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 Objections
Claims 3 and 12 are objected to because of the following informalities:
In claim 3, line 3, the term “TxOP” needs to be defined as to what it stands for.
In claim 12, line 3, the term “TxOP” needs to be defined as to what it stands for.
Appropriate correction is required.
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 7, 16, and 19-20 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.
Regarding claim 7, the phrase "such as" recited in line 2 renders the claim indefinite because it is unclear whether the limitations following the phrase are part of the claimed invention. See MPEP § 2173.05(d).
Regarding claim 16, the phrase "such as" recited in line 2 renders the claim indefinite because it is unclear whether the limitations following the phrase are part of the claimed invention. See MPEP § 2173.05(d).
Regarding claim 19, it is ambiguous as to what device or component is performing the recited method, rendering the scope of the claim indefinite. To be more specific, there is no particular device or component recited for performing method the steps of “dividing a physical layer convergence protocol data unit (PPDU)…”, “receiving preemption requests (PR)…”, “managing preemption opportunities…”, and “processing preemption requests…”
Regarding claim 20, the claim is rejected for depending on claim 19 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.
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.
Claims 1-3, 8-12, and 17-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Cariou et al. (US 2022/0116957 A1), hereinafter referred to as Cariou, in view of Xin et al. (US 2023/0081745 A1), hereinafter referred to as Xin.
Regarding claim 1, Cariou teaches a device (Cariou – Fig. 1; Paragraph [0026], note radio architecture 100 may be part of a Wi-Fi communication station (STA) such as a wireless access point (AP), a base station or a mobile device including a Wi-Fi device), the device comprising processing circuitry coupled to storage (Cariou – Fig. 1; Paragraph [0022], note baseband processing circuity 108 may include a WLAN baseband processing circuitry 108A and a BT baseband processing circuitry 108B, the WLAN baseband processing circuitry 108A may include a memory, such as, for example, a set of RAM arrays), the processing circuitry configured to:
divide a physical layer convergence protocol data unit (PPDU) into a number of PPDUs with time gaps for enabling preemption opportunity for low latency (LL) transmitters (Cariou – Fig. 5; Paragraph [0061], note the AP 502 may communicate with stations 504 using one or more HE or EHT frames (which may be PPDUs, see Paragraph [0057]); Paragraph [0101], note PPDUs during an TXOP are paused every x ms or y µs for a quiet period (few µs) during which other STAs can send a signal to request urgent transmission and preempt the channel);
receive preemption requests from one or more LL transmitters during the time gaps (Cariou – Paragraph [0101], note PPDUs during an TXOP are paused every x ms or y µs for a quiet period (few µs) during which other STAs can send a signal to request urgent transmission and preempt the channel; Paragraph [0119], note the ULL (ultra low latency) AP only sends some frames or requests or receives some frames or requests; Paragraph [0120], note an ULL STA may send a request to send an urgent low latency UL frame, or request for preemption, and so forth);
provide access to a communication medium for LL transmitters based on the received PRs (Cariou – Paragraph [0101], note if the channel was preempted (by a request for preemption), the STA needing urgent resources will be provided channel access and the ongoing PPDU will be terminated); and
process preemption requests in intra-basic service set (BSS) or inter-BSS (Cariou – Fig. 5; Paragraph [0095], note provide low-latency communications to STAs 504 within a BSS 500; Paragraph [0096], note STAs 504 or APs 502 within the same BSS or in different overlapping BSS (OBSS); Paragraph [0101], note other STAs can send a signal to request urgent transmission and preempt the channel).
Cariou does not teach managing preemption opportunities based on the received PRs and provide access to a communication medium for LL transmitters.
In an analogous art, Xin teaches managing preemption opportunities based on the received PRs and provide access to a communication medium for LL transmitters (Xin – Fig. 18; Paragraph [0122], note the preempting STA indicates the priority of its preemption transmission in the preemption request; Paragraph [0125], note the preempting STA can send the preemption request to reserve a short period of the TXOP to occupy the channel; Paragraph [0141], note a preempted STA receives 392 a signal from the preempting STA to request a preemption transmission, the preempted STA makes a decision 394 to accept or reject the preemption transmission request based on the priority of the preemption transmission; Paragraph [0142], note if the preempted STA accepts the preemption transmission request, it interrupts 396 its ongoing transmission).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of Xin into Cariou in order to utilize the priority indication in preemption requests to allow transmission of higher priority PPDUs (Xin – Paragraphs [0005]-[0008] and [0059]).
Regarding claim 2, Cariou does not teach wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to indicate a time gap allowed for preemption in the PPDU preceding the time gap.
In an analogous art, Xin teaches wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to indicate a time gap allowed for preemption in the PPDU preceding the time gap (Xin – Fig. 20; the preemption request 424 can also reserve a period of the TXOP, such as of length L_length 452, to prevent other STAs from accessing the channel in the figure while awaiting the DTX confirmation).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of Xin into Cariou for the same reason as claim 1 above.
Regarding claim 3, the combination of Cariou and Xin, specifically Cariou teaches wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to enable overlapping basic service set (OBSS) station devices (STAs) or access points (APs) to preempt a TxOP of an STA/AP in another BSS (Cariou – Fig. 5, Fig. 9; Paragraph [0099], note OBSS, preemption, which allows for a STA 504 and/or AP 502 to send information to the peer STA 504 and/or AP 502 to stop ongoing transmissions (preempt the transmission) in order to give back the channel/medium to the STA 504 that has urgent packets).
Regarding claim 8, the combination of Cariou and Xin, specifically Cariou teaches wherein the processing circuitry is configured to terminate a transmit opportunity (TXOP) and open a contention period to identify a preempting STA(s) when an OBSS STA sent a preemption request signal detected by a TxOP holder (Cariou – Fig. 5; Paragraph [0061], note a HE AP 502 may operate as a master station which may be arranged to contend for a wireless medium (e.g., during a contention period) to receive exclusive control of the medium for a transmission opportunity (TXOP); Paragraph [0101], note other STAs can send a signal to request urgent transmission and preempt the channel, if the channel was preempted, the STA needing urgent resources will be provided channel access and the ongoing PPDU will be terminated).
Regarding claim 9, Cariou does not teach wherein the processing circuitry is configured to provide a time allocation to an AP that corresponds to a preempting STA if the AP determines that the preempting STA sent a preemption request signal is from a particular OBSS.
In an analogous art, Xin teaches wherein the processing circuitry is configured to provide a time allocation to an AP that corresponds to a preempting STA if the AP determines that the preempting STA sent a preemption request signal is from a particular OBSS (Xin – Fig. 31; Paragraph [0125], note the preempting STA can send the preemption request to reserve a short period of the TXOP to occupy the channel and wait for a response from the preempted STA; Paragraph [0126], note when the preempted STA receives a preemption request, it either accepts or rejects the request; Paragraph [0248], note preemption request signal format, address 3 contains the BSS ID of the transmitter of the frame; it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to utilize the BSS ID in the preemption request to determine whether to accept or reject the preemption request).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of Xin into Cariou for the same reason as claim 1 above.
Regarding claim 10, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the same reason as claim 1 above, except the claim is written in a non-transitory computer-readable medium (CRM) claim format, which is taught by Cariou (Cariou – Paragraph [0084], note some embodiments may be implemented fully or partially in software and/or firmware, this software and/or firmware may take the form of instructions contained in or on a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, such a computer-readable medium may include any tangible non-transitory medium for storing information in a form readable by one or more computers, such as but not limited to read only memory (ROM), random access memory (RAM), magnetic disk storage media, optical storage media, flash memory, etc.).
Regarding claim 11, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the same reason as claim 2 above.
Regarding claim 12, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the same reason as claim 3 above.
Regarding claim 17, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the same reason as claim 8 above.
Regarding claim 18, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the same reason as claim 9 above.
Regarding claim 19, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the same reason as claim 1 above, except the claim is written in a method claim format.
Regarding claim 20, the claim is interpreted and rejected for the same reason as claim 2 above.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4-6 and 13-15 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 7 and 16 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
Applicant’s dependent claims recite wherein the processing circuitry is configured to signal using a preemption request signal OBSS STAs or APs that preemption is allowed on a TxOP from another BSS using OBSS preemption elements and preemption groups, which is neither taught nor suggested by the prior art.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Cariou et al. (US 2019/0075562 A1) discloses coordination between OBSS STAs and channel preemption.
Fang et al. (US 2022/0159718 A1) discloses color coding BSS and preemption of a current OBSS transmission.
Cariou et al. (US 2023/0309008 A1) discloses detecting OBSS transmission and special reuse OBSS PPDU mechanism for transmitting to an AP.
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/BAILOR C HSU/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2461
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