DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . This Office Action is in response to the submission filed 2026-05-14 (herein referred to as the Reply) where claim(s) 30-36, 46 are pending for consideration.
Election/Restrictions
Claim(s) 37-49 is/are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected invention, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the Reply.
Claim Objections
Claim(s) 36
the third message
the third target cell
There are/is no antecedent basis for the limitation(s). Proper introduction to the limitation is required (e.g., replacing the with a or an).
35 USC §103 - Claim Rejections
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 of this title, 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.
The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied 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 non-obviousness.
Claim(s) is/are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over KIM_990 (US20130189990) in view of KITAZOE_920 (US20100178920)
Claim(s) 30
KIM_990 teaches
at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program codes; the at least one memory and the computer program codes are configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the terminal device at least to: UE <FIG(s). 17; para. 0157-0163>.
upon a successful handover to a first target cell in an
transmit, to a first network device providing the first target cell, a first message comprising the information for assessing the validity of the
KIM_990 does not explicitly teach
a list that is ordered
However in a similar endeavor, KITAZOE_920 teaches
a list that is ordered The candidate cells in the list may be ordered, e.g., starting with a cell to which handover is most likely to succeed and concluding with a cell to which handover is least likely to succeed <para. 0032>.
Before the effective filing date of the claim invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in art to have modified the system/techniques disclosed by KIM_990 with the embodiment(s) disclosed by KITAZOE_920. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification in order to provide techniques for performing handover of a UE in a cell-to-base station manner in order to improve handover reliability <para. 0008>.
Claim(s) 32
KIM_990 teaches
wherein the at least one memory and the computer program codes are configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the terminal device to
determine the information for assessing a validity of the ordered list by: measuring, based on a measurement configuration configured by the first network device, at least one signal from at least one candidate cell to handover to; and generating the first message comprising a result for measuring the at least one signal. generating the first message comprising a result for measuring the at least one signal. Measurements results are transmitted by the UE after a handover. Measurement results can determine whether the UE needs to perform handover to a potential, target eNB. Measurement is executed in accordance with MDT configuration information the eNB previously sent to the UE <FIG(s). 13; para. 0006, 0079-0084, 0132-0134, 0149-0150>.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim(s) is/are indicated as having allowable subject matter and objected to.
Claim(s) 31, 33-36
The claim(s) is/are 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.
In addition to the explicit reasons given herein, allowability is also determined in view of the combination of references required for obviousness, the inter-relationship between other claimed limitations, and the claimed invention as a whole. Accordingly, amendments that do not incorporate the allowable claims into the base/intervening claims in its entirely, are not allowable. This includes amendments that incorporate the allowable claims into the base/intervening claims in part or in a non-narrowing manner (i.e., changing the scope of the subject matter).
Relevant Cited References
GUPTA - US20170086131 teaches determining whether the received system information of the target cell is valid includes determining if a validity tag included in a first system information message of the target cell matches with a validity tag included in a second system information message of the target cell however the reference does not teach sending the determination result nor teaches an ordered list of target cells (i.e., the reference is with respect to one target cell).
ISHII - US20220272589 teaches perform a handover to a target cell; to determine validity of the conditional handover configurations, based on whether or not the handover to the target cell is configured with a security configuration, and to use the security configuration to derive a second key set for establishing a second security context with a second wireless access node that serves the target cell. However, the reference does not teach sending the determination result nor teaches an ordered list of target cells (i.e., the reference is with respect to one target cell).
ISHII - US20220408323 teaches perform a handover to a target cell; to determine validity of the conditional handover configurations, based on whether or not the handover to the target cell is configured with a security configuration, and to use the security configuration to derive a second key set for establishing a second security context with a second wireless access node that serves the target cell. However, the reference does not teach sending the determination result nor teaches an ordered list of target cells (i.e., the reference is with respect to one target cell).
MCGILLY - US20110269466 teaches upon being commanded to perform handover to a target cell, the UE determines the validity of its stored system information for the target cell. If the UE determines that it has valid stored system information for the target cell, then the UE discards the dedicated radioResourceConfigCommon that was received in the handover command and applies the common configuration including radioResourceConfigCommon from the stored system information. Thus, in this embodiment, at the time a handover occurs, the UE uses the common configuration including radioResourceConfigCommon from the stored system information to access the target cell. However, the reference teaches actions that are performed BEFORE a handover occurs nor teaches an ordered list of target cells (i.e., the reference is with respect to one target cell).
KIM - US20130189990 teaches the controller keeps the channel measurement-related information, and if a handover is completed, the controller triggers an identifier, sends an RRC message including the identifier to a target eNB from the UE, and determines whether the target eNB requests the channel measurement-related information related to a serving eNB.
Examiner’s Notes
sets
Claim(s) 30, 34, 36
With regards to the phrase “a set of (elements)"
The proper grammatical description of a ‘set’ includes using a plural form of the set’s elements. For example, “a set of numbers,” “a set of configurations” uses a plural form of the term ‘numbers’ and ‘configurations’ respectively.
However, a set can be a singleton (i.e., a set containing a single member and/or having singular cardinality) and the proper grammatical description of said singleton would still conform to “a set of (elements)" where ‘elements’ is in plural form. That is, to use the phrase "set of element" (where ‘element' is in singular form) to describe a singleton set would be grammatically wrong.
Due to the above nuance, a broadest reasonable interpretation of a ‘set of…elements’ does not necessarily require the set to contain more than one element. That is, a ‘set’ can be construed to be a singleton. Consequently, prior art that discloses a single element would anticipate “a set of elements” since the single element can be considered a singleton set (regardless of whether the prior art suggests the possibility of more than one element). Contrast this with limitations such as “a set comprising more than one element” and/or other equivalent limitations that preclude the set from being a singleton set.
Similar comments apply to other phrases such as, but not limited to: “a list of (elements),” “a grouping of (elements),” “a number of (elements),” “a selection of (elements),” and “an arrangement of (elements).”
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ANDRE TACDIRAN whose telephone number is 571-272-1717. The examiner can normally be reached on M-TH, 10-5PM EST. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jeffrey Rutkowski can be reached on 571-270-1215. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ANDRE TACDIRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2415
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