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 Amendment
This communication is considered fully responsive to the Arguments/Remarks filed on 3/19/2026.
Claims 1, 3, 5, 8, 9, 11, 13, 15, 18, 19 and 20 have been amended.
Claims 4 and 14 have been canceled.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 3/19/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Applicant argued in its Remarks in pages 10-11 for claims 1, 8, 11 and 18, as amended, the claims now requires that the first indicator has one of several values, including specifically “a fourth value indicating the first payload carries non-data information”.
Examiner respectfully disagrees. Applicant has incorporated partial features of allowable claim 4 and intervening claim 3 into claim 1. Furthermore, the limitation “a fourth value indicating the first payload carries non-data information” is an “or” optional limitation hence if prior art discloses any of the other “or” limitations, then the claim as amended does not overcome the rejection. Therefore, examiner maintains the rejection with the previous references as applied below.
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.
Claim(s) 1, 2, 8, 11, 12 and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Brunner et al. (WO 2019233759A1, hereinafter “Brunner”, with citations from machine translation Descriptions from Espacenet) in view of Charpentier et al. (US 2009/0116490, hereinafter “Charpentier”).
For claim 1 and 11, Brunner discloses An information transmission method (see Brunner par. 0008-0009 for data frame transmission process), wherein the method comprises:
sending a portion of data packets in a first data frame (The data frame sending process is interrupted after a portion of the data frame has been sent in the minimum frame size; see Brunner par. 0009);
determining whether a priority of a second data frame is higher than a priority of the first data frame (Once the sending process has been initiated, the network device receives the express data frame, which is to be sent with a higher priority than the data frame currently being sent. The network device determines the size of the data frame in the transmission process; see Brunner par. 0009); and
in response to determining that the priority of the second data frame is higher than the priority of the first data frame, sending data packets in the second data frame before sending a remainder portion of the data packets in the first data frame other than the portion of the data packets (After the data frame sending process is interrupted, the express data frame sending process is initiated and only ends after the express data frame has been fully sent. Once the sending process of the express data frame has been completely completed, the sending process of the data frame continues. This involves sending the remaining part of the data frame that has not yet been sent; see Brunner par. 0008-0009).
Brunner does not explicitly disclose wherein each of the data packets in the first data frame comprises a first indicator and a first payload, and wherein the first indicator has one of: a first value indicating the first payload is a start fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame; a second value indicating the first payload is an intermediate fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame; a third value indicating the first payload is an end fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame; or a fourth value indicating the first payload carries non-data information. Charpentier discloses wherein each of the data packets in the first data frame comprises a first indicator and a first payload, and wherein the first indicator has one of: a first value indicating the first payload is a start fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame; a second value indicating the first payload is an intermediate fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame; a third value indicating the first payload is an end fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame (80. A method for transmitting data packets, the method comprising: forming a data packet payload comprising at least one of a full of a service data unit and a segment of a service data unit; forming a data packet header comprising an indicator; and transmitting a data packet over a channel, the data packet comprising, wherein: the indicator indicates whether or not a service data unit is segmented at the beginning of the data packet payload and whether or not a service data unit is segmented at the end of the data packet payload. 81. The method according to claim 80, wherein the indicator comprising a first bit and a second bit, the first bit indicates whether or not a service data unit is segmented at the beginning of the data packet payload and the second bit indicates whether or not a service data unit is segmented at the end of the data packet payload; see Charpentier page 6, claims 80-81 and also par. 0042-0044); or a fourth value indicating the first payload carries non-data information. Examiner’s note: the last limitation is one of the “or” optional limitations hence it was not considered in this case.
For claims 2 and 12, Brunner discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein the method further comprises:
in response to determining that the priority of the second data frame is lower than or equal to the priority of the first data frame or data frame truncation is disabled, sending the data packets in the second data frame after sending the remainder portion of the packets in the first data frame (If data frame 6 has a size of, for example, 65-127 bytes, where 64 bytes can be the minimum frame size 7, data frame 6 can have a size that lies between the minimum frame size 7 and twice the minimum frame size 7 and therefore cannot be divided. Each data frame 6,3 can have a priority value of 8. Therefore, it is not possible to interrupt the transmission process of data frame 6, for example according to the predetermined preemption procedure. This means that sending the express data frame 3 can only be initiated once the sending process of data frame 6 has ended at an end time 9; see Brunner par. 0032).
For claims 8 and 18, Brunner discloses An information transmission method (see Brunner par. 0008-0009 for data frame transmission process), wherein the method comprises:
receiving a portion of data packets in a first data frame (The data frame sending process is interrupted after a portion of the data frame has been sent in the minimum frame size; see Brunner par. 0009);
receiving data packets in a second data frame (Once the sending process has been initiated, the network device receives the express data frame, which is to be sent with a higher priority than the data frame currently being sent. The network device determines the size of the data frame in the transmission process; see Brunner par. 0009);
receiving a remainder portion of the data packets in the first data frame other than the portion of the data packets (After the data frame sending process is interrupted, the express data frame sending process is initiated and only ends after the express data frame has been fully sent. Once the sending process of the express data frame has been completely completed, the sending process of the data frame continues. This involves sending the remaining part of the data frame that has not yet been sent; see Brunner par. 0008-0009);
determining the first data frame based on the received portion of the data packets in the first data frame and the received remainder portion of the data packets in the first data frame (If the data frame has a size that is between the predetermined minimum frame size and twice the minimum frame size, a padding operation of the data frame is performed. During the padding process, the size of the data frame is increased to twice the predetermined minimum frame size by adding placeholder data; see Brunner par. 0009); and
determining the second data frame based on the received data packets in the second data frame, wherein a priority of the second data frame is higher than a priority of the first data frame (Once the transmission of the data frame has begun, the Express data frame can be received by the network device. The express data frame can be a data frame that has a higher priority than the data frame whose delivery process has already been initiated. It may be necessary to initiate the sending process of the express data frame at the next available opportunity. This may require interrupting the data frame transmission process. It may be necessary to split the data frame into two sub-data frames in order to interrupt the transmission process of the data frame; see Brunner par. 0012).
Brunner does not explicitly disclose wherein each of the data packets in the first data frame comprises a first indicator and a first payload, and wherein the first indicator has one of: a first value indicating the first payload is a start fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame; a second value indicating the first payload is an intermediate fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame; a third value indicating the first payload is an end fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame; or a fourth value indicating the first payload carries non-data information. Charpentier discloses wherein each of the data packets in the first data frame comprises a first indicator and a first payload, and wherein the first indicator has one of: a first value indicating the first payload is a start fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame; a second value indicating the first payload is an intermediate fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame; a third value indicating the first payload is an end fragment of the corresponding one of the data packets in the first data frame (80. A method for transmitting data packets, the method comprising: forming a data packet payload comprising at least one of a full of a service data unit and a segment of a service data unit; forming a data packet header comprising an indicator; and transmitting a data packet over a channel, the data packet comprising, wherein: the indicator indicates whether or not a service data unit is segmented at the beginning of the data packet payload and whether or not a service data unit is segmented at the end of the data packet payload. 81. The method according to claim 80, wherein the indicator comprising a first bit and a second bit, the first bit indicates whether or not a service data unit is segmented at the beginning of the data packet payload and the second bit indicates whether or not a service data unit is segmented at the end of the data packet payload; see Charpentier page 6, claims 80-81 and also par. 0042-0044); or a fourth value indicating the first payload carries non-data information. Examiner’s note: the last limitation is one of the “or” optional limitations hence it was not considered in this case.
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.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3, 5-7, 9, 10, 13, 15-17, 19 and 20 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: Brunner and/or Charpentier do not explicitly teach the objected claims.
Conclusion
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 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.
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/CHAE S LEE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2415