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
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 March 20, 2026 has been entered.
This Office Action is in response to claim amendment filed on March 20, 2026 and wherein claims 1, 10 and 19-20 being currently written in independent form.
In virtue of this communication, claims 1-4, 9-13 and 18-20 are currently pending in this Office Action.
The Office appreciates the explanation of the amendment and analyses of the prior arts, and however, although the claims are interpreted in light of the specification, limitations from the specification are not read into the claims. See In re Van Geuns, 988 F.2d 1181, 26 USPQ2d 1057 (Fed. Cir. 1993) and MPEP 2145.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see Remarks, Pages 6-9, filed on March 20, 2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1, 10, 19, 20 under 35 USC §103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of KO.
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.
Claims 1- 4, 10-13, 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Viger et al. (US 20230119901 A1, hereinafter Viger) in view of Wang et al. (US 20220287122 A1, hereinafter Wang) and further in view of KO et al. (US 20230319884 A1, hereinafter KO).
Claim 1: Viger teaches a method (Abstract, Fig. 1, Fig. 2), comprising:
receiving, by a first multi-link device, a message from a second multi-link device, wherein the message carries traffic-to-link mapping information (Fig. 12, elements 1206, Fig. 13 element 1302, [0220], “The link transition request message may include one or more of the fields discussed above with respect to FIG. 8. For example, one or more of a traffic stream identifier TSID, station identifier, status code, Link list, and a required indication may be decoded from the Link transition request message in various aspects”, Fig. 7, elements 790, 792, [0149], “The frames 790-792 are activation frames aiming to route TID/TSID on specific links”);
and establishing or updating, by the first multi-link device (Fig. 13, elements 1303, 1304, 1305, [0221], “In response to receiving the Link transition request message, the station may first determine whether to transition into the link in decision operation 1303”, [0222], “The multi-link request message 780 may request a list of links to which the transmitting device may designate as to communicate with. When the new link is opened, the operation may also include configuring the initiating station to transmit a “multi-link link open indication” message to the first AP of MLE AP in order to make the MLE AP aware of active links in its BSS”), a traffic-to-link mapping relationship based on the traffic-to-link mapping information (Fig. 13, [0224], “Transitioning the P2P traffic stream to a new link(s) may include configuring (step 1305) the MLE station to transmit data associated with the traffic ID to the designated link(s), and/or decoding data from the designated link(s) to determine the data is associated with the traffic stream (TSID)”).
However, Viger does not explicitly teaches wherein the message comprises an information element indicating the traffic-to-link mapping relationship, the information element carries a preset field that indicates the first multi-link device to establish or update the traffic-to- link mapping relationship in a default mapping manner, wherein the default mapping manner comprises: mapping all traffic identifiers to each link on which multi-link communication is established, wherein the information element does not carry a link identifier bitmap (link ID bitmap).
KO and Wang, from the same or similar field of endeavor, teaches wherein the message comprises an information element indicating the traffic-to-link mapping relationship, the information element carries a preset field that indicates the first multi-link device to establish or update the traffic-to- link mapping relationship in a default mapping manner (Wang, [0252], “A special link index may be used to indicate that all of the links may be used”, wherein “all of the links may be used indicator” is serving the similar as indicator for using default mapping), wherein the default mapping manner comprises: mapping all traffic identifiers to each link on which multi-link communication is established, wherein the information element does not carry a link identifier bitmap (link ID bitmap) (KO, Fig. 10, [0121], [0124], disclose there may be a default setting for the mapping between the TID and the link. Specifically, in the absence of additional setup in the multi-link setup, the multi-link device may exchange frames corresponding to the TID at each link according to the default setting, and the default setting may be that all the TIDs are exchanged in any one link, wherein all the TIDs are exchanged in any one link according to the default setting when no existing of an additional mapping configuration between TID and the link).
Viger and KO are both considered to be analogous to the claimed invention because they are in the same field of wireless communication. Therefore, it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the system of Viger and the features of mapping all traffic identifiers to each link on which multi-link communication is established as taught by KO, for the benefit for reducing overhead in the multi-link setup when all the TIDs are exchanged in any one link, allowing a management frame and a control frame be transmitted in all links without an additional configuration (paragraph [0121, 0124]).
Viger and Wang are both considered to be analogous to the claimed invention because they are in the same field of wireless communication. Therefore, it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the system of Viger and the features of mapping all traffic identifiers to each link on which multi-link communication is established as taught by Wang, for the benefit for reducing control overhead to support multi-link operations (paragraph [0086]).
Claim 10 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 1 and Viger further teaches generating, by a second multi-link device, a message, wherein the message carries traffic-to-link mapping information (Fig. 12, elements 1203,1204, 1205, [0205], “the AP may decide to offload the P2P traffic on a distinct Link as a consequence to local issues (buffer, etc). … the station 222 and/or 224 informs the AP of the P2P traffic via an admission-control-like procedure”, [0207], “ Step 1205 configures the AP to memorize the selected Link (via a Link ID), along the stations involved and the TSID, in a portion of its memory”. Fig. 7, elements 790, 792, [0149], “The frames 790-792 are activation frames aiming to route TID/TSID on specific links”, [0209], “The P2P traffic stream may be identified via the information element 800, containing the traffic stream identifier TSID, which may be included in a field of the messages involved in the Link transition phase”);
and sending, by the second multi-link device, the message to the first multi-link device (Fig. 12, elements 1206, Fig. 7, element 790).
Claim 19 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 1 and Viger further teaches at least one processor (Fig. 4A, element 401); and at least one memory (Fig. 4A, element 403) coupled to the at least one processor and storing programming instructions for execution by the at least one processor to cause the multi-link device to ([0100], “a memory 403 for storing an executable code of methods or steps of the methods according to embodiments of the invention as well as the registers adapted to record variables and parameters necessary for implementing the methods”, [0107], “The MAC layer block 422 may optionally be implemented in software, which software is loaded into RAM 403 and executed by CPU 401”).
Claim 20 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 10 and Viger further teaches at least one processor (Fig. 4A, element 401); and at least one memory (Fig. 4A, element 403) coupled to the at least one processor and storing programming instructions for execution by the at least one processor to cause the multi-link device to ([0100], “a memory 403 for storing an executable code of methods or steps of the methods according to embodiments of the invention as well as the registers adapted to record variables and parameters necessary for implementing the methods”, [0107], “The MAC layer block 422 may optionally be implemented in software, which software is loaded into RAM 403 and executed by CPU 401”).
Claim 2: Viger teaches the method according to claim 1, wherein the message is an association response frame or an Extremely High Throughput (EHT) action frame (Fig. 7, elements 790, 792, [0149], “The frames 790-792 are activation frames aiming to route TID/TSID on specific links: frames may be named multi-link operation request/response. Providing no TID/TSID for a given link through those frames is equivalent to a Link Teardown command”, Fig.13, element 1306, [0225], “After the link transition is performed, process moves to operation 1306, which encodes a link transition response message 792. The encoded message may include a status indicating the link transition was accomplished”).
Claim 11 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 10 and claim 2.
Claim 3: Viger teaches the method according to claim 1, wherein the message further comprises ninth indication information indicating a traffic direction of the traffic-to- link mapping information, and wherein the traffic direction is one of uplink, downlink, or uplink and downlink (Fig. 8, [0184], “a 2-bit-length subfield 806 referred to as Direction, may specify the direction of data carried by the traffic stream”, [0185], “If first bit is equal to 1 and second bit is equal to 0, it may mean that the direction of the traffic stream is from station corresponding to AID2 to a non-AP station corresponding to AID1 (when AID2 is wildcard, this is a downlink direction from AP to STA). If first bit is equal to 0 and second bit is equal to 1, it means that the direction of the traffic stream is bidirectional”).
Claim 12 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 10 and claim 3.
Claim 4: Viger teaches the method according to claim 1, wherein the traffic-to-link mapping information is carried in a media access control (MAC) header or in an information element indicating the traffic-to-link mapping relationship (Fig. 8, [0178], “The traffic identifier field 801 may indicate a stream for which the IE 800 pertains. In some aspects, the TID/TSID field 801 may indicate an access category, traffic identifier, and/or other information”, [0181], “the status field 804 may indicate whether the stream identified by the TID field 801 was transitioned to a new Link or not”).
Claim 13 is analyzed and rejected according to claim 10 and claim 4.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 9, 18 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 YONGHONG ZHAO whose telephone number is (571)272-4089. The examiner can normally be reached Monday -Friday 9:00 am - 5:00pm.
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/Y.Z./Examiner, Art Unit 2472
/NICHOLAS A JENSEN/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2472
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