DETAILED ACTION
Status of Case
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 amendment filed on 10/31/2025.
Claims 1, 4-18, and 20-22 are pending, with claims 2-3 and 19 being cancelled and claims 9-16 being withdrawn.
Response to Arguments
Upon performing an updated search, Examiner discovered prior art that reads on Applicant’s latest claim amendments. As such, this second action non-final is being sent to include the newly cited prior art that was discovered during the updated search.
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, 7-8, 17-19, 20, and 22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Adachi (USPAN 2012/0014335) in view of Wu (USPAN 2020/0100138).
Consider claims 1 and 20, Adachi discloses a communication apparatus complying with an IEEE802.11 series standard (see figure 3, wherein disclosed is said apparatus), and a corresponding control method for a communication apparatus (see paragraphs 59-62, 69-70, and 159-163, wherein disclosed is said method), and a corresponding non-transitory computer-readable storage medium that stores a program for causing a computer to perform operations (see figures 3 and 19, wherein disclosed is said computer-readable storage medium), comprising:
receiving, from a first other communication apparatus, a data frame including data units and an indication of a sequence number assigned to at least one data unit of the data units (see paragraphs 59, 69-70, 159-163, and 185, wherein disclosed is said first reception unit configured to perform said receiving);
transmitting, to a second other communication apparatus, a data frame including the sequence number and the at least one data unit (see paragraphs 59 and 90-91: wherein disclosed is said first transmission unit to configured to perform said transmitting);
receiving, from the second other communication apparatus, a reception confirmation with respect to the data frame transmitted by the first transmission unit (see paragraphs 61-62, 69, and 72-77: wherein disclosed is said second reception unit configured to perform said receiving); and
transmitting, to the first other communication apparatus, information of the sequence number of the data unit received by the second other communication apparatus, which is included in the reception confirmation (see paragraphs 61-62, 69, 72-77, and 122-126: wherein disclosed is said second transmission unit to configured to perform said transmitting).
Although Adachi can be broadly construed to disclose that every time the reception confirmation is received, the communication apparatus transmits, to the first other communication apparatus, the information of the sequence number included in the reception confirmation (see above), Adachi does not specifically disclose this.
Wu discloses that every time a reception confirmation is received, the communication apparatus transmits, to a first other communication apparatus, information of a sequence number included in the reception confirmation (see abstract and paragraphs 7-8: the acknowledgement packet includes the first acknowledgement indication, and the first acknowledgment indication includes the sequence number of the first data packet and an address of the second node; also, see figure 8, reproduced below for convenience).
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It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Adachi and combine it with the noted teachings of Wu. The motivation to combine these references is to provide an acknowledgment every time a packet is received, as well as providing a packet sending method that resolves acknowledgment packet implosion while ensuring broadcast packet reliability of a wireless mesh network (see paragraph 6 of Wu).
Consider claim 7, Adachi discloses that the reception confirmation is a Block Ack (see figure 5 and paragraphs 19 and 69: block ack (BA) mechanism).
Consider claim 8, Adachi discloses that the data unit is a MAC Service Data Unit (MSDU) or an Aggregation-MSDU (A-MSDU), and the sequence number is a serial number assigned to each MSDU or each A-MSDU (see paragraph 59: “Each of the MSDU and MMPDU is assigned with a sequence number showing the order of the frame”).
Consider claim 17, Adachi discloses that the first other communication apparatus is an access point and the second other communication apparatus is a terminal apparatus (see paragraphs 59, 69-70, 159-163, and 185).
Consider claim 18, Adachi discloses that the first other communication apparatus is a terminal apparatus and the second other communication apparatus is an access point (see figure 2: AP 101 and terminal apparatus 201).
Consider claim 22, Adachi discloses a communication apparatus complying with an IEEE802.11 series standard (see figure 3, wherein disclosed is said apparatus), and a corresponding control method for a communication apparatus (see paragraphs 59-62, 69-70, and 159-163, wherein disclosed is said method), and a corresponding non-transitory computer-readable storage medium that stores a program for causing a computer to perform operations (see figures 3 and 19, wherein disclosed is said computer-readable storage medium), comprising:
receiving, from a first other communication apparatus, a data frame including data units and an indication of a sequence number assigned to at least one data unit of the data units (see paragraphs 59, 69-70, 159-163, and 185, wherein disclosed is said first reception unit configured to perform said receiving);
transmitting, to a second other communication apparatus, a data frame including the sequence number and the at least one data unit (see paragraphs 59 and 90-91: wherein disclosed is said first transmission unit to configured to perform said transmitting);
receiving, from the second other communication apparatus, a reception confirmation with respect to the data frame transmitted by the first transmission unit (see paragraphs 61-62, 69, and 72-77: wherein disclosed is said second reception unit configured to perform said receiving); and
transmitting, to the first other communication apparatus, information of the sequence number of the data unit received by the second other communication apparatus, which is included in the reception confirmation (see paragraphs 61-62, 69, 72-77, and 122-126: wherein disclosed is said second transmission unit to configured to perform said transmitting),
wherein after receiving a plurality of reception confirmations, the communication apparatus collectively transmits, to the first other communication apparatus, information of the sequence numbers included in the reception confirmation (see paragraph 69: “…a delivery confirmation response is transmitting concerning a plurality of data frames, and the wireless terminal on the transmitting side which receives the delivery confirmation response retransmits unsuccessfully transmitted data frames. This is called a block ack (BA) mechanism”).
Although Adachi can be broadly construed to disclose that every time the reception confirmation is received, the communication apparatus transmits, to the first other communication apparatus, the information of the sequence number included in the reception confirmation (see above), Adachi does not specifically disclose this.
Wu discloses that every time a reception confirmation is received, the communication apparatus transmits, to a first other communication apparatus, information of a sequence number included in the reception confirmation (see abstract and paragraphs 7-8: the acknowledgement packet includes the first acknowledgement indication, and the first acknowledgment indication includes the sequence number of the first data packet and an address of the second node; also, see figure 8, reproduced below for convenience).
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It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Adachi and combine it with the noted teachings of Wu. The motivation to combine these references is to provide an acknowledgment every time a packet is received, as well as providing a packet sending method that resolves acknowledgment packet implosion while ensuring broadcast packet reliability of a wireless mesh network (see paragraph 6 of Wu).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4-6 and 21 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
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Jamal Javaid whose telephone number is 571-270-5137 and email address is Jamal.Javaid@uspto.gov.
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/JAMAL JAVAID/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2412