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 .
DETAILED ACTION
This communication is in response to Applicant's response filed under 37 C.F.R. § 1.111 in response to a Non-Final Office Action. Claims 1-2, 4-11, 15, 17-21, 23-26, and 30 have been amended; claims 31-32 have been added; no claims have been canceled. Claims 1-32 are subject to examination.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims have been considered but are moot in view of the new grounds of rejection.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claim 1-32 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor, or for pre-AIA the applicant regards as the invention.
Claim 1, 17, 18, and 30 recites “at least one downlink packet or at least one downlink packet retransmission” in the limitations. If “at least one downlink packet retransmission” is selected for rejection, “at least one downlink packet” limitation in the amended portion becomes optional.
Claim(s) 2-16, 19-29, and 31-32 are also rejected because they are dependent upon rejected claims 1 and 18 as set forth above and include limitations of the claims 1 and 18 respectively.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 3, 7-10, 23-25, and 31 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.
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 1, 14, 16-18, and 29-30 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over LIN et al. (LIN hereinafter) (US 20230379919 A1) in view of Kittichokechai et al. (Kittichokechai hereinafter) (US 20240195536 A1).
Regarding claim 1 and claim 17, LIN teaches, An apparatus for wireless communication at a user equipment (UE), comprising:
a memory (LIN; the terminal device, Par. 0155); and
at least one processor coupled to the memory and configured to (LIN; the terminal device, Par. 0155):
receive, from a base station, at least one downlink packet or at least one downlink packet retransmission (LIN; Fig. 6, element “SPS 4 and 5” ; The time slot of the first SPS PDSCH received by the terminal device is time slot n+2, Par. 0155);
determine that a transmission of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) feedback associated with the at least one downlink packet or the at least one downlink packet retransmission corresponds to a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) collision (LIN; then the feedback information corresponding to the first SPS PDSCH needs to be transmitted in time slot n+3 ... the terminal device determines the PUCCH resource 2, and the PUCCH resource 2 includes downlink symbols, indicating that the PUCCH resource 2 is not available, Par. 0155);
determine, based on the determination that the transmission of the HARQ feedback corresponds to a PUCCH collision, whether to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback associated with the at least one downlink packet or the at least one downlink packet retransmission to a first available PUCCH occasion (LIN; maximum feedback defer length of 2 time slots, Par. 0155); and
cancel or delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback to the base station based on the determination whether to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback (LIN; Fig. 6; The terminal device then determines the next time slot n+4, and the time slot n+4 does not include PUCCH resources ... then determines that the feedback information associated with time slot n+5 … the PUCCH resource 2 is determined, and the symbols occupied by the PUCCH resource 2 are all uplink symbols, so the terminal device determines that the PUCCH resource 2 is available … and the feedback information of SPS PDSCH 4-8 is transmitted in slot n+5, Par. 0155).
Although LIN teaches HARQ deferral, but failed to explicitly teach,
wherein the transmission of the HARQ feedback for the at least one downlink packet is determined to be delayed based on the at least one downlink packet being in a first physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) occasion.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Kittichokechai teaches,
wherein the transmission of the HARQ feedback for the at least one downlink packet is determined to be delayed based on the at least one downlink packet being in a first physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) occasion (Kittichokechai; the wireless device 22 determines a set of occasions for candidate PDSCH receptions for which the wireless device 22 can transmit corresponding HARQ-ACK information in a PUCCH in slot n.sub.U if SPS HARQ-ACK deferral is enabled, Par. 0157; the maximum timing value allowed for SPS HARQ-ACK deferral K.sub.1+K.sub.def is 8 slots ... the deferred SPS AN in a slot n.sub.u could correspond to SPS PDSCH in any of the slot n.sub.u−1, n.sub.u−2, . . . , n.sub.u−8, Par. 0163).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN to include the use of candidate PDSCH occasions as taught by Kittichokechai in order to determine HARQ deferral (Kittichokechai; Par. 0157).
Specifically for claim 17, LIN teaches, A method of wireless communication at a user equipment (UE), comprising (LIN; Fig. 6; the terminal device, Par. 0155).
Regarding claim 18 and claim 30, LIN teaches, An apparatus for wireless communication at a base station, comprising:
a memory (LIN; the network device, Par. 0157); and
at least one processor coupled to the memory and configured to (LIN; the network device, Par. 0157):
transmit, to a user equipment (UE), at least one downlink packet or at least one downlink packet retransmission (LIN; Fig. 6, element “SPS 4 and 5” ; The time slot of the first SPS PDSCH received by the terminal device is time slot n+2, Par. 0155); and
receive, from the UE, a transmission of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) feedback associated with the at least one downlink packet or the at least one downlink packet retransmission on a first available physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) occasion, the transmission of the HARQ feedback corresponding to a PUCCH collision (LIN; maximum feedback defer length of 2 time slots ... then the feedback information corresponding to the first SPS PDSCH needs to be transmitted in time slot n+3 ... the terminal device determines the PUCCH resource 2, and the PUCCH resource 2 includes downlink symbols, indicating that the PUCCH resource 2 is not available ... The terminal device then determines the next time slot n+4, and the time slot n+4 does not include PUCCH resources ... then determines that the feedback information associated with time slot n+5 … the PUCCH resource 2 is determined, and the symbols occupied by the PUCCH resource 2 are all uplink symbols, so the terminal device determines that the PUCCH resource 2 is available … and the feedback information of SPS PDSCH 4-8 is transmitted in slot n+5, Par. 0155).
Although LIN teaches HARQ deferral, but failed to explicitly teach,
wherein reception of the transmission of the HARQ feedback for the at least one downlink packet is determined to be delayed based on the at least one downlink packet being in a first physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) occasion.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Kittichokechai teaches,
wherein reception of the transmission of the HARQ feedback for the at least one downlink packet is determined to be delayed based on the at least one downlink packet being in a first physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) occasion (Kittichokechai; the wireless device 22 determines a set of occasions for candidate PDSCH receptions for which the wireless device 22 can transmit corresponding HARQ-ACK information in a PUCCH in slot n.sub.U if SPS HARQ-ACK deferral is enabled, Par. 0157; the maximum timing value allowed for SPS HARQ-ACK deferral K.sub.1+K.sub.def is 8 slots ... the deferred SPS AN in a slot n.sub.u could correspond to SPS PDSCH in any of the slot n.sub.u−1, n.sub.u−2, . . . , n.sub.u−8, Par. 0163).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN to include the use of candidate PDSCH occasions as taught by Kittichokechai in order to determine HARQ deferral (Kittichokechai; Par. 0157).
Specifically for claim 30, LIN teaches, A method of wireless communication at a user equipment (UE), comprising (LIN; Fig. 6; the network device, Par. 0157).
Regarding claim 14, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the transmission of the HARQ feedback is based on semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) (LIN; the feedback information of SPS PDSCH 4-8 is transmitted in slot n+5, Par. 0155).
Regarding claim 16, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 1, further comprising a transceiver coupled to the at least one processor (LIN; the terminal device, Par. 0155).
Regarding claim 29, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 18, further comprising a transceiver coupled to the at least one processor (LIN; the network device, Par. 0157).
Claim 2, 4-6, and 19-22 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over LIN- Kittichokechai in view of BAE et al. (BAE hereinafter) (US 20230198679 A1) and in further view of Dudda et al. (Dudda hereinafter) (US 20220183040 A1).
Regarding claim 2, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 1.
LIN- Kittichokechai fails to explicitly teach,
the at least one processor being further configured to: determine a duration from the first available PUCCH occasion to an ending time of a current industrial internet of things (IIOT) cycle.
However, in the same field of endeavor, BAE teaches,
the at least one processor being further configured to: determine a duration from the first available PUCCH occasion to an ending time of a current industrial internet of things (IIOT) cycle (BAE; The UE may transmit a HARQ-ACK PUCCH ... Next available UL symbol/slot/subslot, Par. 0256; if the ending symbol of the delayed PUCCH is delayed after the starting symbol of another SPS PDSCH occasion associated with the same HARQ process … the UE may perform SPS PDSCH reception on the other SPS PDSCH occasion and drop the delayed HARQ-ACK transmission, Par. 320).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai to include the use of timing of same harq process id as taught by BAE in order to cancel or not transmit harq (BAE; Par. 0320).
Although BAE teaches period of SPS HARQ, but LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE failed to explicitly teach IIOT cycle.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Dudda teaches in Par. 0006 that “it is feasible to support those multiple DL SPS configurations, and furthermore DL SPS configurations with short periodicities, in order to match the short periodicities of the expected NR-IIOT traffic”.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE to include the use of SPS periodicities as taught by Dudda in order to match with IIOT traffic periodicities (Dudda; Par. 0006).
Regarding claim 4, LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE- Dudda teaches, The apparatus of claim 2, wherein the determination whether to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback is further based on the duration when the HARQ feedback is a negative ACK (NACK) (BAE; The UE may transmit a HARQ-ACK PUCCH ... Next available UL symbol/slot/subslot, Par. 0256; if the ending symbol of the delayed PUCCH is delayed after the starting symbol of another SPS PDSCH occasion associated with the same HARQ process … the UE may perform SPS PDSCH reception on the other SPS PDSCH occasion and drop the delayed HARQ-ACK transmission, Par. 320; The HARQ-ACK response includes positive ACK (simply, ACK), negative ACK (NACK), Par. 0119).
Regarding claim 5, LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE- Dudda teaches, The apparatus of claim 4, wherein to determine whether to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback, the at least one processor is configured to determine to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback further based on the HARQ feedback being an ACK (BAE; The UE may transmit a HARQ-ACK PUCCH ... Next available UL symbol/slot/subslot, Par. 0256; if the ending symbol of the delayed PUCCH is delayed after the starting symbol of another SPS PDSCH occasion associated with the same HARQ process … the UE may perform SPS PDSCH reception on the other SPS PDSCH occasion and drop the delayed HARQ-ACK transmission, Par. 320; The HARQ-ACK response includes positive ACK (simply, ACK), negative ACK (NACK), Par. 0119).
Regarding claim 6, LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE-Dudda teaches, The apparatus of claim 2, wherein the determination whether to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback is further based on the duration (BAE; if the ending symbol of the delayed PUCCH is delayed after the starting symbol of another SPS PDSCH occasion associated with the same HARQ process … the UE may … drop the delayed HARQ-ACK transmission, Par. 320).
Regarding claim 19, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 18.
LIN- Kittichokechai fails to explicitly teach,
wherein the reception of the transmission of the HARQ feedback is further based on a duration from the first available PUCCH occasion to an ending time of a current industrial internet of things (IIOT) cycle when the HARQ feedback is a negative ACK (NACK).
However, in the same field of endeavor, BAE teaches,
wherein the reception of the transmission of the HARQ feedback is further based on a duration from the first available PUCCH occasion to an ending time of a current industrial internet of things (IIOT) cycle (BAE; The UE may transmit a HARQ-ACK PUCCH ... Next available UL symbol/slot/subslot, Par. 0256; if the ending symbol of the delayed PUCCH is delayed after the starting symbol of another SPS PDSCH occasion associated with the same HARQ process … the UE may perform SPS PDSCH reception on the other SPS PDSCH occasion and drop the delayed HARQ-ACK transmission, Par. 320) when the HARQ feedback is a negative ACK (NACK) (BAE;The HARQ-ACK response includes positive ACK (simply, ACK), negative ACK (NACK), Par. 0119).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai to include the use of timing of same harq process id as taught by BAE in order to cancel or not transmit harq (BAE; Par. 0320).
Although BAE teaches period of SPS HARQ, but LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE failed to explicitly teach IIOT cycle.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Dudda teaches in Par. 0006 that “it is feasible to support those multiple DL SPS configurations, and furthermore DL SPS configurations with short periodicities, in order to match the short periodicities of the expected NR-IIOT traffic”.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE to include the use of SPS periodicities as taught by Dudda in order to match with IIOT traffic periodicities (Dudda; Par. 0006).
Regarding claim 20, LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE- Dudda teaches, The apparatus of claim 19, wherein the reception of the transmission of the HARQ feedback is delayed further based on when the HARQ feedback is being ACK (BAE;The HARQ-ACK response includes positive ACK (simply, ACK), negative ACK (NACK), Par. 0119).
Regarding claim 21, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 18.
LIN- Kittichokechai fails to explicitly teach,
wherein the reception of the transmission of the HARQ feedback is further based on a duration from the first available PUCCH occasion to an ending time of a current industrial internet of things (IIOT) cycle.
However, in the same field of endeavor, BAE teaches,
wherein the reception of the transmission of the HARQ feedback is further based on a duration from the first available PUCCH occasion to an ending time of a current industrial internet of things (IIOT) cycle (BAE; The UE may transmit a HARQ-ACK PUCCH ... Next available UL symbol/slot/subslot, Par. 0256; if the ending symbol of the delayed PUCCH is delayed after the starting symbol of another SPS PDSCH occasion associated with the same HARQ process … the UE may perform SPS PDSCH reception on the other SPS PDSCH occasion and drop the delayed HARQ-ACK transmission, Par. 320).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai to include the use of timing of same harq process id as taught by BAE in order to cancel or not transmit harq (BAE; Par. 0320).
Although BAE teaches period of SPS HARQ, but LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE failed to explicitly teach IIOT cycle.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Dudda teaches in Par. 0006 that “it is feasible to support those multiple DL SPS configurations, and furthermore DL SPS configurations with short periodicities, in order to match the short periodicities of the expected NR-IIOT traffic”.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE to include the use of SPS periodicities as taught by Dudda in order to match with IIOT traffic periodicities (Dudda; Par. 0006).
Regarding claim 22, LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE-Dudda teaches, The apparatus of claim 21, wherein the ending time of the current IIOT cycle is based on an IIOT cycle duration (BAE; another SPS PDSCH occasion associated with the same HARQ process, Par. 320 [Note that cycle duration is time interval between two PDSCHs with same harq process number]).
Claim 11 and 26 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over LIN- Kittichokechai in view of BAE et al. (BAE hereinafter) (US 20230198679 A1).
Regarding claim 11, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 1.
LIN- Kittichokechai fails to explicitly teach,
wherein to determine whether to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback , the at least one processor is configured to determine: to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback when the first available PUCCH occasion occurs before a threshold percentage point of a current semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) period, and
not delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback when the first available PUCCH occasion occurs after the threshold percentage point of the current SPS period.
However, in the same field of endeavor, BAE teaches,
wherein to determine whether to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback, the at least one processor is configured to determine: to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback when the first available PUCCH occasion occurs before a threshold percentage point of a current semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) period (BAE; The UE may transmit a HARQ-ACK PUCCH ... Next available UL symbol/slot/subslot, Par. 0256), and
not delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback when the first available PUCCH occasion occurs after the threshold percentage point of the current SPS period (BAE; if the ending symbol of the delayed PUCCH is delayed after the starting symbol of another SPS PDSCH occasion associated with the same HARQ process … the UE may perform SPS PDSCH reception on the other SPS PDSCH occasion and drop the delayed HARQ-ACK transmission, Par. 320 [Note that PUCCH will be delayed if the pucch is occurring before 0% of the period before the next PDSCH having the same harq process number]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai to include the use of timing of same harq process id as taught by BAE in order to cancel or not transmit harq (BAE; Par. 0320).
Regarding claim 26, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 18.
LIN- Kittichokechai fails to explicitly teach,
wherein the reception of the transmission of the HARQ feedback is delayed further based on the first available PUCCH occasion that occurs before a threshold percentage point of a current semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) period, and is not delayed when the first available PUCCH occasion occurs after the threshold percentage point of the current SPS period.
However, in the same field of endeavor, BAE teaches,
wherein the reception of the transmission of the HARQ feedback is delayed further based on the first available PUCCH occasion that occurs before a threshold percentage point of a current semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) period (BAE; The UE may transmit a HARQ-ACK PUCCH ... Next available UL symbol/slot/subslot, Par. 0256), and
is not delayed when the first available PUCCH occasion occurs after the threshold percentage point of the current SPS period (BAE; if the ending symbol of the delayed PUCCH is delayed after the starting symbol of another SPS PDSCH occasion associated with the same HARQ process … the UE may perform SPS PDSCH reception on the other SPS PDSCH occasion and drop the delayed HARQ-ACK transmission, Par. 320 [Note that PUCCH will be delayed if the pucch is occurring before 0% of the period before the next PDSCH having the same harq process number]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai to include the use of timing of same harq process id as taught by BAE in order to cancel or not transmit harq (BAE; Par. 0320).
Claim 12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE and in further view of Dudda et al. (Dudda hereinafter) (US 20220183040 A1).
Regarding claim 12, LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE teaches, The apparatus of claim 11.
Although BAE teaches period of SPS HARQ, but LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE failed to explicitly teach,
wherein the current SPS period corresponds to a current industrial internet of things (IIOT) cycle.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Dudda teaches
wherein the current SPS period corresponds to a current industrial internet of things (IIOT) cycle (Dudda; it is feasible to support those multiple DL SPS configurations, and furthermore DL SPS configurations with short periodicities, in order to match the short periodicities of the expected NR-IIOT traffic, Par. 0006).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai - BAE to include the use of SPS periodicities as taught by Dudda in order to match with IIOT traffic periodicities (Dudda; Par. 0006).
Claim 13, 15, 27 and 28 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over LIN- Kittichokechai in view of ZHANG et al. (ZHANG hereinafter) (US 20230396391 A1).
Regarding claim 13 and 27, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 1 and The apparatus of claim 18 respectively, wherein the PUCCH collision is associated with a conflicting (LIN; the terminal device determines the PUCCH resource 2, and the PUCCH resource 2 includes downlink symbols, indicating that the PUCCH resource 2 is not available, Par. 0155).
LIN- Kittichokechai failed to explicitly teach,
conflicting time division duplexing (TDD) configuration.
However, in the same field of endeavor, ZHANG teaches,
conflicting time division duplexing (TDD) configuration (ZHANG; if PUCCH(s) carrying the HARQ-ACK codebook for HARQ-ACK information for the SPS PDSCH(s) overlaps with a set of symbols which are indicated as downlink symbols and/or flexible symbols by higher layer signaling (for example, the parameter tdd-UL-DL-ConfigurationCommon, Par. 0213).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai to include the use of tdd configuration as taught by ZHANG in order to cancel or not transmit harq (ZHANG; Par. 0213).
Regarding claim 15, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to.
LIN- Kittichokechai failed to explicitly teach,
receive, from the base station, an indication to cancel or delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback.
However, in the same field of endeavor, ZHANG teaches,
receive, from the base station, an indication to cancel or delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback (ZHANG; the base station to indicate to the UE whether the UE may delay the transmission of the HARQ-ACK codebook including HARQ-ACK information only for SPS PDSCH reception(s), Par. 0217).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai to include the use of 1 bit indication as taught by ZHANG in order to indicate UE to delay harq (ZHANG; Par. 0217).
Regarding claim 28, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 18, the at least one processor being further configured to:
LIN- Kittichokechai failed to explicitly teach,
transmit, to the UE, an indication to cancel or delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback.
However, in the same field of endeavor, ZHANG teaches,
transmit, to the UE, an indication to cancel or delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback (ZHANG; the base station to indicate to the UE whether the UE may delay the transmission of the HARQ-ACK codebook including HARQ-ACK information only for SPS PDSCH reception(s), Par. 0217).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai to include the use of 1 bit indication as taught by ZHANG in order to indicate UE to delay harq (ZHANG; Par. 0217).
Claim 32 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over LIN- Kittichokechai and in further view of Wang (Wang hereinafter) (US 12028888 B2).
Regarding claim 32, LIN- Kittichokechai teaches, The apparatus of claim 1.
Although LIN teaches in Par. 0177-0182 that “the actual deferred SPS HARQ-ACK bits in slot n.sub.U are determined based on ... the RRC configuration of other activated SPS configurations”, but LIN- Kittichokechai failed to explicitly teach,
wherein the at least one processor is further configured to:
receive a configuration that indicates to delay HARQ feedback associated with semi- persistent scheduling (SPS), and wherein the determination whether to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback is further based on the configuration.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Wang teaches
wherein the at least one processor is further configured to:
receive a configuration that indicates to delay HARQ feedback associated with semi- persistent scheduling (SPS), and wherein the determination whether to delay the transmission of the HARQ feedback is further based on the configuration (Wang; whether or not a HARQ-ACK may be deferred, may be configured or indicated per SPS configuration by RRC configuration and/or by using activation DCI, col 24 line 64-67).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of LIN- Kittichokechai to include the use of RRC as taught by Wang in order to configure HARQ deferral (Wang; col 24).
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.
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/SHARMIN CHOWDHURY/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2416
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