DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present U.S. non-provisional application is being examined under the first-inventor-to-file provisions of the AIA . The present U.S. non-provisional application, filed on November 21, 2023, is the U.S. national stage of an international PCT application, filed on June 3, 2022, and claims benefit to U.S. provisional applications, filed on June 17, 2021 and June 4, 2021.
Response to Amendment
This Office action is responsive to the amendment and arguments on February 12, 2026. Claims 1, 16, 29 and 38 were amended. Claims 1-18, 29 and 38 are pending for consideration in the present U.S. non-provisional application.
Response to Arguments
The arguments (page 6) directed to the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 112 have been considered. The arguments are directed to the amendment, and considered as sufficient to overcome the rejections. However, the amendment raises new indefiniteness rejections. Accordingly, the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 112 are revised.
The arguments (pages 7-10) directed to the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 103 have been considered. The arguments are directed to the amendment, but considered as not sufficient to overcome the rejections. The arguments indicate that Shah at paragraphs [0203] and [0204] does not describe the indication may indicate that the monitoring period should not be monitored. However, Shah at paragraphs [0216] and [0226] provides sufficient prior art disclosure and suggestions for the indication via description of terminating the monitoring period when an explicit indication is received. Accordingly, the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 103 are maintained.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 14 would be considered as allowable if rewritten into independent form to include all of the limitations of the respective base claim and any intervening claims, and if made to overcome the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 112 set forth in this Office action. The claimed invention is neither anticipated by the prior art of record, nor considered as obvious in view thereof to a person having ordinary skill in the art.
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 1-13, 15-18, 29 and 38 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as unpatentable over Kone (US 2011/0292852 A1) in view of Shah et al. (US 2022/0264616 A1).
1. A method performed by a user equipment (UE) for eliminating or reducing a monitoring period for retransmission associated to Discontinuous Reception (DRX) (Kone, FIG. 2), the method comprising:
receiving, from a network node, an indication of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], “…Just as in the variation described above, the runtime of the drx-RetransmissionTimer may be set according to a configuration signaled by gNB via RRC, MAC CE or DCI, for instance, so as to ensure a monitoring period covering configured retransmissions. As the retransmission timer is per HARQ process, it may be stopped when the UE 100 successfully decodes the received data.”), wherein the indication may indicate that the monitoring period should not be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0216], [0226], “For instance, the monitoring period may be terminated when an explicit indication to stop the timer is received. This may be performed via MAC CE upon reception of the last retransmission of the DL or transmission of UL data, for instance…”);
determining, based on the indication, whether to start a retransmission timer (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], “In this variation of the embodiment, the UE 100 starts the drx-RetransmissionTimer after decoding the data transmitted in a first transmission. As can be seen in FIG. 16, the drx-InactivityTimer is initiated after reception of DCI for the first transmission, in accordance with a configured DRX procedure. Further, when the corresponding DL data is received and decoded, the drx-RetransmissionTimer is initiated when an error has occurred in decoding the DL data…” Id.); and
starting the retransmission timer upon determining that the retransmission timer should be started (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], “In this variation of the embodiment, the UE 100 starts the drx-RetransmissionTimer after decoding the data transmitted in a first transmission. As can be seen in FIG. 16, the drx-InactivityTimer is initiated after reception of DCI for the first transmission, in accordance with a configured DRX procedure. Further, when the corresponding DL data is received and decoded, the drx-RetransmissionTimer is initiated when an error has occurred in decoding the DL data…” Id.)
Kone may not seem to describe the identical claimed invention, however in the same field of endeavor, Shah et al. provides prior art disclosure for the claimed invention, such as receiving, from a network node, an indication of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.) The prior art disclosure and suggestions of Shah et al. are for reasons of facilitating improved procedures for UE power saving (Shah, para. [0005], “One non-limiting and exemplary embodiment facilitates providing improved procedures for facilitating to save UE power, including procedures involving monitoring of a downlink control channel.”) In view of the prior art of record, the claimed invention 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, for reasons of facilitating improved procedures for UE power saving.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein the retransmission timer is associated with at least one timer of a plurality of DRX retransmission timers (Shah, paras. [0204], [0240], “…Note that different HARQ processes may be configured independently with the number of blind retransmissions and DRX timer values (drx-InactivityTimer and drx-RetransmissionTimer, for instance). The dynamic value of blind retransmissions and DRX timers can be configured, for instance, via DCI signaling.”)
3. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving, from the network node, the indication of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE comprises: receiving a maximum number of retransmissions (Shah, paras. [0236], [0240], “In a further embodiment, gNB 200 transmits a duration indicator indicating the duration of the monitoring period. For instance, the duration of the monitoring period may be indicated as a runtime of a dedicated timer. Further, gNB 200 transmits a retransmission indicator indicating the number of retransmissions to the UE 100…”)
4. The method of claim 1, further comprising limiting a number of times the UE starts or restarts the retransmission timer (Shah, paras. [0203], [0264], “…According to a first variation, the drx-RetransmissionTimer is disabled such that the UE 100 does not start or restart drx-RetransmissionTimer upon receiving a retransmission. Instead, drx-InactivityTimer is initiated each time a transmission or retransmission is received. Details of the procedure are described with reference to FIGS. 24 and 25.”)
5. The method of claim 1, wherein the indication is received separately for an uplink and a downlink (Shah, paras. [0240], [0329], “…Note that the term drx-RetransmissionTimer used in the present disclosure may refer to a drx-RetransmissionTimerDL for retransmission of downlink data or to drx-RetransmissionTimerUL for retransmission of uplink data. Further, the term drx-HARQ-RTT-Timer used in the present disclosure may refer to a drx-HARQ-RTT-TimerDL or a HARQ-RTT-TimerUL.”)
6. The method of claim 1, further comprising skipping a Negative Acknowledgement (NACK) transmission based on the indication (Shah, paras. [0167], [0240], “In order to ensure fast and reliable transmission of data, retransmissions may be sent without having received any feedback from the UE. That is, the UE may not transmit a NACK to gNB in a case where the received data could not be decoded successfully. Instead, gNB may retransmit the data for a configured number of times…”)
7. The method of claim 1, wherein the indication comprises a maximum monitoring time, the method further comprising stopping the retransmission timer after the maximum monitoring time has expired (Shah, paras. [0204], [0210], “…Although the drx-RetransmissionTimer is terminated once the DL data could be decoded successfully, the present disclosure is not limited thereto, and said timer could expire after its configured runtime.”)
8. The method of claim 1, wherein determining whether to start a retransmission timer is further based on a battery status of a battery associated with the UE (Kone, paras. [0006], [0042], “…In cases of using the DRX functionality, whenever a new DRX cycle begins, an On Duration Timer is started for awaking the UE to monitor the PDCCH until the On Duration Timer expires. In addition, when a DRX Inactivity Timer or a DRX Retransmission Timer is started, the UE also monitors the PDCCH. […] According to the process 60, after receiving the battery power status BS from the UE, the network changes the configuration Config1 to the configuration Config2 according to the battery power status BS. The configuration Config2 has a longer DRX cycle than the configuration Config1 for the UE in an idle mode…”)
9. The method of claim 1, wherein the indication is received in at least one of Radio Resource Control (RRC) signaling, Layer 1 signaling, Layer 2 signaling, Downlink Control Information (DCI) in a Physical Dedicated Control Channel (PDCCH), and a Medium Access Control-Control Element (MAC-CE) (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], “…Just as in the variation described above, the runtime of the drx-RetransmissionTimer may be set according to a configuration signaled by gNB via RRC, MAC CE or DCI, for instance, so as to ensure a monitoring period covering configured retransmissions. As the retransmission timer is per HARQ process, it may be stopped when the UE 100 successfully decodes the received data.” Id.)
10. The method of claim 1, wherein the indication comprises information indicating whether the retransmission timer should be used (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.)
11. The method of claim 1, wherein the indication comprises an array of values associated with a maximum number of retransmissions and an index pointing to a value in the array (Shah, paras. [0204], [0312], “…FIG. 30 schematically illustrates a MAC Control Element, CE, indicating a number of blind retransmissions according to an embodiment. For example, a field D.sub.1 of the MAC CE may indicate the number of blind retransmissions, wherein if D.sub.1 is set to “1,” may indicate that the number of blind retransmissions is i. For example, D.sub.1 is associated with one blind retransmission, D.sub.2 with two blind retransmissions, D.sub.3 with three blind retransmissions, and so on. However, the present disclosure is not limited to one byte indicating up to seven retransmissions, and a larger number of blind retransmissions may be configured by MAC CE.”)
12. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving, from the network node, the indication of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE comprises: receiving the indication in each PDCCH indicating whether the retransmission timer should be started (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id. It is noted that a person having ordinary skill in the art would understand that downlink control information, DCI, is received in a physical downlink control channel, PDCCH.)
13. The method of claim 1 further comprising: receiving, from the network node, a second indication indicating whether the UE should stop the retransmission timer; and stopping the retransmission timer upon receiving the second indication indicating that the UE should stop the retransmission timer (Shah, paras. [0216], [0226], “…In a second variation, the drx-InactivityTimer is initiated when DCI for a first transmission of DL data is received. Further, the monitoring period is initiated by starting the drx-RetransmissionTimer when the data received in the first transmission has been decoded. Further, the drx-RetransmissionTimer is stopped upon reception of an implicit or explicit indication. This procedure is illustrated in FIGS. 20 and 21.” Id.)
15. The method of claim 1, wherein determining, based on the indication, whether to start the retransmission timer comprises: determining whether to start the retransmission timer based on at least one of a plurality of channel quality metrics (Shah, paras. [0302], [0303], “…In other words, UE 100 keeps track of the number of received blind retransmissions and determines whether the number of received blind retransmissions is equal to the number of blind retransmissions indicated by the indicator received in step S900. If the number of blind retransmissions is over (Yes in step S940), the method ends. In a case where the number of blind retransmissions is not over (No in step S940) it is continued to step S950. In step [S950], the drx-RetransmissionTimer is restarted (after decoding of the DL data received via the PDSCH) and it is continued to step S910.”)
16. A method performed by a network node for facilitating a user equipment (UE) to eliminate or reduce a monitoring period for retransmission associated to Discontinuous Reception (DRX) (Kone, FIG. 2, Id.), the method comprising:
determining whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.); and
transmitting, to the UE, an indication based on a determination of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.), wherein the indication may indicate that the monitoring period should not be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0216], [0226], Id.),
wherein a retransmission timer is started based on the indication if the indication indicates that that the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id. cf. Claim 1).
Kone may not seem to describe the identical claimed invention, however in the same field of endeavor, Shah et al. provides prior art disclosure for the claimed invention, such as transmitting, to the UE, an indication based on a determination of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.) The prior art disclosure and suggestions of Shah et al. are for reasons of facilitating improved procedures for UE power saving (Shah, para. [0005], Id.) In view of the prior art of record, the claimed invention 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, for reasons of facilitating improved procedures for UE power saving.
17. The method of claim 16, wherein the retransmission timer is associated with at least one timer of a plurality of DRX retransmission timers (Shah, paras. [0204], [0240], Id. cf. Claim 2).
18. The method of claim 16, wherein transmitting, to the UE, the indication based on the determination of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE comprises: transmitting a maximum number of retransmissions (Shah, paras. [0236], [0240], Id. cf. Claim 3).
29. A user equipment (UE) for eliminating or reducing a monitoring period for retransmission associated to Discontinuous Reception (DRX) (Kone, FIG. 2, Id.), comprising: a transceiver, a processor, and a memory, said memory containing instructions executable by the processor whereby the UE is operative (Kone, FIG. 2, Id.) to:
receive, from a network node, an indication of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.), wherein the indication may indicate that the monitoring period should not be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0216], [0226], Id.);
determine, based on the indication, whether to start a retransmission timer (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.); and
start the retransmission timer upon determining that the retransmission timer should be started (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id. cf. Claim 1).
Kone may not seem to describe the identical claimed invention, however in the same field of endeavor, Shah et al. provides prior art disclosure for the claimed invention, such as receive, from a network node, an indication of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.) The prior art disclosure and suggestions of Shah et al. are for reasons of facilitating improved procedures for UE power saving (Shah, para. [0005], Id.) In view of the prior art of record, the claimed invention 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, for reasons of facilitating improved procedures for UE power saving.
38. A network node for facilitating a user equipment (UE) to eliminate or reduce a monitoring period for retransmission associated to Discontinuous Reception (DRX) (Kone, FIG. 2, Id.), comprising: a transceiver, a processor and a memory, said memory containing instructions executable by the processor whereby the network node is operative (Kone, FIG. 2, Id.) to:
determine whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.); and
transmit, to the UE, an indication based on a determination of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.), wherein the indication may indicate that the monitoring period should not be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0216], [0226], Id.),
wherein a retransmission timer is started based on the indication if the indication indicates that that the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id. cf. Claim 1).
Kone may not seem to describe the identical claimed invention, however in the same field of endeavor, Shah et al. provides prior art disclosure for the claimed invention, such as transmit, to the UE, an indication based on a determination of whether the monitoring period should be monitored by the UE (Shah, paras. [0203], [0204], Id.) The prior art disclosure and suggestions of Shah et al. are for reasons of facilitating improved procedures for UE power saving (Shah, para. [0005], Id.) In view of the prior art of record, the claimed invention 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, for reasons of facilitating improved procedures for UE power saving.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraph of 35 U.S.C. 112 that forms the basis for all indefiniteness rejections set forth in this Office action:
(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.
Claims 1-18, 29 and 38 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite because they fail to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
Claim 1 recites “wherein the indication may indicate that the monitoring period should not be monitored by the UE” (ll. 5-6) whereas it is not clear whether said language limits the claim scope because “may indicate” appears optional. Claim scope is not limited by claim language that suggests or makes optional but does not require steps to be performed. MPEP 2111.04. Claims 16, 29 and 38 contain the same deficiencies. Claims 2-15, 17 and 18 are dependent.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record (PTO-1449, PTO-892) and not relied upon is considered pertinent to the subject matter of the present U.S. non-provisional application.
Xue et al. (US 2021/0315046 A1) provides prior art disclosure considered as relevant to the subject matter of the claimed invention (Xue, Abstract, “A configuration method includes receiving, by a terminal device, configuration information from a network device, where the configuration information includes a first discontinuous reception (DRX) parameter and a second DRX parameter, and communicating, by the terminal device, with the network device on a first bandwidth part (BWP) using the first DRX parameter or on a second BWP using the second DRX parameter.”)
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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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/TIMOTHY J WEIDNER/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2476