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 .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claim 1-18, 21-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to a judicial exception (i.e., a law of nature, a natural phenomenon, or an abstract idea) without “significantly more”. Claim(s) 1-20 is/are directed to Abstract Idea such as an idea standing alone such as an instantiated concept, pan or scheme, as well as a mental process (thinking) that “can be performed in the human mind, or by a human using a pen and paper for example using measurement received from a mobile device, transmitting from the source relay node to a donor access node.
The apparatus and the method claim 1, 18 and 19 recites limitation, “calculate, for each of a plurality of active links between the apparatus and at least one wireless node, a metric indicative of loading on that link; and perform at least a first action to inactivate a first link of the plurality of active links, if a first criterion involving the metric calculated for the first link is met”. Since the claim is directed to a process and a machine, which is one of the statutory categories of the invention (Step 1: YES).
The claim is then analyzed to determine whether it is directed to any judicial exception. The claim recites calculate, for each of a plurality of active links between the apparatus and at least one wireless node, a metric indicative of loading on that link; and then perform at least a first action to inactivate a first link of the plurality of active links, if a first criterion involving the metric calculated for the first link is met. The calculating step and performing step recited in the claim is no more than an abstract idea i.e., mental process of calculating and performing, etc. (Step 2A: Prong One Abstract Idea=Yes).
The claim is then analyzed if it requires an additional elements or a combination of additional elements in the claim to apply, rely on, or use the judicial exception in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on the judicial exception, such that the claim is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the exception – i.e., limitation that are indicative of integration into a practical application: improving to the functioning of a computer or to any other technology or technical field. In the current claims, there is no additional elements or an improvement in the functioning of computer, or an improvement to other technology or technical field that would integrate the abstract idea into a practical application (Step 2A: Prong Two Abstract Idea=Yes).
Next the claim as a whole is analyzed to determine if there are additional limitation recited in the claim such that the claim amount to significantly more than an abstract idea. The claim requires the additional limitation of a computer with the central processing unit, memory, a printer, an input and output terminal and a program. These generic computer components are claimed to perform the basic functions of storing, retrieving and processing data through the program that enables. In the current scenario, there are no additional elements that would amount to significantly more than the abstract idea. Therefore, the claim does not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea itself (Step 2B: No). Accordingly, the claim is not patent eligible.
Further, dependent claims do not add any positive limitation or step that recite within the scope of the claim and does not carry patentable weight they are also rejected for the same reasons as independent claims.
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.
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 nonobviousness.
Claim(s) 1-13, 15-18, 21-22 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Cherian et al. Pub. No. US 20180206190 A1 in view of Kubota et al. Pub. No. US 20230397083 A1
Regarding Claim 1, Cherian teaches an apparatus for wireless communications (Fig. 8 Unit 805 and Para 101 i.e., device), comprising: at least one processor (Fig. 8 Unit 820, processor); memory (Para 103 and Fig. 8 Unit 825, memory) coupled with the processor (Para 102, a memory controller may be integrated into processor 820); and instructions stored in the memory and executable by the at least one processor to cause the apparatus to (Para 102, Processor 820 may be configured to execute computer-readable instructions stored in a memory to perform various functions):
calculate (Para 66, At 315, wireless device 305-a may monitor an anchor channel (e.g., an anchor wireless link) for indications that a second wireless device (e.g., wireless device 305-b) has data to be transmitted to wireless device 305-a. In some cases, wireless device 305-a may continuously monitor the anchor wireless link for such indications automatically following multi-link session establishment or, in other cases, may continuously monitor the anchor wireless link upon receiving an explicit indication to do so from wireless device 305-b i.e., calculate), for each of a plurality of active links between the apparatus and at least one wireless node (Para 68, wireless device 305-b may identify channel conditions for the wireless links of the multi-link session established at 310, and may determine whether or not to activate, inactivate, or maintain as active any of the wireless links based on the channel conditions), a metric (Para 47, The decision to switch between multi-link aggregation techniques (e.g., modes) may additionally or alternatively be based on other metrics (e.g., a time of day, traffic load within the network, available battery power for a wireless device, etc.)) indicative of loading on that link (Para 53, the communication load over a given wireless link 205 (e.g., wireless link 205-a) may be low at any particular instant, whereas the demand may be high for another wireless link 205 (e.g., wireless link 205-b) i.e., indicative of loading on that link);
perform at least a first action to inactivate a first link of the plurality of active links (Para 72, wireless device 305-a may identify a duration (e.g., a time duration that may be predetermined and indicated in the link activation indication received at 320, etc.) for the one or more links activated at 325 to remain active. In such cases, the wireless device 305-a may continue to monitor the anchor wireless link, and if an indication identifying an active wireless link is not received prior to the duration expiring, the wireless device may return receiver components associated with the wireless link to an inactive state. The time duration may be indicated by one or more of a TBTT, a TWT SP, a PPDU duration, a TxOP, etc i.e., perform at least a first action to inactivate a first link of the plurality of active links), if a first criterion involving the metric calculated for the first link is met (Para 47, The decision to switch between multi-link aggregation techniques (e.g., modes) may additionally or alternatively be based on other metrics (e.g., a time of day, traffic load within the network, available battery power for a wireless device, etc.) i.e., first criterion involving the metric calculated for the first link is met),
wherein the at least one transceiver is configured to at least one of transmit to or receive from the at least one wireless node via at least one of the plurality of active links (Para 70, At 330, wireless device 305-a may receive data over multiple links. The multiple links may include the links activated at 325. Such data may be received by wireless device 305-a via multiple wireless links (e.g., using at least some of the receiver components activated at 325) and may employ multi-link aggregation techniques (e.g., techniques to process and order the data received over the multiple links i.e., the at least one transceiver is configured to at least one of transmit to or receive from the at least one wireless node via at least one of the plurality of active links).
Cherian teaches monitor an anchor channel for indications that a second wireless device (e.g., wireless device 305-b) has data to be transmitted to wireless device 305-a. In some cases, wireless device 305-a may continuously monitor the anchor wireless link for such indications automatically following multi-link session establishment or, in other cases, may continuously monitor the anchor wireless link upon receiving an explicit indication to do so from wireless device 305-b where monitor can be broadly read as calculating but does not explicitly teach calculating a metric indicative of loading for each of a plurality of active links between the apparatus and at least one wireless node, a metric indicative of loading on that link.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Kubota teaches from Fig. 5 Ste ST204-ST208 and Para 91 that the processor 23 selects a communication route based on the metric (priority of communication route) of the routing table (ST205). Next, the processor 23 calculates the communication speed of the user terminal 5 (speed of communication from the user terminal 5 to the local service server 3 to be connected) via a selected communication route (ST206). Next, the processor 23 calculates the communication speed of the user terminal 5 via another communication route (ST207). Next, the processor 23 calculates the power efficiency for each communication route from the communication speed and power consumption over the entire target network (ST208) which can also be read as calculating a metric indicative of loading for each of a plurality of active links between the apparatus and at least one wireless node, a metric indicative of loading on that link (Para 91).
Therefore, it would have been obvious for one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the method of Cherian with the method of Kubota so as to optimize power efficiency of the overall network according to the collected information (see Kubota Abstract).
Regarding Claim 2, Cherian teaches wherein the plurality of active links comprise active links on different frequency bands (Para 48).
Regarding Claim 3, Cherian teaches wherein the metric for each of the plurality of active links is calculated periodically (Para 66).
Regarding Claim 4, Cherian teaches wherein the first criterion is met if the metric is below a threshold value (Para 53).
Regarding Claim 5, Cherian teaches wherein the instructions stored in the memory and executable by the at least one processor further cause the apparatus to perform at least a second action to reactivate the first link, if a second criterion is met (Para 72).
Regarding Claim 6, Cherian teaches wherein the second criterion involves at least one of: a failure to meet a quality of service (QoS) objective; or a detection of congestion on at least a second link of the plurality of active links (Para 72).
Regarding Claim 7, Cherian teaches wherein the instructions stored in the memory and executable by the at least one processor further cause the apparatus to apply at least one power saving scheme, if the first criterion is not met and at least one other criterion is met (Para 64).
Regarding Claim 8, Cherian teaches wherein the at least one power saving scheme involves at least one of: bandwidth reduction; radio frequency (RF) chain reduction; a peripheral bus power management state; or an Ethernet power state (Para 54).
Regarding Claim 9. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein the at least one other criterion involves at least one of: a failure to meet a quality of service (QoS) objective; or a detection of congestion on one or more of the plurality of active links (Para 72).
Regarding Claim 10, Cherian teaches wherein calculating the metric indicative of loading on a link is based on one or more first parameters associated with that link (Para 47).
Regarding Claim 11, Cherian teaches wherein the one or more first parameters comprise at least one of: a channel idle time; a number of associated peers; a number of active peers; a maximum bandwidth across peers; a maximum quantity of radio frequency (RF) chains; transmit power; or an average presence of clients active on that link (Para 47).
Regarding Claim 12, Cherian teaches wherein calculating the metric indicative of loading on a link is further based on one or more second parameters associated with at least one peer node on that link (Para 57).
Regarding Claim 13, Cherian teaches wherein the one or more second parameters comprise at least one of: bandwidth; a quantity of radio frequency (RF) chains; a quality of service (QoS) objective; or one or more link-level statistics (Para 57).
Regarding Claim 15, Cherian teaches wherein the first action to inactivate the first link is performed only if a condition involving the at least one wireless node is met (Para 72).
Regarding Claim 16, Cherian teaches wherein the condition is met if the at least one wireless node is capable of communicating on multiple links (Para 72).
Regarding Claim 17, Cherian teaches wherein the condition involves at least one of: a type of the at least one wireless node; or a signal strength, associated with the first link, observed at the at least one wireless node (Para 66).
Regarding Claim 18, it has been rejected for the same reasons as claim 1.
Regarding Claim 21, The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the apparatus is configured to operate as an access point (AP) (Para 52).
Regarding Claim 22, , it has been rejected for the same reasons as claim 1 and further teaches a non-transitory computer-readable medium (Para 101 and Fig. 8 Unit 825) having instructions stored thereon (Para 103, memory 825 may store computer-readable, computer-executable software 830 including instruction) that when executed by one or more processors (Para 103, executed, cause the processor to perform various functions).
Claim(s) 14 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Cherian et al. Pub. No. US 20180206190 A1 in view of Kubota et al. Pub. No. US 20230397083 A1 and further in view of Ko et al. Pub. No. US 20240114573 A1
Regarding Claim 14, Cherian does not specifically teach wherein the first action to inactivate the first link involves at least one of: band steering via basic service set (BSS) transition management (BTM); or traffic identifier (TID) to Link Mapping (T2LM).
However, in the same field of endeavor, Ko teaches When the capability of a multi-link device support TID-to-link mapping, the multi-link device may perform the TID-to-link mapping. In addition, the range within which the multi-link device can conduct TID-to-link mapping may vary depending on the capability of the multi-link device. For example, the number of TIDs that a multi-link device can map to a link, or the number of combinations of TIDs and link mapping that can be applied, may vary depending on the capability of the multi-link device. The capability of a multi-link device may indicate whether the multi-link device can map all TIDs to the same link set. In addition, the capability of a multi-link device may indicate how many link sets the multi-link device can map TIDs to. FIG. 28, an AP multi-link device (AP ML) includes a first AP (AP 1), a second AP (AP 2), and a third AP (AP 3). A non-AP multi-link device (Non-AP MLD) includes a first non-AP station (Non-AP STA 1) and a second non-AP station (Non-AP STA 2). The non-AP multi-link device (Non-AP MLD) transmits, to the AP multi-link device (AP ML), an association request frame including a TID-to-link Mapping element. The AP multi-link device (AP ML) may accept or reject TID-to-link mapping corresponding to the TID-to-link Mapping element by transmitting an association response frame including a TID-to-link Mapping element to the non-AP multi-link device (Non-AP MLD). In addition, the non-AP multi-link device (Non-AP MLD) may transmit a TID-to-link mapping request frame to the AP multi-link device (AP ML) to renegotiate TID-to-link mapping i.e., the first action to inactivate the first link involves at least one of: band steering via basic service set (BSS) transition management (BTM); or traffic identifier (TID) to Link Mapping (T2LM) (Para 389-390).
Therefore, it would have been obvious for one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the method of Cherien with the method of Ko so as to increase maximum transmission rate thus indicating the capability of a multilink device (See Ko Para 7 and 389).
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1-18, 21-22 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Applicant is arguing with regards to 35 USC 101 rejection that the calculating step and performing step recited in the claim is no more than an abstract idea. However examiner disagree. MPEP clearly disclose that A claim that recites a mathematical calculation, when the claim is given its broadest reasonable interpretation in light of the specification, will be considered as falling within the "mathematical concepts" grouping. A mathematical calculation is a mathematical operation (such as multiplication) or an act of calculating using mathematical methods to determine a variable or number, e.g., performing an arithmetic operation such as exponentiation. There is no particular word or set of words that indicates a claim recites a mathematical calculation. That is, a claim does not have to recite the word "calculating" in order to be considered a mathematical calculation. For example, a step of "determining" a variable or number using mathematical methods or "performing" a mathematical operation may also be considered mathematical calculations when the broadest reasonable interpretation of the claim in light of the specification encompasses a mathematical calculation. For example calculating a number representing an alarm limit value using the mathematical formula ‘‘B1=B0 (1.0–F) + PVL(F)’’, Parker v. Flook, 437 U.S. 584, 585, 198 USPQ 193, 195 (1978) which in our case can be read as calculate for each of the plurality of active links between the apparatus and one wireless node, a metric indicative of loading on that link (2106.04 (a) (2) C and then based on this calculation perform an action without showing how the calculation is applied which can be refer to as an abstract idea of mental step i.e., create a metric of the link loading and then perform an action. For at least the above reasons applicant argument is not persuasive and the rejection is maintained.
Conclusion
Applicant's submission of an information disclosure statement under 37 CFR 1.97(c) with the timing fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(p) on 12/31/2025 prompted the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 609.04(b). 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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to NIZAR N SIVJI whose telephone number is (571)270-7462. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 7-4.
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NIZAR N. SIVJI
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 2647
/NIZAR N SIVJI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2647
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