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 .
Priority
Applicant’s claim for the benefit of a prior-filed application under 35 U.S.C. 119(e) or under 35 U.S.C. 120, 121, 365(c), or 386(c) is acknowledged. Applicant has not complied with one or more conditions for receiving the benefit of an earlier filing date under 35 U.S.C. 120, 121 as follows: Applicant’s priority claim to the parent application is not proper. Applicant need to amend the specification to include priority claim to the parent application. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Objections
Claims 31, 35 and 37 are objected to because of the following informalities: the acronym “PDSCH” in the cited claims need to be fully defined, at least once. These are considered as a typographical error that need to be corrected. Appropriate correction is required.
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.
The factual inquiries 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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
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.
Claim(s) 31 and 34 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over ZHANG et al., US 2022/0201724 A1 (using PCT application filing date of December 29, 2020 corresponding to PCT/KR2020/019245; referred to as Zhang hereinafter), in view of Liu et al., US 2023/0275703 A1 (using foreign application priority date of August 31, 2020, corresponding to PCT/CN2020/112432; referred to as Liu hereinafter).
Here is how the references teach the claims.
Regarding claim 31, Zhang discloses a method (Zhang, abstract, The present disclosure relates to a communication method and system for converging a 5th-generation (5G) communication system for supporting higher data rates beyond a 4th-generation ( 4G) system with a technology for internet of things (IoT)) comprising:
generating, at a network device, downlink control information (DCI) related to a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) process (Zhang, Fig. 2, steps 201. step 202 and paragraphs [0058]-[0059], First, in step 201, UE receives downlink data and/or downlink control signaling from the BS … At step 202, UE determines an HARQ-ACK codebook and an uplink time unit for transmitting the HARQACK codebook based on the downlink data and/or the downlink control signaling), wherein the DCI comprises a counter downlink assignment indicator (DAI) field and a total DAI field (Zhang, paragraph [0113], The downlink control signaling may be DCI, and the downlink assignment index may be DAI. A DAI field includes at least one of a first type of DAI and a second type of DAI. The first type of DAI may be C-DAI (counter-DAI) … The second type of DAI may be T-DAI (total-DAI)), … transmitting the DCI to a terminal device (Zhang, paragraph [0052], The first type of control signaling may be control signaling transmitted by the first type of transceiver node to the second type of transceiver node. In the following examples, downlink control signaling is taken as an example (but not limited thereto) to describe the first type of control signaling. The downlink control signaling may be DCI (downlink control information) carried by the PDCCH (physical downlink control channel) and/or control signaling carried by the PDSCH (physical downlink shared channel). Also see paragraph [0050], In the present disclosure, the first type of transceiver node may be a BS (base station), and the second type of transceiver node may be a UE (user equipment)); and
receiving a hybrid automatic repeat request acknowledgement (HARQ-ACK) codebook for PDSCH scheduled by the DCI from the terminal device (Zhang, Fig. 2, paragraph [0061], At step 203, the UE transmits the HARQ-ACK codebook to the BS (i.e., codebook received by the network device) in the determined uplink time unit), wherein the HARQ-ACK codebook is generated based on at least one of the counter DAI field and the total DAI field (Zhang, Fig. 4, steps 402, 403, and paragraphs [0152]-[0153], In step 402, if the numbers of bits of DAI fields in different DCI formats are different, a unified number of bits is configured by standard specifications or high layer signaling, and values of C-DAI and/or T-DAI indicated by different numbers of bits are converted into values indicated by the unified number of bits … In step 403, the HARQ-ACK codebook is determined (i.e., generated) based on the converted values of DAI).
Zhang does not explicitly disclose and the counter DAI field is reserved in response to HARQ feedback being disabled for the HARQ process. In the same field of endeavor (e.g., communication system) Liu discloses a method related to wireless communication that comprises and the counter DAI field is reserved in response to HARQ feedback being disabled for the HARQ process (Liu, paragraph [0233], At 1710, the base station may transmit a DCI including a grant scheduling the data transmission, the feedback information for the data transmission being enabled or disabled based on the rateless coding scheme and one or more of: the DCI, a resource associated with the DCI, or a semi-persistent scheduling configuration associated with the data transmission. Also see paragraph [0110], the downlink assignment index (DAI) field of DCI 215 may be used to convey the indication that feedback information 225 is disabled for data transmission 220 using rateless coding. That is, the DAI field of DCI 215 may include one or more bits used as a counter DAI (i.e., counter DAI field is reserved) (e.g., the DAI field may be set to a first value to indicate that feedback information 225 is enabled for a non-rateless coding data transmission or to a second value to indicate that feedback information 225 is disabled for data transmission 220 using rateless coding));
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Zhang by using the features, as taught by Liu, in order to provide an improved method that support an indication scheme for rate-less code transmission without feedback information (see Liu, abstract and paragraph [0004]).
Regarding claim 34, Zhang discloses wherein the HARQ-ACK codebook is a Type-2 HARQ-ACK codebook (Zhang, paragraph [0214], In another embodiment, a UE is configured with dynamic HARQ-ACK codebook, such as 3GPP 38.213 Type-2 codebook).
Claim(s) 32 and 33 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over ZHANG et al., US 2022/0201724 A1 (using PCT application filing date of December 29, 2020 corresponding to PCT/KR2020/019245; referred to as Zhang hereinafter), in view of Liu et al., US 2023/0275703 A1 (using foreign application priority date of August 31, 2020, corresponding to PCT/CN2020/112432; referred to as Liu hereinafter), as applied to the claims above and further in view of Nishio et al., US 2024/0187136 A1 (using foreign application priority date of April 6, 2021, corresponding to JP 2021-064668; referred to as Nishio hereinafter).
Here is how the references teach the claims.
Regarding claims 32, Zhang and Liu disclose the method of claim 1. Zhang and Liu do not explicitly disclose wherein receiving the HARQ-ACK codebook comprises:
in accordance with a determination that HARQ feedback is disabled for the HARQ process, receiving the HARQ-ACK codebook generated based on the total DAI field from the terminal device; and
in accordance with a determination that HARQ feedback is enabled for the HARQ process, receiving the HARQ-ACK codebook generated based on the counter DAI field and the total DAI field from the terminal device. In the same field of endeavor (e.g., communication system) Nishio discloses a wireless communication method that comprises wherein receiving the HARQ-ACK codebook comprises:
in accordance with a determination that HARQ feedback is disabled for the HARQ process, receiving the HARQ-ACK codebook generated based on the total DAI field from the terminal device (Nishio, paragraph [0060], A non-limiting embodiment of the present disclosure describes methods for improving HARQ processing efficiency using, for example, DAI (e.g., C-DAI and T-DAI) for the feedback-disabled HARQ process. For example, information configured to DAI (e.g., C-DAI and T-DAI) may be determined ( or controlled) based on a configuration (e.g., enabled or disabled) related to HARQ feedback. Also see paragraph [0096], For example, terminal 200 may control the reception processing (e.g., determination of the size of a HARQ-ACK codebook) for the downlink data (e.g., data for a feedback-disabled HARQ process) based on a DAI (e.g., at least one of C-DAI and T-DAI) for the feedback-disabled HARQ process); and
in accordance with a determination that HARQ feedback is enabled for the HARQ process, receiving the HARQ-ACK codebook generated based on the counter DAI field and the total DAI field from the terminal device (Nishio, paragraph [0101], In Configuration Method 1, a C-DAI field in DCI assigning a feedback-enabled HARQ process may include, as specified in NR Rel. 15/16, a C-DAI value indicating a count value of slots and CCs with data assignment (or a count value of the number of data assignments) until the slot and CC in which the DAI is indicated, for example. Further, in Configuration Method 1, a T-DAI field in DCI assigning a feedback-enabled HARQ process may include, as specified in NR Rel. 15/16, a T-DAI value indicating the total number of data assignments until the slot in which the DAI is indicated, for example).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Zhang and Liu by using the features, as taught by Nishio, in order to support method for improving retransmission control efficiency (see Nishio, abstract and paragraph [0009]).
Regarding claim 33, Zhang and Nishio do not explicitly disclose further comprising: in accordance with a determination that HARQ feedback is disabled for the HARQ process, indicating a HARQ process number for the HARQ process with the counter DAI field. However, Liu discloses a method related to wireless communication that comprises further comprising:
in accordance with a determination that HARQ feedback is disabled for the HARQ process, indicating a HARQ process number for the HARQ process with the counter DAI field (Liu, paragraph [0116], the HARQ process number carried or otherwise conveyed in DCI 215 may be used to convey the indication that feedback information 225 is disabled for data transmission 220 using rateless coding. Also see paragraph [0110], the downlink assignment index (DAI) field of DCI 215 may be used to convey the indication that feedback information 225 is disabled for data transmission 220 using rateless coding. That is, the DAI field of DCI 215 may include one or more bits used as a counter DAI (e.g., the DAI field may be set to a first value to indicate that feedback information 225 is enabled for a non-rateless coding data transmission or to a second value to indicate that feedback information 225 is disabled for data transmission 220 using rateless coding)).
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Zhang and Nishio by using the features, as taught by Liu, in order to provide an improved method that support an indication scheme for rate-less code transmission without feedback information (see Liu, abstract and paragraph [0004]).
Claim(s) 35-36 and 37-38 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lei et al., US 2022/0385411 A1 (using PCT application filing date of November 8, 2019 corresponding to PCT/CN2019/116691; referred to as Lei hereinafter), in view of Liu et al., US 2023/0275703 A1 (using foreign application priority date of August 31, 2020, corresponding to PCT/CN2020/112432; referred to as Liu hereinafter).
Here is how the references teach the claims.
Regarding claim 35, Lei discloses a method (Lei, paragraph [0004], The subject disclosure provides several solutions to reduce the size of the one-shot HARQ-ACK codebook) comprising: …. generating, for a PDSCH reception corresponding to the DCI (Lei, paragraph [0068], The gNB sends the DCI for triggering the one-shot feedback in slot n+3 on CC1. In FIG. 7, each one of the four component carriers is used to transmit PDSCHs, based on C-DAI and T-DAI, the UE determines all the configured carriers, i.e., CC1 to CC4, are used to transmit PDSCHs based on both counter DAI and total DAI), a HARQ feedback bit indicating a positive acknowledgement (Lei, paragraph [0032], The DL TBs (transport blocks) are carried on the Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH). A maximum of two TBs can be transmitted on PDSCH in one serving cell and in one slot. HARQ-ACK in the subject disclosure represents collectively the Positive Acknowledgement (ACK) and the Negative Acknowledgement (NACK). ACK means a TB is correctly received while NACK means a TB is erroneously received. For the TB-based retransmission, one HARQ-ACK feedback bit corresponds to one TB. A HARQ-ACK information bit value of "0" represents a negative acknowledgement (NACK) while a HARQ-ACK information bit value of "l" represents a positive acknowledgement (ACK)); and
transmitting a hybrid automatic repeat request acknowledgement (HARQ-ACK) codebook comprising the HARQ feedback bit to the network device (Lei, Lei, Fig.11 step 1103 and paragraph [0089], In step 1103, the UE transmits a HARQ-ACK codebook in the PUCCH, wherein the HARQ-ACK codebook comprises the HARQ-ACK feedback for the one or more carriers of the first plurality of carriers. Also see paragraph [0088], Then the UE determines the one-shot HARQ-ACK codebook only including HARQ-ACK information bit for the SPS PDSCH release or only for the PDSCH reception or only for the SPS PDSCH reception).
Regarding claim 37, Lei discloses a method (Lei, paragraph [0004], The subject disclosure provides several solutions to reduce the size of the one-shot HARQ-ACK codebook) comprising: … and
receiving a hybrid automatic repeat request acknowledgement (HARQ-ACK) codebook from the terminal device (Lei, Fig.11 step 1103 and paragraph [0089], In step 1103, the UE transmits a HARQ-ACK codebook in the PUCCH), wherein the HARQ-ACK codebook comprises a HARQ feedback bit for a PDSCH reception corresponding to the DCI and the HARQ feedback bit indicates a positive acknowledgement (Lei, paragraph [0032], The DL TBs (transport blocks) are carried on the Physical Downlink Shared Channel (PDSCH). A maximum of two TBs can be transmitted on PDSCH in one 11, step 1serving cell and in one slot. HARQ-ACK in the subject disclosure represents collectively the Positive Acknowledgement (ACK) and the Negative Acknowledgement (NACK). ACK means a TB is correctly received while NACK means a TB is erroneously received. For the TB-based retransmission, one HARQ-ACK feedback bit corresponds to one TB. A HARQ-ACK information bit value of "0" represents a negative acknowledgement (NACK) while a HARQ-ACK information bit value of "1" represents a positive acknowledgement (ACK)).
Lei does not explicitly disclose the following features.
Regarding claim 35, receiving, at a terminal device, downlink control information (DCI) related to a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) process with HARQ feedback disabled from a network device;
Regarding claim 37, transmitting, from a network device to a terminal device, downlink control information (DCI) related to a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) process with HARQ feedback disabled;
In the same field of endeavor (e.g., communication system) Liu discloses a method related to wireless communication that comprises the following features.
Regarding claim 35, receiving, at a terminal device, downlink control information (DCI) related to a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) process with HARQ feedback disabled from a network device (Liu, paragraph [0233], At 1710, the base station may transmit a DCI including a grant scheduling the data transmission, the feedback information for the data transmission being enabled or disabled based on the rateless coding scheme and one or more of: the DCI, a resource associated with the DCI, or a semi-persistent scheduling configuration associated with the data transmission. Also see paragraph [0110], the downlink assignment index (DAI) field of DCI 215 may be used to convey the indication that feedback information 225 is disabled for data transmission 220 using rateless coding. That is, the DAI field of DCI 215 may include one or more bits used as a counter DAI (e.g., the DAI field may be set to a first value to indicate that feedback information 225 is enabled for a non-rateless coding data transmission or to a second value to indicate that feedback information 225 is disabled for data transmission 220 using rateless coding));
Regarding claim 37, transmitting, from a network device to a terminal device, downlink control information (DCI) related to a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) process with HARQ feedback disabled (Liu, paragraph [0233], At 1710, the base station may transmit a DCI including a grant scheduling the data transmission, the feedback information for the data transmission being enabled or disabled based on the rateless coding scheme and one or more of: the DCI, a resource associated with the DCI, or a semi-persistent scheduling configuration associated with the data transmission. Also see paragraph [0110], the downlink assignment index (DAI) field of DCI 215 may be used to convey the indication that feedback information 225 is disabled for data transmission 220 using rateless coding. That is, the DAI field of DCI 215 may include one or more bits used as a counter DAI (e.g., the DAI field may be set to a first value to indicate that feedback information 225 is enabled for a non-rateless coding data transmission or to a second value to indicate that feedback information 225 is disabled for data transmission 220 using rateless coding));
Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Lei by using the features, as taught by Liu, in order to provide an improved method that support an indication scheme for rate-less code transmission without feedback information (see Liu, abstract and paragraph [0004]).
Regarding claim 36, Lei discloses wherein the HARQ-ACK codebook is a Type-1 HARQ-ACK codebook (Lei, paragraphs [0036] and [0037], HARQ-ACK feedback for multiple PDSCHs can be multiplexed in one HARQ-ACK codebook by means of HARQ-ACK multiplexing. There are two HARQ-ACK codebooks in NR Rel-15: … The first codebook is the Semi-static HARQ-ACK codebook (also called Type 1 in TS38.213 Rel-15)).
Regarding claim 38, Lei discloses wherein the HARQ-ACK codebook is a Type-1 HARQ-ACK codebook (Lei, paragraphs [0036] and [0037], HARQ-ACK feedback for multiple PDSCHs can be multiplexed in one HARQ-ACK codebook by means of HARQ-ACK multiplexing. There are two HARQ-ACK codebooks in NR Rel-15: … The first codebook is the Semi-static HARQ-ACK codebook (also called Type 1 in TS38.213 Rel-15)).
Conclusion
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/OBAIDUL HUQ/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2473 Dated: 02/02/2026