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 office action is in response the preliminary amendment filed on 10/25/23, claims 1-5 are amended, claims 7-12 are newly added, therefore claims 1-12 are being examined.
Drawings
The drawings are objected to as failing to comply with 37 CFR 1.84(p)(5) because they do not include the following reference sign(s) mentioned in the description: “calculation resource 109”. Corrected drawing sheets in compliance with 37 CFR 1.121(d) are required in reply to the Office action to avoid abandonment of the application. Any amended replacement drawing sheet should include all of the figures appearing on the immediate prior version of the sheet, even if only one figure is being amended. Each drawing sheet submitted after the filing date of an application must be labeled in the top margin as either “Replacement Sheet” or “New Sheet” pursuant to 37 CFR 1.121(d). If the changes are not accepted by the examiner, the applicant will be notified and informed of any required corrective action in the next Office action. The objection to the drawings will not be held in abeyance.
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.
Claims 2 and 7-8 are 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 applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
As to claim 2, the limitation “estimating a tendency of a job requested from a client terminal” is unclear. More specifically, a job requested implied that it had already occurred and contradicts with the need to “estimate”. It is assumed that applicant intends to claim the forecasting or estimating the possibility that a particular job request will be received by a client terminal as indicated in applicant’s specification [paragraph 103]. For examination purpose, the limitation is treated as the assumption by the examiner in light of applicant’s specification.
As to claim 7-8, these claims are rejected for the same reason as claim 2 above.
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 and 6 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over “An Incentive Mechanism for Computing Resource Allocation in Vehicular Fog Computing Environment” to Nazih et al. (hereafter Nazih) in view of translation of JP2020160661A to Masaru.
Masaru was cited in applicant’s IDS filed on 10/25/23.
As to claim 6, Nazih teaches the invention substantially as claimed including a management method of managing, by using a management device [data service operator (DSO) having computing resources, p. 1, right column, 4th paragraph], cloud computing utilizing a calculation resource mounted on each of a plurality of moving bodies, the management method comprising by using resource information that is information related to the calculation resource mounted on each of the plurality of moving bodies [DSO provides shared resources for user equipments (UE) including utilizing computing resources of vehicles as fog nodes (FNs), abstract; p. 1, right column, 4th paragraph; DSO design contract items (i.e. contract being the computational capacity of a respective DSO having a number of shared CRBs provided by accepted vehicles) to FNs/vehicles indicating required number of computing resources blocks (CRBs) to satisfy user equipment (UE) demand, Section III. Incentive Mechanism Formulation for Resource Allocation; vehicle type and preference towards resource sharing, p. 2, right column, Table I and corresponding description] and operation history information indicating a history of calculation processing in the cloud computing of each of the plurality of moving bodies, performing extraction processing of referring to the resource information and the operation history information stored in a memory unit of the management device and extracting a target moving body to be a target for reinforcing the calculation resource from among the plurality of moving bodies [each vehicle being labeled or classified as particular type based on preference towards resource sharing (i.e. record/log/table entries indicating willingness to process an amount of workload), p. 2, right column, Table I and corresponding description; computational resources needed define as CRBs are proposed as contracts and acceptance is receive from FNs, section A. Stakelberg game formulation; section B. Contract formulation],
guidance processing of transmitting a guidance on reinforcement of the calculation resource to an owner of the target moving body, and update processing of updating the resource information on a basis of update information indicating that the calculation resource in the target moving body has been reinforced when the update information is acquired [soliciting participation via contract items sent to vehicle(s) and waiting for a response, p. 3, right column, lines 7-10 (Note: reinforcement of resource is broadly interpreted as the providing/committing/participating in the providing of resources)].
Nazih does not specifically teaches cloud computing being grid computing. However, Nazih disclosed vehicular fog computing [abstract]. Furthermore, Masaru teaches utilization on-vehicle calculation resources in a grid computing environment [abstract].
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have combine Nazih’s computing resource allocation in vehicular fog computing environment with Masaru’s computing resource allocation in vehicular grid computing environment because they are in the same field of endeavor exploiting unused resources of vehicles.
As to claim 1, Nazih and Masaru teach the method of managing, by using a management device, grid computing utilizing a calculation resource mounted on each of a plurality of moving bodies therefore Nazih and Masaru teach the management system for implementing the method.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3-5 and 9-12 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Claims 2 and 7-8 are allowable by overcoming the 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph rejection above.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
The prior arts of record when taken individually or in combination do not expressly teach or render obvious, in the context of the claims taken as a whole, the invention as recited in claims 2-5.
Neither a reference uncovered that would have provided a basis of evidence for asserting a motivation, nor one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, knowing the teaching of the prior arts of record would have combined them to arrive at the present invention as recited in the context of claims 2-5 as a whole.
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
“Contract-Based Resource Allocation for Low-Latency Vehicular Fog Computing” teaches a contract-based vehicular fog computing resource allocation framework exploiting and soliciting participation of unused resources of vehicles.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to QING YUAN WU whose telephone number is (571)272-3776. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9AM-6PM EST.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Lewis Bullock can be reached on 571-272-3759. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/QING YUAN WU/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2199
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