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
2. 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.
3. The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 103(a) which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
(a) A patent may not be obtained though the invention is not identically disclosed or described as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the subject matter sought to be patented and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains. Patentability shall not be negatived by the manner in which the invention was made.
4. 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.
5. 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.
6. Claims 1-2, 4-6, 8, 10, 12, 17, 18 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhang, Hui-ying (CN-110098858 A - IDS), hereinafter Zhang, in view of Dees et al. (US 2022/0369215), hereinafter referred to as Dees.
Regarding claim 1, Zhang discloses: (1) a relay terminal receives a relay request message sent by remote terminal; based on the relay request message, the relay terminal determines the relay working mode provided to the remote terminal, and send information indicating the relay working mode to the remote terminal, see 0011-0013 (equivalent to obtaining, by a terminal, first information); (2) [0026] when the relay request message carries service information that the remote terminal needs to relay, the steps for determining the relay working mode provided to the remote terminal based on the relay request message include: [0027] Based on the priority of the services that the remote terminal needs to relay, the first relay working mode is determined for the remote terminal, where the first relay working mode is the relay working mode required by the high-priority services (equivalent to determining, by the terminal, a first relay communication mode corresponding to the first information based on the first information, wherein the first relay communication mode is used for terminal communication of the terminal).
Zhang, however, fails to teach a user equipment routing selection policy URSP, and the URSP carries a relay communication mode.
Dees from the same field of endeavor as Zhang teaches information about which relay UEs may or should be used for a specific slice can be provided as a new extension to the UE route selection policy (URSP) as defined in 3GPP [29.507] [23.503], which can be sent to the UE using the UE policy delivery protocol defined in Annex D of 3GPP [24.501], see 0177.
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to employ a mechanism in which information about relay(s) to be provided to an URSP into the system of Zhang. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been to enable the UE to connect to one or more of its required and/or preferred 5G network slice instances via a relay UE, and hence it needs to know which relay UEs in vicinity would be capable or would not be capable to do so.
Regarding claim 2, Zhang also discloses the following features (see supra): wherein the above-mentioned relay operation modes include, but are not limited to: at least one of L2 terminal-to-UE Relay, L3 terminal-to-UE Relay, L2 terminal-to-Network Relay, and L3 terminal-to-Network Relay; if the relay operation mode selection policy is preconfigured, the relay terminal, upon receiving the relay request message, determines a relay operation mode to provide for the remote terminal in accordance with the relay operation mode selection policy; assuming that L2 relays are preconfigured to take precedence over L3 relays, when the relay terminal selects the relay operation mode, L2 relays are preferentially selected (equivalent to an L2-preferred relay communication mode).
Regarding claim 4, the relay terminal of Zhang, upon receiving the relay request message transmitted by the remote terminal, selecting and determining a suitable relay operating mode for the remote terminal in accordance with the relay requirements characterized by the relay request message to meet the relay requirements of the remote terminal, the relay request message carrying at least one of the following information: traffic information that the remote terminal (Remote UE) needs to relay; identification information of the remote terminal (equivalent to the granularity at which the application layer indicates the way of relaying communication includes one of the following: terminal).
Regarding claim 5, please see the rejection of claim 1. The terminal of Zhang receives the first information from the relay terminal (first core network device).
Regarding claim 6, as shown in FIG. 2 of Zhang, the D2D communication is as follows: UE1 (first core network) and UE2 close to each other, by directly establishing a link between the two UEs, so the communication link originally transmitted through the network device into the direct communication link local, saves a lot of bandwidth and network efficiency.
Regarding claim 8, please see the rejection of claim 1. The rejection of claim 1 is for a method for determining a communication mode by a terminal which receives first information from a BS, e.g., the BS-fig.3 of Zhang, and it should be noted that a method for determining a communication mode by a first core network device (BS) which transmits first information to the terminal can be performed in a similar manner.
Regarding claim 10, this claim has similar limitations as those of claim 6. Therefore, it is rejected under Zhang-Dees for the same reasons as set forth in the rejection of claim 6.
Regarding claim 12, Zhang discloses based on the priority of the services that the remote terminal needs to relay, the first relay working mode is determined for the remote terminal, where the first relay working mode is the relay working mode required by the high-priority services, see 0027 (second information); and the relay terminal (first core network device) based on the high-priority service generate the first relay working mode for the remote terminal, where the first relay working mode is the relay working mode required by the high-priority services.
Regarding claim 17, this claim has similar limitations as those of claim 1. Therefore, it is rejected under Zhang-Dees for the same reasons as set forth in the rejection of claim 1. The relay terminal of Zhang includes a memory (not shown) storing instructions, when executed by a processor (not shown) causes the relay terminal to perform the claimed steps.
Regarding claim 18, this claim has similar limitations as those of claim 8. Therefore, it is rejected under Zhang-Dees for the same reasons as set forth in the rejection of claim 8. The BS-fig.3 of Zhang includes a memory (not shown) storing instructions, when executed by a processor (not shown) causes the BS or a core network device to perform the claimed steps.
Regarding claim 20, this claim has similar limitations as those of claim 1. Therefore, it is rejected under Zhang-Dees for the same reasons as set forth in the rejection of claim 1. The relay terminal of Zhang includes a non-transitory readable storage medium (not shown) storing instructions, when executed by a processor (not shown) causes the relay terminal to perform the claimed steps.
Allowable subject matter
7. Claims 14, 16 and 19 are allowed.
8. Claims 3, 7, 9, 11 and 13 are rejected based on its dependency, would be allowable if rewritten or amended to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
9. 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.
10. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DUC C HO whose telephone number is (571)272-3147. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F 8am-4pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Gary Mui can be reached on 571-270-1420 (Gary.mui@uspto.gov). The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/DUC C HO/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2465
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