DETAILED ACTION
Response to Amendment
The amendment filed on 05/27/2026 has been entered and considered by Examiner. Claims 1 - 20 are presented for examination. This Action is made FINAL.
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 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.
Claim(s) 1-4, 6-11, 13-18, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Grischy et al. (US Pub. 20170026929 A1) in view of Kumar et al. (US Pub. 20180295548 A1).
For claims 1, 9, and 16, Grischy discloses a method comprising:
associating to a first Access Point (AP) (Fig. 1) [0029, 0048];
exchanging a low coverage threshold with the first AP (Fig. 3 (306) [0041-42, 0046, 0065-68, 0072];
determining to roam to a new AP based on coverage from the first AP satisfying the low coverage threshold (detects poor coverage based on signal threshold conditions and subsequently associates with another AP; This helps determine "why it hasn't already roamed to another access point" when experiencing a hole) [0011, 0033, 0068, 0108-109]; and
in response to determining to roam to the new AP:
requesting a neighbor report from the first AP (sends IEEE 802.11k Neighbor Request to AP to obtain neighbor information) [0069],
receiving the neighbor report from the first AP (Neighbor Request/Report exchange inherently involves receiving neighbor report from AP.) [0069],
performing AP discovery signaling (performs scanning operations and maintains scan table for roaming purposes, constituting discovery signaling) [0068, 0112], comprising:
scanning neighbor APs using the neighbor report (Neighbor report provides information used to scan neighboring APs), [0069, 0109] and
selecting a second AP to roam to, associating to the second AP ("connected to a CHD-capable AP" (the second/new AP) after roaming, sends coverage measurement report to next AP it associates with) [0027, 0034, 0109, 0061], and
sending low coverage information to the second AP, the low coverage information comprising information associated with the determination to roam to the new AP based on the low coverage threshold (If the MU cannot send the report to the first AP before roaming, it "saves the measurement report" and sends this "saved report" to the new AP (AP B). This report includes the signal measurement values "measured value that triggered the incident".) [0034, 0050-51], an identifier of the first AP, and one or more reasons the second AP was selected, [0034-35, 0042-43, 0093, 0103].
wherein the low coverage information is usable by the second AP or a controller to identify a client-experienced coverage gap associated with the first AP (step 310) [0041-42, 109];
But Grischy doesn’t explicitly disclose sending, after associating to the second AP, low coverage information identifying low coverage experienced with respect to the first AP to the second AP the low coverage information comprising a duration of during which coverage from the first AP satisfied the low coverage threshold before the determination to roam to the new AP,
However, Kumar discloses sending, after associating to the second AP, low coverage information identifying low coverage experienced with respect to the first AP to the second AP the low coverage information comprising a duration of during which coverage from the first AP satisfied the low coverage threshold before the determination to roam to the new AP (Figs. 7 and 12; Step 702-736) [0117-126, 0161, 0092],
Kumar also discloses an identifier of the first AP, and one or more reasons the second AP was selected (Figs. 7 and 12; Step 1240) [0050-52],
wherein the low coverage information is usable by the second AP or a controller to identify a client-experienced coverage gap associated with the first AP (Figs. 7 and 12; Step 1250, Weak coverage area) [0038, 0041, 0055, 0131].
Since, all are analogous arts addressing signal detection used in a mobile network; Therefore, it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Grischy with Kumar to ensure proper detection of network condition to make informed decisions, thus, improving network adaptability.
Claim 9 differs from claim 1 only by the additional recitation of the following limitation, which is also taught by the cited prior art. The cited prior art further Grischy, as modified by Kumar, discloses a system comprising: a memory storage; and a processing unit coupled to the memory storage, wherein the processing unit is operative to (Fig. 2) [0028, 0117]. All other identical limitations are rejected based on the same rationale as shown above.
Claim 15 differs from claim 1 only by the additional recitation of the following limitation, which is also taught by the cited prior art. The cited prior art Grischy further discloses non-transitory computer-readable medium that stores a set of instructions which when executed perform a method executed by the set of instructions (Fig. 2) [0028, 0117]. All other identical limitations are rejected based on the same rationale as shown above.
For claims 2, 10, and 17, Grischy, as modified by Kumar, discloses sending the low coverage information to the first AP [0030-34, 0042, 0046-47].
For claim 3, Grischy, as modified by Kumar, discloses exchanging one or more low coverage Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), wherein the one or more low coverage KPIs comprise any one of: (i) a low coverage period, (ii) a low coverage percentage, (iii) a packet quantity, or (iv) any combination of (i)-(iii) (See Page 11-12, Claim 8) [0042, 0046-47].
For claim 4, Grischy, as modified by Kumar, discloses determining to roam to the new AP is further based on the one or more low coverage KPIs (KPIs, e.g. retries, missed beacons, trigger coverage detection and reporting which in turn indicate the MU "has a roam trigger") [0046, 0070, 0108].
For claims 6, and 13, Grischy, as modified by Kumar, discloses identifying a coverage issue based on the low coverage threshold, wherein the low coverage information further comprises information associated with the coverage issue (Coverage measurement report contains information about coverage incident.) [0011, 0018, 0047; 0051].
For claims 7, 14, and 20, Grischy, as modified by Kumar, discloses the low coverage information comprises any one of: (i) a low coverage Information Element (IE) indicating a duration of low coverage before determining to roam to the new AP, (ii) a missed beacon IE indicating a number of missed beacons before determining to roam to the new AP, (iii) an invalid APs IE comprising information associated with one or more invalid APs, (iv) an unidentified APs IE comprising information associated with one or more unidentified APs, (v) a roaming session IE indicating the one or more reasons the second AP was selected to roam to, or (vi) any combination of (i)-(v) (See Page 11-12, Claim 8) [0046-47, 0051].
For claims 8, and 15, Grischy, as modified by Kumar, discloses the low coverage threshold is any one of (i) a Received Signal Strength Indicator (RSSI) threshold, (ii) a Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) threshold, or (iii) a combination of (i) and (ii) (See Page 11-12, Claim 8) [0041, 0045-47, 0072].
For claims 11, and 18, Grischy, as modified by Kumar, discloses exchanging one or more low coverage Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), wherein the one or more low coverage KPIs comprise any one of: (i) a low coverage period, (ii) a low coverage percentage, (iii) a packet quantity, or (iv) any combination of (i)-(iii) (See Page 11-12, Claim 8) [0030-34, 0046-47], wherein determining to roam to the new AP is further based on the one or more low coverage KPIs (KPIs, e.g. retries, missed beacons, trigger coverage detection and reporting which in turn indicate the MU "has a roam trigger") [0045-46, 0108].
Claims 5, 12, and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Grischy et al. (US Pub. 20170026929 A1) in view of Kumar et al. (US Pub. 20180295548 A1) in further view of Li et al. (CN-106688296-B).
For claims 5, 12, and 19, Grischy, as modified by Kumar, discloses all limitations this claim depended on.
But Grischy, as modified by Kumar, doesn’t explicitly disclose the following limitation taught by Li.
Li discloses performing the AP discovery signaling further comprises identifying any one of (i) an unidentified AP, (ii) an invalid AP, or (iii) both (i) and (ii) (Page 6, Parag. 4 - Page 7, Parag. 5; Page 11 Parag. 1-5, Page 13, claim 1 and 7); and
the low coverage information includes any one of (iv) information associated with the unidentified AP, (v) information associated with the invalid AP, or (vi) both (iv) and (v) (Page 6, Parag. 4 - Page 7, Parag. 5; Page 11 Parag. 1-5, Page 13, claim 1 and 7).
Since, all are analogous arts addressing signal detection used in a mobile network; Therefore, it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Grischy, and Kumar with Li to ensure proper signal detection when the noise and power of the particular signal can change over time, thus, improving signal reliability.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments with respect to all the claims have been considered but are moot in view of the new ground(s) of rejection.
In view of amendment, a new reference has been used for new ground of rejections.
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 extension fee 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 date of this final action.
Inquiries
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the Examiner should be directed to PAKEE FANG whose telephone number is (571)270-3633. The Examiner can normally be reached on Mon-Fri 9:00AM-5:00PM.
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If attempts to reach the Examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the Examiner’s supervisor, Armouche, Hadi can be reached on 571-270-3618. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/PAKEE FANG/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2409
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