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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The NPL reference in the information disclosure statement filed Jan 17, 2024 fails to comply with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97, 1.98 and MPEP § 609 because it is of low quality and difficult to read (i.e., not legible).
It has been placed in the application file, but the information referred to therein has not been considered as to the merits. Applicant is advised that the date of any re-submission of any item of information contained in this information disclosure statement or the submission of any missing element(s) will be the date of submission for purposes of determining compliance with the requirements based on the time of filing the statement, including all certification requirements for statements under 37 CFR 1.97(e). See MPEP § 609.05(a).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112 - Indefinite
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 1-12 and 21-25 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.
Claim 1 recites:
1. A non-transitory machine-readable medium comprising executable instructions that, when executed by a processing system including a processor, facilitate performance of operations, the operations comprising:
It is not clear how to interpret the term “facilitate” in the context of this claim. In particular, facilitating something is not necessarily the same as doing something, so that the claim does not appear to require performing the recited operations. However, it is not clear what is required by the claim.
It may be that “facilitate” includes sending or receiving data or instructions, or processing data, or reading data from memory, or storing data in memory, or powering another device, or sending instructions to another part of a network, or changing a network configuration because these things “facilitate” the performance of other operations, including the steps recited in the claim. For the purposes of this Action, the claim will be broadly interpreted to mean functionality related to an optical network (e.g., an optical network with an ROADM and/or WDM signals), because such operations would “facilitate” the steps recited in the claim. Amendment and/or clarification is required.
Claim 4 recites:
4. The non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 3, wherein the parameters comprise, for the plurality of ROADM nodes, the one or more ILAs, or any combination thereof:
one or more of gain, noise figure (NF), polarization dependent loss (PDL).
It is not clear what is modified by “or any combination thereof”. If it modifies the “one or more ILAs”, then it is not clear what “combination” of ILAs is being referenced (e.g., “one or more ILAs” and a “combination” of ILAs seems to be redundant). If it modifies “one or more of gain, noise figure (NF), polarization dependent loss (PDL)”, then “thereof” should be “of one of the following”, or something similar. In any event, it is not clear how to interpret this claim.
Claim 4 recites:
4. The non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 3, wherein the parameters comprise, for the plurality of ROADM nodes, the one or more ILAs, or any combination thereof:
one or more of gain, noise figure (NF), polarization dependent loss (PDL).
The last line is confusing. It is not clear if the gain, NF, and PDL are the “parameters” (in which case the structure of the claim should be changed to make this clear), or if they are some other limitation to the claim.
Claim 4 recites:
4. The non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 3, wherein the parameters comprise, for the plurality of ROADM nodes, the one or more ILAs, or any combination thereof:
one or more of gain, noise figure (NF), polarization dependent loss (PDL).
The absence of the word “and” between ND and PDL makes it unclear if this absence was typographical error, or if one or more items were inadvertently omitted after PDL, or if there is some other typographical error.
Claim 7 recites:
7. The non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 3, wherein the parameters comprise, for the at least one pair of transponders, the at least one regenerator, or any combination thereof:
minimum optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) requirements.
It is not clear what is modified by “or any combination thereof”. If it modifies the “at least one regenerator”, then it is not clear what combination is being referenced. If it modifies “minimum OSNR requirements”, then it is also not clear what combination is being referenced. Furthermore, if it is modifying “minimum OSNR”, then “thereof” should be “the following”, or something similar. In any event, it is not clear.
Claim 7 recites:
7. The non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 3, wherein the parameters comprise, for the at least one pair of transponders, the at least one regenerator, or any combination thereof:
minimum optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) requirements.
The last line is confusing. It is not clear if the minimum OSNR is one of the parameters (in which case the structure of the claim should be changed to make this clear), or if it is some other limitation to the claim.
Claims 2-12 are rejected because they depend from claim 1 and fail to further limit the scope in a manner to overcome the rejection.
Claim 21 is a device claim that recites:
a memory that stores executable instructions that, when executed by the processing system, facilitate performance of operations, the operations comprising:
This is rejected for the reasons discussed in claim 1, and interpreted in the manner discussed in claim 1. Amendment and/or clarification is required.
Claims 22-25 are rejected because they depend from claim 21 and fail to further limit the scope in a manner to overcome the rejection.
Claim 28 recites:
28. The method of claim 27, wherein the parameters comprise, for the at least one pair of transponders, the at least one regenerator, or any combination thereof:
minimum OSNR requirements.
It is not clear what is modified by “or any combination thereof”. See the discussion of claims 4 and 7 above.
Claim 28 recites:
28. The method of claim 27, wherein the parameters comprise, for the at least one pair of transponders, the at least one regenerator, or any combination thereof:
minimum OSNR requirements.
The last line is confusing. See the discussion of claims 4 and 7 above.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103 - Obvious
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) 1-12 and 21-25 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 2011/0318021 (Zhou) in view of US 2017/0005869 (Prasad).
Regarding claim 1, Zhou teaches a non-transitory machine-readable medium comprising executable instructions that, when executed by a processing system including a processor, facilitate performance of operations (FIG. 8: DSP 806, memory 808), the operations comprising:
receiving traffic pattern data;
receiving parameters associated with components that will be part of a reconfigurable optical add-drop multiplexer (ROADM) dense wavelength-division multiplexing (DWDM) network;
defining a configuration of the ROADM DWDM network, wherein the defining of the configuration is based upon the traffic pattern data and the parameters, and wherein the configuration that is defined includes a plurality of ROADM nodes;
outputting the configuration that is defined in order to facilitate physical provisioning and operation of the plurality of ROADM nodes according to the configuration;
receiving performance monitoring (PM) data that is indicative of operation of the ROADM DWDM network as configured according to the configuration;
defining an updated configuration of the ROADM DWDM network, wherein the defining of the updated configuration is based at least in part upon the PM data, and wherein the defining of the updated configuration adds to the ROADM DWDM network at least one pair of transponders, at least one regenerator, or a combination thereof; and
outputting the updated configuration that is defined in order to facilitate physical updating of the ROADM DWDM network in a manner such that the at least one pair of transponders, the at least one regenerator, or the combination thereof is placed into operation.
Zhou at FIG. 8 illustrates a computer system to store instructions in non-transitory computer-readable memory 808, 810, and for a DSP 806 to execute the instructions to implement desired methods or functionality in an optical communications system.
The scope of the claims is not clear, as discussed above in the 112(b) rejections. However, in the interests of compact prosecution, the following art rejections is presented in an attempt to assist Applicant is preparing the most complete response.
Zhou at FIG. 8 illustrates a computer system to store instructions in non-transitory computer-readable memory 808, 810, and for a DSP 806 to execute the instructions to implement desired methods or functionality in an optical communications system.
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[0040] FIG. 8 shows an example of a computational system 802 for performing a multi-stage carrier phase recovery process. One skilled in the art can construct the computational system 802 from various combinations of hardware and software (including firmware). One skilled in the art can construct the computational system 802 from various combinations of electronic components, such as general purpose microprocessors, digital signal processors (DSPs), application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), random access memory, and non-volatile read-only memory.
[0041] Computational system 802 comprises computer 804, which includes a digital signal processor (DSP) 806, memory 808, and data storage device 810. Data storage device 810 comprises at least one non-transitory, persistent, tangible computer readable medium, such as non-volatile semiconductor memory (data storage device 810 can also comprise other non-transitory, persistent, tangible computer readable medium with sufficiently high data transfer rates).
[0042] Computational system 802 further comprises input/output interface 820, which interfaces computer 804 with input/output device 840. Data, including computer executable code can be transferred to and from computer 804 via input/output interface 820. Computational system 802 further comprises digital signal interface A 822, which interfaces computer 804 with digital signal source 842. An example of digital signal source 842 is a DSP that transmits digital signal X.sub.k. Computational system 802 further comprises digital signal interface B 824, which interfaces computer 804 with digital signal receiver 844. An example of digital signal receiver 844 is a DSP that receives decoded symbol .sub.k.sup.(3).
[0043] As is well known, a computer operates under control of computer software, which defines the overall operation of the computer and applications. DSP 806 controls the overall operation of the computer and applications by executing computer program instructions that define the overall operation and applications. The computer program instructions can be stored in data storage device 810 and loaded into memory 808 when execution of the program instructions is desired. The method steps shown in the flowchart in FIG. 7 can be defined by computer program instructions stored in memory 808 or in data storage device 810 (or in a combination of memory 808 and data storage device 810) and controlled by the DSP 806 executing the computer program instructions. For example, the computer program instructions can be implemented as computer executable code programmed by one skilled in the art to perform algorithms implementing the method steps shown in the flowchart in FIG. 7. Accordingly, by executing the computer program instructions, the DSP 806 executes algorithms implementing the method steps shown in the flowchart in FIG. 7.
In other words, it was known to use a processor, memory, and programming to implement or facilitate desired methods or functionality in an optical communications system.
The Examiner is of the opinion that this is sufficient to teach the claimed subject matter. However, in the interests of compact prosecution, the Examiner also cites Prasad which, in FIG. 1A, illustrates an operating environment in which a controller 113 gathers information about the network 123, and gathers information about network demands 111 (e.g., traffic pattern demands), and produces mapping solutions to configure the network 109.
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Prasad also teaches a WDM optical network that includes ROADMS. See:
[0058] In certain embodiments of the network 100, the OADMs 110 may represent reconfigurable OADMs (ROADMs) that are capable of adding or dropping individual or multiple wavelengths of a WDM signal. The individual or multiple wavelengths may be added or dropped in the optical domain, for example, using a wavelength selective switch (WSS) (not shown) which may be included in a ROADM.
See also FIGS. 6-9 which teach the process in more detail. In summary, Prasad teaches that it was known to perform operations that would “facilitate” the operations recited in the claim.
It would have been obvious that the non-transitory CRM and programming taught in Zhou to perform desired functionality can be implemented in a known manner, such as to perform functions such as those taught in Prasad. In particular, both are in the same technical field (e.g., optical communications) and the results would have been predictable.
Dependent claims 2-12 add additional operations that that memory and processor “facilitate”. Under the interpretation of “facilitate” set forth in the 112(b) rejections, those claim would be obvious for the reasons set forth in the rejection of claim 1.
Regarding claim 21, Zhou teaches a device comprising:
a processing system including a processor (FIG. 8: DSP 808); and
a memory that stores executable instructions that, when executed by the processing system, facilitate performance of operations (FIG. 8: memory 808, 810), the operations comprising:
receiving traffic pattern data; receiving parameters associated with components that will be part of a reconfigurable optical add-drop multiplexer (ROADM) dense wavelength-division multiplexing (DWDM) network;
defining a configuration of the ROADM DWDM network, wherein the defining of the configuration is based upon the traffic pattern data and the parameters, and wherein the configuration that is defined includes a plurality of ROADM nodes;
outputting the configuration that is defined in order to facilitate physical provisioning and operation of the plurality of ROADM nodes according to the configuration; receiving performance monitoring (PM) data that is indicative of operation of the ROADM DWDM network as configured according to the configuration;
defining an updated configuration of the ROADM DWDM network, wherein the defining of the updated configuration is based at least in part upon the PM data, and wherein the defining of the updated configuration adds to the ROADM DWDM network at least one pair of transponders, at least one regenerator, or a combination thereof; and
outputting the updated configuration that is defined in order to facilitate physical updating of the ROADM DWDM network in a manner such that the at least one pair of transponders, the at least one regenerator, or the combination thereof is placed into operation.
This is rejected for the reasons discussed in claim 1.
Dependent claims 22-25 add additional operations that that memory and processor “facilitate”. Under the interpretation of “facilitate” set forth in the 112(b) rejections, those claim would be obvious for the reasons set forth in the rejection of claim 21.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 26 and 27 are allowed.
Claim 28 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 an examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance. US 2017/0005869 (Prasad) is the closest art of record. Prasad which, in FIG. 1A, illustrates an operating environment in which a controller 113 gathers information about the network 123, and gathers information about network demands 111 (e.g., traffic pattern demands), and produces mapping solutions to configure the network 109.
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Prasad also teaches a WDM optical network that includes ROADMS. See:
[0058] In certain embodiments of the network 100, the OADMs 110 may represent reconfigurable OADMs (ROADMs) that are capable of adding or dropping individual or multiple wavelengths of a WDM signal. The individual or multiple wavelengths may be added or dropped in the optical domain, for example, using a wavelength selective switch (WSS) (not shown) which may be included in a ROADM.
See also FIGS. 6-9 which teach the process in more detail. However, Prasad does not appear to teach performing the particular combination of operations recited in claim 26.
US 6,690,884 (Kelty) at FIG. 2 illustrates an optical communication system using a system transmitter 36 to transmit supervisory information on a supervisory channel.
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FIG. 4 illustrates a network element including a controller 34 to process the monitor the received signal.
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The monitored signals can be used to provision new optical paths. See also col 7, first two paragraphs, which discuss FIG. 4 in more detail:
(17) Monitoring at the receiver 18 can be performed for each received wavelength as part of the normal receiver functions and the receiver or node CP 34 can monitor the status of the channels. As shown in FIG. 4, signal monitors 38 also can be disposed along the optical path 32 at various monitoring points, such as amplifiers 20 sites shown by the dashed box in FIG. 2. The signal monitors 38 can include one or more fixed wavelength receivers 18 or tunable monitors, such as one or more wavelength tunable receivers or spectrum analyzers. The signal monitors 38 can be configured to perform FEC decoding of the one or more signal channels to follow the evolution of errors that have to be corrected along the transmission path 32. Corrected error monitoring and other signal performance monitoring, such as optical signal to noise ratio monitoring, can be used to identify the fibers 14 and spans in the system 10 where signal degradation is occurring. The signal monitoring information along the transmission path 32 can be used to provision new optical paths to bypass only the degraded portions and specifically identify the degraded portions for service personnel.
(18) System transmitters 36 can be provided in the amplifiers 20 to transmit FEC and other signal monitoring information from the amplifiers 20 to the NMS 22. The supervisory channel information can be transmitted in either or both directions via the available fibers 14 in the transmission path 32 and can be counter- and/or co-propagated with the signal channels in the system 10.
US 2014/0233946 (Gerstel) at FIGS. 1A and 1B illustrates changing the routing of signals in a mesh network.
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[0033] In one embodiment, it is desirable to see if there is a "better" path in network 100, and in particular within server (optical network) 110, than existing communications path spanning between client network packet switching devices 101 to 109 which could be used to replace this existing communications path. Such a determination could be made by any device in network 100 that has the requisite information, or could be made in a distributed fashion by multiple devices in network 100. In one embodiment, server network 110 (which can be an optical network or some other network that provides communications services to the client devices, such as packet switching devices 101 and 109) includes devices 111-115 which communicate/flood topology and/or routing information with each other (e.g., using an interior gateway protocol) so any of devices 111-115 could make this determination. In one embodiment, the edge device 111 or 114 (e.g., the device directly connected to a client device 101 or 109) makes the determination.
[0035] FIG. 1B illustrates a new communications path inclusively between optical interfaces of packet switching devices 101 and 109, and traversing optical devices 111, 115, 113, and 114. FIG. 1B illustrates the sharing of the same physical resources used by the existing communications path illustrated in FIG. 1A. Examples of such exclusive physical resources include, but are not limited to, optical interfaces of packet switching devices 101 and 109; transmitting and receiving wavelengths of fibers between devices 101 and 111, 113 and 114, and 114 and 109, and possibly optical elements (e.g., regenerators, cross-connects, etc.) along these fiber paths.
See also FIGS. 1C and 1D.
FIG. 3A illustrates communications between various optical nodes when determining whether to reconfigure the optical path, including control messages and acknowledgement messages.
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FIG. 3B illustrates communication in another embodiment.
2012/0163814 (Zhao) at FIG. 4 illustrates a routing method including using a K-shortest path (KSP) algorithm.
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[0038] In step 300, a topology network of traffic engineering (TE) links is acquired; and the K-shortest routing algorithm is initialized. TE link information is used to describe attributes of an optical path.
[0046] The K-shortest routing branch algorithm is used to separate the topology network of the TE links from the last node to the first node in the last calculated routing direction to acquire the second-shortest routing, and the method proceeds to step 304.
[0047] Currently, a variety of selectable mature technologies is used for the K-shortest routing algorithm to find a plurality of routes. The K-shortest routing algorithm might be based on the traditional CSPF Bellman-Ford algorithm and Dijkstra algorithm. Except that the first nodes and the last nodes of these found routes are the same, other passing nodes may be different, and the exit interfaces of the first and last nodes might also be different. The K-shortest routing algorithm may also be suitable for 1+1 route calculation, that is, a working route and a protection route are calculated.
There are also other teachings to use the KSR algorithm. See, for example:
[0065] The wavelength assignment determination is made in the K-shortest routing algorithm to reduce information exchange between modules, to speed up establishment of a service tunnel, and to improve the system stability of the optical network.
[0067] In step 501, in the K-shortest routing algorithm, a route of 5->4 is first calculated, and TE link information is searched to make wavelength assignment determination, and if the result is failure, the reason might be that there are no wavelength resources.
Performing Plural Route Resource Allocation.
FIG. 4 illustrates a method calculating the route (e.g., see steps 300, 303). FIG. 4, step 305 illustrates that a second route (e.g., a protection route) can also be calculated. See also FIG. 2, step 202, which teaches to “calculate at least one route”). See also FIG. 8, steps 702, 703 which illustrates a working route determination unit 702 and a protection route determination unit 704.
Zhao teaches wavelength assignment when a route has been found. See, for example:
[0015] The device also comprises: a protection route determination unit configured to, after the route is selected as a working route and when the working route is determined to need a protection route, notify the routing control unit to calculate a route, and for each node on the route, determine whether link attribute information of the node meets the predetermined constraint condition, if the predetermined constraint condition is met, select the route as the protection route to send to a connection controller; if the predetermined constraint condition is not met, notify the routing control unit to calculate another route, and make the determination for the route; and an optical path impairment validation module configured to, when the working route determination unit or the protection route determination unit determines that link attribute information of each node on a route meets the predetermined constraint condition, perform optical path impairment validation on an optical fiber between the node and its adjacent node on the route, and when the route is determined to be used as the working route or protection route, notify the working route determination unit or the protection route determination unit to select the route as the working route or the protection route, wherein the meeting the predetermined constraint condition means that the node has connectivity and is able to transmit the optical signal with the preset wavelength.
[0036] According to the technical scheme described above, an embodiment of the present invention provides a method for routing and wavelength assignment in an optical network based on wavelength resource information analysis. In an optical network, a) unlink and downlink constraint analysis of the first and last nodes, which means that wavelengths of optical signals inserted into an optical fiber at the first node and removed from the optical fiber at the last node are analyzed; b) K-shortest routing algorithm; c) node connectivity analysis of a passing node and wavelength resource information analysis, are required to be performed in this embodiment. In the wavelength resource information analysis analyzes, the wavelength resource information of each node on the route is analyzed. If all nodes on the route have available wavelengths and the uplink and downlink of the first node and the last node meet the constraint analysis, then this route is available.
[0087] a working route determination unit 702 configured to, for each node on the route, determine whether link attribute information of the node meets a predetermined constraint condition, and if the predetermined constraint condition is met, select the route as a working route; if the predetermined constraint condition is not met, continue to make the determination for another route calculated by the routing control unit.
[0094] a protection route determination unit 703 configured to, after the route is selected as a working route and when the working route is determined to need a protection route, notify the routing control unit 701 to calculate a route, and for each node on the route, determine whether link attribute information of the node meets the predetermined constraint condition, if the predetermined constraint condition is met, select the route as the protection route to send to a connection controller (CC); if the predetermined constraint condition is not met, notify the routing control unit 701 to calculate another route, and make the determination for the route; wherein the meeting the predetermined constraint condition means that the node has connectivity and wavelength resource information of the node indicates that the node is able to transmit the optical signal with the preset wavelength.
See also, for example, FIG. 2, step 203, which teaches wavelength assignment. See also:
[0031] In step 203, i.e., a wavelength assignment determination step, for each node on the route, it is determined whether link attribute information of the node meets a predetermined constraint condition, if the predetermined constraint condition is met, the route is selected as a working route, and the method ends; if the predetermined constraint condition is not met, the method returns to the route calculation step.
In other words, Zhao contemplates selecting a wavelength and path for the data (i.e., performing resource allocation).
Determining Route Computation Results.
As discussed above, Zhao teaches to determine routing results and to allocate resources (e.g., assign wavelengths). It also teaches to determine route computation results. See, for example:
[0036] According to the technical scheme described above, an embodiment of the present invention provides a method for routing and wavelength assignment in an optical network based on wavelength resource information analysis. In an optical network, a) unlink and downlink constraint analysis of the first and last nodes, which means that wavelengths of optical signals inserted into an optical fiber at the first node and removed from the optical fiber at the last node are analyzed; b) K-shortest routing algorithm; c) node connectivity analysis of a passing node and wavelength resource information analysis, are required to be performed in this embodiment. In the wavelength resource information analysis analyzes, the wavelength resource information of each node on the route is analyzed. If all nodes on the route have available wavelengths and the uplink and downlink of the first node and the last node meet the constraint analysis, then this route is available.
[0084] In the technical scheme described above, a series of algorithm processing such as the wavelength assignment (WA) and optical path impairment validation are performed in the Routing (R) process. If the preset condition is met, one or more routes and wavelength resource assignment information for these routes are returned.
[0087] a working route determination unit 702 configured to, for each node on the route, determine whether link attribute information of the node meets a predetermined constraint condition, and if the predetermined constraint condition is met, select the route as a working route; if the predetermined constraint condition is not met, continue to make the determination for another route calculated by the routing control unit.
[0094] a protection route determination unit 703 configured to, after the route is selected as a working route and when the working route is determined to need a protection route, notify the routing control unit 701 to calculate a route, and for each node on the route, determine whether link attribute information of the node meets the predetermined constraint condition, if the predetermined constraint condition is met, select the route as the protection route to send to a connection controller (CC); if the predetermined constraint condition is not met, notify the routing control unit 701 to calculate another route, and make the determination for the route; wherein the meeting the predetermined constraint condition means that the node has connectivity and wavelength resource information of the node indicates that the node is able to transmit the optical signal with the preset wavelength.
Any comments considered necessary by applicant must be submitted no later than the payment of the issue fee and, to avoid processing delays, should preferably accompany the issue fee. Such submissions should be clearly labeled “Comments on Statement of Reasons for Allowance.”
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DARREN WOLF whose telephone number is (571)270-3378. The examiner can normally be reached Monday through Friday, 7:00 AM to 3:00 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, KENNETH N. VANDERPUYE can be reached at 571-272-3078. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/DARREN E WOLF/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2634
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