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 .
Preliminary Amendment Acknowledgment
Preliminary Amendment filed on 02/02/2024 has been acknowledged and 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) 1-2, 4, 7-8, 17-18, 20, 23, 31-32, 34, 37-38, 47-48, 50, 53 and 92-93 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Matsumura et al. (Pub. No. US 2021/0037519).
Regarding claim 1. Matsumura teaches a frequency hopping indication method, applied to a terminal device (Matsumura, the Abstract, Fig. 20, pp [286]), comprising:
receiving a higher layer signaling transmitted from a network device, wherein the higher layer signaling is configured with a first frequency hopping pattern or multiple candidate frequency hopping patterns (Matsumura, pp [288], Fig. 20 pp [290]; Fig. 21, pp [296]-[300], [346]: a user terminal 204 receives multiple frequency resource information such as frequency hopping information PUCCH frequency hopping from a base station via a higher layer signaling, and the user terminal’s control section 401 determines at least one of the spreading factor of the time-domain orthogonal cover code to apply to the uplink control channel, the configuration of the demodulation reference code included in the uplink control channel, and the base sequence to apply to the uplink control channel); and
determining a frequency hopping pattern for an uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device based on the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, Fig. 21, pp [296]-[300], [346]: a user terminal 204 receives multiple frequency resource information such as frequency hopping information PUCCH frequency hopping from a base station via a higher layer signaling, and the user terminal’s control section 401 determines at least one of the spreading factor of the time-domain orthogonal cover code to apply to the uplink control channel, the configuration of the demodulation reference code included in the uplink control channel, and the base sequence to apply to the uplink control channel);
Regarding claim 17. Matsumura teaches a frequency hopping indication method, applied to a network device (Matsumura, the Abstract), comprising:
transmitting a higher layer signaling to a terminal device, wherein the higher layer signaling is configured with a first frequency hopping pattern or multiple candidate frequency hopping patterns (Matsumura, Fig. 21, pp [296]-[300], [346]: a user terminal 204 receives multiple frequency resource information such as frequency hopping information PUCCH frequency hopping from a base station via a higher layer signaling, and the user terminal’s control section 401 determines at least one of the spreading factor of the time-domain orthogonal cover code to apply to the uplink control channel, the configuration of the demodulation reference code included in the uplink control channel, and the base sequence to apply to the uplink control channel).
Regarding claim 31. Matsumura teaches a terminal device, comprising a memory, a transceiver, and a processor (Matsumura, the Abstract, Figs. 18, 21, 22, pp [292]-[293], [316]);
the memory is configured for storing a computer program;
the transceiver is configured for transmitting and receiving data under control of the processor (Matsumura, Figs. 18, 21, 22, pp [292]-[293]);
the processor is configured for executing the computer program stored in the memory and implementing the following steps:
receiving a higher layer signaling transmitted from a network device, wherein the higher layer signaling is configured with a first frequency hopping pattern or multiple candidate frequency hopping patterns (Matsumura, pp [288], Fig. 20 pp [290]; Fig. 21, pp [296]-[300], [346]: a user terminal 204 receives multiple frequency resource information such as frequency hopping information PUCCH frequency hopping from a base station via a higher layer signaling, and the user terminal’s control section 401 determines at least one of the spreading factor of the time-domain orthogonal cover code to apply to the uplink control channel, the configuration of the demodulation reference code included in the uplink control channel, and the base sequence to apply to the uplink control channel); and
determining a frequency hopping pattern for an uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device based on the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, Fig. 21, pp [296]-[300], [346]: a user terminal 204 receives multiple frequency resource information such as frequency hopping information PUCCH frequency hopping from a base station via a higher layer signaling, and the user terminal’s control section 401 determines at least one of the spreading factor of the time-domain orthogonal cover code to apply to the uplink control channel, the configuration of the demodulation reference code included in the uplink control channel, and the base sequence to apply to the uplink control channel).
Regarding claim 47. Matsumura teaches a network side device, comprising a memory, a transceiver, and a processor (Matsumura, the Abstract, Figs. 18, 22, pp [316]);
the memory is configured for storing a computer program (Matsumura, Figs. 18, 21, 22, pp [292]-[293]);
the transceiver is configured for transmitting and receiving data under control of the processor (Matsumura, Figs. 18, 21, 22, pp [292]-[293]);
the processor is configured for executing the computer program stored in the memory and implementing the following steps:
transmitting a higher layer signaling to a terminal device, wherein the higher layer signaling is configured with a first frequency hopping pattern or multiple candidate frequency hopping patterns (Matsumura, Fig. 21, pp [296]-[300], [346]: a user terminal 204 receives multiple frequency resource information such as frequency hopping information PUCCH frequency hopping from a base station via a higher layer signaling, and the user terminal’s control section 401 determines at least one of the spreading factor of the time-domain orthogonal cover code to apply to the uplink control channel, the configuration of the demodulation reference code included in the uplink control channel, and the base sequence to apply to the uplink control channel).
Regarding claim 2. The method of claim 1, wherein in case that the uplink channel is a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), the method further comprises:
receiving first downlink control information (DCI) transmitted from the network device (Matsumura, pp [37], [58]-[60]);
the determining the frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device based on the higher layer signaling comprises:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on the higher layer signaling in case that the higher layer signaling is configured with the first frequency hopping pattern (Matsumura, pp [67]-[70], [75], [79]-[80]); and
determining the first frequency hopping pattern as enabled or disabled based on the first DCI (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]);
wherein the determining the first frequency hopping pattern comprises:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on a first information element (IE) configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on a second IE configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on a joint channel estimation (JCE) association configuration in the higher layer signaling, as well as an interSlot or interRepetition frequency hopping pattern configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling, wherein the JCE association configuration comprises at least one of a time-domain window size, a time-domain frequency hopping interval, or a JCE enabled/disabled (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]).
Regarding claim 4. The method of claim 1, wherein in case that the uplink channel is a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) (Matsumura, Fig. 4A-4B, pp [78]-[80]), the determining the frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device based on the higher layer signaling comprises:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on the higher layer signaling in case that the higher layer signaling is configured with the first frequency hopping pattern (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]);
wherein the determining the first frequency hopping pattern comprises:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on a third IE configured in PUCCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on a JCE association configuration in the higher layer signaling, as well as an interSlot frequency hopping pattern configured in PUCCH-config by the higher layer signaling, wherein the JCE association configuration comprises at least one of a time-domain window size, a time-domain frequency hopping interval, or a JCE enabled/disabled (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]).
Regarding claim 7. The method of claim 2, wherein:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device as disabled in case that a value of the time-domain window size or the time-domain frequency hopping interval in the JCE association configuration is 1 (Matsumura, pp [303]-[306], [332]-[334]).
Regarding claim 8. The method of claim 1, wherein the method further comprises:
receiving second DCI transmitted from the network device (Matsumura, pp [37], [58]-[60]);
the determining the frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device based on the higher layer signaling comprises:
determining configured multiple candidate frequency hopping patterns based on the higher layer signaling in case that the higher layer signaling is configured with the multiple candidate frequency hopping patterns (Matsumura, pp [288], Fig. 20 pp [290]; Fig. 21, pp [296]-[300], [346]); and
determining the frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device among the multiple candidate hopping patterns based on the second DCI (Matsumura, pp [288], Fig. 20 pp [290]; Fig. 21, pp [296]-[300], [346]).
Regarding claim 18. The method of claim 17, wherein in case that an uplink channel is a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), the transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device comprises:
transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device and configuring the first frequency hopping pattern (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]);
after the transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device, the method further comprises:
transmitting first downlink control information (DCI) to the terminal device (Matsumura, pp [37], [58]-[60]); and
indicating the first frequency hopping pattern of the terminal device as enabled or disabled based on the first DCI (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]);
wherein the configuring the first frequency hopping pattern comprises:
configuring the first frequency hopping pattern based on a first information element IE configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
configuring the first frequency hopping pattern based on a second IE configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
configuring the first frequency hopping pattern based on a joint channel estimation (JCE) association configuration in the higher layer signaling, as well as an interSlot or interRepetition frequency hopping pattern configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling, wherein the JCE association configuration comprises at least one of a time-domain window size, a time-domain frequency hopping interval, or a JCE enabled/disabled (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]).
Regarding claim 20. The method of claim 17, wherein in case that the uplink channel is a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH), the transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device comprises:
transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device and configuring the first frequency hopping pattern (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); wherein the configuring the first frequency hopping pattern comprises:
configuring the first frequency hopping pattern based on a third IE configured in PUCCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
configuring the first frequency hopping pattern based on a JCE association configuration in the higher layer signaling, as well as an interSlot frequency hopping pattern configured in PUCCH-config by the higher layer signaling, wherein the JCE association configuration comprises at least one of a time-domain window size, a time-domain frequency hopping interval, or a JCE enabled/disabled (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]).
Regarding claim 23. The method of claim 17, wherein the transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device comprises:
transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device, wherein the higher layer signaling is configured with the multiple candidate frequency hopping patterns (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]);
after the transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device, the method further comprises:
transmitting second DCI to the terminal device (Matsumura, pp [37], [58]-[60]); and
indicating, based on the second DCI, the terminal device to determine a frequency hopping pattern for a corresponding uplink channel among the multiple candidate hopping patterns (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]).
Regarding claim 32. The terminal device of claim 31, wherein in case that the uplink channel is a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), the steps further comprise:
receiving first downlink control information (DCI) transmitted from the network device (Matsumura, pp [37], [58]-[60]);
the determining the frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device based on the higher layer signaling comprises:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on the higher layer signaling in case that the higher layer signaling is configured with the first frequency hopping pattern (Matsumura, pp [67]-[70], [75], [79]-[80]); and
determining the first frequency hopping pattern as enabled or disabled based on the first DCI; wherein the determining the first frequency hopping pattern comprises:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on a first information element IE) configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]); or
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on a second IE configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on a joint channel estimation (JCE) association configuration in the higher layer signaling, as well as an interSlot or interRepetition frequency hopping pattern configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling, wherein the JCE association configuration comprises at least one of a time-domain window size, a time-domain frequency hopping interval, or a JCE enabled/disabled (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]).
Regarding claim 34. The terminal device of claim 31, wherein in case that the uplink channel is a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH), the determining the frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device based on the higher layer signaling comprises:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on the higher layer signaling in case that the higher layer signaling is configured with the first frequency hopping pattern (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]);
wherein the determining the first frequency hopping pattern comprises:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on a third IE configured in PUCCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
determining the first frequency hopping pattern based on a JCE association configuration in the higher layer signaling, as well as an interSlot frequency hopping pattern configured in PUCCH-config by the higher layer signaling, wherein the JCE association configuration comprises at least one of a time-domain window size, a time-domain frequency hopping interval, or a JCE enabled/disabled (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]).
Regarding claim 37. The terminal device of claim 32, wherein:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device as disabled in case that a value of the time-domain window size or the time-domain frequency hopping interval in the JCE association configuration is 1 (Matsumura, pp [303]-[306], [332]-[334]).
Regarding claim 38. The terminal device of claim 31, wherein the steps further comprise:
receiving second DCI transmitted from the network device (Matsumura, pp [37], [58]-[60]);
the determining the frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device based on the higher layer signaling comprises:
determining configured multiple candidate frequency hopping patterns based on the higher layer signaling in case that the higher layer signaling is configured with the multiple candidate frequency hopping patterns (Matsumura, pp [288], Fig. 20 pp [290]; Fig. 21, pp [296]-[300], [346]); and
determining the frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device among the multiple candidate hopping patterns based on the second DCI (Matsumura, pp [288], Fig. 20 pp [290]; Fig. 21, pp [296]-[300], [346]).
Regarding claim 48. The network side device of claim 47, wherein in case that an uplink channel is a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), the transmitting higher layer signaling to the terminal device comprises:
transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device and configuring the first frequency hopping pattern (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]);
after the transmitting higher layer signaling to the terminal device, the steps further comprise:
transmitting first downlink control information (DCI) to the terminal device (Matsumura, pp [37], [58]-[60]); and
indicating the first frequency hopping pattern of the terminal device as enabled or disabled based on the first DCI (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]);
wherein the configuring the first frequency hopping pattern comprises:
configuring the first frequency hopping pattern based on a first information element (IE) configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
configuring the first frequency hopping pattern based on a second IE configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
configuring the first frequency hopping pattern based on a joint channel estimation (JCE) association configuration in the higher layer signaling, as well as an interSlot or interRepetition frequency hopping pattern configured in PUSCH-config by the higher layer signaling, wherein the JCE association configuration comprises at least one of a time-domain window size, a time-domain frequency hopping interval, or a JCE enabled/disabled (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]).
Regarding claim 50. The network side device of claim 47, wherein in case that the uplink channel is a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH), the transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device comprises:
transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device and configuring the first frequency hopping pattern (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]);
wherein the configuring the first frequency hopping pattern comprises:
configuring the first frequency hopping pattern based on a third information element (IE) configured in PUCCH-config by the higher layer signaling (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]); or
configuring the first frequency hopping pattern based on a joint channel estimation (JCE) association configuration in the higher layer signaling, as well as an interSlot frequency hopping pattern configured in PUCCH-config by the higher layer signaling, wherein the JCE association configuration comprises at least one of a time-domain window size, a time-domain frequency hopping interval, or a JCE enabled/disabled (Matsumura, pp [70], [78], [87], [100], [102]).
Regarding claim 53. The network side device of claim 47, wherein the transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device comprises:
transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device, wherein the higher layer signaling is configured with the multiple candidate frequency hopping patterns (Matsumura, pp [41]-[49], [57]-[58]);
after the transmitting the higher layer signaling to the terminal device, the steps further comprise:
transmitting second DCI to the terminal device (Matsumura, pp [37], [58]-[60]); and
indicating, based on the second DCI, the terminal device to determine a frequency hopping pattern for a corresponding uplink channel among the multiple candidate hopping patterns (Matsumura, pp [37], [58]-[60]).
Regarding claim 92. The method of claim 4, wherein:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device as disabled in case that a value of the time-domain window size or the time-domain frequency hopping interval in the JCE association configuration is 1 (Matsumura, pp [303]-[306], [332]-[334]).
Regarding claim 93. The terminal device of claim 34, wherein:
determining the first frequency hopping pattern for the uplink channel corresponding to the terminal device as disabled in case that a value of the time-domain window size or the time-domain frequency hopping interval in the JCE association configuration is 1 (Matsumura, pp [303]-[306], [332]-[334]).
Some related references but not used in the rejection above
Liu et al. (Pub No. US 2021/0058111), teaches Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communications are described. A user equipment (UE) may transmit uplink transmissions according to a frequency hopping pattern. The UE may identify that a first set of uplink transmissions are to be transmitted to a base station by a first set of resources (e.g., a first set of slots, a first set of frequency resources) as indicated by the frequency hopping pattern. The UE may further identify, based on the frequency hopping pattern, that a second set of uplink transmissions are to be transmitted to the base station by a second set of resources (e.g., a second set of slots, a second set of frequency resources). The first set of slots and the second set of slots may each include more than one slot. Additionally, the first and second set of resources may be within a same bandwidth part or in different bandwidth parts.
Hasegawa et al. (Pub No. US 2023/0291523), teaches Systems, methods, and instrumentalities are disclosed herein associated with transmission of demodulation reference signals (DMRS) in wireless systems. DMRS symbols may be placed in a slot for channel estimation operations. For example, channel estimation performance may be enhanced based on using an increased number of DMRS symbols. Channel estimation enhancements may be performed by transmitting DMRS symbols in an extended slot, for example, to avoid data degradation (e.g., which may result from replacing data transmission symbols with DMRS symbols). An extended slot may be a slot that includes symbols spanning across multiple slots (e.g., two slots, consecutive slots), for example, such as a slot n and a slot n+1.
Taherzadeh Boroujeni et al. (Pub No. US 2022/0322450), teaches Techniques and devices for wireless communications are described. A base station may indicate to a user equipment (UE) repetition parameters for an uplink message using transmission parameters in a response message of a random access channel (RACH) procedure. In some examples, the base station may transmit system information to the UE configuring a mapping between the transmission parameters and the repetition parameters, for example based on a repetition request or a capability indication in a random access request from the UE. The indications in the response message configuring uplink message repetitions may enable increased system efficiency and reduced latency at the UE, among other benefits.
Conclusion
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/HUY C HO/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2644