3DETAILED 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 .
Response to Arguments/Amendments
Applicant's arguments filed 12/24/25 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Claim 1 is amended by merging original claims 4 and 5 into it. Similarly, claim 10 is amended by merging original claims 22 and 23 into it. Claims 1-3,6-11,13-15,18 and 20-21 are pending.
For claim 1, Applicant argues: “The Examiner alleged that D1 in view of Takeda teaches "determining a current synchronization signal raster corresponding to the synchronization signal according to the synchronization signal raster indication information." citing D1 at sections IV. B- IV.B.2, V-V.B, figure 19, such as p. 16, col.1, IV. B(1) and Takeda at para. [0034] (Office Action pp. 3-4). Applicant respectfully disagrees.” (p15, ) because:
a) First, Takeda discloses “a UE searches for a synchronization signal” PSS SSS “on a predetermined synchronization signal raster” (p15, 3rd full para) … and “though D1 may teach the network sending "synchronization signal indication information" to the UE for determining the synchronization signal through frame structure, Takeda discloses "the synchronization signal raster predetermined by the UE itself." Therefore, there is no motivation to combine D1 and Takeda to obtain the claimed "determining a current synchronization signal raster corresponding to the synchronization signal according to the synchronization signal raster indication information." (p15, last para extending to p16);
b) Secondly, D1 discloses "[t]he synchronization process is the first task the UE
undertakes when it is switched on. … The first step of these synchronization methods is called "coarse synchronization", which is computationally simple and allows a complexity reduction of the second step, called "refined synchronization"." See D1 at p16, col. 1, IV.B(1)). This indicates that after the UE powers on, it can achieve time and frequency synchronization through the NPSS synchronization signal, performing coarse synchronization first, followed by fine synchronization (p16, 2nd para);
c) Moreover, Applicant makes a lengthy arguements regarding Examiner’s rejection to original claim 4 and claim 5. For example, Applicant argues that synchronization signal is the PSS (p18, 1st para).
In response, Examiner respectfully disagrees:
a) D1 in view of Takeda is used to disclose the claim limitations of claim 1. However, Applicant hardly mentioned the primary reference D1, and focused on the arguments on the secondary reference Takeda. Applicant acknowledged that D1 “teach the network sending "synchronization signal indication information" to the UE for determining the synchronization signal through frame structure”. D1 does not use the phases ““the synchronization signal raster” to described synchronization signal but Takeda uses the phrase to the synchronization signal and the motivation of combining D1 and Takeda by replacing the synchronization signal indication information by D1 with the synchronization signal raster of Takeda to yield a predictable result of providing synchronization. Therefore, Applicant’s argument is not persuasive.
b) claim 1 recites “receiving the synchronization signal and synchronization signal raster indication information”. There are no limitations on when the synchronization signal is received and whether it is received periodically or not. Therefore, a citation on receiving a synchronization signal satisfies the claim limitation. Therefore, Applicant’s argument is not persuasive. Applicant may want to add more limitations to the claim to overcome the cited references.
c) First, D1 clearly discloses PSS in p8, 1st para, last para “… in LTE the cell ID information is shared between the primary synchronization signal (PSS) and the secondary synchronization signal (SSS). …”; second, p16, Section B, 1st para “… the downlink signals (i.e., NPSS and NSSS) require different dedicated processing blocks since they are used by the UE to achieve synchronization with the eNB. …”; note that NPSS is a special kind PSS with narrow band, which can be used to read on PSS, Therefore, Applicant’s arguments are not persuasive. Furthermore, because claim limitations of claims 4 and 5 are now merged into claim 1 with a term “or”, which makes many limitations optional, which makes many Applicant’s arguments unpersuasive.
Other Applicant’s arguments can be answered in a similar fashion. Overall, Applicant’s claim amendments and arguments do not place the current claims in condition for allowance.
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.
Claims 1-3, 6-11,13-15,18 and 20-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over D1 (NPL dated 3/14, 39 pages "A Tutorial on NB-loT Physical Layer Design", IEEE COMMUNICATIONS SURVEYS & TUTORIALS, IEEE, USA, vol. 22, no. 4, 11 September 2020 (2020-09-11)) in view of Takeda (US 20190281539 A1).
For claim 1, D1 discloses a method for determining a synchronization signal, performed by a user equipment (UE) (Fig. 1, UE) and comprising:
receiving the synchronization signal and synchronization signal indication information (p4-6, section II.A-C, figures 2, 4, 5, 7, "NB-loT framing system"; section IIl.A.1-4, figures 8-11, operation mode indication, such as p7, 1st col, 3rd para “the mapping of some channels and signals (e.g., NPBCH, NPSS and NSSS) remains unchanged as in in-band operation mode due to the constraints related to the synchronization procedure at the UE side …”, sections IV.B-IV.B.2, V-V.B, figure 19, such as p16, IV.B(1) “… The synchronization process is the first task the UE undertakes when it is switched
on. It consists of a physical synchronization in both time and frequency using the NPSS.”); and
determining a current synchronization signal corresponding to the synchronization signal according to the synchronization signal indication information (sections IV.B-IV.B.2, V-V.B, figure 19, such as p16, col. 1, IV.B(1) “… The synchronization process is the first task the UE undertakes when it is switched
on. It consists of a physical synchronization in both time and frequency using the NPSS.”; IV.B(1), 2nd para “In NB-IoT, the synchronization can be performed with a cross-correlation between the received signal and the known sequence of NPSS. In practice, it is preferable to perform an auto-correlation followed by an cross-correlation, such as suggested in [30]–[32]. The first step of these synchronization methods is called ‘coarse synchronization’, which is computationally simple and allows a complexity reduction of the second step, called ‘refined synchronization’.”);
wherein the synchronization signal indication information comprises at least one of: a PSS or NPSS (p16, Section B, 1st para “… the downlink signals (i.e., NPSS and NSSS) require different dedicated processing blocks since they are used by the UE to achieve synchronization with the eNB. …”);
wherein the synchronization signal indication information is the PSS (p8, 1st para, last para “… in LTE the cell ID information is shared between the primary synchronization signal (PSS) and the secondary synchronization signal (SSS). …” and p16, Section B, 1st para “… the downlink signals (i.e., NPSS and NSSS) require different dedicated processing blocks since they are used by the UE to achieve synchronization with the eNB. …”; note that NPSS is a special kind PSS with narrow band, which can be used to read on PSS), and
determining the current synchronization signal corresponding to the synchronization signal according to the synchronization signal indication information comprises:
generating individual candidate PSSs according to a generation rule of the PSS and individual first generation parameters (FIG. 6; or p26, 2nd col., 1st para of Section “H. Scheduling of NPDCCH”, “In NB-IoT, the eNB considers all downlink subframes as available for the transmission of the NPDSCH and the NPDCCH, except subframes used by NPBCH, NPSS, NSSS, SIB1-NB, and other SIBs-NB. However, according to 3GPP specifications, the NPDCCH transmissions can only be made in specific time intervals, called ”search spaces”.”);
determining a first generation parameter corresponding to a PSS obtained according to a correlation between the candidate PSSs and the PSS obtained (FIG. 8 and the associated text, such as “(p7, col. 2, the para under Fig. 8, “1) Narrowband Primary Synchronization Signal (NPSS): The NPSS is the first essential signal transmitted by the eNB. .... This signal is used by the UE to perform time and frequency synchronization. In other words, it allows the UE to find the beginning of the NB-IoT frame and remove the frequency offset due to its low-cost oscillator.”); and
determining the current synchronization signal corresponding to the synchronization signal according to the first generation parameter corresponding to the PSS obtained and a corresponding relationship between the individual first generation parameters and individual synchronization signal (Fig. 8 shows the generation parameters are frequency, time, NPSS/NB-IoT, CRS/LTE);
or
wherein the synchronization signal indication information is the NPSS (p7, col. 2, the para under Fig. 8, “1) Narrowband Primary Synchronization Signal (NPSS): The NPSS is the first essential signal transmitted by the eNB. It is based on a Zadoff-Chu (ZC) sequence [28], [29] that has a very good correlation property. This signal is used by the UE to perform time and frequency synchronization. In other words, it allows the UE to find the beginning of the NB-IoT frame and remove the frequency offset due to its low-cost oscillator.”), and
determining the current synchronization signal corresponding to the synchronization signal according to the synchronization signal indication information comprises:
generating individual candidate NPSSs according to a generation rule of the NPSS and individual second generation parameters (p7, col. 2, the para under Fig. 8, “1) Narrowband Primary Synchronization Signal (NPSS): The NPSS is the first essential signal transmitted by the eNB. It is based on a Zadoff-Chu (ZC) sequence [28], [29] that has a very good correlation property. This signal is used by the UE to perform time and frequency synchronization. In other words, it allows the UE to find the beginning of the NB-IoT frame and remove the frequency offset due to its low-cost oscillator.”);
determining a second generation parameter corresponding to an NPSS obtained according to a correlation between the candidate NPSSs and the NPSS obtained (FIG. 8 and the associated text, such as “(p7, col. 2, the para under Fig. 8, “1) Narrowband Primary Synchronization Signal (NPSS): The NPSS is the first essential signal transmitted by the eNB. .... This signal is used by the UE to perform time and frequency synchronization. In other words, it allows the UE to find the beginning of the NB-IoT frame and remove the frequency offset due to its low-cost oscillator.”); and
determining the current synchronization signal corresponding to the synchronization signal according to the second generation parameter corresponding to the NPSS obtained, and a corresponding relationship between individual the second generation parameters and individual synchronization signal (FIG. 3 and the associated text, such as p7, col. 2, the para under Fig. 8, “1).
D1 does not use a phrase “the synchronization signal raster” for the synchronization signal indication information. However, Takeda teaches that a synchronization signal raster provides the synchronization signal indication information (“[0034] … a UE searches for a synchronization signal (PSS (Primary Synchronization Signal), SSS (Secondary Synchronization Signal), etc.) on a predetermined synchronization signal raster. For example, the synchronization signal raster indicates frequency resources configured to enable the synchronization signal to be mapped at predetermined frequency intervals, and may be defined by specifications. After detecting one or a plurality of synchronization signals, the UE interprets a broadcast channel (PBCH: Physical Broadcast Channel), and recognizes the cell”; note that the signal raster is similar to a framing of D1, such as presented in FIGs. 4, 5, 7 and 8). OOSA would have been motivated to replace the synchronization signal indication information by D1 with the synchronization signal raster of Takeda to yield a predictable result of providing synchronization signal information according to MPEP 2143(B).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to OOSA before the effective filing date of the application to combine D1 and Takeda for the benefit of providing synchronization signal information ([0034] of Takeda).
Claim 10 is rejected because it is a claim of a method that is performed by the side corresponding network device (instead of UE) and has the same subject matter as claim 1.
Claim 18 is rejected because it is a claim of a generic communication device that performs the method of claim 1 and has the same subject matter as claim 1.
As to claims 2, 11 and 20, D1 in view Takeda discloses 1, 10 and 18, D1 further discloses: wherein the synchronization signal raster indication information further comprises at least one of: a physical broadcast channel (PBCH), a narrow band physical broadcast channel (NPBCH) (FIG. 6; or p26, 2nd col., 1st para of Section “H. Scheduling of NPDCCH”, “In NB-IoT, the eNB considers all downlink subframes as available for the transmission of the NPDSCH and the NPDCCH, except subframes used by NPBCH, NPSS, NSSS, SIB1-NB, and other SIBs-NB), a master information block (MIB), a master information block for narrow band Internet of Things (MIB-NB) or a system information block (SIB) (p4, last 2 paras “ This is a carrier to be used for only data exchange (i.e., NPSS, NSSS and master/system information blocks are not transmitted over such a carrier).”).
As to claims 3 and 21, D1 in view Takeda discloses 2 and 20, D1 further discloses:
wherein the synchronization signal raster indication information is one of the MIB, the MIB-NB or the SIB (page 16, Section V, 2nd para “Before being able to exchange data with the network, the NB-IoT UE has to acquire a set of essential information like the MIB-NB, SIB1-NB, SIB2-NB and other SIBs-NB (if indicated).”), and determining the current synchronization signal raster corresponding to the synchronization signal according to the synchronization signal raster indication information (as disclosed by the parent claims) comprises:
determining the current synchronization signal raster corresponding to the synchronization signal according to a value of a specified bit in the synchronization signal raster indication information (p9, col. 2, “ab-Enabled-r13: One bit indicating whether access class barring is applied or not”).
As to claim 6, D1 in view Takeda discloses claim 2, D1 further discloses:
wherein the synchronization signal raster indication information is one of the PBCH or the NPBCH, and determining the current synchronization signal raster corresponding to the synchronization signal according to the synchronization signal raster indication information (as disclosed by the parent claim) comprises:
determining the current synchronization signal raster corresponding to the synchronization signal according to a scrambling sequence corresponding to one of a PBCH or an NPBCH obtained and a corresponding relationship between individual scrambling sequences and individual synchronization signal rasters (FIG. 3 and the associated text, such as p7, col. 2, the para under Fig. 8, “1) Narrowband Primary Synchronization Signal (NPSS): The NPSS is the first essential signal transmitted by the eNB. It is based on a Zadoff-Chu (ZC) sequence [28], [29] that has a very good correlation property. This signal is used by the UE to perform time and frequency synchronization. In other words, it allows the UE to find the beginning of the NB-IoT frame and remove the frequency offset due to its low-cost oscillator.” and “[0034] … After detecting one or a plurality of synchronization signals, the UE interprets a broadcast channel (PBCH: Physical Broadcast Channel), and recognizes the cell”).
As to claim 7, D1 in view Takeda discloses claim 2, D1 further discloses:
wherein the synchronization signal raster indication information is one of the PBCH or the NPBCH, and determining the current synchronization signal raster corresponding to the synchronization signal according to the synchronization signal raster indication information (as disclosed by the parent claim) comprises:
determining the current synchronization signal raster corresponding to the synchronization signal according to a third generation parameter corresponding to one of a PBCH or an NPBCH obtained and a corresponding relationship between individual third generation parameters and individual synchronization signal rasters (FIG. 3 and the associated text, such as p7, col. 2, the para under Fig. 8, “1) Narrowband Primary Synchronization Signal (NPSS): The NPSS is the first essential signal transmitted by the eNB. It is based on a Zadoff-Chu (ZC) sequence [28], [29] that has a very good correlation property. This signal is used by the UE to perform time and frequency synchronization. In other words, it allows the UE to find the beginning of the NB-IoT frame and remove the frequency offset due to its low-cost oscillator.” and “[0034] … After detecting one or a plurality of synchronization signals, the UE interprets a broadcast channel (PBCH: Physical Broadcast Channel), and recognizes the cell”).
As to claim 8, D1 in view Takeda discloses claim 7, D1 further discloses:
generating individual candidate scrambling sequences corresponding to the one of the PBCH or the NPBCH according to a generation rule of the scrambling sequence and the individual third generation parameters; and obtaining the one of the PBCH or the NPBCH based on the candidate scrambling sequences (FIG. 8 and the associated text, such as p7, col. 2, the para under Fig. 8, “1) Narrowband Primary Synchronization Signal (NPSS): The NPSS is the first essential signal transmitted by the eNB. It is based on a Zadoff-Chu (ZC) sequence [28], [29] that has a very good correlation property. This signal is used by the UE to perform time and frequency synchronization. In other words, it allows the UE to find the beginning of the NB-IoT frame and remove the frequency offset due to its low-cost oscillator.” and FIG. 11 and the associated text, such as p9, col. 1, “4) Narrowband Physical Broadcast Channel (NPBCH): The NPBCH is the first essential channel for the NB-IoT UE modules as it is the first to be decoded. …”; note that Fig. 11 shows NPBCH is generated, NPBCH in the red block).
As to claim 9, D1 in view Takeda discloses claim 1, D1 further discloses: determining the current synchronization signal raster corresponding to the synchronization signal according to a protocol regulation (FIG. 8 “Mapping of NPSS with one antenna port for NB-IoT and four antenna ports for LTE.”; note that NB-LoT and LTE are protocol regulations).
As to claim 13, D1 in view Takeda discloses claim 10, D1 further discloses:
wherein the synchronization signal raster indication information is the PSS, and generating the synchronization signal raster indication information based on the specified (as disclosed by the parent claim) rule comprises:
generating at least one PSS according to a generation rule of the PSS and at least one first generation parameter (Fig. 8 shows a raster in view of the parent claims, NPSS is generated at least one of the generation parameters are frequency, time, NPSS/NB-IoT, CRS/LTE).
As to claim 14, D1 in view Takeda discloses claim 10, D1 further discloses:
wherein the synchronization signal raster indication information is the NPSS, and generating the synchronization signal raster indication information based on the specified rule (as disclosed by the parent claim) comprises:
generating at least one NPSS according to a generation rule of the NPSS and at least one second generation parameter set (FIG. 8 shows NPSS is depend on at least on time and frequency “Mapping of NPSS with one antenna port for NB-IoT and four antenna ports for LTE.”; note that NB-LoT and LTE are protocol regulations).
As to claim 15, D1 in view Takeda discloses claim 11, D1 further discloses:
wherein the synchronization signal raster indication information is one of the PBCH or the NPBCH, and generating the synchronization signal raster indication information based on the specified rule (as disclosed by the parent claim) comprises:
generating at least one scrambling sequence corresponding to the one of the PBCH or the NPBCH according to a generation rule of the scrambling sequence corresponding to the one of the PBCH or the NPBCH and at least one third generation parameter (FIG. 11 and the associated text, such as p9, col. 1, “4) Narrowband Physical Broadcast Channel (NPBCH): The NPBCH is the first essential channel for the NB-IoT UE modules as it is the first to be decoded. …”; note that Fig. 11 shows NPBCH is generated, NPBCH in the red block).
Conclusion
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.
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/JIANYE WU/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2462