DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
1. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Status of Claims
2. Claims 1-6, 8-16, 18-20 are pending wherein claims 1 and 11 are in independent form.
3. Claims 1-2, 6, 11-12, 16, and 19 have been amended.
4. Claims 7 and 17 have been canceled.
Response to Arguments
5. Applicant's arguments filed on 11/09/2025 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. The reasons set forth below.
6. On page 9 of the remarks, applicant argues, “Claims 2 - 5 and 9 are dependent upon Claim 1. As the applicant believes the amendments to Claim 1 have placed it in a position for allowance, claims 2 - 5 and 9 should also be found allowable.”
In response, examiner respectfully disagrees because:
The allowable subject matter indicates that each of the dependent claims is allowable as a whole, not a portion of the dependent claim (Claims 2 -5, 7, 9, 12- 15, 17 and 19 were objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be found allowable if rewritten in independent form, including all limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims”). As applicant included only a portion of claim 2 into the independent claim 1, independent claim 1 does not include all the limitations of allowable dependent claim 2 and therefore, is not placed in a condition for allowance.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
7. 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.
8. Claims 1, 8, 11, and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kucharewski et al (WO 2023239534 A1, hereinafter referred to as Kucharewski) in view of Kneckt et al (US 20230254732 A1, hereinafter referred to as Kneckt).
Re claim 1, Kucharewski teaches a multi-link operation (MLO) controller for a mesh network (AP MLD, Fig. 6, Fig. 10-11), comprising:
(i) a processing unit, for controlling operations of the mesh network (Processor 530) (Fig. 5, Par 0089, Par 0102), comprising:
(ii) establishing a multi-link connection with at least a first non-access (AP) point MLO device (Non-AP MLD, STA1) within the mesh network according to an initial traffic identifier (TID) to link mapping (TID to Link mapping, T2LM) and a channel list (operating channels) (Fig. 6, Fig. 10A-B, Fig. 11, Par 0137-0147, Par 0156-0161, Par 0166-0170),
(iii) wherein the multi-link connection includes an associated link (one of links 1-3) containing information of all other links (frame 1/ TID to Link mapping, T2LM transmitted on a link such as link 1 or link 2 or link 3), and priority traffic (low latency traffic/latency sensitive traffic) is sent on a better or best affiliated link configured by the TID to link mapping (low latency traffic is sent via a reserved link/premium link) (Par 0154-0155, Par 0164-0165, Par 0174, Par 0195-096);
(iv) configuring a plurality of thresholds (latency threshold, interference threshold, load threshold) for a respective plurality of operating parameters of the multi-links (latency, interference, load) (Par 0143-0144, Par 0148, Par 0156-0159, Par 0162, Par 0169-0171);
(v) when at least one of the operating parameters changes (latency, interference, load) with respect to the configured threshold, disabling traffic on the corresponding link (switching links when latency, interference or load changes with respect to the corresponding threshold) (Fig. 10A-B, Fig. 11, Par 0148-0150, Par 0162-0165, Par 0171-0173); and
(vi) performing traffic distribution according to updated operating parameters (switching links when latency, interference or load changes with respect to the corresponding threshold) and updating the TID to link mapping for the multi-link connection (re-mapping/updating TID to link mapping) (Fig. 10A-B, Fig. 11, Par 0148-0150, Par 0162-0165, Par 0171-0173), comprising:
(vii) determining a priority of all links (setting a link (i.e., link 3) as a reserved/premium link and other links not reserved/premium; detecting load level, latency of each link and diverting non-latency sensitive traffic to other links from the reserved link and by doing so, the reserved link is reprioritized as the highest priority link for low latency traffic and others are lower priority links); and directing priority traffic (latency sensitive traffic) to the highest priority link (reserved link) (Par 0154-0155, Par 0164-0165, Par 0174, Par 0181); and
(viii) receiving a notification from the first non-AP MLO device when the operating parameter changes (receiving an indication/link metrics associated with the change of latency, interference level, or traffic load) (Fig. 10A-B, Fig. 11, Par 0148-0150, Par 0162-0165, Par 0171-0173), and
(ix) sending the updated TID to link mapping to the first non-AP MLO device (re-mapped/updated TID to link mapping in a frame_2) (Fig. 10A-B, Fig. 11, Par 0148-0150, Par 0162-0165, Par 0171-0173).
Kucharewski does not explicitly disclose
(x) a communications unit, for transmitting the configured thresholds to the first non-AP MLO device.
Re component (x), Kneckt teaches
(x) a communications unit (communication chain, antenna, radio, Fig. 3), for transmitting the configured thresholds to the first non-AP MLO device (transmitting load, congestion level threshold to the wireless device) (Fig. 3-4, Fig. 29-31, Par 0079, Par 000087-0090, Par 0095-0096, Par 0101, Par 0136-0141).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the invention to modify Kucharewski by including (x) a communications unit, for transmitting the configured thresholds to the first non-AP MLO device, as taught by Kneckt for the purpose of improving load signaling in a multi-link wireless local area network architecture, as taught by Kneckt (Par 0004-0005).
Claim 11 recites a method performing the functions recited in claim 1 and thereby, is rejected for the reasons discussed above with respect to claim 1.
Re claims 8, 18, Kucharewski teaches that the multi-links comprise a 6GHz frequency band, a 5GHz frequency band and a 2.4GHz frequency band, wherein priority traffic is sent on the 6GHz frequency band (low latency traffic/latency sensitive traffic is sent via 6 GHz band) (Par 0137, Par 0154-0155, Par 0164-0165, Par 0174, Par 0195-096).
9. Claims 10 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kucharewski and Kneckt as applied to claim 1 and further in view of Montemurro et al (US 20230319925 A1, hereinafter referred to as Montemurro).
Re claims 10, 20, Kucharewski does not explicitly disclose that the mesh network further comprises a second non-AP MLO agent, and the MLO controller is configured to operate with the second non-AP MLO agent via the first non-AP MLO agent.
Montemurro teaches that the mesh network further comprises a second non-AP MLO agent (non-AP MLD 112), and the MLO controller (AP MLD 102) is configured to operate with the second non-AP MLO agent (non-AP MLD 112) via the first non-AP MLO agent (affiliated STA 114, 115) (Fig. 5-7, Fig. 9, Par 0069-0070, Par 0101-0105, Par 0124-0127).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the filing date of the invention to modify Kucharewski by including the function that that the mesh network further comprises a second non-AP MLO agent, and the MLO controller is configured to operate with the second non-AP MLO agent via the first non-AP MLO agent, as taught by Montemurro for the purpose of improving WLAN multi-link management frame addressing to efficiently handle the unicast management frames, as taught by Montemurro (Par 0003-0004, Par 0006).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-6, 9, 12-16, and 19 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
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 HARUN UR R CHOWDHURY whose telephone number is (571)270-3895. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 9AM-5PM.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Kwang B Yao can be reached at 5712723182. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/HARUN CHOWDHURY/Examiner, Art Unit 2473