute handles from the first device comprise:
performing the service discovery to the first device to retrieve all the attribute handles of the first device" (see par. 0058 “…the Bluetooth hub 400 may first establish a connection with the BLE device 510, e.g., using its first Bluetooth chip 410, to obtain service characteristics of the BLE device 510. For example, the Bluetooth hub 400 may scan for available Bluetooth devices via the first Bluetooth chip 410, detect the advertising packets transmitted by the BLE device 510, and store the data in the advertising packets. After a connection with the BLE device 510 is established, the Bluetooth hub 400 may retrieve the service characteristics of the BLE device 510 and store the retrieved service characteristics locally.”).
Claims 10 and 17 are rejected for the same reasons set forth above because the claims have similar limitations or have been addressed.
Regarding Claim 4 Gu teaches the limitations "The control method of claim 1, further comprising:
in response to the second device not having the same attribute handles as the first device, performing the service discovery to the second device to retrieve a plurality of attribute handles of the second device; and storing the plurality of attribute handles of the second device into the database cache" (see par. 0030, “Analyzable Bluetooth devices are configured with service characteristics that can be found in a database stored locally in the hub 120, allowing the hub 120 to communicate with the Bluetooth devices based on the stored service characteristics. Unanalyzable Bluetooth devices are configured with service characteristics that cannot be found in a database stored locally in the hub 120, and thus the hub 120 may not be able to perform application layer communication with the unanalyzable Bluetooth devices” and par. 0036 “may be configured to connect to a cloud server and capable of adaptively reconfigure itself based on the use history, interaction, and/or activities of the client device 110. For example, the hub 120 may be configured to update its database storing the service characteristics through the cloud server to include newly available service characteristics or update the existing service characteristics.” Lastly, see3 par. 0043 “After detecting advertising packets of a Bluetooth device, the Bluetooth hub 210 may establish a connection with the Bluetooth device and retrieve the service characteristics associated with the Bluetooth device.”).
Claims 11 and 18 are rejected for the same reasons set forth above because the claims have similar limitations or have been addressed.
Regarding Claim 6 Gu teaches the limitations "The control method of claim 5, wherein the first device and the second device are a pair of earphones" (see par. 0035 “The Bluetooth devices 125-140 may operate as slave devices. Bluetooth slave devices may be speakers, headsets…”).
Claims 13 and 20 are rejected for the same reasons set forth above because the claims have similar limitations or have been addressed.
Regarding Claim 7 Gu teaches the limitations "The control method of claim 5, wherein the plurality of attribute handles comprise services, characteristics and descriptors of a Generic Attribute (GATT) profile" (see par. 0058 Table 1).
Claims 14 is rejected for the same reasons set forth above because the claims have similar limitations or have been addressed.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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 extension fee 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.
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/David Bilodeau/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2648