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 .
Response to Arguments
In response to Application’s election 11/9/2025, group I, claims 1-7, 15-19 are rejected. Claims 8-14, 20-25 have been canceled.
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 1-6,15-19, 26-37 arer ejected 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 to claim 1, the term “an MSN greater than the maximum MSN” is not clearly how the MSN can be greater than the maximum MSN. Same rejection for claim 15.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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) 1-4, 15-18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tabatabaee et al. (Pub. No. 20230344769) in view of Monin (Patent No. 6243358).
- With respect to claim 1 and 15, Tabatabaee teaches a system comprising a first network device, which includes: a host interface to receive messages from a host device (e.g. Fig. 1 shows data center 102 and device 108; Fig. 2 shows the NIC for transmit and receive the message); a network interface to provide a connection to a second network device over a packet data network (e.g. the Fig. 2 shows the packets transmitted over network); and packet processing circuitry to: prepare the messages for sending to the second network device over the packet data network (e.g. packet shows in Fig. 2); send a batch of the messages to the second network device without waiting for an acknowledgement receipt from the second network device after sending each of the messages in the batch before sending a next one of the messages in the batch, one of the messages in the batch having a maximum message sequence number (MSN) (e.g. claim 1 discloses “providing a plurality of data packets based on a data transmission sequence to the destination endpoint, wherein the data packets for a first data stream is provided without waiting for credits”); receive a given acknowledgement receipt from the second network device indicating that all the messages in the batch have been received by the second network device and including credit data indicating that there is no space in a receive work queue of the second network device for receiving an additional message (e.g. par. 54 discloses “TDST 213 may send credit messages and other control messages—such as acknowledgement (ACK) signals and/or negative acknowledgment (NACK) signals—to the source (e.g., TSRC 211)”); and send the additional message having an MSN greater than the maximum MSN to the second network device responsively to receiving the given acknowledgement receipt and based on the credit data indicating that there is no space in the receive work queue of the second network device for receiving the additional message (e.g. par. 63 discloses “End-to-end congestion control mechanisms and load balancing mechanisms can ensure that packet drops rarely occurs. When a packet is dropped, the switch can still send a header of the dropped packet to the destination, whereby the destination then sends a NACK message back to the source which retransmits the packet” which consider as the retransmits the packet that was dropped). Tabatabaee fails to teach sending the additional message when indicating that there is no space in a receive work queue of the second network device for receiving an additional message. Monin teaches the receiver node dispatches to sender node packets of credit containing information about the capacity of receiver node (see claim 1) and sending the additional message when indicating that there is no space in a receive work queue of the second network device for receiving an additional message (see claim 1 discloses “continuing to dispatch in advance at said sender node the waiting data packets which are to be transmitted when said credits are exhausted” which consider as there is no space in receiver node). Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filling date to implement the method allocation resource of Monin into Tabatabaee’s invention for control packet between sender and receiver node.
- With respect to claims 2, 16, Tabatabaee teaches wherein each of the messages in the batch of the messages consume work queue elements in a receive work queue of the second network device (e.g. VQE discloses in par. 24, claim 5).
- With respect to claims 3, 17, Tabatabaee teaches wherein the packet processing circuitry is configured to receive a single acknowledgement receipt for all the messages in the batch (e.g. the ACK/NACK in par. 54 consider as for data transmission comprise data packets).
- With respect to claims 4, 18, Tabatabaee teaches wherein the packet processing circuitry is configured to resend the additional message to the second network device intermittently (e.g. the retransmit packet discloses in par. 63).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5-7, 19, 26-37 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.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. See PTO-892.
. Examiner's Note: Examiner has cited particular paragraphs or columns and line numbers in the references applied to the claims above for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings of the art and are applied to specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested from the applicant in preparing responses, to fully consider the references in entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the Examiner.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to PHUC H TRAN whose telephone number is (571)272-3172. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8-5 Flex.
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/PHUC H TRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2471