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 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 1-7, 11, 91-92, and 101-110 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Parron et al. (WO 2020/036928 A1), hereinafter “Parron” in view of Stojanovsky et al. (US 11,792,838 B2), hereinafter “Stojanovsky”.
Claims 1, 91, and 92:
Regarding claim 1, Parron teaches, a method for controlling quality of service (QoS), applicable to a terminal device (Pg.7, ll. 11-13, “This may be implemented in the (R)AN 110 using a 5G QoS ID (5QI) that references node-specific parameters that control the QoS forwarding treatment.”; ll. 15-21 “The (R)AN 110 and 5GC 120 ensure QoS by mapping packets to appropriate QoS flows 151 and DRBs 154. The (R)AN 110 maps on or more packet flows 145 belonging to the PDU session 150 to a DRB 154. This involves a first step ( e.g., NAS level) of mapping packet flows 145 to QoS flows 151, and a second step (e.g., Access Stratum (AS) level) of mapping QoS flows 151 to DRBs 154. NAS level packet filters in the UE 101 and in the 5GC 120 associate UL and DL packets with QoS Flows 151, and AS level mapping rules in the UE 101 and in the (R)AN 110 associate UL and DL QoS Flows 151 with DRBs 154” ), the method comprising:
determining a radio resource (Parron: Pg.8, ll. 8-10, “The mapping of QoS flows 151 to DRBs 154 in the UL is controlled by "QoS flow to DRB mapping rules" (e.g., QoS rules), which may be signaled/determined using reflective mapping or explicit configuration via Radio Resource Control (RRC) signaling.”; DRBs are radio resource per the claim) corresponding to the service data flow according to service data flow information and corresponding radio resource information (Parron: Pg.16, ll. 25-27, “At operations 305-310, the UE 101 uses stored QoS rules and/or UL packet filters (e.g., SDF filters/templates, etc.) to determine a mapping between UL UP traffic and one or more QoS flows 151.”); and
sending the data over the radio resource (Parron: Pg.16, ll. 30-32, “at operation 325 the UE 101 transmits the UL PDU(s) using the corresponding access specific resource (e.g., a DRB 154) for the QoS flow(s) 151 based on the mapping provided by (R)AN 110/(R)AN node 111.”).
Parron however does not expressly teach, determining, a service data flow to which data belongs, though it teaches identifying packets of a packet data flow, perform mapping and sending packets toward destination (ref. Fig. 3), the steps are not for user equipment for which the claim may be associated with.
In the same field of endeavor, Stojanovsky in Col.9 , ll. 1-17, teaches the following:
“The request for resources may also be signaled to UE 105 (at 525a or 525b). In one implementation the request for resources may be signaled from control plane block 120 to UE 105 (at 525a, "Request resources (SDF, QoS)") The request may correspond to NAS signaling. Alternatively, the request for resources may also be signaled to UE 105 from eNB 112 (at 525b, "Request resources (SDF, QoS)"). The request may correspond to AS signaling. In either situation, the request may include the indication of the SDF and the QoS information. The UE may decode the resource request in order to process the resource request.
At this point, UE 105 and eNB 112 may schedule packets, as identified by the SDF, for transmission according to the associated QoS information (at 530, "Per-flow QoS handling). For instance, at UE 105, the UE may rely exclusively on the per-SDF QoS information to perform scheduling of uplink packets.”
Disclosure by Stojanovsky implies the teaching of the claim.
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine disclosure by Stojanovsky regarding determination of per SDF QoS information for uplink packet scheduling with disclosure of DRB (discussed above) motivated by selection of the resource (the DRB matching the SDF.
Claim 91 is for terminal device implementing method of claim 1. The claim is a change in category with respect to claim 1. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claim 1.
Claim 92 is for a network device implementing method complementary to method of claim 1, that is performed by device of claim 91. Claim elements are discussed above in claim 1. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claims 1 and 91.
Claims 2, 101, and 108:
Regarding claim 2, combination of Parron and Stojanovsky teaches the method according to claim 1 (discussed above), further comprising:
receiving, the service data flow information and the corresponding radio resource information from a base station (implied by disclosure in Parron: Pg. 7, ll. 15-21, “The (R)AN 110 and 5GC 120 ensure QoS by mapping packets to appropriate QoS flows 151 and DRBs 154. The (R)AN 110 maps on or more packet flows 145 belonging to the PDU session 150 to a DRB 154. This involves a first step ( e.g., NAS level) of mapping packet flows 145 to QoS flows 151, and a second step (e.g., Access Stratum (AS) level) of mapping QoS flows 151 to DRBs 154. NAS level packet filters in the UE 101 and in the 5GC 120 associate UL and DL packets with QoS Flows 151, and AS level mapping rules in the UE 101 and in the (R)AN 110 associate UL and DL QoS Flows 151 with DRBs 154”).
Claim 101 is for terminal device implementing method of claim 2. The claim is a change in category with respect to claim 2. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claim 2.
Claim 108 is for a network device implementing method complementary to method of claim 2, that is performed by device of claim 101. Claim elements are discussed above in claim 2. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claims 2 and 101.
Claims 3 and 102:
Regarding claim 3, combination of Parron and Stojanovsky teaches the method according to claim 1 (discussed above), wherein the service data flow information comprises a service data flow identifier or a service data flow template (Parron: Pg.6, ll. 3-5, “An SDF template is a set of SDF filters in a policy rule, or an application ID (app_ID) in a policy rule referring to an application detection filter, required for defining an SDF.”; ll. 16-17, “Each packet flow 145 heading to a UE 101 is classified into different SDFs according to their service type by using an SDF template.”).
Claim 102 is for terminal device implementing method of claim 3. The claim is a change in category with respect to claim 3. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claim 3.
Claims 4 and 103:
Regarding claim 4, combination of Parron and Stojanovsky teaches the method according to claim 3 (discussed above), wherein the service data flow template comprises at least one data packet filter (Parron: Pg.7 ll. 29-31, “The PFS may contain one or more packet filter(s) where each packet filter is applicable for the DL direction, the UL direction, or both directions.”).
Claim 103 is for terminal device implementing method of claim 4. The claim is a change in category with respect to claim 4. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claim 4.
Claims 5 and 104:
Regarding claim 5, combination of Parron and Stojanovsky teaches the method according to claim 1 (discussed above).
Parron however fails to expressly teach, but Stojanovsky teaches, wherein determining, by the terminal device, the service data flow to which the data belongs comprises:
determining, a service data flow template matched with the data (Stojanovski: Pg.8, ll. 55-59, “A service data flow template (SDF template) may be provided for each SDF. The SDF template may serve as a template to which packets may be matched to determine the corresponding SDF.”).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine disclosure by Stojanovsky with that of Parron and come up with the claimed invention so as to determine SDF for the purpose of using proper resource for transmission.
Claim 104 is for terminal device implementing method of claim 5. The claim is a change in category with respect to claim 5. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claim 5.
Claims 6, 105, and 109:
Regarding claim 6, combination of Parron and Stojanovsky teaches the method according to claim 1 (discussed above).
Parron however fails to expressly teach, but Stojanovsky teaches, method further comprising:
receiving, a service data flow template and a corresponding service data flow identifier from a second network device (Stojanovsky: Fig.5 steps 525a and 525b; Fig. 6, step 640, “Forward SDF template and per-flow QoS information to the UE and the eNB”).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine disclosure by Stojanovsky with that of Parron and come up with the claimed invention so as can use proper resource for uplink transmission.
Claim 105 is for terminal device implementing method of claim 6. The claim is a change in category with respect to claim 6. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claim 6.
Claim 109 is network device performing complimentary function to the device of claim 105. Claim elements are discussed in claim 105. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claim 105.
Claims 7 and 106:
Regarding claim 7, combination of Parron and Stojanovsky teaches the method according to claim 6 (discussed above).
Parron however fails to expressly teach, but Stojanovsky teaches, wherein determining, the service data flow to which the data belongs comprises:
determining, the service data flow identifier corresponding to the service data flow template matched with the data (Stojanovsky: Pg.8, ll. 55-59, “A service data flow template (SDF template) may be provided for each SDF. The SDF template may serve as a template to which packets may be matched to determine the corresponding SDF.”).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine disclosure by Stojanovsky with that of Parron and come up with the claimed invention so as to determine SDF for the purpose of using proper resource for transmission.
Claim 106 is network device performing method of claim 7. Claim is a change in category with respect to claim 7. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claim 7.
Claims 11 and 107:
Regarding claim 11, combination of Parron and Stojanovsky teaches the method according to claim 1 (discussed above), wherein the radio resource information comprises a radio bearer identifier (implied by disclosures in Parron: Pg. 6, ll. 28-29, “A QoS flow 151 is the finest granularity of QoS differentiation in a PDU session 150. Each of the QoS flows 151 are mapped in the (R)AN 110 to a respective DRB 154.”; and Pg.16, ll. 30-32, “at operation 325 the UE 101 transmits the UL PDU(s) using the corresponding access specific resource (e.g., a DRB 154) for the QoS flow(s) 151 based on the mapping provided by (R)AN 110/(R)AN node 111.”).
Claim 107 is for terminal device implementing method of claim 11. The claim is a change in category with respect to claim 11. Claim is rejected based on rejection of claim 11.
Regarding claim 110, combination of Parron and Stojanovsky teaches the method according to claim 92 (discussed above), wherein the network device comprises a base Station (Parron: Pg.2, ll. 15-17 “the UE 101 is communicatively coupled with the (R)AN node 111 via a radio or air interface (Uu)”; see Fig. 1).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
a) WO-2019085853-A1 teaches mapping UpLink packet and QFI of unstructured PDU session, reading a QoS flow identifier (QFI) of a received UpLink PDU packet of the unstructured PD session; and
b) CN-107295576-A teaches service quality QoS policy processing method
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