DETAILED ACTION
This office action is in response to applicant’s remarks filed on July 2, 2025 in application 18/400,694.
Claims 1-17, 19-21 are presented for examination. Claims 1, 3, 9-10, 13-17 and 19-20 are amended. Claim 18 is cancelled. Claim 21 is newly added.
IDS submitted on November 4, 2024 was acknowledged.
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 claim(s) 1-17, 19-21 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 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 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 set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied 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 1-5, 9, 12, 14, 17 and 21 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tang et al. (US 2020/0133902) in further view of Bagchi et al. (US 2023/0065780).
In regard to claim 1, Tang et al. teach an apparatus comprising:
a first die that uses a first protocol (various dies configured for data communication, may use various data communication protocols or versions of protocols, para. 7);
a second die that uses a second protocol (various dies configured for data communication, may use various data communication protocols or versions of protocols, para. 7); and
die management unit communicatively coupled to both the first die and the second die in an integrated circuit (translation circuitry may be included in an active interposer or interconnected bridge between the dies, para. 7).
Tang et al. does not explicitly teach but Bagchi et al. teach wherein the die management unit is configured to:
obtain information related to the first protocol from the first die; identify one or more relationships between the first protocol and the second protocol (universal interface apparatus is configured to interface with both a serial component and multiple wireless IoT components, para. 37, fig. 1);
store the one or more relationships to facilitate converting messages between a first protocol and the second protocol format (universal interface apparatus is configured to communicate, para. 37-39); and
in response to receiving at least one message from one of the first die or the second die, translate the at least one message between the first protocol format and the second protocol format to support communication between the first die and the second die (derives core message content from a distributed device message originating from a source component, para. 42, convert core message content to open standard file format message content to enable legacy devices using serial communication having proprietary protocols to communicate with cloud applications or other virtualized application, para. 48).
It would have been obvious to modify the apparatus of Tang et al. by adding Bagchi et al. message management. A person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have been motivated to make the modification because it would enable legacy devices using serial communication having proprietary protocols to communicate with cloud applications or other virtualized application (para. 48).
In regard to claim 2, Tang et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein:
the first die lacks support for the second protocol (the translation circuitry to be used with dies having different protocols without designing such flexibility into the dies themselves, para. 8); and
the second die lacks support for the first protocol (the translation circuitry to be used with dies having different protocols without designing such flexibility into the dies themselves, para. 8).
In regard to claim 3, Tang et al. does not explicitly teach but Bagchi et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein the first protocol comprises at least one of a custom protocol, a proprietary protocol, and a third-party protocol; and the second protocol comprises at least one of Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe), compute express link (CXL), universal serial bus (USB), advance extensible interface (AXI), coherent hub interface (CHI), inter-integrated circuit (I2C), serial peripheral interface (SPI), and improved inter-integrated circuit (I3C) (derives core message content from a distributed device message originating from a source component, para. 42, convert core message content to open standard file format message content to enable legacy devices using serial communication having proprietary protocols to communicate with cloud applications or other virtualized application, para. 48, universal interface apparatus enables a set of respective serial devices and/or respective IoT wireless devices to communicate, para. 28).
Refer to claim 1 for motivational statement.
In regard to claim 4, Tang et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein the die management unit:
receives the at least one message from the first die (the input/output translation circuitry may receive the transmitted data, para. 30);
creates a compatible version of the at least one message that complies with the second protocol (perform various conversion on the received data, para. 30); and
sends the compatible version of the at least one message to the second die (the conversion may include any decoding of the protocol used by the AIB 2.0 and encoding the data in the protocol used for reception of data by the AIB 1.0, para. 30).
In regard to claim 5, Tang et al. teach the apparatus of claim 4, wherein:
the second die comprises a set of system managers (interconnect circuitry, fig. 1, 13, 14, para. 18, 22); and
the die management unit (translation circuit, fig. 2, 34):
interprets contents of the at least one message (receive data from the interconnection circuitry, para. 32); and
directs the compatible version of the at least one message to a specific manager included in the set of system managers based at least in part on the contents of the at least one message (translate the data received to a format recognizable, para. 32).
In regard to claim 9, Tang et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein the die management unit:
detects, from the second die, a request formatted in the second protocol format to modify a power state of the first die (the data may be adjusted to a level suitable for the input/output translation circuitry that translate the data received from the low-swing receiver circuitry 52, para. 30, the full swing transmission voltage adapter 58 may translate the low swing voltage level to a full-swing voltage level 58, para. 32);
translates the request from the second protocol format to the first protocol format (translation circuitry may receive a signal with high-swing voltage levels and output translated values using the low-swing voltage levels, para. 32); and
provide the translated requests to the first die to modify the power state based at least in part on the translated request (output translated values using the low-swing voltage levels, para. 32).
In regard to claim 12, Tang et al. teach the apparatus of claim 11, wherein the format used by the second die complies with an x86 machine check architecture (implementation of the design may utilize other circuitry in various forms and different architecture, para. 37).
In regard to claim 14, Tang et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein the die management unit and the second die communicate via a predefined interface using a set of addressable components (the Advance Interface Bus (AIB) interconnect standard may be implemented within the boundary of a chiplet, para. 21).
In regard to claim 17, Tang et al. teach (adding the translation protocol to the interposer medium where the translation circuitry may include active circuitry incorporated within the interposer medium, para. 25), Tang et al. does not explicitly teach but Bagchi et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein the die management unit obtains during initialization, firmware and/or configuration information from the second die to be provided to and implemented by the first die (microcontroller configured to derive core message content from a source component, para. 4).
Refer to claim 1 for motivational statement.
In regard to claim 21, Tang et al. does not explicitly teach but Bagchi et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein:
the second die is configured to manage at least one controller incorporated on the first die (the universal interface apparatus includes a plurality of serial interface adapter boards configured to convert any serial aspect of the distributed device message to TTL format, para. 4);
the at least one message is a command to modify at least one setting for the at least one controller (adapting the open standard file format message response, para. 69);
the die management unit translates the command from the second protocol format to the first protocol format for use by the first die (the system on a chip microcontroller of the universal interface apparatus converts the core message response content to source component format, para. 69); and
the die management unit provides the translated command within the at least one message to the first die (send and receive communications within an IoT framework, para. 46).
Refer to claim 1 for motivational statement.
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Claims 6-8, 10-11, 15-16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tang et al. (US 2020/0133902) in further view of Bagchi et al. (US 2023/0065780) in further view of Wu et al. (US 2018/0300275).
In regard to claim 6, Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. does not explicitly teach but Wu et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein:
the first die experiences a fault (error detection in sideband errors or errors in LLPs critical to LSM state transitions, para. 98); and
the die management unit communicatively isolates the first die from the second die, wherein the at least one message comprises a command received from the second die in an attempt to repair the first die in view of the fault (errors can be caught corresponding of a state and can be transition to Reset, para. 99).
It would have been obvious to modify the apparatus of Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. by adding Wu et al. multichip package link. A person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have been motivated to make the modification because it would aid in the support of using multiple different protocols (para. 88).
In regard to claim 7, Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. does not explicitly teach but Wu et al. teach the apparatus of claim 6, wherein:
the die management unit sends a translated version of the at least one message to the first die (LSM state transitions, para. 98); and
the first die is unable to recover from the fault despite receiving the translated version of the at least one message (errors detected in a sideband can be caught through a time-out mechanism, para. 100).
Refer to claim 6 for motivational statement.
In regard to claim 8, Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. does not explicitly teach but Wu et al. teach the apparatus of claim 7, wherein the die management unit executes either: a die-specific reset event that causes the first die to reset; or a global reset event that causes the integrated circuit to reset (error handling techniques where error can be logged and the link state machine can then be transitioned to Reset, para. 100).
Refer to claim 6 for motivational statement.
In regard to claim 10, Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. does not explicitly teach but Wu et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein the die management unit:
detects, from the second die, a request formatted in the second protocol format to modify a security state of the first die (logical PHY 630 can be used to negotiate and manage link control signal sent between devices connected by the MCPL, para. 71, 66);
maps the security state as identified in the request to a corresponding security state of the first die (identify that the data is link layer-to-link layer messaging, para. 71);
translates the request from the second protocol format to the first protocol format based at least in part on the mapping of the security state to the corresponding security state (link layer messages enabled using LLP module can assist in the negotiation and performance of link layer state transitioning, para. 71); and
provide the translated request to the first die to implement the corresponding security state based at least in part on the translated request (data sent on each of the lanes of the MCPL can be strictly aligned to the strobe signal, para. 73-74).
Refer to claim 6 for motivational statement.
In regard to claim 11, Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. does not explicitly teach but Wu et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein the die management unit: detects a reliability, availability, and serviceability (RAS) event in connection with the first die; translates the RAS event to a format used by the second die; and notifies the second die of the RAS event via the format used by the second die (a multichip package link (MCPL) can be implemented connecting a first device with a second device, para. 66, an MCPL can provide a physical layer (PHY) connection over which data is communicated between devices. The logical PHY can include logic for facilitating clocking, link state management, and protocol multiplexing between potentially multiple, different protocols used for communication over the MCPL, para. 67, multiple independent transaction layers can be provided at each device, para. 69-71)
Refer to claim 6 for motivational statement.
In regard to claim 15, Tang et al. and Bagchi et al.does not explicitly teach but Wu et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein the die management unit: directs the second die to operate in a low power state; detects an event in connection with the first die; and refuses to notify the second die of the event due at least in part to the event not implicating the second die (when the valid signal is low, the source indicates to the sink that the sink will not be sending data on the data lanes during the following time period, accordingly, when the sink logical PHY detects that the valid signal is not asserted, the sink can disregard any data that is detected on the data lanes, para. 73).
Refer to claim 6 for motivational statement.
In regard to claim 16, Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. does not explicitly teach but Wu et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein the die management unit: directs the second die to operate in a low power state; detects an event in connection with the first die; and implements a higher power state in the second die due at least in part to the event implicating the second die (a valid signal, sent on one or more dedicated valid signal channels, can serve as a leading indicator for the receiving device to identify, when asserted high, to the receiving device, that data is being sent, para. 73).
Refer to claim 6 for motivational statement.
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Claim 13 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tang et al. (US 2020/0133902) in further view of Bagchi et al. (US 2023/0065780) in further view of Kondo et al. (US 2023/0004310).
In regard to claim 13, Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. teach the apparatus of claim 1, wherein: the at least one message comprises a command received from the second die, directing the first die to modify a thermal setting; and the die management unit: translates the command to a format used by the first die; and directs the first die to modify a thermal setting via the format used by the first die.
Tang et al. does not explicitly teach but Kondo et al. teach the thermal control command (the thermal throttling control unit transmits a read command designated a specific address for temperature acquisition, to each NAND flash memory die, para. 67).
It would have been obvious to modify the apparatus of Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. by adding Kondo et al. memory device controlling method. A person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have been motivated to make the modification because it would aid providing a thermal control command to the die (para. 67).
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Claims 19-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tang et al. (US 2020/0133902) in further view of Bagchi et al. (US 2023/0065780) in further view of Yamanaka et al. (US 2023/0161722).
In regard to claim 19, Tang et al. teach a system comprising: an integrated circuit comprising:
a first die that uses a first protocol (various dies configured for data communication, may use various data communication protocols or versions of protocols, para. 7);
a second die that uses a second protocol (various dies configured for data communication, may use various data communication protocols or versions of protocols, para. 7);
die management unit communicatively coupled to both the first die and the second die (translation circuitry may be included in an active interposer or interconnected bridge between the dies, para. 7),
at least one interface communicatively coupled to the integrated circuit (adding the translation protocol to the interposer medium where the translation circuitry may include active circuitry incorporated within the interposer medium, para. 25).
Tang et al. does not explicitly teach but Bagchi et al. teach wherein the die management unit is configured to:
obtain information related to the first protocol from the first die; identify one or more relationships between the first protocol and the second protocol (universal interface apparatus is configured to interface with both a serial component and multiple wireless IoT components, para. 37, fig. 1);
in response to receiving at least one message from one of the first die or the second die, translate the at least one message between the first protocol format and the second protocol format to support communication between the first die and the second die (derives core message content from a distributed device message originating from a source component, para. 42, convert core message content to open standard file format message content to enable legacy devices using serial communication having proprietary protocols to communicate with cloud applications or other virtualized application, para. 48).
It would have been obvious to modify the apparatus of Tang et al. by adding Bagchi et al. message management. A person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have been motivated to make the modification because it would enable legacy devices using serial communication having proprietary protocols to communicate with cloud applications or other virtualized application (para. 48).
Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. does not explicitly teach but Yamanaka et al. teach distill the one or more relationship into a table that facilitates converting messages between a first protocol format and a second protocol format (protocol conversion unit 32a, correspondence between the data format based on the protocol A and the data format based on protocol B is defined in the protocol conversion table 34a in advance, para. 25).
It would have been obvious to modify the apparatus of Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. by adding Yamanaka et al. semiconductor device. A person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have been motivated to make the modification because it would aid in providing a protocol conversion table for the protocol conversion unit to perform protocol conversion (para. 25).
In regard to claim 20, Tang et al. teach a method comprising:
coupling a first die that uses a first protocol (various dies configured for data communication, may use various data communication protocols or versions of protocols, para. 7) to a die management unit in an integrated circuit (the translation circuit may be implemented within an interposer or substrate medium of a chip including the multiple chiplets, para. 8);
coupling a second die that uses a second protocol (various dies configured for data communication, may use various data communication protocols or versions of protocols, para. 7) to the die management unit in the integrated circuit (the translation circuit may be implemented within an interposer or substrate medium of a chip including the multiple chiplets, para. 8); and
Tang et al. does not explicitly teach but Bagchi et al. teach configuring the die management unit to:
obtain information related to the first protocol from the first die; identify one or more relationships between the first protocol and the second protocol (universal interface apparatus is configured to interface with both a serial component and multiple wireless IoT components, para. 37, fig. 1);
in response to receiving at least one message from one of the first die or the second die, translate the at least one message between the first protocol format and the second protocol format to support communication between the first die and the second die (derives core message content from a distributed device message originating from a source component, para. 42, convert core message content to open standard file format message content to enable legacy devices using serial communication having proprietary protocols to communicate with cloud applications or other virtualized application, para. 48).
Refer to claim 19 for motivational statement.
Tang et al. and Bagchi et al. does not explicitly teach but Yamanaka et al. teach distill the one or more relationship into a table that facilitates converting messages between a first protocol format and a second protocol format (protocol conversion unit 32a, correspondence between the data format based on the protocol A and the data format based on protocol B is defined in the protocol conversion table 34a in advance, para. 25).
Refer to claim 19 for motivational statement.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. See PTO 892.
Ding et al. (US 2022/0345370) protocol tables
Hadrick et al. (US 2024/0029767) die to die communication
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Hadrick (US 2024/0029767) translate via a look up table, para. 29
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Haba et al. (US 2025/0006642) chiplet to chiplet protocol
Choudhary et al. (US 2022/0342841) die to die adapter
Vogelsang et al. (US 2021/0200680) normal and modified access of DRAM
Paley et al. (US 2021/0011819) managing context information for storage device
Hor et al. (US 2019/0227972) MCPL connecting two dies, dies protocol
Wagh et al. (US 2016/0285624) more than two protocols
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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.
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.
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/Loan L.T. Truong/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2114 Loan.truong@uspto.gov
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