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 .
Detailed Action
Claims 1-16, 18-20 are pending in this Office Action.
Claims 1-3, 8-10, 15-16, 18, and 20 are amended.
Claim 17 is cancelled.
Claims 1, 8, 15, and 20 are in independent form.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments filed in the amendment filed 6/26/2026, have been fully considered but are moot in view of new grounds of rejection. The reasons set forth below.
Applicant’s invention as claimed:
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
The text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
Claims 1-6, 8-13, 15-16, 18-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by U.S. Patent Publication No. 20240048277 by Li et al.
1. (Currently Amended) A transmitter, comprising:
circuitry configured to:
transmit packets to a receiver using multipathing and according to a congestion window (Li: page 1, para 1);
receive at least one acknowledgement (ACK) from the receiver (Li: page 2, para 30; page 5, 61), the ACK comprising:
a subportion of a packet tracking bitmap maintained by the receiver, the subportion indicating a first number of out-of-order (OOO) packets that the receiver has received from the transmitter (Li: page 5, para 60-63), and
an OOO packet count indicating a second number of OOO packets that the receiver has received from the transmitter, wherein the second number is greater than the first number (Li: page 3, para 63-67); and
upon determining the OOO packet count satisfies a threshold, retransmit one or more packets to the receiver, wherein the threshold is dynamically adjusted based on the congestion window (Li: page 3, para 63-67).
2. (Original) The transmitter of claim 1, wherein the packet tracking bitmap comprises bit values corresponding to respective packet sequence numbers (PSNs) (Li: page 3, para 60-67).
3. (Original) The transmitter of claim 2, wherein the bit values in the packet tracking bitmap indicate whether a corresponding packet transmitted by the transmitter has been received at the receiver, wherein the transmitter is configured to use the bit values to determine which packets should be retransmitted to the receiver and which have already been received by the receiver (Li: page 3, para 60-67).
4. (Original) The transmitter of claim 3, wherein one of the bit values in the packet tracking bitmap is a highest PSN (HPSN) indicating an OOO packet with the highest PSN, wherein the transmitter does not retransmit any packets that have already been sent to the receiver with PSNs greater than the HPSN (Li: page 3, para 60-67).
5. (Original) The transmitter of claim 4, wherein one of the bit values in the packet tracking bitmap is an expected PSN (EPSN) indicating a next packet the receiver is expecting to receive from the transmitter, wherein the transmitter only retransmits packets that are between the EPSN and the HPSN and have bit values indicating the transmitted packets have not been received by the receiver (Li: page 3, para 60-67; para 53 shows highest sequence number lost and indicates next to send).
6. (Original) The transmitter of claim 1, wherein the threshold is a maximum of either a metric derived from the congestion window or a minimum floor value (Li: page 6, para 70-71; time-based threshold).
Claims 8-13 are rejected as being substantially similar to claims 1-6 above.
Claims 15-16, 18-19 are rejected as being substantially similar to claims 1-6 above.
Claim 20 is rejected as being substantially similar to claim 1 above.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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.
The factual inquiries 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 nonobviousness.
Claims 7 and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 unpatentable by U.S. Patent Publication No. 20240048277 by Li et al in view of US Patent No. 8159939 by Kaufman et al
Regarding claims 7 and 14,
The Li reference teaches dealing with network congestion in page1, para 1.
The Li reference fails to explicitly teach a congestion window that is adjusted.
However, in analogous art, the Kaufman reference teaches:
wherein the congestion window is reduced when there is more network congestion between the transmitter and the receiver and increased when there is less congestion between the transmitter and the receiver (Kaufman: col. 3, lines 61- col. 4, line34) in order to mitigate network congestion without overloading resources (Kaufman: col. 1, lines 6-36).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effectively filed date to include the congestion window of Kaufman with the bitmap tracking of Li in order to mitigate network congestion without overloading resources (Kaufman: col. 1, lines 6-36).
Prior Art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure:
U. S. Patent Publication No. 20210400537 by Zhang et al
Conclusion
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BENJAMIN R. BRUCKART
Supervisory Patent Examiner
Art Unit 2424
/BENJAMIN R BRUCKART/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2424
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