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 Objections
Claims 5, 7, 13, and 15, are objected to because of the following informalities: The claims recited several acronyms e.g. HARQ, PSSCH, SCI, etc. which are not clearly defined in the claims. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 17-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter.
Claims 17-20 recites "computer readable storage medium" which isdefined in the original specification paragraph [0202] as "The computer-readable storage medium may be any available medium accessible to a computer or a data storage device such as a server, data center, or the like that contains at least one available media integration. The available media may be magnetic media (e.g. floppy disk, hard disk, magnetic tape), optical media (e.g. DVD), or semiconductor media (e.g. solid state disk (SSD)), etc."
Therefore, leaving the description open-ended, where given the broadest reasonable interpretation, the computer readable storage medium may include a signal. Therefore, embodying functional descriptive material that is neither a process ("actions"), machine, manufacture, nor composition of matter (i.e., tangible "thing") and therefore does not fall within one of the four categories of § 101. Because the full scope of the claim as properly read in light of the disclosure encompasses non-statutory subject matter, the claims as a whole is non- statutory, under the present USPTO Interim Guidelines, 1300 Official Gazette Patent and Trademark Office 142 (Nov. 22, 2005).
However, amending the claim to include the term "non-transitory" overcomes the rejection.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1-6, 8-14, and 16-20, is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Zhao (US Publication No. 20230362739).
As to claims 1, 9, and 17, Zhao teaches a method, a computer readable storage medium, and a device for indicating resource collision, comprising: a processor (fig. 1, fig. 21, pp0155, first UE), configured to determine whether to send first information through a transceiver, where the first information indicates that a resource collision is likely to occur on a resource to be used by a second device (fig. 1, fig. 3, pp0004, sending a potential collision indication to a second UE in response to determining an impending resource collision on a reserved resource for data transmission by the second UE, the potential collision indication for indicating the impending resource collision on the reserved resource for data transmission by the second UE and pp0045).
As to claims 2, 10, and 18, Zhao teaches wherein the first information comprises third information, wherein the third information indicates that the resource collision is likely to occur on the resource to be used by the second device (fig. 1, pp0046, potential collision indication is configured to indicate the impending resource collision on the reserved resource for data transmission by the second UE).
As to claims 3, 11, and 19, Zhao teaches wherein the first information is carried on a physical sidelink feedback channel (PSFCH) (fig. 1, fig. 5, and pp0053, a potential collision indication is sent to a second UE by using a PSFCH resource mapped by a first PSSCH transmission resource).
As to claims 4, 12, and 20, Zhao teaches wherein the first information comprises the third information; and wherein determining, by the first device, whether to send the first information comprises: in response to satisfying a second condition, determining, by the first device, to send the third information, wherein the second condition comprises that the resource collision is likely to occur on the resource to be used by the second device (fig. 1, fig. 4, pp0047, pp0048, If the reserved resources in the respective SCIs of the second UE and the other UE overlap in the time domain and/or frequency domain, the impending resource collision on the reserved resource for data transmission by the second UE is determined, the potential collision indication is sent to the second UE).
As to claims 5 and 13, Zhao teaches wherein a time domain position of the third information is the same as a time domain position of a PSFCH carrying a HARQ feedback of a PSSCH transmitted by the second device in a slot n (fig. 1, fig. 4, fig.6, and fig. 8, S51, HARQ feedback and a potential collision indication are sent by multiplexing the HARQ feedback and the potential collision indication on the PSFCH resource with the same time and frequency domain, and pp0146).
As to claims 6 and 14, Zhao teaches wherein a frequency domain position of the third information is different from a frequency domain position of a PSFCH carrying a HARQ feedback of a PSSCH transmitted by the second device in the slot n (fig. 1, fig. 4, fig.6, and fig. 10, S61, and pp0080, the HARQ feedback may use the PSFCH resource in a frequency division multiplexing (FDM) manner. For example, the HARQ feedback and the potential collision indication are sent on different frequency domain resources).
As to claims 8 and 16, Zhao teaches wherein the third information comprises at least one PSFCH sequence, each PSFCH sequence indicative of at least one of the following: whether a resource collision occurs on a resource reserved by the second device (fig. 1, fig. 3, fig. 4, pp0078, a base sequence is sent by using the PSFCH resource with the same time and frequency domain and the base sequence is cyclically shifted to indicate the HARQ feedback and potential collision indication, and pp0113, potential collision indication is configured to indicate an impending resource collision on a reserved resource for data transmission by the second UE); or whether a resource collision occurs on a next resource for a same TB retransmission reserved by the second device.
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) 7 and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao (US Publication No. 20230362739) in view of Hwang et al. (US publication No. 20220303954).
As to claims 7 and 15, Zhao teaches wherein a time domain position of the third information is in a slot m-b (fig. 4), wherein m represents a slot in which a next resource for transmission (fig. 4, pp0049, pp0051, first PSCCH is configured to indicate a time-frequency resource for a next PSSCH (the PSSCH in Slot5) transmission) and b represents a time for the second device to receive a PSFCH, process the PSFCH (fig. 4, sending a 1 bit collision indication using PSFCH and pp0060, a time interval ΔT between a moment when the potential collision indication is sent to the second UE and a moment when the impending resource collision occurs to the second UE, is greater than or equal to a time interval threshold Tmax, so that the second UE receives the potential collision indication to perform resource selection before the moment when the impending resource collision occurs to the second UE). However, Zhao fails to explicitly teach a slot for transmission for of a same TB reserved by a first-stage SCI sent by the second device is located, and a time for the second device to prepare for sidelink retransmission.
In an analogous field of endeavor, Hwang teaches the concept of a slot for transmission for of a same TB reserved by a first-stage SCI sent by the second device is located (fig. 2, fig. 4, pp0355, when the UE-B performs the retransmission for the same TB, the UE-B may indicate the receiving UE to empty the data value that has been previously received upon the decoding for the same TB using a specific value of a RESERVED field of (first) SCI), and a time for the second device to prepare for sidelink retransmission (fig. 2, fig. 4, pp0344, UE-A may include a retransmission transmission resource derived based on time resource allocation field/information or TRIV field value from SCI transmitted by the UE-B). Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Zhao with the teachings of Hwang to achieve the goal of efficiently and reliably using resources between UEs and increasing reliability in the SL communication (Hwang, pp0005).
Conclusion
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/OMONIYI OBAYANJU/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2645
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