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 .
Notice for all Patent Application as subject to AIA
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.
RESPONSE TO PRE-APPEAL BRIEF
Claims 1-17 are pending and remain for further examination.
REOPEN PROSECUTION
Applicant's request for reconsideration of the finality of the rejection of the last Office Action mailed on 11/18/2025 filed with Pre-Appeal Brief has been considered. Applicant’s arguments filed on 12/26/2025, with respect to claims 1-17 have been fully considered and are persuasive; therefore, the finality of the rejection of the last Office Action is withdrawn.
The new grounds of rejection
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1-17 filed on December 26, 2025 have been fully considered but they are deemed to be persuasive for the claims 1-17; therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn and further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of new references.
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.
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.
Claims 1-17 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being un-patentable over Boucadair et al (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2022/0311734 A1) in view of Eastlake, III (U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2024/0236214 A1).
As to claim 1, Boucadair et al teach a method of NAT64 translation (figure 1, pars. 0010 & 0014) comprising: discovering NAT64-Prefix by an IPv6 host (figure 1, pars. 0018, 0022, selecting the prefix used in nat64 by the terminal connected to the ipv6 network); generating IPv4 connectivity by a customer-side translator (CLAT) device according to NAT64-Prefix (pars. 0011, 0020, 0030-0035, 0039-0048, selecting ipv4 connectivity using clat associated with the prefix used in nat64); notifying the IPv4 connectivity to a private IPv4 (v4p) host (pars. 0051-0052, 0057-0058, 0060, 0064-0068, confirming ipv4 connectivity with the server connected to the ipv4 network); notifying IPv4 header configuration to the v4p host by the CLAT device (pars. 0051-0052, 0057-0058, updating header in the conversion of the packet).
However, Boucadair et al do not disclose that the IPv4 header configuration comprising a header length and also do not teach that increasing the header length by the v4p host.
Eastlake, III discloses that the IPv4 header configuration comprising a header length (figure 5, pars. 0048 & 0052), and also teaches that increasing the header length by the v4p host (figure 6, pars. 0066 &0068).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to incorporate the teaching of Eastlake, III as stated above with the method of NAT64 translation of Boucadair et al for increasing the header length by the v4p host because it would have improved efficiency, throughput, and system utilization of the NAT64 translation system and also increased processing speed of data packet conversion of the NAT64 translation system.
As to claim 2, Eastlake, III teaches that the header length is increased to 48 bytes (pars. 0068-0072).
As to claim 3, Boucadair et al teach that further comprising waking up IPv6 only interface of the CLAT device (pars. 0042-0043, 0058, figure 5, pars. 0157-0158).
As to claim 4, Boucadair et al teach that further comprising: generating an IPv4 packet by the v4p host, wherein the IPv4 packet comprising an IPv4 header with dummy options and a payload; sending the IPv4 packet from the v4p host to the CLAT device; translating the IPv4 header with the dummy option, by the CLAT device, to an IPv6 header to generate an IPv6 packet; and sending the IPv6 packet, by the CLAT device, to an IPv6 network (figure 1, pars. 0011-0018, 0032, 0035, 0045, 0051, 0057-0067).
As to claims 5-6, Boucadair et al teach that the IPv6 packet comprises the IPv6 header and the payload (figures 6-7, pars. 0181-0188) and the IPv4 packet further comprises a checksum-neutral address (pars. 0052, 0058, 0195).
As to claims 7-9, Boucadair et al teach that further comprising: generating an IPv4 packet by the v4p host, the IPv4 packet comprising an IPv4 header with dummy options and a payload; sending the IPv4 packet from the v4p host to the CLAT device; translating the IPv4 header and the dummy option to an IPv6 header and a fragmentation header, by the CLAT device, to generate an IPv6 packet; and sending the IPv6 packet, by the CLAT device, to an IPv6 network (pars. 0051, 0058, 0157-0158, figures 9-10, pars. 0232-0235), wherein the IPv6 packet comprises the IPv6 header, the fragmentation header and the payload (figures 6-7, pars. 0181-0188) and wherein the IPv6 packet further comprises a checksum-neutral address (pars. 0052, 0058, 0195).
As to claims 10-11, Boucadair et al teach that further comprising: receiving an IPv6 packet by the CLAT device from an IPv6 network; translating an IPv6 header of the IPv6 packet to an IPv4 header to generate an IPv4 packet; and sending the IPv4 packet from the CLAT device to the v4p host (figure 1. Pars. 0011-0018), wherein the IPv6 packet comprises a checksum-neutral address (pars. 0052, 0058, 0195).
As to claims 12-14, they are also rejected for the same reasons set forth to rejecting claims 1 and 4-6 above, since claims 12-14 do not teach or define any new limitations than above rejected claims 1 and 4-6.
As to claims 15-17, they are also rejected for the same reasons set forth to rejecting claims 1 and 7-9 above, since claims 15-17 do not teach or define any new limitations than above rejected claims 1 and 7-9.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to the rejection(s) of claims 1-17 under 102 rejection filed on December 26, 2025 have been fully considered but they are deemed to be moot in a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of new reference. The examiner has attempted to answer (response) to the remarks (arguments) in the body of the Office Action.
Additional References
The examiner as of general interest cites the following references.
a. Kuppannan et al, U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2019/0007314 A1.
b. Shen et al, U.S. Patent No. 12,068,886 B2.
c. Chakravarthy Dandangi et al, U.S. Patent No. 10,880,264 B1.
Content Information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Bharat Barot whose telephone number is (571)272-3979. The examiner can normally be reached on 7:00AM-3:30PM.
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/BHARAT BAROT/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2453
August 11, 2026
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