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 § 112
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 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 12, 13, 18 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.
Claims 3, 4, 6, 8, 12 recite “transmission requirement”. Claims fail to define what constitute a “transmission requirement” whether this requirement pertains to data size, latency, bandwidth, quality of service or any other parameters.
Claims 3, 5, 7, 12, 13, 18 are structured with multiple “or” statements that are confusing and ambiguous. As an example for claim 5, does the first “or” differentiate two independent embodiments?, is each block internally linked?, does “and/or” allow any mix of length and position limitations?. For claim 12, the claim has multiple nested alternatives and it is unclear whether the three branches are mutually exclusive, also not clear is whether the internal “at least one of” applies only within a branch or across branches.
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) 1-3, 9-11, 13-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sun et al. (US 2021/0092783, hereinafter “Sun”) in view of Xue et al. (US 2022/0312379, hereinafter “Xue”).
For claims 1, 19 and 20, Sun discloses A method for determining a resource in a shared band (the first UE may correspond to the UE 400 and may utilize one or more components.. to determine the COT in the shared radio frequency band for the communicating the sidelink with the second UE according to the schemes 600; see Sun par. 0130 and Figs. 11 and 6), comprising:
performing, by a first terminal, sidelink (SL) sensing (In the scheme 600, a UE 615a (e.g., the UEs 115, 215, and/or 400) may initiate or contend for a COT 602 in the frequency band 302 by performing an LBT 630 in the frequency band 302. The LBT 630 may be a CAT4 LBT similar to the LBT 330. The LBT 630 is a pass as shown by the checkmark indicating that the UE 615a won the COT 602; see Sun par. 0096); and
determining, based on the SL sensing, a resource or candidate resource N indicated or reserved by a second terminal (To provision for sidelink COT sharing, the UE 615a may additionally include a sidelink COT sharing SCI 640 in the PSCCH communication 612. In some aspects, the SCI 640 may indicate remaining unused frequency interlaces 308 so that other sidelink UE(s) (e.g., a UE 615c) monitoring for the sidelink COT sharing SCI 640 may opportunistically join the COT 602 and utilize the remaining unused frequency interlaces 308 for sidelink transmission. In this regard, the UE 615a may include in the SCI 640, an indication of the remaining unused frequency interlace( s) 308. In the illustrated example of FIG. 6, the SCI 640 may indicate that the frequency interlace 308rci) to the frequency interlace 308rc9) are available for sharing. In some other instances, the UE 615a may include in the SCI 640 including a reservation or indication of the frequency interlace(s) 308 that are to be used by the UE 615a. In the illustrated example of FIG. 6, the SCI 640 may indicate that the frequency interlace 308rco) is in use or reserved by the UE 615a, and thus other UEs desiring to join the COT 602 may refrain from using the reserved frequency interlace 308rco); see Sun par. 0097).
Sun does not explicitly disclose candidate resource N. Xue discloses candidate resource N (…PHY layer 1001 may then report the identified candidate resources along with the indices that identify which sub-resource pool the identified candidate resource is located at 1006. With sub-resource pool indices, MAC layer 1000 can conduct COT-aware resource selection, at 1007…; see Xue par. 0112). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Xue's arrangement in Sun's invention to improve the robustness of channel access as channel occupancy time (COT) sharing has been proposed for NR SL communications over unlicensed band (see Xue par. 0067).
Specifically for claim 19, Sun discloses A terminal, comprising a processor, a memory, and a program or instructions stored in the memory and capable of running on the processor, wherein the program or instructions, when executed by the processor, causes the terminal to perform: (FIG. 4 is a block diagram of an exemplary UE 400 according to some aspects of the present disclosure. The UE 400 may be a UE 115 discussed above in FIG. 1. As shown, the UE 400 may include a processor 402, a memory 404, an sidelink communication module 408, a transceiver 410 including a modem subsystem 412 and a radio frequency (RF) unit 414, and one or more antennas 416; see Sun par. 0074 and Fig. 4).
Specifically for claim 20, Sun discloses A non-transitory readable storage medium, wherein the non-transitory readable storage medium stores a program or instructions, and the program or instructions, when executed by a processor of a terminal, causes the terminal to perform: (the memory 404 includes a non-transitory computer-readable medium. The memory 404 may store, or have recorded thereon, instructions 406. The instructions 406 may include instructions that, when executed by the processor 402, cause the processor 402 to perform the operations described herein with reference to the UEs 115 in connection with aspects of the present disclosure, for example, aspects of FIGS. 6-13 (see Sun par. 0076).
For claim 2, Sun discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein the first terminal has to-be-sent data (In some other instances, the UE 615a may include in the SCI 640 including a reservation or indication of the frequency interlace(s) 308 that are to be used by the UE 615a; see Sun par. 0097), and the method further comprises at least one of the following:
performing, by the first terminal, clear channel assessment (CCA) or listen before talk (LBT) sensing on a first resource (the UE 615a may schedule one or more transmission gap periods 604 in the COT 602. The gap periods 604 allow for a monitoring sidelink UE ( e.g., the UE 615c) to perform a category 2 (CAT2) LBT 632 prior to joining the COT 602; see Sun par. 0101);
selecting, by the first terminal, a resource in a resource unit in which the resource or candidate resource N is located;
selecting, by the first terminal, a resource within a first channel occupancy time (COT) range of the first terminal (to reduce the probability of multiple monitoring sidelink UEs in the neighborhood of the UE 615a from selecting the same unoccupied frequency interlace 308 in the COT 602 for sidelink transmission, a UE desiring to join the COT 602 may hash a random number and select an unoccupied frequency interlace 308 based on the hashed random number; see Sun par. 0100);
selecting, by the first terminal, a resource within a second COT range of the second terminal (when there are X number of available frequency interlaces 308 in the COT 602, the responding UE 615b may draw a random number between 0 and X-1 and select an unoccupied frequency interlace 308 based on the drawn random number; see Sun par. 0100);
selecting, by the first terminal, a resource within a union of a first COT of the first terminal and a second COT of the second terminal; or
selecting, by the first terminal, a resource within a larger one of a first COT of the first terminal and a second COT of the second terminal.
Examiner’s note: some or all of the optional limitations above have not been considered yet for rejection at this stage.
For claim 3, Sun discloses The method according to claim 2, wherein the first resource comprises at least one of the following:
a resource not comprising the resource or candidate resource N;
a remaining resource after the resource or candidate resource N is excluded (To provision for sidelink COT sharing, the UE 715a may additionally include sidelink COT sharing SCI 740 in the PSCCH communication 712. In some aspects, the SCI 740 may indicate remaining unused time resources (e.g., the period 706) in the COT 702 so that other sidelink UE(s) (e.g., a UE 715c) monitoring for the sidelink COT sharing SCI 740 may opportunistically join the COT 702 and utilize the remaining unused time period 706 in the COT 702 for sidelink transmission; see Sun par. 0106);
candidate resources; or a part of candidate resources (to reduce the probability of multiple monitoring sidelink UEs in the neighborhood of the UE 715a from selecting the same unoccupied time resources in the COT 602 for sidelink transmission, the scheme 700 may apply a contention time slot grid 709 in the unoccupied time period 706 for contention. The grid 709 may include a plurality of contention slots 708, where a monitoring sidelink UE may contend for resources in the unoccupied time period 706; see Sun par. 0107);
or
the selecting, by the first terminal, a resource in a resource unit in which the resource or candidate resource N is located comprises:
in a case that remaining resources in the resource unit in which the resource or candidate resource N is located meet a data transmission requirement of the first terminal, selecting, by the first terminal, the resource in the resource unit.
Examiner’s note: some or all of the optional limitations above have not been considered yet for rejection at this stage.
For claim 9, Sun does not explicitly disclose The method according to claim 2, wherein the method meets at least one of the following that: an SL terminal uses continuous resource selection in time domain; a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) feedback mechanism is disabled for an SL system; an SL uses blind retransmission; an SL channel busy rate (CBR) or channel occupancy rate (CR) is greater than or equal to a preset value; or a size of a data packet meets a first preset condition. Xue discloses The method according to claim 2, wherein the method meets at least one of the following that: an SL terminal uses continuous resource selection in time domain (Reserved resource region 403 may be defined in the form of a time/frequency domain rectangle as a product of a set of frequency domain resources and continuous time domain resources. The set of frequency domain resources may be implemented as a set of continuous subchannels where legacy waveforms are used, or may be a set of non-continuous interlaces where interlaced waveforms are used; see Xue par. 0076); a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) feedback mechanism is disabled for an SL system; an SL uses blind retransmission; an SL channel busy rate (CBR) or channel occupancy rate (CR) is greater than or equal to a preset value (The ECW-based resource selection may be implemented to overcome limitations with the CBR-based mechanism. When operating in a licensed band with Mode 2 based autonomous channel access, NR SL operations may rely on the CBR-based mechanism for congestion/contention control, as noted above. Thus, each NR SL UE, such as UEs 115a and 115b, measures CBR and then uses pre-configured mapping from the CBR to a CR limit in order to self-regulate channel access attempts to avoid heavy congestion/contention to the resources; see Xue par. 0117); or a size of a data packet meets a first preset condition. It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Xue's arrangement in Sun's invention to improve the robustness of channel access as channel occupancy time (COT) sharing has been proposed for NR SL communications over unlicensed band (see Xue par. 0067).
Examiner’s note: some or all of the optional limitations above have not been considered yet for rejection at this stage
For claim 10, Sun discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein the first terminal has to-be-sent data (In some other instances, the UE 615a may include in the SCI 640 including a reservation or indication of the frequency interlace(s) 308 that are to be used by the UE 615a; see Sun par. 0097), and the method further comprises at least one of the following:
excluding, by the first terminal, the resource or candidate resource N, and resources of A resource units after the resource or candidate resource N; or performing CCA or LBT sensing in B resource units after the resource or candidate resource N, wherein A and B are values greater than or equal to 1 (The UE 615a may determine locations of the gap periods 604 within the COT 602. For instance, the UE 615a may determine a gap periods 604 such that the relative time between the SCI 640 and the gap period 604 is long enough to allow a monitoring UE to process and decode the SCI 640. The UE 615a may indicate timing information of the gap period 604 in the SCI 640 to facilitate LBT at the monitoring UE. In this regard, the SCI 640 may include a start time of the gap period 604, an end time of the gap period 604, where the start time and/or the end time may be relative to a time location of the SCI 640 (e.g., in units of symbol time or any time units). For instance, the responding UE 615c may recover timing information associated with the gap periods 604 from the SCI 640. The UE 615c may perform an LBT 632 during a gap period 604 indicated by the SCI 640 and transmit the PSSCH/PSCCH communication 620 if the LBT 632 passes; see Sun par. 0101).
For claim 11, Sun discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein the first terminal has to-be-sent data (In some other instances, the UE 615a may include in the SCI 640 including a reservation or indication of the frequency interlace(s) 308 that are to be used by the UE 615a; see Sun par. 0097), and the method further comprises:
Sun does not explicitly disclose determining, by the first terminal based on remaining resources in a resource unit in which the resource or candidate resource N is located, whether to select a resource in the resource unit in which the resource or candidate resource N is located. Xue discloses determining, by the first terminal based on remaining resources in a resource unit in which the resource or candidate resource N is located, whether to select a resource in the resource unit in which the resource or candidate resource N is located ([0113] FIG. 10B is a communication flow diagram of communications between a MAC layer 1000 and a PHY layer 1001 of UE 115a configured to support sub-resource pools for transmission over unlicensed bands according to one or more aspects of the present disclosure. For an NR SL UE, such as UE 115a, its MAC layer 1000 can request its PHY layer 1001 to sense using the channel access type-aware configuration for sensing the sub-resource-pools. At 1009, MAC layer 1000 communicates the request to PHY layer 1001 to perform sensing using the sensing configurations for the one or more sub-resource pools identified according to channel access type of each resource of the transmission resource pool allocated with the resource selection window. At 1010, PHY layer 1001 uses the per sub-resource pool configuration to perform sensing at the sensing window of potentially available resources of the resource selection window. At 1011, the resource selection trigger prompts MAC layer 1000 to trigger PHY layer 1001 to identify candidate resources at 1012 over the identified sub-resource pools. PHY layer 1001 may then report the identified candidate resources identified using the per sub-resource pool sensing along with the indices that identify which sub-resource pool the identified candidate resource is located at 1013. With sub-resource-pool indices, MAC layer 1000 can conduct COT-aware resource selection, at 1014, according to one or more of the aspects described here and perform a sidelink transmission at 1015; see Xue par. 0113). It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Xue's arrangement in Sun's invention to improve the robustness of channel access as channel occupancy time (COT) sharing has been proposed for NR SL communications over unlicensed band (see Xue par. 0067).
For claim 13, Sun does not explicitly disclose The method according to claim 1, wherein the first terminal has to-be-sent data, and when selecting, indicating, or reserving a resource, the first terminal uses at least one of the following access modes: a type-1 channel access mode; a type-2 channel access mode; or data retransmitted by the first terminal is sent on a time domain resource corresponding to the resource or candidate resource N. Xue discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein the first terminal has to-be-sent data, and when selecting, indicating, or reserving a resource, the first terminal uses at least one of the following access modes: a type-1 channel access mode; a type-2 channel access mode (When operating autonomous channel access (e.g., Mode 2 in Rel 16) over a transmission resource pool in an unlicensed band that uses LBT access procedures, a NR SL UE, such as UEs 115a and 115b, can be configured to define multiple sub-resource pools as containers of sets of radio resources using different types of LBT, as noted above. In such operations, a transmission resource pool can have a sub-resource-pool that can be accessed with an abbreviated Type 2 LBT procedure when COT-sharing is allowed, and another sub-resource-pool using the full Type 1 LBT. For example, sub-resource pool 808, which includes the FDM-based sharing region 806 and the TDM-based sharing region 807, may be identified as accessible via the abbreviated Type 2 LBT procedure. UE 115a may further identify a sub-resource pool 809 that includes the remaining resources within the transmission resource pool of resource selection window 802 other than the resources within sub-resource pool 808. This sub-resource pool 809 may be identified as accessible via the full Type 1 LBT procedure; see Xue par. 0094); or data retransmitted by the first terminal is sent on a time domain resource corresponding to the resource or candidate resource N. It would have been obvious to the ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date to use Xue's arrangement in Sun's invention to improve the robustness of channel access as channel occupancy time (COT) sharing has been proposed for NR SL communications over unlicensed band (see Xue par. 0067).
Examiner’s note: some or all of the optional limitations above have not been considered yet for rejection at this stage.
For claim 14, Sun discloses The method according to claim 10, wherein the method meets at least one of the following that:
an SL terminal uses discontinuous resource selection in time domain;
an HARQ feedback mechanism is enabled for an SL (In some aspects, HARQ techniques may be applied to sidelink communication (e.g., D2@, V2V, V2X and/or C-V2X) to improve communication reliability. In some instances, a sidelink UE may be configured with a pool of PSSCH/PSCCH resources and a pool of PSFCH resources (for ACK/NACK transmissions). There may be a mapping between the pool of PSSCH/PSCCH resources and the pool of PSFCH resources. Each PSSCH/PSCCH transmission may be mapped to a PSFCH resource. In other words, there is a corresponding PSFCH resource for each PSSCH/PSCCH transmission. In some instances, the PSSCH/PSCCH transmission and the PSFCH transmission may not be adjacent to each other. Thus, COT sharing between PSSCH/PSCCH transmission and the PSFCH transmission may be difficult. However, it may be advantageous to configure the PSFCH resource to be within a COT of the PSSCH/PSCCH transmission to save LBT overhead or delay; see Sun par. 0121, 0123, 0126);
a physical sidelink feedback channel (PSFCH) period in an SL is set to a non-zero value; or
a size of a data packet meets a second preset condition.
Examiner’s note: some or all of the optional limitations above have not been considered yet for rejection at this stage.
For claim 15, Sun discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein the SL sensing comprises detecting a physical sidelink control channel (PSCCH) or detecting sidelink control information (SCI), wherein the PSCCH or the SCI carries information about one or more time domain resources and/or frequency domain resources, or information about one or more resources ([0113] In the scheme 800, the detectability of the SCI 740 may be different than in the scheme 700. As shown in FIG. 8, the UE 715c may detect the SCI 740 transmitted by the UE 715a as shown by the dashed link with the checkmark between the UE 715c and the UE 715a. The UE 715c may determine to join the COT 702 and transmit a PSSCH communication 820 and PSCCH communication 822 during the unoccupied period 706 using mechanisms as described in the scheme 700. The PSSCH communication 820 and PSCCH communication 822 may correspond to the PSSCH/PSCCH communication 720 of FIG. 7. The UE 715b may additionally repeat at least some of the COT sharing information transmitted by the UE 715a. In this regard, the UE 715c may transmit SCI 840 in the PSCCH communication 822 in addition to scheduling SCI for the PSSCH communication 820. The SCI 840 may include at least some COT sharing information (e.g., the unoccupied time period 706, the delay 707, the contention time slot grid 709, and/or the CAPC) recovered from the SCI 740. In some instances, the SCI 840 may have the same message structure as the SCI 740; see Sun par. 0113); and
the information about the time domain resource and/or frequency domain resource, or the information about the resource comprises at least one of the following:
a resource occupied by the second terminal;
a start position of a second COT of the second terminal;
an end position of a second COT of the second terminal; or
a length of a second COT of the second terminal (The UE 615a may determine locations of the gap periods 604 within the COT 602. For instance, the UE 615a may determine a gap periods 604 such that the relative time between the SCI 640 and the gap period 604 is long enough to allow a monitoring UE to process and decode the SCI 640. The UE 615a may indicate timing information of the gap period 604 in the SCI 640 to facilitate LBT at the monitoring UE. In this regard, the SCI 640 may include a start time of the gap period 604, an end time of the gap period 604, where the start time and/or the end time may be relative to a time location of the SCI 640 (e.g., in units of symbol time or any time units). For instance, the responding UE 615c may recover timing information associated with the gap periods 604 from the SCI 640. The UE 615c may perform an LBT 632 during a gap period 604 indicated by the SCI 640 and transmit the PSSCH/PSCCH communication 620 if the LBT 632 passes; see Sun par. 0101).
For claim 16, Sun discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein the method further comprises:
sending a PSCCH or SCI (In the illustrated example of FIG. 8, the UE 715d may not detect the SCI 740 transmitted by the UE 715a as shown by the dashed line with the cross symbol between the UE 715d and the UE 715a. However, the UE 715d may detect the SCI 840 transmitted by the UE 715c as shown by the dashed line with the checkmark between the UE 715d and the UE 715c. Thus, the UE 715d may also join the COT 702 and transmit the PSSCH/PSCCH communication 750 during the period 706 using mechanisms described in the scheme 700; see Sun par. 0114), wherein
the PSCCH or the SCI carries information about one or more time domain resources and/or frequency domain resources, or information about one or more resources ([0113] In the scheme 800, the detectability of the SCI 740 may be different than in the scheme 700. As shown in FIG. 8, the UE 715c may detect the SCI 740 transmitted by the UE 715a as shown by the dashed link with the checkmark between the UE 715c and the UE 715a. The UE 715c may determine to join the COT 702 and transmit a PSSCH communication 820 and PSCCH communication 822 during the unoccupied period 706 using mechanisms as described in the scheme 700. The PSSCH communication 820 and PSCCH communication 822 may correspond to the PSSCH/PSCCH communication 720 of FIG. 7. The UE 715b may additionally repeat at least some of the COT sharing information transmitted by the UE 715a. In this regard, the UE 715c may transmit SCI 840 in the PSCCH communication 822 in addition to scheduling SCI for the PSSCH communication 820. The SCI 840 may include at least some COT sharing information (e.g., the unoccupied time period 706, the delay 707, the contention time slot grid 709, and/or the CAPC) recovered from the SCI 740. In some instances, the SCI 840 may have the same message structure as the SCI 740; see Sun par. 0113); and
the information about the time domain resource and/or frequency domain resource, or the information about the resource comprises at least one of the following:
a resource occupied by the first terminal;
a start position of a first COT of the first terminal;
an end position of a first COT of the first terminal; or
a length of a first COT of the first terminal (The UE 615a may determine locations of the gap periods 604 within the COT 602. For instance, the UE 615a may determine a gap periods 604 such that the relative time between the SCI 640 and the gap period 604 is long enough to allow a monitoring UE to process and decode the SCI 640. The UE 615a may indicate timing information of the gap period 604 in the SCI 640 to facilitate LBT at the monitoring UE. In this regard, the SCI 640 may include a start time of the gap period 604, an end time of the gap period 604, where the start time and/or the end time may be relative to a time location of the SCI 640 (e.g., in units of symbol time or any time units). For instance, the responding UE 615c may recover timing information associated with the gap periods 604 from the SCI 640. The UE 615c may perform an LBT 632 during a gap period 604 indicated by the SCI 640 and transmit the PSSCH/PSCCH communication 620 if the LBT 632 passes; see Sun par. 0101).
For claim 17, Sun discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein the method further comprises: receiving data on at least one of the following resources: a resource indicated by a PSCCH or SCI; a resource reserved by a PSCCH or SCI; or a resource or candidate resource indicated by a PSCCH or SCI (To provision for sidelink COT sharing, the UE 615a may additionally include a sidelink COT sharing SCI 640 in the PSCCH communication 612. In some aspects, the SCI 640 may indicate remaining unused frequency interlaces 308 so that other sidelink UE(s) (e.g., a UE 615c) monitoring for the sidelink COT sharing SCI 640 may opportunistically join the COT 602 and utilize the remaining unused frequency interlaces 308 for sidelink transmission. In this regard, the UE 615a may include in the SCI 640, an indication of the remaining unused frequency interlace( s) 308. In the illustrated example of FIG. 6, the SCI 640 may indicate that the frequency interlace 308rci) to the frequency interlace 308rc9) are available for sharing. In some other instances, the UE 615a may include in the SCI 640 including a reservation or indication of the frequency interlace(s) 308 that are to be used by the UE 615a. In the illustrated example of FIG. 6, the SCI 640 may indicate that the frequency interlace 308rco) is in use or reserved by the UE 615a, and thus other UEs desiring to join the COT 602 may refrain from using the reserved frequency interlace 308rco); see Sun par. 0097).
For claim 18, Sun discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein the SL sensing comprises at least one of the following: detecting a PSCCH; detecting SCI; detecting a physical sidelink feedback channel (PSFCH) ([0125] Upon detecting the SCI 1040, the UE 1015b may receive and decode the PSSCH communication 1010 and transmit a PSFCH communication 1020 to the UE 1015a to provide a reception status of the PSSCH communication 1010. For instance, if the UE 1015b successfully decoded the sidelink data in the PSSCH communication 1010, the UE 615b may transmit an ACK in the PSFCH communication 1020. Conversely, if the UE 1015b fails to decode the sidelink data from the PSSCH communication 1010, the UE 1015b may transmit a NACK in the PSFCH communication 1020. The UE 1015b may perform a CAT2 LBT 1032 prior to transmitting the PSFCH communication 1020 based on the LBT type information. The PSFCH communication 1020 may be transmitted when the LBT 1032 is a pass. [0126] Referring to FIG. l0B, the UE 1015a may use substantially similar mechanisms as in the FIG. 10A to communicate sidelink data with HARQ and indicate resources and/or LBT type for the PSFCH communication 1020. However, FIG. 10B illustrates a scenario when PSFCH resources are in a different resource pool than the PSSCH communication 1010. As shown in FIG. 10B, the PSFCH resource 1046 is outside the COT 1002. Accordingly, the UE 1015a may transmit SCI 1044 in the PSCCH communication 1012 indicating a CAT4 LBT type for the LBT 1034 prior to the PSFCH communication 1020 as shown by the dashed arrow 1007. The SCI 1044 may also indicate the resource 1046 as shown by the dashed arrow 1006; see Sun par. 0125-0126); detecting an acknowledgment (ACK) or a negative acknowledgment (NACK) (In some aspects, the first UE may apply hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) techniques for sidelink data communication and may include in a scheduling SCI indicating an LBT type to be used by a receiving sidelink UE to transmitting a HARQ acknowledgement/negative-acknowledgement (ACK/NACK) for the sidelink data communication; see Sun par. 0038); detecting a wake-up signal (WUS); detecting a random access preamble sequence; detecting reference signal received power (RSRP); comparing RSRP with a threshold; CCA or LBT sensing (the BS is required to contend for channel access in the spectrum, for example, via clear channel assessment (CCA) and/or listen-before-talk (LBT) procedures; see Sun par. 0034); detecting a received signal strength indicator RSSI; detecting energy; (the LBT may be based on energy detection. For example, the LBT results in a pass when signal energy measured from the channel is below a threshold; see Sun par. 0057); detecting a predefined, preconfigured, or configured sequence; or detecting a predefined, preconfigured, or configured position;
or
the performing, by a first terminal, SL sensing comprises:
when the first terminal has to-be-sent data or to-be-received data, performing, by the first terminal, the SL sensing;
or
a position of the SL sensing is determined based on at least one of the following:
a time-frequency domain resource of a PSCCH configured in an SL resource pool;
a predefined, preconfigured, or configured time domain resource position and/or frequency domain resource position; or
a redefined, preconfigured, or configured resource position.
Examiner’s note: some or all of the optional limitations above have not been considered yet for rejection at this stage.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4-8 and 12 objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims and overcoming the 112b rejections above as well.
The following is an examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance: claims 4-9 and 12 would be allowable because the closest prior arts listed above either alone or in combination, fail to anticipate or render obvious, the claimed invention of “in a case that remaining resources in the resource unit in which the resource or candidate resource N is located do not meet a data transmission requirement of the first terminal, and resources within the first COT range of the first terminal meet the data transmission requirement, selecting a resource at a position corresponding to the resource or candidate resource N”, in combination with all other limitations in the claim(s) above as defined by applicant.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
-Sun et al. (US 2022/0248384).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to CHAE S LEE whose telephone number is (571)272-8236. The examiner can normally be reached 8:30AM - 5:00PM.
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/CHAE S LEE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2415