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 Objections
Claim(s) 1 and 8 is/are objected because of the following informalities (or vagueness): Said claims recite "transmit a first frame in the first link based on a backoff counter based on the backoff operation being 0 and a transmission …" The underlined feature with “being 0” is unclear if the back operation has not been done or the backoff operation contains a value of 0 and indicates no wait. Appropriate correction or rephrase is required.
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.
Claim(s) 1-2 and 8-9 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Naribole et al. (US 2021/0076398, “Naribole”) in view of Ko et al. (US 2024/0422706, “Ko”).
Examiner’s note: in what follows, references are drawn to Naribole unless otherwise mentioned.
Naribole comprises the following features:
With respect to independent claims:
Regarding claim 1, a method of a first station (STA) associated with a multi-link device (MLD),the method comprising:
performing a backoff operation in a first link of non-simultaneous transmit and receive (NSTR) link pair ([0110 and Fig. 11A] “FIGS. 11A-11B illustrate the aggregated link backoff procedure performed by the multi-link station, according to some embodiments of the present disclosure.” See Fig. 11A link B. The backoff procedure begins after ‘BUSY’., and [0101 and Fig. 9] “FIG. 9 illustrates TXOP aggregation being performed on a pair of idle links” Note that the claimed NSTR link pair will be discussed in view of Ko.); and
transmitting a first frame in the first link based on a backoff counter based on the backoff operation being 0 and a transmission opportunity (TXOP) being obtained in a second link belonging to the NSTR link pair ([0111] “At time t1, the backoff countdown on link B reaches zero, and the backoff countdown on link B is less than the aggregation threshold. Therefore, according to some embodiments, the multi-link station aggregates link A and simultaneously transmits on both channels.” See Fig. 11A for TXOP at t1 on link A. Link B and Link A in Fig. 11A are equivalent to the claimed second link and first link, respectively. At t1, backoff counter in link B reaches zero and a TXOP is obtained in link A.).
It is noted that while disclosing a link pair for transmission based on a counter and a TXOP, Naribole does not specifically teach about a NSTR link pair. It, however, had been known in the art before the effective date of the instant application as shown by Ko as follows;
a pair of NSTR link pair ([Ko, 0292] “when an MLD transmits PPDUs in multiple links, start time sync may be performed. The MLD may be an MLD operating in the NSTR link pair.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of instant application to modify Naribole by using the features of Ko in order to provide efficient multilink aggregations for faster data rates and new applications such that “the processor receives a frame transmitted from one of one or more stations (STAs) through a second STA operating in the second link, resets a medium sync delay timer for application of a medium sync delay of the second STA on the basis of the received frame” [Ko, 0011].
Regarding claim 8, it is a MLD claim corresponding to the method claim 1, except the limitations, “at least one processor” ([0140] “The operations performed by each of the stations and access point of the multi-link network may be performed by a “processing circuit””), and is therefore rejected for the similar reasons set forth in the rejection of claim 1.
With respect to dependent claims:
Regarding claims 2 and 9, the method of claim 1 and the MLD of claim 8, respectively, further comprising: maintaining the backoff counter at 0 without transmission of the first frame in the first link based on the backoff counter being 0 ([0117 and Fig. 13A] “FIG. 13A illustrates an example scenario of multi-link TXOP aggregation with RTS-CTS handshaking”, and [0118 and Fig. 13A] “a multi-link station (e.g., a non-STR STA) can aggregate RTS frames when the backoff countdown on one of the links on which the station is contending reaches zero, assuming the aggregated link is otherwise idle”).
Claim(s) 3-4 and 10-11 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Naribole et al. (US 2021/0076398, “Naribole”) in view of Ko et al. (US 2024/0422706, “Ko”) and further in view of Jang et al. (US 11,871,447, “Jang”).
Examiner’s note: in what follows, references are drawn to Naribole unless otherwise mentioned.
Regarding claims 3 and 10, it is noted that while disclosing a link pair for transmission based on a counter and a TXOP, Naribole does not specifically teach about maintaining a backoff counter at zero until a TXOP obtained in another link. It, however, had been known in the art before the effective date of the instant application as shown by Jang as follows;
the method of claim 1 and the MLD of claim 8, respectively, wherein the backoff counter is maintained at 0 until the TXOP is obtained in the second link ([Jang, claim 1] “determining, by the first STA, whether to initiate transmission on the first link based on a back-off counter of the first STA and a condition related to the second STA, wherein based on the back-off counter of the first STA reaching zero (0) and the condition related to the second STA being that the second STA obtains a transmission opportunity on the second link”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of instant application to modify Naribole by using the features of Ko in order to properly handle the interference constraints of NSTR link pairs such that “performing channel access on a first link and a second link; determining whether to transmit a first physical protocol data unit (PPDU) based on a channel access result on the first link and a channel access result on the second link” [Jang, Col. 1; lines 57-61].
Regarding claims 4 and 11, the method of claim 1 and the MLD of claim 8, respectively, wherein the TXOP in the second link is obtained by a second STA associated with the MLD ([Jang, claim 1] “the condition related to the second STA being that the second STA obtains a transmission opportunity on the second link”).
The rational and motivation for adding this teaching of Jang are the same as for claim 3.
Claim(s) 5-7 and 12-14 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Naribole et al. (US 2021/0076398, “Naribole”) in view of Ko et al. (US 2024/0422706, “Ko”) and further in view of Chu et al. (US 2021/0266891, “Chu”).
Examiner’s note: in what follows, references are drawn to Naribole unless otherwise mentioned.
Regarding claims 5 and 12, it is noted that while disclosing a link pair for transmission based on a counter and a TXOP, Naribole does not specifically teach about synchronizing a start time across links. It, however, had been known in the art before the effective date of the instant application as shown by Chu as follows;
the method of claim 1 and the MLD of claim 8, respectively, wherein a start time of the first frame in the first link is synchronized with a start time of a second frame transmitted by a second STA associated with the MLD in the second link ([Chu, 0052] “the MLD with the NSTR capability may be a multi-link station device that has a non-simultaneous transmission and reception capability (NSTR STA MLD) which may also perform a separate backoff in each link (e.g., link1 and link2), in which each link has a primary channel (e.g., primary 20 MHz channel). In such an embodiment, the MLD with the NSTR capability may transmit PPDUs on multiple links with the same start time where the transmission on the link (e.g., link1) whose backoff counter becomes zero early may be deferred.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of instant application to modify Naribole by using the features of Chu in order to implement a robust NSTR transmission scheme such that “maintaining, at the NSTR STA MLD, at least one of a frame exchange and a link state on multiple links with the AP MLD that has at least one of the simultaneous transmission capability and the STR capability” [Chu, 0003].
Regarding claims 6 and 13, the method of claim 1 and the MLD of claim 8, respectively, wherein an end time of the first frame in the first link is synchronized with an end time of a second frame transmitted by a second STA associated with the MLD in the second link ([Chu, 0052] “maintaining, at the NSTR STA MLD, at least one of a frame exchange and a link state on multiple links with the AP MLD that has at least one of the simultaneous transmission capability and the STR capability”).
The rational and motivation for adding this teaching of Chu are the same as for claim 5.
Regarding claims 7 and 14, the method of claim 6 and the MLD of claim 13, respectively, wherein one or more padding bits are added to at least one of the first frame or the second frame for synchronization of the end time of the first frame and the end time of the second frame ([Chu, 0069] “an MPDU delimiter may be used as padding to fill the responding frame, allowing responding frames to have an aligned transmission end time on multiple links and subsequent PPDUs to have an aligned transmission start time on multiple links.”).
Conclusion
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/HARRY H KIM/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2411