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
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1-24 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.
Claim Objections
Claim 23 is objected to.
Claim 23 objected to because of the following informalities: In line 2 of claim 23, there are two instances of the word “at”. Appropriate correction is required.
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 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)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-3, 5-11, 13-17 & 19-24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Ashcroft (US 2022/0329017).
With regard to claims 1-3, 5, 6, 21-24, Ashcroft, in Figure 5, discloses an apparatus comprising: a resistor (310) and a switch (510) coupled between a power terminal or a ground terminal (ground) and an electrical terminal (426), the electrical terminal coupled to an electrical connector (as seen in Fig 4); and an integrated circuit (1080 of Fig. 10, paragraph 0068) coupled to the switch and configurable to: cause the switch to connect the electrical terminal to the power terminal or the ground terminal to provide a signal via the electrical connector; and responsive to detecting a presence of liquid in the electrical connector, cause the switch to disconnect the electrical terminal from the resistor (paragraph 0039 teaches that switch 510 disconnects resistor 310 from the connector when liquid is detected) (re claim 1), wherein the electrical terminal is a first electrical terminal, and the IC is configurable to monitor a voltage of a second electrical terminal coupled to the electrical connector and perform a mitigation action responsive to the voltage and detecting the presence of liquid in the electrical connector (paragraphs 0053-0055) (re claim 2), wherein the IC is configurable to: responsive to the voltage not decreasing to be less than a threshold value, the mitigation action includes providing a notification to a user (paragraph 0061); and responsive to the voltage decreasing to be less than a threshold value apply a pull-down resistance to at least some conductors of the electrical connector (if the liquid is not present, the switch couples the pulldown resistor to the contact) (re claim 3), wherein the electrical connector is an universal serial bus (USB) type-C connector (paragraph 0017), and the electrical terminal is a configuration channel (CC) terminal (paragraph 0034) (re claim 5), wherein the IC is configurable to detect the presence of liquid in an electrical connector via at least one of electrical impedance spectroscopy, leakage measurement, or pulsed measurement (paragraph 0027 teaches that a pulse waveform is measured) (re claim 6), further comprising a USB type-A connector coupled to the USB type-C connector (paragraph 0017 teaches that a USB is used which would necessarily include both type A and Type C connectors) (re claim 21), wherein the CC terminal and a voltage bus (VBUS) terminal of the electrical connector are electrically coupled (as seen in Fig. 5, the CC pin 426 is also coupled to the bus through resistor 320) (re claim 22), wherein the IC is configurable to detect the presence of liquid in the electrical connector by measuring voltages at at least some conductors of the electrical connector while applying a bias voltage to the at least some conductors (the stimulus voltage of paragraph 0053 can be taken as the bias voltage) (re claim 23),wherein the resistor is a first resistor (120), the apparatus further comprises a second resistor (310) coupled between the switch and the ground terminal, and the IC is configurable to cause the switch to connect the electrical terminal to the power terminal via the first resistor to signal a source mode and connect the electrical terminal to the ground terminal via the second resistor to signal a sink mode (paragraph 0034) (re claim 24).
With regard to claims 7-11, Ashcroft, in Figure 5, discloses a method, comprising: connecting an electrical terminal (426) of an electrical connector (as seen in Fig. 5) to a power terminal or a ground terminal (ground) via a resistor (310) to provide a signal via the electrical connector; detecting a presence of a foreign material in the electrical connector; and responsive to detecting the presence of the foreign material in the electrical connector, disconnecting the electrical terminal from the resistor (paragraph 0039 teaches that switch 510 disconnects resistor 310 from the connector when liquid is detected) (re claim 7), further comprising: monitoring a bus voltage of the electrical connector; and based on a value of the bus voltage determined via the monitoring, performing a corrosion mitigation action responsive to the presence of the foreign material in the electrical connector (paragraphs 0053-0055) (re claim 8), further comprising, responsive to determining via the monitoring that the bus voltage is greater than a threshold value after a programmed amount of time, providing a notification to a user (paragraph 0061) (re claim 9), further comprising, responsive to determining via the monitoring that the bus voltage is less than a threshold value, applying a pull-down resistance to the at least some conductors (if the liquid is not present, the switch couples the pulldown resistor to the contact) (re claim 10), wherein the electrical connector is a USB type-C connector (paragraph 0017) (re claim 11).
With regard to claims 13-17, 19 & 20, Ashcroft, in Figure 5, discloses an apparatus, comprising: a Universal Serial Bus (USB) receptacle (paragraph 0017 as seen in Fig. 5); and a resistor (310) and a switch (510) coupled between a power terminal or a ground terminal (ground) and an electrical terminal (426), the electrical terminal coupled to the USB receptacle; and a USB controller (1080) coupled to the USB receptacle, the USB controller configurable to: cause the switch to connect the electrical terminal to the power terminal or the ground terminal to provide a signal via the USB receptacle; detect a presence of liquid in the USB receptacle; and responsive to detecting the presence of liquid in the USB receptacle, cause the switch to disconnect the electrical terminal from the resistor (paragraph 0039 teaches that switch 510 disconnects resistor 310 from the connector when liquid is detected) (re claim 13), wherein the USB controller is configured to: monitor a bus voltage of the USB receptacle; and based on a value of the bus voltage determined via the monitoring, perform a corrosion mitigation action responsive to the presence of liquid in the USB receptacle (paragraphs 0053-0055) (re claim 14), wherein the USB controller is configurable to. responsive to determining via the monitoring that the bus voltage is greater than a threshold value, provide a notification to a user (paragraph 0061) (re claim 15), wherein the USB controller is configurable to provide the notification to the user responsive to the bus voltage remaining greater than the threshold value for greater than a programmed amount of time (paragraph 0061) (re claim 16), wherein the USB controller is configurable to, responsive to determining via the monitoring that the bus voltage is less than a threshold value, apply a pull-down resistance to the at least some conductors of the USB receptacle (if the liquid is not present, the switch couples the pulldown resistor to the contact) (re claim 17), wherein the USB controller is configurable to perform at least one of electrical impedance spectroscopy, leakage measurement, or pulsed measurement to detect the presence of liquid in the USB receptacle (paragraph 0027 teaches that a pulse waveform is measured) (re claim 19), wherein the electrical terminal is a USB type C configuration channel pin (paragraph 0017) (re claim 20).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4, 12 & 18 would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Claim 4 would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims because the prior art of record does not teach or fairly suggest an apparatus comprising all the features as recited in the claims and in combination with the power terminal being configurable to a first bias voltage, and wherein the IC is configurable to, responsive to the presence of liquid in the electrical connector, apply a second bias voltage to at least some conductors of the electrical connector, the second bias voltage being greater than the first bias voltage and less than or equal to a voltage of a voltage bus terminal coupled to the electrical connector.
Claim 12 would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims because the prior art of record does not teach or fairly suggest a method comprising all the features as recited in the claims and in combination with providing a first bias voltage to the power terminal; responsive to detecting the presence of the foreign material in the electrical connector, applying a second bias voltage to the at least some conductors of the electrical connector, the second bias voltage being greater than the first bias voltage and less than or equal to the bus voltage.
Claim 18 would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims because the prior art of record does not teach or fairly suggest an apparatus comprising all the features as recited in the claims and in combination with the power terminal being configurable to receive a first bias voltage, and the USB controller is configurable to. responsive to detecting the presence of the liquid in the USB receptacle, apply a second bias voltage to the at least some conductors of the USB receptacle, the second bias voltage being greater than the first bias voltage and less than or equal to the bus voltage.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). 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 SCOTT BAUER whose telephone number is (571)272-5986. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 12pm - 8pm EST.
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/Scott Bauer/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2838
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