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 .
Applicant amended claims 1, and 15. Applicant previously canceled claims 5, 6, 8, 9 and 11-14.
Status of claims:
Claims 1-4, 7, 10 and 15-28 are pending in this application.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1-4, 7, 10 and 15-28 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
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.
5. Claim(s) 1-4, 7, 10 and 15-26 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over 3GPP TSG-RAN WG2 Meeting #112 Electronic R2-2009350 (hereinafter D1 in view of Alfarhan et al. (US20230189245) (hereinafter Alfarhan, [also refer to provisional application 63/093,977])
Per claim 1, D1 discloses a method performed by a user equipment (UE), comprising: detecting a
trigger condition relating to a wireless network characteristic, while the UE is in a non-connected radio
resource (RRC) state with a network device (page 2, 2.1.1 Timing alignment validity, line 11-page 3, line
2, "If the condition to use the pre-configured PUSCH resources is to have a valid Timing Alignment then it
is necessary that the UE has a mechanism available, while in RRC Inactive, that allows it to keep track if
the Timing Alignment is still valid. In preconfigured uplink resources[ PUR], this is based on the
monitoring of the cell RSRP level; while an alternative/additional approach could be to have this
mechanism to be timer based as in RRC CONNECTED state, which would require the introduction of a
timeAlignmentTimer (or equivalent timer) to be available for the UE that transitions to RRC_INACTIVE
state."); and controlling a data transmission according to the detection of the trigger condition(page 3,
lines 3-5, "In PUR, when pur TimeAlignmentTimer is running and RSRP has not changed more than
increase Thresh/decreaseThr TA is considered as valid [3]. It seems the approach used for PUR can
be used as baseline for the NR SDT") but fails to explicitly disclose by performing a fallback from a configured grant (CG) type 1 based small data transmission (SDT) to a random
access channel (RACH) based small data transmission (SDT) in response to the fallback to the RACH
based SDT to be initiated by the UE, wherein the UE remains in the non connected RRC state; or performing a RACH procedure in response to the fallback to the
RACH based SDT not to be initiated by the UE.
In an analogous filed of endeavor, Alfarhan discloses by performing a fallback from a configured grant (CG) type 1 based small data transmission (SDT) to a random access channel (RACH) based small data transmission (SDT) in response to the fallback to the RACH based SDT to be initiated by the UE, wherein the UE remains in the non connected RRC state (paragraph 0140, i.e. he WTRU may be configured to perform beam failure recovery in INACTIVE state/mode. In one embodiment, upon detection of beam failure in INACTIVE mode, the WTRU may perform one or more of the following recovery activities: (1) the WTRU may transition to connected mode. (2) The WTRU may perform cell reselection. (3) The WTRU may fall back on a different method of small data transmission. For example, if the WTRU is configured to perform small data transmission on a configured grant, the WTRU may instead attempt to transmit small data on a RACH-based resource (e.g., MsgA or Msg3) ; or performing a RACH procedure in response to the fallback to the RACH based SDT not to be initiated by the UE.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing
date of the claimed invention to have incorporated the teachings of Alfarhan into the invention D1, where D1 provides One of the objectives of the item on NR small data transmissions in inactive state is to specify mechanisms that enable the transmission of small data transmissions over pre-configured PUSCH resources and Alfarhan provides methods and apparatus for downlink small data reception in wireless communications are provided. In an example, a method includes receiving configuration information for small data transmission (SDT), and the configuration information indicates one or more uplink (UL) configured grants (CGs), one or more downlink (DL) CGs, and a Transport Block Size (TBS) threshold for SDT; receiving a DL data transmission using a DL CG of the one or more DL CGs in order to provide a better quality of service by having options during recovery that allows going into connect mode or retransmitting or fallback while idle to mode to transition to CG SDT and/or RACH SDT for transmitting data in see Alfarhan, paragraphs 0002 and 0140.
Per claim 2, the combination of D1 and Alfarhan discloses the method of Claim 1, wherein D1 discloses the trigger condition relating to the wireless network characteristic includes reduction in received beam quality or availability of at least one pre-configured uplink resource (page 3,5.3.3.19 Timingalignment validation for transmission using PUR, lines 6-13; page 3, lines 16-21; page 4, Observation 1, Proposal 3, i.e. Observation 1: The condition of a valid timing alignment is not sufficient condition to prevent gNB Rx beam misalignment in all scenarios. Proposal 3: Beam validation is considered on top of TA validation to decide if a CG occasion can be used for SDT).
Per claim 3, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 2, where examiner interprets that D1 discloses via timing alignment validation where you're considering if conditions are met, see page 3 5.3.3.19, 6-13 and 16-21, where the UE possibly lost the timing alignment, where stopping suspending, starting or resuming data transmission would be apart the process of determining timing alignment validation, as well as determining if there's beam misalignment, page 4, observation 1 and proposal 3).
Per claim 4, the combination of D1 and Alfarhan discloses the method of Claim 3, further D1 discloses comprising: transmitting a radio resource control (RRC) message to the network device, wherein the RRC message includes an RRC cause indicating a cause of the control of the data transmission (page 2, Fig 1, ref. 1 RRC resume request., where resume is a cause).
Per claim 7, the combination of D1 and Alfarhan discloses the method of Claim 4, wherein D1
discloses an access category is mapped to the RRC cause indicating the cause of the control of the data transmission (page 2, Fig 1, ref. 1 RRC resume request., where resume is the cause and 2.1 and 2.1.1, i.e. In the WID, it is highlighted that the transmission of UL data over pre-configured PUSCH resources has the caveat that the UE must have a valid timing alignment, which is in-line with the PUR design [2]. A UE in RRC_CONNECTED state, is configured by the RRC with timeAlignmentTimer that controls for how long the MAC entity considers the Serving Cells associated with the Timing Advance Group to be uplink time aligned, where examiner interprets that access category relates to a resume cause, In the Applicant's specification, where the term access category has the same function as access identity, where they are both mapped to the resume cause, examiner is not sure what is the difference between access identity and access category).
Per claim 10, the combination of D1 and Alfarhan discloses the method of Claim 4, wherein D1
discloses an access identity is mapped to the RRC cause indicating the cause of the control of the data transmission( page 2, Fig 1, ref. 1 RRC resume request., where resume is the cause and 2.1 and 2.1.1, i.e. In the WID, it is highlighted that the transmission of UL data over pre-configured PUSCH resources has the caveat that the UE must have a valid timing alignment, which is in-line with the PUR design [2]. A UE in RRC_CONNECTED state, is configured by the RRC with timeAlignmentTimer that controls for how long the MAC entity considers the Serving Cells associated with the Timing Advance Group to be uplink time aligned, where examiner interprets that access identity relates to a resume cause, In the Applicant's specification, where the term access identity has the same function as access category where they are both mapped to the resume cause, examiner is not sure what is the difference between access identity and access category).
Per claim 15, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 1.
Per claim 16, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 2.
Per claim 17, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 3.
Per claim 18, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 4.
Per claim 19, the combination of D1 and Alfarhan discloses the apparatus of Claim 18, wherein D1 discloses the RRC cause indicates that: the fallback to the RACH based SDT is performed according to that a beam quality is less than a threshold or the at least one pre-configured uplink resource is not available; the RACH procedure is performed according to that the beam quality is less than the threshold (page 3, 5.3.3. 19, i.e. A UE shall consider the timing alignment value for transmission using PUR to be valid when all of the following conditions are fulfilled: 1>if pur-TimeAlignmentTimer 1s configured:2> pur-TimeAlignmentTimer is running as confirmed by lower layers;1> if pur-RSRP- ChangeThreshold (pur-NRSRP-Change Threshold in NB-IoT) 1s configured: 2> since the last TA validation, the serving cell(N)RSRP has not increased by more than increaseThresh, and 2> since the last TA validation, the serving cell (N)RSRP has not decreased by more than decrease Thresh, where Proposal 1: the PUR criteria(s}) of RSRP and TA timer to track if the UE's current Timing Alignment is valid is taken as baseline for CG based SDT, also see page 2, Fig 1 RRC resume request, examiner interprets a resume cause or the at least one pre-configured uplink resource is not available; or the beam quality is less than the threshold or the at least one pre- configured uplink resource is not available.
Per claim 20, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 4.
Per claim 21, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 7.
Per claim 22, the combination of D1 and Alfarhan discloses the apparatus of Claim 21, wherein D1 discloses the RRC cause includes a resume cause value, and the access category mapped to the resume cause value indicates that: an access attempt for the fallback to the RACH based SDT is performed according to that a beam quality is less than a threshold; the access attempt for the RACH procedure is performed according to that the beam quality is less than the threshold (similar to claim 19 and 7); or the access attempt is performed according to that the beam quality is less than the threshold.
Per claim 23, the combination of D1 and Alfarhan discloses the apparatus of Claim 21, wherein D1 discloses the RRC cause includes an establishment cause value, and the access category mapped to the establishment cause value indicates that an access attempt is performed according to a small data transmission beam failure recovery (page 2, 2.1.1, i.e. The general design principle is that if this timer expires then the MAC entity assumes that the uplink is no longer time aligned, which in turn triggers several configuration release actions which include also the "clear any configured downlink assignments and configured uplink grants". This timer can be started or restarted upon the reception of a TimingAdvance Command MAC CEs or by a Timing Advance Command via a Random Access Response message, where examiner interprets restarting or starting is related to RRC cause and establishment cause is based on timer expiration and the timing Alignment .is not aligned, see page 4, lines 4-6, observation 1, proposal 3, The condition of a valid timing alignment is not sufficient condition to prevent gNB Rx beam misalignment in all scenarios, beam validation is considered on top of TA validation to decide if a CG occasion can be used for SDT.
Per claim 24, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 10.
Per claim 25 refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 19.
Per claim 26, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 23.
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.
Claim(s) 27 and 28 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over D1 and Alfarhan in further view of (3GPP TSG-WG2 meeting #112 electronic/ R2-2010388) (hereinafter D2).
Per claim 27, the combination of D1 and Alfarhan discloses the apparatus of Claim 17, but both references fail to explicitly discloses wherein the processor is configured to cause the apparatus to: obtain data of the data transmission stored in a first buffer used for hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) when the fallback to the RACH based SDT is performed; and store the data in a second buffer, wherein the second buffer is used for message-3 of RACH, message-A of RACH, message-3 of RACH based SDT or message-A of RACH based SDT.
In an analogous filed of endeavor, D2 discloses wherein the processor is configured to cause the apparatus to: obtain data of the data transmission stored in a first buffer used for hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) when the fallback to the RACH based SDT is performed; and store the data in a second buffer, wherein the second buffer is used for message-3 of RACH, message-A of RACH, message-3 of RACH based SDT or message-A of RACH based SDT (page 2, Scheme Switch, 2.3 Switch between SDT and RRC resume, When buffer size is larger than a threshold configured by network, UE may resume RRC connection and apply UL resource for data and page 3, see lines 1-13, transmission. The buffer size here not only includes the data in L2 buffer, but also the foresee data, for example, periodic data packets. Proposal 6: Consider buffer size as criteria for UE to decide whether to do SDT or not).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have incorporated the teachings of D2 into the invention of D1 and Alfarhan, D2 provides to analyze the SDT type selection between Configured grant and RACH based scheme, and details of data volume calculation for performing transmission scheme in order to provide efficient quality of service to prevent failure or delays, where determining buffer size is crucial to in switching between CG based SDT or a RACH based SDT transmission.
Per claim 28, refer to the same rationale as explained in claim 27( D1 provides Mac entities, see page 2, timing alignment validity and D2 provides switching from buffer 1 to buffer 2, page 3 lines 1-13).
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 JOSEPH E DEAN, JR whose telephone number is (571)270-7116. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Fri 7:30-3:30.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Yuwen Pan can be reached at 571-272-7855. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/JOSEPH E DEAN, JR/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2647
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