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 .
The preliminary amendment filed 1/22/24 has been entered.
Claims 35-47 are pending.
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
The IDS filed 1/22/24 has been considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 35, 38-39, 41, 44-45, and 47 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Hosseini et al., US 2022/0046664, (“Hosseini”).
Independent Claims
Regarding independent claim 1, Hosseini teaches “A first radio terminal (Fig. 2, UE 120 and Fig. 7, First UE) comprising:
at least one radio transceiver (Fig. 2, demod/mod 254a); and
at least one processor (Fig. 2, processor 280) coupled to the at least one radio transceiver and configured to:
transmit inter-terminal coordination to a second radio terminal (Fig. 7, step 740; paragraph no. 0035, “The first UE may identify a set of resources in a selection window based at least in part on receiving the inter-UE coordination request and based at least in part on a sensing operation, and may transmit an inter-UE coordination message to the second UE indicating the set of resources”; see also, paragraph no. 0093); and
receive, from the second radio terminal, information indicating a request for inter-terminal coordination (Fig. 7, step 720; paragraph no. 0035, “For example, the second UE, or a base station, may transmit an inter-UE coordination request that the first UE perform an inter-UE coordination operation”; see also, paragraph no. 0088),
wherein the inter-terminal coordination information includes a first set of preferred resources for sidelink transmission by the second radio terminal or a second set of non- preferred resources for sidelink transmission by the second radio terminal (paragraph no. 0035, “The first UE may identify a set of resources in a selection window based at least in part on receiving the inter-UE coordination request and based at least in part on a sensing operation, and may transmit an inter-UE coordination message to the second UE indicating the set of resources. The set of resources can be available resources and/or unavailable resources. The second UE may select a resource based at least in part on the set of resources and may communicate on the selected resource”; the claimed “preferred resources” and “non-preferred resources” read on the available resources and the unavailable resources, respectively; see also, paragraph no. 0092, “In this case, the first UE may transmit information indicating at least one of the unavailable resources (e.g., non-preferred resources) or the set of available sidelink resources (e.g., preferred resources)”), and
the request includes information indicating a resource reservation interval for defining a plurality of candidate resources from which the first radio terminal selects the first set or the second set” (paragraph no. 0090, “a length of the selection window may be indicated by the second UE or by the base station (or a relay associated with the base station). For example, the inter-UE coordination request may indicate the length of the selection window”; see paragraph nos. 0035 and 0089 which disclose that the first UE selects the available and/or unavailable resources from candidate resources during the selection window indicated by the inter-UE coordination request message).
Regarding independent claims 41 and 47, these independent claims are corresponding method and computer readable medium claims of the apparatus claim 1 and recite similar subject matter. As such, the rationale behind the above rejection of claim 1 applies with equal force to these independent claims and as further amplified below to highlight the minor differences between the claims.
Regarding further independent claim 47, see Fig. 2, memory 282 for the “non-transitory computer readable medium.”
Dependent Claims
Regarding claims 38 and 44, Hosseini teaches “wherein the inter-terminal coordination information is considered by the second radio terminal in resource selection for sidelink transmission by the second radio terminal” (Fig. 7, steps 740 and 750 and their respective written descriptions; see also, paragraph no. 0035).
Regarding claims 39 and 45, Hosseini teaches “wherein the at least one processor is configured to transmit the inter-terminal coordination information to the second radio terminal in response to receiving the request” (Fig. 7, steps 720 and 740 and their respective written descriptions).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 36-37, 40, 42-43, and 46 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.
Regarding claims 36 and 42, the prior art of record does not teach or fairly suggest the claim limitations “wherein the inter-terminal coordination information indicates a trust level of each resource in the first or second set, and the at least one processor is configured to:
perform sensing to detect resources reserved for sidelink transmission by one or more other radio terminals;
set, to a first level, the trust level of a first preferred or non-preferred resource determined based on sidelink control information actually received from another radio terminal during the sensing; and
set, to a second level lower than the first level, the trust level of a second preferred or non-preferred resource determined based on hypothetical sidelink control information that could have been received in a slot that the first radio terminal was unable to monitor during the sensing.”
Claims 37 and 43 depend from claims 36 and 42, respectively.
Regarding claims 40 and 46, the prior art of record does not teach or fairly suggest the claim limitations “wherein the at least one processor is configured to provide a Medium Access Control (MAC) layer, and a physical layer providing physical layer procedures, wherein the MAC layer is configured to request the physical layer for a report of a subset of resources, and the MAC layer is configured to indicate to the physical layer whether the report is for resource selection for sidelink transmission by the first radio terminal or for inter- terminal coordination.”
Conclusion
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/WON TAE C KIM/Examiner, Art Unit 2414