DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, anycorrection of the statutory basis for the rejection will not be considered a new ground ofrejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would bethe same under either status.
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 05/18/2026 has been entered.
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.
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 non-obviousness.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claim(s) 1-2, 14 and 16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Noh et al. (US 2022/0345243 A1) in view of Jeon et al. (US 2021/0409078 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Noh et al. teach a method includes: receiving, by a first station (STA) from a second STA, a beacon frame including an extremely high throughput (EHT) operation element including (Figs. 1 and 8, [0030, 0092], a WLAN BSS 100 may include a one AP 110 and a plurality of STAs 120. Any one of the plurality of STAs 120 may receive resource allocated for MU transmission and communicate with the AP 110. The AP 110 may deliver information regarding the resource allocation for MU transmission to any one of the plurality of STAs 120. The plurality of STAs 120 may receive/transmit, from/to the AP 110, the frames simultaneously in the WLAN BSS 100 based on the allocated resources for MU transmission. Static puncturing channel indication could be provided with the EHT Operation element as shown in fig. 8, wherein this element could be carried in a management frame such as a beacon frame),
Noh et al. teach a first field related to whether a disabled subchannel bitmap field is present in the EHT operation element (Fig. 9, [0094], the format of the EHT Operation element 900 includes Element ID field 901, Length field 902, Element ID Extension filed 903, EHT Operation Information field 904 and Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905. The Disabled Subchannel Bitmap Present subfield indicates whether the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap filed 905 is present. For example, the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905 is present if the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap Present subfield is 1, otherwise, the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905 is not present.),
Noh et al. teach and the disabled subchannel bitmap field related to at least one first subchannel that is punctured within a bandwidth (Fig. 9, [0094], the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905 provides the static puncturing channel indication indicating a list of subchannels that are punctured within the BSS bandwidth, if present),
Noh et al. teach and receiving, by the first STA from the second STA, a null-data physical layer protocol data unit (NDP) announcement frame (Fig. 5, [0058], beamformed transmission is initiated with a NDP Announcement frame 503a by the beamformer 501a. After SIFS 505a interval, the NDP frame 504a is transmitted to be estimated for channel matrix by for the beamformee 502a and beamformee 502a calculates the beam matrix. After SIFS 505a interval, Compressed Beamforming/channel quality indicator (CQI) frame 506a including feedback information is sent by the beamformee 502a. The NDP Announcement frame 503a contains proper signaling to help this procedure for some STAs wherein the STA ID is included in NDP Announcement frame 503a),
Noh et al. teach wherein a frame including a multiple- input multiple-out (MIMO) control field including a first partial bandwidth (BW) information subfield is transmitted between the first STA and the second STA (Figs. 1, 2B and , [0048, 0055, 0105], the STA 120 may include any number of antenna(s) 205 for MIMO communication with an AP 110. The AP 110 may want to have more control mechanism of the medium by using more scheduled access, which may allow more frequent use of OFDMA/MU-MIMO transmissions. The first puncturing pattern could reuse the one defined in EHT NDP Announcement frame wherein the one is 9 bit of partial BW Info subfield consisting of B0 to inform whether it is 20 MHz or 40 MHz resolution for following each bit and B1 to B8 to inform the feedback bitmap as shown in Table 6),
Noh et al. teach wherein compressed beamforming feedback information is provided based on the MIMO control field (Fig. 5, [0055, 0059], AP may want to have more control mechanism of the medium by using more scheduled access. the beamformed transmission is initiated with a NDP Announcement frame 503b by the beamformer 501b. After SIFS 505b interval, the NDP frame 504b is transmitted to be estimated for channel matrix by for the beamformees 502b (beamformee 1, beamformee 2, . . . beamformee n) and beamformees 502b calculate the beam matrix. After SIFS 505b, the beamforming report poll (BFRP) Trigger frames 507b followed by Compressed Beamforming/CQI frames 506b (Compressed Beamforming/CQI frame 1, Compressed Beamforming/CQI frame 2, . . . Compressed Beamforming/CQI frame n) from a plurality of beamformees 502b are exchanged one or more times. NDP Announcement frame 503b contains proper signaling to help this procedure for some STAs wherein the STA ID is included in NDP Announcement frame 503b),
Noh et al. teach and wherein the first partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field has a value of a second partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame (Fig. 9, [0105-0107], some specific frame could use a first puncturing pattern. Otherwise, use a second puncturing pattern. The first puncturing pattern could be designed as much as flexible. For example, only primary 20 MHz subchannel is not punctured and any 20 MHz subchannels could be punctured while keeping the channel bandwidth. The first puncturing pattern could reuse the one defined in EHT NDP Announcement frame wherein the one is 9 bit of partial BW Info subfield consisting of B0 to inform whether it is 20 MHz or 40 MHz resolution for following each bit and B1 to B8 to inform the feedback bitmap as shown in Table 6. EHT MU PPDU carries the Punctured Channel Information in U-SIG to indicate which 20 MHz subchannels are punctured to a single user transmission and a multiple user transmission (Full (or partial) bandwidth MU-MIMO transmission or OFDMA transmission).
Regarding claim 2, Noh et al. teach wherein: the beacon frame is decoded by the first STA, and the frame includes a second subfield indicating whether the first partial BW information subfield related to the at least one first subchannel is present in the frame (Fig. 9, [0105], first puncturing pattern could reuse the one defined in EHT NDP Announcement frame wherein the one is 9 bit of partial BW Info subfield consisting of B0 to inform whether it is 20 MHz or 40 MHz resolution for following each bit and B1 to B8 to inform the feedback bitmap as shown in Table 6).
Noh et al. is teaching a beacon frame an operational element including EHT operational elements. Noh et al., however, fail to expressly disclose MIMO control field including a partial bandwidth information of NDP subfield. (Emphasis added).
Regarding claim 1, Jeon et al. teach wherein a frame including a multiple- input multiple-out (MIMO) control field including a first partial bandwidth (BW) information subfield is transmitted between the first STA and the second STA (Fig. 18, [0244], when the receiving device is requested by the transmission device to transmit channel state information on multiple RUs through the NDPA frame, the compressed beamforming frame may include a plurality of partial bandwidth information subfields respectively indicating subcarrier indexes respectively corresponding to the partial bandwidths in one MIMO control field. That is, the receiving device may use the same indexing as that of the transmission device in order to represent ‘first subcarrier index information’ and ‘last subcarrier index information’ corresponding to each of the RUs in the MIMO control field, which will be described in detail hereinafter. For example, for convenience of discussion, according to an embodiment of the inventive concept, a compressed beamforming frame including two partial bandwidth information subfields in one MIMO control field),
Jeon et al. teach wherein the first partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field has a value of a second partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame (Figs. 9 and 18-19, [0165, 0244, 0257], the null data packet announcement (NDPA) frame (fig. 9) may include a plurality of STA Info fields (for example, two or more STA Info fields) respectively indicating subcarrier indexes respectively corresponding to the partial bandwidths. A compressed beamforming frame including two partial bandwidth information subfields in one MIMO control field. When the transmission device transmits the NDPA frame to the receiving device in which the multiple RUs including the plurality of partial bandwidths are designated as the channel feedback section, the corresponding receiving device may feedback only state information of a channel designated thereto to the transmission device by using the MIMO control field in the compressed beamforming frame).
It would have been obvious to one of the ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Noh et al. by incorporating the features as taught by Jeon et al. in order to provide a more effective and efficient system that is capable of including a frame with MIMO control field including a first partial bandwidth (BW) information subfield is transmitted between the first STA and the second STA, and the first partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field has a value of a second partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame. The motivation is to support an improved method for wireless communication based on an enhanced null data packet announcement [0002]).
Regarding claim 14, Noh et al. teach a first station (STA) comprising: at least one transceiver; and at least one processor coupled to the one or more transceivers; wherein the at least one processor is configured to (Fig. 2B, [0041-0042 ], the STA 121 includes antenna(s) 205, a radio frequency (RF) transceiver 210, TX processing circuitry 215, a microphone 220, and receive (RX) processing circuitry 225. The STA 111 also includes a speaker 230, a controller/processor 240, an input/output (I/O) interface (IF) 245, a touchscreen 250, a display 255, and a memory 260. The memory 260 includes an operating system (OS) 261 and one or more applications 262. The RF transceiver 210 receives, from the antenna(s) 205, an incoming RF signal transmitted by an AP of the WLAN BSS 100),
Noh et al. teach receive, from a second STA through the at least one transceiver, a beacon frame including an extremely high throughput (EHT) operation element including (Figs. 1 and 8, [0030, 0092], a WLAN BSS 100 may include a one AP 110 and a plurality of STAs 120. Any one of the plurality of STAs 120 may receive resource allocated for MU transmission and communicate with the AP 110. The AP 110 may deliver information regarding the resource allocation for MU transmission to any one of the plurality of STAs 120. The plurality of STAs 120 may receive/transmit, from/to the AP 110, the frames simultaneously in the WLAN BSS 100 based on the allocated resources for MU transmission. Static puncturing channel indication could be provided with the EHT Operation element as shown in fig. 8, wherein this element could be carried in a management frame such as a beacon frame),
Noh et al. teach a first field related to whether a disabled subchannel bitmap field is present in the EHT operation element (Fig. 9, [0094], the format of the EHT Operation element 900 includes Element ID field 901, Length field 902, Element ID Extension filed 903, EHT Operation Information field 904 and Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905. The Disabled Subchannel Bitmap Present subfield indicates whether the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap filed 905 is present. For example, the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905 is present if the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap Present subfield is 1, otherwise, the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905 is not present.),
Noh et al. teach and the disabled subchannel bitmap field related to at least one first subchannel that is punctured within a bandwidth (Fig. 9, [0094], the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905 provides the static puncturing channel indication indicating a list of subchannels that are punctured within the BSS bandwidth, if present),
Noh et al. teach and receive, from the STA through the at least one transceiver, a null-data physical layer protocol data unit (NDP) announcement frame (Fig. 5, [0058], beamformed transmission is initiated with a NDP Announcement frame 503a by the beamformer 501a. After SIFS 505a interval, the NDP frame 504a is transmitted to be estimated for channel matrix by for the beamformee 502a and beamformee 502a calculates the beam matrix. After SIFS 505a interval, Compressed Beamforming/channel quality indicator (CQI) frame 506a including feedback information is sent by the beamformee 502a. The NDP Announcement frame 503a contains proper signaling to help this procedure for some STAs wherein the STA ID is included in NDP Announcement frame 503a),
Noh et al. teach wherein a frame including a multiple-input multiple-out (MIMO) control field including a first partial bandwidth (BW) information subfield is transmitted between the first STA and the second STA (Figs. 1, 2B and , [0048, 0055, 0105], the STA 120 may include any number of antenna(s) 205 for MIMO communication with an AP 110. The AP 110 may want to have more control mechanism of the medium by using more scheduled access, which may allow more frequent use of OFDMA/MU-MIMO transmissions. The first puncturing pattern could reuse the one defined in EHT NDP Announcement frame wherein the one is 9 bit of partial BW Info subfield consisting of B0 to inform whether it is 20 MHz or 40 MHz resolution for following each bit and B1 to B8 to inform the feedback bitmap as shown in Table 6),
Noh et al. teach wherein compressed beamforming feedback information is provided based on the MIMO control field (Fig. 5, [0055, 0059], AP may want to have more control mechanism of the medium by using more scheduled access. the beamformed transmission is initiated with a NDP Announcement frame 503b by the beamformer 501b. After SIFS 505b interval, the NDP frame 504b is transmitted to be estimated for channel matrix by for the beamformees 502b (beamformee 1, beamformee 2, . . . beamformee n) and beamformees 502b calculate the beam matrix. After SIFS 505b, the beamforming report poll (BFRP) Trigger frames 507b followed by Compressed Beamforming/CQI frames 506b (Compressed Beamforming/CQI frame 1, Compressed Beamforming/CQI frame 2, . . . Compressed Beamforming/CQI frame n) from a plurality of beamformees 502b are exchanged one or more times. NDP Announcement frame 503b contains proper signaling to help this procedure for some STAs wherein the STA ID is included in NDP Announcement frame 503b),
Noh et al. teach and wherein the first partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field has a value of a second partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame (Fig. 9, [0105-0107], some specific frame could use a first puncturing pattern. Otherwise, use a second puncturing pattern. The first puncturing pattern could be designed as much as flexible. For example, only primary 20 MHz subchannel is not punctured and any 20 MHz subchannels could be punctured while keeping the channel bandwidth. The first puncturing pattern could reuse the one defined in EHT NDP Announcement frame wherein the one is 9 bit of partial BW Info subfield consisting of B0 to inform whether it is 20 MHz or 40 MHz resolution for following each bit and B1 to B8 to inform the feedback bitmap as shown in Table 6. EHT MU PPDU carries the Punctured Channel Information in U-SIG to indicate which 20 MHz subchannels are punctured to a single user transmission and a multiple user transmission (Full (or partial) bandwidth MU-MIMO transmission or OFDMA transmission).
Noh et al. is teaching a beacon frame an operational element including EHT operational elements. Noh et al., however, fail to expressly disclose MIMO control field including a partial bandwidth information of NDP subfield. (Emphasis added).
Regarding claim 14, Jeon et al. teach wherein a frame including a multiple-input multiple-out (MIMO) control field including a first partial bandwidth (BW) information subfield is transmitted between the first STA and the second STA (Fig. 18, [0244], when the receiving device is requested by the transmission device to transmit channel state information on multiple RUs through the NDPA frame, the compressed beamforming frame may include a plurality of partial bandwidth information subfields respectively indicating subcarrier indexes respectively corresponding to the partial bandwidths in one MIMO control field. That is, the receiving device may use the same indexing as that of the transmission device in order to represent ‘first subcarrier index information’ and ‘last subcarrier index information’ corresponding to each of the RUs in the MIMO control field, which will be described in detail hereinafter. For example, for convenience of discussion, according to an embodiment of the inventive concept, a compressed beamforming frame including two partial bandwidth information subfields in one MIMO control field),
Jeon et al. teach wherein the first partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field has a value of a second partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame (Figs. 9 and 18-19, [0165, 0244, 0257], the null data packet announcement (NDPA) frame (fig. 9) may include a plurality of STA Info fields (for example, two or more STA Info fields) respectively indicating subcarrier indexes respectively corresponding to the partial bandwidths. A compressed beamforming frame including two partial bandwidth information subfields in one MIMO control field. When the transmission device transmits the NDPA frame to the receiving device in which the multiple RUs including the plurality of partial bandwidths are designated as the channel feedback section, the corresponding receiving device may feedback only state information of a channel designated thereto to the transmission device by using the MIMO control field in the compressed beamforming frame).
It would have been obvious to one of the ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Noh et al. by incorporating the features as taught by Jeon et al. in order to provide a more effective and efficient system that is capable of including a frame with MIMO control field including a first partial bandwidth (BW) information subfield is transmitted between the first STA and the second STA, and the first partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field has a value of a second partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame. The motivation is to support an improved method for wireless communication based on an enhanced null data packet announcement [0002]).
Regarding claim 16, Noh et al. teach second station (STA) comprising: at least one transceiver; and at least one processor coupled to the one or more transceivers; wherein the at least one processor is configured to (Fig. 2A, [0032-0034 ], AP 110 includes multiple antennas 204 a-204 n, multiple RF transceivers 209 a-209 n, transmit (TX) processing circuitry 214, and receive (RX) processing circuitry 219. The AP 110 also includes a controller/processor 224, a memory 229, and a backhaul or network interface 234. The TX processing circuitry 214 receives analog or digital data (such as voice data, web data, e-mail, or interactive video game data) from the controller/processor 224. The TX processing circuitry 214 encodes, multiplexes, and/or digitizes the outgoing baseband data to generate processed baseband or IF signals),
Noh et al. teach generate a beacon frame including an extremely high throughput (EHT) operation element including (Figs. 1 and 8, [0030, 0092], a WLAN BSS 100 may include a one AP 110 and a plurality of STAs 120. Any one of the plurality of STAs 120 may receive resource allocated for MU transmission and communicate with the AP 110. The AP 110 may deliver information regarding the resource allocation for MU transmission to any one of the plurality of STAs 120. The plurality of STAs 120 may receive/transmit, from/to the AP 110, the frames simultaneously in the WLAN BSS 100 based on the allocated resources for MU transmission. Static puncturing channel indication could be provided with the EHT Operation element as shown in fig. 8, wherein this element could be carried in a management frame such as a beacon frame),
Noh et al. teach a first field related to whether a disabled subchannel bitmap field is present in the EHT operation element (Fig. 9, [0094], the format of the EHT Operation element 900 includes Element ID field 901, Length field 902, Element ID Extension filed 903, EHT Operation Information field 904 and Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905. The Disabled Subchannel Bitmap Present subfield indicates whether the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap filed 905 is present. For example, the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905 is present if the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap Present subfield is 1, otherwise, the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905 is not present.),
Noh et al. teach and the disabled subchannel bitmap field related to at least one first subchannel that is punctured within a bandwidth (Fig. 9, [0094], the Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905 provides the static puncturing channel indication indicating a list of subchannels that are punctured within the BSS bandwidth, if present),
Noh et al. teach transmit, through the at least one transceiver to the first STA, the beacon frame; and transmit, through the at least one transceiver to the first STA, a null-data physical layer protocol data unit (NDP) announcement frame (Fig. 5, [0058], beamformed transmission is initiated with a NDP Announcement frame 503a by the beamformer 501a. After SIFS 505a interval, the NDP frame 504a is transmitted to be estimated for channel matrix by for the beamformee 502a and beamformee 502a calculates the beam matrix. After SIFS 505a interval, Compressed Beamforming/channel quality indicator (CQI) frame 506a including feedback information is sent by the beamformee 502a. The NDP Announcement frame 503a contains proper signaling to help this procedure for some STAs wherein the STA ID is included in NDP Announcement frame 503a),
Noh et al. teach wherein a frame including a multiple-input multiple-out (MIMO) control field including a first partial bandwidth (BW) information subfield is transmitted between the first STA and the second STA (Figs. 1, 2B and , [0048, 0055, 0105], the STA 120 may include any number of antenna(s) 205 for MIMO communication with an AP 110. The AP 110 may want to have more control mechanism of the medium by using more scheduled access, which may allow more frequent use of OFDMA/MU-MIMO transmissions. The first puncturing pattern could reuse the one defined in EHT NDP Announcement frame wherein the one is 9 bit of partial BW Info subfield consisting of B0 to inform whether it is 20 MHz or 40 MHz resolution for following each bit and B1 to B8 to inform the feedback bitmap as shown in Table 6),
Noh et al. teach wherein compressed beamforming feedback information is provided based on the MIMO control field (Fig. 5, [0055, 0059], AP may want to have more control mechanism of the medium by using more scheduled access. the beamformed transmission is initiated with a NDP Announcement frame 503b by the beamformer 501b. After SIFS 505b interval, the NDP frame 504b is transmitted to be estimated for channel matrix by for the beamformees 502b (beamformee 1, beamformee 2, . . . beamformee n) and beamformees 502b calculate the beam matrix. After SIFS 505b, the beamforming report poll (BFRP) Trigger frames 507b followed by Compressed Beamforming/CQI frames 506b (Compressed Beamforming/CQI frame 1, Compressed Beamforming/CQI frame 2, . . . Compressed Beamforming/CQI frame n) from a plurality of beamformees 502b are exchanged one or more times. NDP Announcement frame 503b contains proper signaling to help this procedure for some STAs wherein the STA ID is included in NDP Announcement frame 503b),
Noh et al. teach and wherein the first partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field has a value of a second partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame (Fig. 9, [0105-0107], some specific frame could use a first puncturing pattern. Otherwise, use a second puncturing pattern. The first puncturing pattern could be designed as much as flexible. For example, only primary 20 MHz subchannel is not punctured and any 20 MHz subchannels could be punctured while keeping the channel bandwidth. The first puncturing pattern could reuse the one defined in EHT NDP Announcement frame wherein the one is 9 bit of partial BW Info subfield consisting of B0 to inform whether it is 20 MHz or 40 MHz resolution for following each bit and B1 to B8 to inform the feedback bitmap as shown in Table 6. EHT MU PPDU carries the Punctured Channel Information in U-SIG to indicate which 20 MHz subchannels are punctured to a single user transmission and a multiple user transmission (Full (or partial) bandwidth MU-MIMO transmission or OFDMA transmission).
Noh et al. is teaching a beacon frame an operational element including EHT operational elements. Noh et al., however, fail to expressly disclose MIMO control field including a partial bandwidth information of NDP subfield. (Emphasis added).
Regarding claim 16, Jeon et al. teach wherein a frame including a multiple-input multiple-out (MIMO) control field including a first partial bandwidth (BW) information subfield is transmitted between the first STA and the second STA (Fig. 18, [0244], when the receiving device is requested by the transmission device to transmit channel state information on multiple RUs through the NDPA frame, the compressed beamforming frame may include a plurality of partial bandwidth information subfields respectively indicating subcarrier indexes respectively corresponding to the partial bandwidths in one MIMO control field. That is, the receiving device may use the same indexing as that of the transmission device in order to represent ‘first subcarrier index information’ and ‘last subcarrier index information’ corresponding to each of the RUs in the MIMO control field, which will be described in detail hereinafter. For example, for convenience of discussion, according to an embodiment of the inventive concept, a compressed beamforming frame including two partial bandwidth information subfields in one MIMO control field),
Jeon et al. teach wherein the first partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field has a value of a second partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame (Figs. 9 and 18-19, [0165, 0244, 0257], the null data packet announcement (NDPA) frame (fig. 9) may include a plurality of STA Info fields (for example, two or more STA Info fields) respectively indicating subcarrier indexes respectively corresponding to the partial bandwidths. A compressed beamforming frame including two partial bandwidth information subfields in one MIMO control field. When the transmission device transmits the NDPA frame to the receiving device in which the multiple RUs including the plurality of partial bandwidths are designated as the channel feedback section, the corresponding receiving device may feedback only state information of a channel designated thereto to the transmission device by using the MIMO control field in the compressed beamforming frame).
It would have been obvious to one of the ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Noh et al. by incorporating the features as taught by Jeon et al. in order to provide a more effective and efficient system that is capable of including a frame with MIMO control field including a first partial bandwidth (BW) information subfield is transmitted between the first STA and the second STA, and the first partial BW information subfield of the MIMO control field has a value of a second partial BW information subfield of the NDP announcement frame. The motivation is to support an improved method for wireless communication based on an enhanced null data packet announcement [0002]).
Claim(s) 3 and 19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Noh et al. (US 2022/0345243 A1) in view of Jeon et al. (US 2021/0409078 A1) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Yu et al. (US 20210266054 A1).
Noh et al. and Jeon et al. disclose the claimed limitations as described in paragraph 6 above.
Regarding claim 19, Noh et al. teach wherein: the first partial BW information subfield is based on the disabled subchannel bitmap field (Fig. 9, [0084, 0105], The Disabled Subchannel Bitmap field 905 provides the static puncturing channel indication indicating a list of subchannels that are punctured within the BSS bandwidth, if present. The first puncturing pattern could reuse the one defined in EHT NDP Announcement frame wherein the one is 9 bit of partial BW Info subfield consisting of B0 to inform whether it is 20 MHz or 40 MHz resolution for following each bit and B1 to B8 to inform the feedback bitmap as shown in Table 6).
Noh et al. and Jeon et al. do not close the following features: regarding claim 3, wherein: whether the first partial BW information subfield is included in the frame is based on the second subfield.
Regarding claim 3, Yu et al. teach wherein: whether the first partial BW information subfield is included in the frame is based on the second subfield (Figs. 4, 6 and 14, [0155] the MIMO control field may further include a plurality of pieces of partial bandwidth information, and the partial bandwidth information includes a resource unit start index and a resource unit end index. Each piece of partial bandwidth information corresponds to one feedback field, and the partial bandwidth information is used to indicate that channel state information included in the corresponding feedback field).
It would have been obvious to one of the ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Noh et al. with Jeon et al. by incorporating the features as taught by Yu et al. in order to provide a more effective and efficient system that is capable of including the first partial BW information subfield is in the frame is based on the second subfield. The motivation is to support an improved method or a channel state information feedback (see [0002]).
Claim(s) 4 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Noh et al. (US 2022/0345243 A1) in view of Jeon et al. (US 2021/0409078 A1) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Li et al. (US 2021/0105667 A1).
Noh et al. and Jeon et al. disclose the claimed limitations as described in paragraphs 6 above. Noh et al. and Jeon et al. do not expressly disclose the following features: regarding claim 4, wherein: second subfield is set on at least one bit among [[the]] a 15th bit (B14) to 17th bit (B 16) or a 38th bit (B37) to 40th bit (B39) of the MIMO control field.
Regarding claim 4, Li et al. teach wherein: second subfield is set on at least one bit among [[the]] a 15th bit (B14) to 17th bit (B 16) or a 38th bit (B37) to 40th bit (B39) of the MIMO control field (Fig. 3-3, [0010, 0131-0132] a preamble puncture mode includes a plurality of modes. Because each of the at least three bits corresponds to at least one secondary subchannel, the plurality of modes included in the preamble puncture mode can be indicated to the first device. A CTS-A frame is a frame that carries a new type of A-Control field. The new type of A-Control field includes a bitmap, and each bit corresponds to one 20 MHz subchannel. Because the new type of A-Control field is introduced in this implementation, a size of the bitmap may be randomly extended. The CTS-A frame is a new type of frame. The new type of frame includes a bitmap, and each bit corresponds to one 20 MHz subchannel. Because the new type of frame is introduced in this implementation, a size of the bitmap may be randomly extended. Therefore, the size of the bitmap may be extended to indicate a bandwidth higher than 160 MHz. For example, when a maximum communication bandwidth is 320 MHz, a 16-bit bitmap may be used, where each bit corresponds to one 20 MHz subchannel. Because the primary 20 MHz subchannel needs to be used, optionally, a bit corresponding to the primary 20 MHz subchannel may be set as a reserved bit or a 15-bit bitmap is used).
It would have been obvious to one of the ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Noh et al. with Jeon et al. by incorporating the features as taught by Li et al. in order to provide a more effective and efficient system that is capable of indicating the fourth information is set on at least one bit among the 15th bit (B 14) to 17th bit (B16) or the 38th bit (B37) to 40th bit (B39) of the control field. The motivation is to support an improved method for sending a new bandwidth mode to a receive end (see [0002]).
Claim(s) 7 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Noh et al. (US 2022/0345243 A1) in view of Jeon et al. (US 2021/0409078 A1) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Kwon et al. (US 2021/0336752 A1).
Noh et al. and Jeon et al. disclose the claimed limitations as described in paragraph 6 above. Noh et al. and Jeon et al. do not expressly disclose the following features: regarding claim 7, wherein: the first disabled subchannel bitmap field consists of 16 bits, and the partial BW information subfield consists of 9 bits.
Regarding claim 7, Kwon et al. teach wherein: the disabled subchannel bitmap field consists of 16 bits, and the first partial BW information subfield consists of 9 bits (Fig. 1, [0098-0099, 0102] in some embodiments, NDP packets used for signaling may support more than one hole transmission (similar to OFDMA transmissions) for punctured information signaling. In some embodiments, punctured information signaling may be performed according to one of three techniques. According to a first technique, a Universal-Signal field (U-SIG) and/or an EHT-Signal field (EHT-SIG) in an NDP packet may be similar to that of an OFDMA mode. In some embodiments, the first technique may involve a puncturing subfield in an NDP using the same format as an uncompressed OFDMA mode. In some embodiments, the first technique may involve omitting an RU Allocation field in EHT-SIG as a receiver (e.g., client or STA) will know how to combine content channels based on puncturing information in U-SIG. In some embodiments, the first technique may involve the NDP transmission being indicated in U-SIG via (1) an unused entry for PPDU+EHT-SIG compression/format, or (2) EHT-Modulation and Coding Scheme (EHT-MCS) 0 and number of EHT-SIG symbol=1. According to a second technique, channel puncturing indication may be done in an NDPA using a special Association Identifier (AID). In some embodiments, the second technique may be similar to a High-Efficiency (HE) NDPA, except that the number of puncturing bits (e.g., “disallowed subchannel bitmap”) may be extended from 8-bits to 16-bits. According to a third technique, the first technique and the second technique may be combined such that channel puncturing information may be signaled via both an NDPA and an NDP packet (see fig. 12). In some embodiments, a partial bandwidth feedback request may use 9-bits with a feedback resolution bit and an 8-bit bitmap, without the primary/secondary bit. Fig. 13 depicts fields of the HE NDPA that may be used by a beamformer (e.g., an AP) for sounding procedures for channel status information identification when the HE NDPA is aimed at more than one client (e.g., multiple STAs). With reference to fig. 13, HE NDPA 1200 includes a Frame Control field 1202 (2 octets), a Duration field 1204 (2 octets), a Receiving Address (RA) field 1206 (6 octets), a Transmission Address (TA) field 1208 (6 octets), a Sounding Dialog Token field 1210 (1 octet), a first per-STA Info field (shown as “STA Info 1”) 1212 (4 octets), a subsequent per-STA Info field (shown as “STA Info n”) 1214 (4 octets), and a Frame Check Sequence (FCS) field 1216 (4 octets). In such an embodiment, the Sounding Dialog Token field 1210 may include three subfields, implemented as Reserved 1210-1 (1-bit), VHT/HE 1210-2 (1-bit), and Sounding Dialog Token Number 1210-3 (6-bits). Additionally, in such an embodiment, the first per-STA Info field (shown as “STA Info 1”) 1212 may include six subfields, implemented as AID11 1212-1 (11-bits), Partial Bandwidth Info 1212-2 (9-bits), Feedback type+Ng 1212-3 (2-bits), Disambiguation bit 1212-4 (1-bit), Codebook size 1212-5 (1-bit), and Number of columns (Nc) 1212-6 (3-bits)).
It would have been obvious to one of the ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Noh et al. with Jeon et al. by incorporating the features as taught by Kwon et al. in order to provide a more effective and efficient system that is capable of using the first disabled subchannel bitmap field consists of 16 bits, and the partial BW information subfield consists of 9 bits. The motivation is to support an improved method for operating an access point using feedback subcarrier indices for a bandwidth of up to 320 MHz to a client (see [0003]).
Claim(s) 10 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Claim(s) 4 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Noh et al. (US 2022/0345243 A1) in view of Jeon et al. (US 2021/0409078 A1) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Li et al. (US 2021/0153210 A1) (Li’210 hereinafter).
Noh et al. and Jeon et al. disclose the claimed limitations as described in paragraphs 6 above. Noh et al. and Jeon et al. do not expressly disclose the following features: regarding claim 10, wherein: the EHT operating element includes a third field related to whether indication of at least one second subchannel that is punctured within the bandwidth is supported.
Regarding claim 10, Li’210 teach wherein: the operating element includes a second field related to whether indication of at least one second subchannel that is punctured within the bandwidth different from the at least one first subchannel is supported (Figs 6-7, [0125-0126], a bitmap for preamble puncture field, a channel bandwidth field, a third channel center frequency segment field, and a fourth channel center frequency segment field are in a same operation element field, and the bitmap for preamble puncture field is in an operation element field different from an operation element field that the first channel center frequency segment field and the second channel center frequency segment field are in. Alternatively, FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram of a frame structure of another first frame according to an embodiment of this application. A bitmap for preamble puncture field, a channel bandwidth field, a first channel center frequency segment field, a second channel center frequency segment field, a third channel center frequency segment field, and a fourth channel center frequency segment field are in a same operation element field).
It would have been obvious to one of the ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Noh et al. with Jeon et al. by incorporating the features as taught by Li’210 in order to provide a more effective and efficient system that is capable of having EHT operating element includes a third field related to whether indication of at least one second subchannel that is punctured within the bandwidth is supported. The motivation is to support an improved method for providing a bandwidth information indication (see [0006]).
Conclusion
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/SYED M BOKHARI/Examiner, Art Unit 2473 6/5/2026
/KWANG B YAO/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2473
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