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 § 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.
Claim(s) 1-13 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over You (US 20240388413) in view of Abedini (US 20210258948)
Re claim 1:
You discloses a resource configuration method, comprising: sending, (Fig. 17 ref. S172 Receiving configuration information for the frequency resource and/or the second frequency resource from the gNB and Para.[0179] Hereinafter, the network may be interpreted as being replaced with a base station or CU (Centralized Unit)/DU (Distributed Unit). Additionally, the UE may be interpreted as being replaced by the MT (mobile terminal) of the IAB node),
wherein the first configuration information comprises correspondences between a plurality of frequency domain resource sets of the IAB DU and time division duplex (TDD) configurations, and each frequency domain resource set in the plurality of frequency domain resource sets corresponds to at least one TDD configuration (Para.[0278] i) Frequency resource information corresponding to the first frequency resource and/or the second frequency resource is set through TDD-UL-DL-ConfigCommon IE and Para.[0282] Frequency resource information corresponding to the first frequency resource and/or the second frequency resource is set through TDD-UL-DL-ConfigDedicated IE and Para.[0285] At this time, information about frequency resources that the UE can use in a specific slot is additionally set. For this purpose, for example. ‘resourceBlocks’ is added to the TDD-UL-DL-SlotConfig of TDD-UL-DL-ConfigDedicated IE, and ‘resourceBlocks’ sets information about the frequency resources available in the slot indicated by ‘slotIndex’).
You discloses the system can be used with CU/DU and IAB nodes (Para.[0179] Hereinafter, the network may be interpreted as being replaced with a base station or CU (Centralized Unit)/DU (Distributed Unit). Additionally, the UE may be interpreted as being replaced by the MT (mobile terminal) of the IAB node). However, You does not explicitly disclose sending, by an IAB CU, to an IAB DU.
Abedini discloses sending, configuration information by an IAB CU, to an IAB DU (Para.[0016] receive, by a parent DU from a CU, a child resource configuration including an indication of the NA resources via an invalid TDD-uplink-downlink configuration; and determine, by the parent DU, one or more NA resources based on the child resource configuration, the one or more NA resources corresponding to a set of one or more resources configured at the parent DU as being unavailable for uplink and downlink communications between the parent DU and a child node of the parent DU).
You and Abedini are analogous because they both pertain to data communications.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify You to include sending configuration information from an IAB CU to an IAB DU as taught by Abedini in order to improve efficiency in the use of network resources (Abedini Para.[0037]).
Re claim 2:
You discloses the method of claim 1, wherein each frequency domain resource set in the plurality of frequency domain resource sets corresponds to one TDD configuration in a first format or one TDD configuration in a second format (Para.[0279] Frequency resource information corresponding to the first frequency resource and/or the second frequency resource is set through the TDD-UL-DL-Pattern of TDD-UL-DL-ConfigCommon IE);
each frequency domain resource set in the plurality of frequency domain resource sets corresponds to one TDD configuration in a first format and one TDD configuration in a second format (The alternative limitation has been addressed above);
the plurality of frequency domain resource sets correspond to a same TDD configuration in a first format, and each frequency domain resource set in the plurality of frequency domain resource sets corresponds to one TDD configuration in a second format (The alternative limitation has been addressed above); or
each frequency domain resource set in the plurality of frequency domain resource sets corresponds to one TDD configuration in a first format, a first type of TDD configuration in a second format, and a second type of TDD configuration in a second format, the first type of TDD configuration in the second format is used for spatial multiplexing transmission between each frequency domain resource set and an integrated access and backhaul mobile terminal (IAB MT), and the second type of TDD configuration in the second format is used for full-duplex multiplexing transmission between each frequency domain resource set and the IAB MT (The alternative limitation has been addressed above).
Re claim 3:
You discloses the method of claim 1, wherein the plurality of frequency domain resource sets are a plurality of resource block (RB) sets of a cell of the IAB DU (Para.[0285] At this time, information about frequency resources that the UE can use in a specific slot is additionally set. For this purpose, for example. ‘resourceBlocks’ is added to the TDD-UL-DL-SlotConfig of TDD-UL-DL-ConfigDedicated IE, and ‘resourceBlocks’ sets information about the frequency resources available in the slot indicated by ‘slotIndex’ and Para.[0179] Hereinafter, the network may be interpreted as being replaced with a base station or CU (Centralized Unit)/DU (Distributed Unit). Additionally, the UE may be interpreted as being replaced by the MT (mobile terminal) of the IAB node).
Re claim 4: Claim 4 is rejected on the same grounds of rejection set forth in claim 1 from the perspective of the IAB DU.
Re claim 5:
You discloses the method of claim 4, wherein each frequency domain resource set in the plurality of frequency domain resource sets corresponds to one TDD configuration in a first format or one TDD configuration in a second format (Para.[0279] Frequency resource information corresponding to the first frequency resource and/or the second frequency resource is set through the TDD-UL-DL-Pattern of TDD-UL-DL-ConfigCommon IE and Para.[0282] Frequency resource information corresponding to the first frequency resource and/or the second frequency resource is set through TDD-UL-DL-ConfigDedicated IE);
each frequency domain resource set in the plurality of frequency domain resource sets corresponds to one TDD configuration in a first format and one TDD configuration in a second format (Para.[0365] When a plurality of BWPs are configured for a UE, independent DL/UL resource configurations can be applied to each BWP. These DL/UL resource configurations may more specifically mean TDD-UL-DL-ConfigCommon and/or TDD-UL-DL-ConfigDedicated);
the plurality of frequency domain resource sets correspond to a same TDD configuration in a first format, and each frequency domain resource set in the plurality of frequency domain resource sets corresponds to one TDD configuration in a second format (Para.[0365] When a plurality of BWPs are configured for a UE, independent DL/UL resource configurations can be applied to each BWP. These DL/UL resource configurations may more specifically mean TDD-UL-DL-ConfigCommon and/or TDD-UL-DL-ConfigDedicated – Examiner Note: the common configuration is “a same TDD configuration in a first format” because the common configuration is for a cell and the Dedicated configuration is a TDD configuration in a second format).
Re claim 6: Claim 6 is rejected on the same grounds of rejection set forth in claim 3.
Re claim 7:
As discussed above, You in view of Abedini meets all the limitations of the parent claims.
You does not explicitly disclose the method of claim 4, wherein the first configuration information further comprises resource type information indicating a resource type of a frequency domain resource set corresponding to at least one TDD configuration.
Abedini discloses the method of claim 4, wherein the first configuration information further comprises resource type information indicating a resource type of a frequency domain resource set corresponding to at least one TDD configuration (Para.[0076] In an aspect, an IAB-node DU may be provided, by the CU, an indication for a slot format over a number of slots by IAB-DU-Resource-Configuration. The DU-Resource-Configuration indicates both the downlink/uplink/flexible (D/U/F) type of resources, as well as hard/soft/not-available (H/S/NA)).
You and Abedini are analogous because they both pertain to data communications.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify You to include a resource type in the configuration information as taught by Abedini in order to improve efficiency in the use of network resources (Abedini Para.[0037]).
Re claim 8:
As discussed above, You in view of Abedini meets all the limitations of the parent claims.
You does not explicitly disclose the method of claim 7, wherein the resource type comprises a hard resource, a soft resource, or a not available resource.
Abedini discloses the method of claim 7, wherein the resource type comprises a hard resource, a soft resource, or a not available resource (Para.[0076] In an aspect, an IAB-node DU may be provided, by the CU, an indication for a slot format over a number of slots by IAB-DU-Resource-Configuration. The DU-Resource-Configuration indicates both the downlink/uplink/flexible (D/U/F) type of resources, as well as hard/soft/not-available (H/S/NA)).
You and Abedini are analogous because they both pertain to data communications.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify You to include a resource type in the configuration information as taught by Abedini in order to improve efficiency in the use of network resources (Abedini Para.[0037]).
Re claim 9:
You discloses sending, (Fig. 17 ref. S172 Receiving configuration information for the frequency resource and/or the second frequency resource from the gNB and Para.[0179] Hereinafter, the network may be interpreted as being replaced with a base station or CU (Centralized Unit)/DU (Distributed Unit). Additionally, the UE may be interpreted as being replaced by the MT (mobile terminal) of the IAB node),
wherein the first configuration information comprises correspondences between a plurality of frequency domain resource sets of a second IAB DU and time division duplex (TDD) configurations, (Para.[0278] i) Frequency resource information corresponding to the first frequency resource and/or the second frequency resource is set through TDD-UL-DL-ConfigCommon IE and Para.[0282] Frequency resource information corresponding to the first frequency resource and/or the second frequency resource is set through TDD-UL-DL-ConfigDedicated IE and Para.[0285] At this time, information about frequency resources that the UE can use in a specific slot is additionally set. For this purpose, for example. ‘resourceBlocks’ is added to the TDD-UL-DL-SlotConfig of TDD-UL-DL-ConfigDedicated IE, and ‘resourceBlocks’ sets information about the frequency resources available in the slot indicated by ‘slotIndex’).
You discloses the system can be used with CU/DU and IAB nodes (Para.[0179] Hereinafter, the network may be interpreted as being replaced with a base station or CU (Centralized Unit)/DU (Distributed Unit). Additionally, the UE may be interpreted as being replaced by the MT (mobile terminal) of the IAB node). However, You does not explicitly disclose sending, by an IAB CU, to an IAB DU; and the second IAB DU is a neighboring node of the first IAB DU.
Abedini discloses sending, configuration information by an IAB CU, to an IAB DU; and the second IAB DU is a neighboring node of the first IAB DU (Para.[0016] receive, by a parent DU from a CU, a child resource configuration including an indication of the NA resources via an invalid TDD-uplink-downlink configuration; and determine, by the parent DU, one or more NA resources based on the child resource configuration, the one or more NA resources corresponding to a set of one or more resources configured at the parent DU as being unavailable for uplink and downlink communications between the parent DU and a child node of the parent DU).
You and Abedini are analogous because they both pertain to data communications.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify You to include sending configuration information from an IAB CU to an IAB DU as taught by Abedini in order to improve efficiency in the use of network resources (Abedini Para.[0037]).
Re claim 10: Claim 10 is rejected on the same grounds of rejection set forth in claim 5.
Re claim 11: Claim 11 is rejected on the same grounds of rejection set forth in claim 3.
Re claim 12: Claim 12 is rejected on the same grounds of rejection set forth in claim 7.
Re claim 13: Claim 13 is rejected on the same grounds of rejection set forth in claim 8.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Park (US 20230117298) discloses TDD configuration and indicating a resource type.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MOHAMMAD SAJID ADHAMI whose telephone number is (571)272-8615. The examiner can normally be reached 8:30-5:00 PM.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Sujoy Kundu can be reached at (571) 272-8586. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/MOHAMMAD S ADHAMI/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2471