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
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 07/31/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. Applicant asserts that neither Huawei nor ZTE disclose “one or more codebooks.” The Examiner notes, that as previously indicated in the Office Action mailed on 05/13/2026 (see rejection of claim 1) that, per the claim language, the one of more codebooks merely comprise “a plurality of acknowledgement of negative acknowledgement bits.” No further detail is provided with respect to the claimed codebooks. Therefore, the codebooks are interpreted to be the same as a plurality of acknowledgement of negative acknowledgement bits, which is disclosed by Huawei (Section 2.1 and Fig. 1 – PSFCH disclosed for group feedback. Feedback is HARQ-ACK for sidelink unicast and groupcast communication). In order to distinguish over the aforementioned interpretation, Applicant is encouraged to add further detail regarding the structure and composition of the claimed codebooks.
Applicant’s remaining arguments with respect to claim(s) 1, 63, 65, and 67 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim(s) 5, 8, 10-12, 16, 19, 34-39 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.
The following is an examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance:
With respect to the claim(s), the prior art of record fails to disclose singly or in combination or render obvious all the limitations of the claim(s).
The closest prior art relating to Applicant' s claimed invention is:
Support for sidelink unicast, groupcast and broadcast 3GPP TSG RAN WG1 Meeting #94bis R1-1810137, Huawei
Discussion on PHY procedures for sidelink 3GPP TSG RAN WG1 #98bis R1-1910299, ZTE
US 20210028910 A1 Cheng; Yu-Hsin et al.
US 20220225283 A1 Ye; Chunxuan et al.
Huawei discloses a physical sidelink feedback channel (PSFCH) from destination UE to source UE for sidelink unicast and groupcast communications.
ZTE discloses associating priorities with sidelink communications.
Cheng discloses a method of determining one or more PSFCH resources for HARQ feedback in sidelink communication for a first UE is disclosed. The method comprises receiving a first SCI for scheduling a first PSSCH transmission, from a second UE, receiving a second SCI for scheduling a second PSSCH transmission, from the second UE, determining priorities of a first HARQ feedback corresponding to the first PSSCH transmission and a second HARQ feedback corresponding to the second PSSCH transmission according to the first SCI and the second SCI, and transmitting a PSFCH for at least one of the first HARQ feedback and the second HARQ feedback with a higher priority according to the determined priorities, to the second UE when a first PSFCH resource for the first HARQ feedback and a second PSFCH resource for the second HARQ feedback are at least overlapped in the time domain.
Ye discloses sidelink (SL) power control within wireless communication systems. A user equipment (UE) selects a parameter set to use to calculate a transmit power of one or more channels to be transmitted according to an SL session with a peer UE from a plurality of parameter sets each configured for use according to a distance between the UE and the peer UE. A UE determines whether an SL pathloss based calculation is to be used to calculate a transmit power of a channel according to an SL session with a peer UE, wherein that calculation is configured to be used depending on a distance between the UE and the peer UE. UE selection of a number of physical SL feedback channel (PSFCH) transmissions to match a UE capability and determinations regarding whether to perform PSFCH reception or PSFCH transmission are also discussed.
Any comments considered necessary by applicant must be submitted no later than the payment of the issue fee and, to avoid processing delays, should preferably accompany the issue fee. Such submissions should be clearly labeled “Comments on Statement of Reasons for Allowance.”
Claim Interpretation
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(f):
(f) Element in Claim for a Combination. – An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The claims in this application are given their broadest reasonable interpretation using the plain meaning of the claim language in light of the specification as it would be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art. The broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim element (also commonly referred to as a claim limitation) is limited by the description in the specification when 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is invoked.
As explained in MPEP § 2181, subsection I, claim limitations that meet the following three-prong test will be interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
(A) the claim limitation uses the term “means” or “step” or a term used as a substitute for “means” that is a generic placeholder (also called a nonce term or a non-structural term having no specific structural meaning) for performing the claimed function;
(B) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is modified by functional language, typically, but not always linked by the transition word “for” (e.g., “means for”) or another linking word or phrase, such as “configured to” or “so that”; and
(C) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is not modified by sufficient structure, material, or acts for performing the claimed function.
Use of the word “means” (or “step”) in a claim with functional language creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim limitation is to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. The presumption that the claim limitation is interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is rebutted when the claim limitation recites sufficient structure, material, or acts to entirely perform the recited function.
Absence of the word “means” (or “step”) in a claim creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim limitation is not to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. The presumption that the claim limitation is not interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is rebutted when the claim limitation recites function without reciting sufficient structure, material or acts to entirely perform the recited function.
Claim limitations in this application that use the word “means” (or “step”) are being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, except as otherwise indicated in an Office action. Conversely, claim limitations in this application that do not use the word “means” (or “step”) are not being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, except as otherwise indicated in an Office action.
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, 9, 17, 18, 33, 63, 65, 67 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over “Support for sidelink unicast, groupcast and broadcast” (R1-1810137) to Huawei in view of US 20210050950 A1 to Zhou; Miao et al.
Re: Claim(s) 1, 63, 65, 67
Huawei discloses a method for wireless communications at a first wireless device, comprising: monitoring a plurality of sidelink resources for a plurality of sidelink messages from a second wireless device (Sections 1 and 2.1 and Fig. 1 - Feedback channel for HARQ-ACK and CSI reporting over sidelink. The Examiner notes that monitoring would be required in order for destination UE to receive Data/RS from source UE);
generating one or more codebooks comprising a plurality of acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement bits corresponding to the plurality of sidelink messages (The Examiner notes that the term codebook is general in its usage and no further detail as to what the codebook is or comprises is given other than containing a plurality of ACKs or NACKs. See Section 2.1 and Fig. 1 – PSFCH disclosed for group feedback. Feedback is HARQ-ACK for sidelink unicast and groupcast communications).
and transmitting a set of feedback messages to the second wireless device over a set of feedback resources in accordance with a sidelink feedback configuration of the first wireless device, the set of feedback messages comprising an indication of the one or more codebooks (Section 2.1 and Figs. 1 and 2(a) and Proposal 1 - Define a physical sidelink feedback channel (PSFCH) from destination UE to source UE for sidelink unicast and groupcast communications. Section 3 - From a receiver’s perspective, it is natural that a vehicle UE can receive unicast and/or groupcast, and/or broadcast simultaneously with SL resource configuration. The Examiner notes that SL resource configuration would be inclusive of a PSFCH).
Huawei does/do not appear to explicitly disclose wherein the plurality of sidelink messages are associated with different group indices.
However, attention is directed to Zhou which discloses said limitation (0474 - When generating a Type 2 HARQ-ACK codebook of sidelink transmission, if the UE is configured with a plurality of sidelink resource pools, the respective DAIs corresponding to the plurality of sidelink resource pools may be separately counted or jointly counted. For separate counting, when generating a Type 2 codebook, the UE separately calculates {C-DAI, T-DAI} for each resource pool, and generates one Type 2 codebook for each resource pool based on its DAI, or generates one sub-codebook for each resource pool based on its DAI and generates a Type 2 codebook by sorting the sub-codebooks of all resource pools in order. For the latter, the method of sorting in order includes: when the UE is configured with a plurality of sidelink resource pools, the index of each sidelink resource pool is obtained, and the UE sorts the sub-codebooks of all resource pools according to the indexes of the sidelink resource pools).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the Huawei invention by employing the teaching as taught by Zhou to provide the ability for a plurality of sidelink messages transmitted to a RX UE to be associated with different group indices in order to determine a sorting order of a HARQ-ACK codebook. The motivation for the combination is given by Zhou (0002).
Huawei further discloses:
An apparatus comprising a processor and memory (i.e. means) (Fig. 1 – Destination UE – processor and memory are inherent), as required by claims 63 and 65; and
A non-transitory computer-readable medium (Fig. 1 – Destination UE - memory is inherent), as required by claim 67.
Re: Claim(s) 9
Huawei in view of Zhou discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 1 above.
Huawei further discloses wherein the plurality of sidelink messages are multiplexed with respective instances of sidelink control information (Fig. 6 and Proposal 11 - Use of FDM, TDM, and SDM should be supported for multiplexing of unicast, groupcast, and broadcast sidelink transmissions. Section 3 - From a receiver’s perspective, it is natural that a vehicle UE can receive unicast and/or groupcast, and/or broadcast simultaneously with SL resource configuration. The Examiner notes that SL resource configuration is analogous to sidelink control information).
Re: Claim(s) 17
Huawei in view of Zhou discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 1 above.
Huawei further discloses wherein the plurality of sidelink messages comprise unicast physical sidelink shared channel transmissions (Sections 1 and 2.1 – unicast and groupcast transmissions disclosed for a sidelink. The Examiner notes that a PSSCH is inherent).
Re: Claim(s) 18
Huawei in view of Zhou discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 1 above.
Huawei further discloses wherein the plurality of sidelink messages comprise unicast physical sidelink shared channel transmissions, groupcast physical sidelink shared channel transmissions, or both (Sections 1 and 2.1 – unicast and groupcast transmissions disclosed for a sidelink. The Examiner notes that a PSSCH is inherent).
Re: Claim(s) 33
Huawei in view of Zhou discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 1 above.
Huawei further discloses retransmitting the set of feedback messages based at least in part on a result of a listen before talk procedure, an unsuccessful initial transmission, or both (Section 2.1 - In option 1, after the source UE receives the feedback information, it will further forward the feedback information to the gNB as shown in Figure 2 (a). The Examiner notes that the feedback information includes information pertaining to unsuccessful unicast/groupcast transmissions (via HARQ-ACK)).
Claim(s) 2, 3, 7, 13, 15, 40 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Huawei as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of “Discussion on PHY procedures for sidelink” (R1-1910299) to ZTE
Re: Claim(s) 2
Huawei in view of Zhou discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 1 above.
Huawei in view of Zhou does/do not appear to explicitly disclose wherein generating the one or more codebooks comprises: generating a joint codebook that comprises the plurality of acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement bits corresponding to the plurality of sidelink messages that are associated with different priority levels (emphasis added to denote the deficiency).
However, attention is directed to ZTE which discloses said limitation (Section 1 – priority rules disclosed for sidelink PSCCH/PSSCH).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the Huawei in view of Zhou invention by employing the teaching as taught by ZTE to provide the ability for sidelink messages transmitted to a RX UE to be associated with a priority in order to determine a PSFCH for feedback transmission. The motivation for the combination is given by ZTE (Section 1).
Re: Claim(s) 3
Huawei in view of Zhou in view of ZTE discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 2 above.
Huawei further discloses disclose generating a first subset of the joint codebook that comprises acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement bits corresponding to a first subset of sidelink messages from the plurality of sidelink messages,
Huawei in view of Zhou does/do not appear to explicitly disclose that the first subset of sidelink messages associated with a first priority level; and the second subset of sidelink messages associated with a second priority level that is different from the first priority level.
However, further attention is directed to ZTE which discloses said limitation (see as analyzed in the rejection of claim 2).
Re: Claim(s) 7
Huawei in view of Zhou in view of ZTE discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 2 above.
Huawei further discloses transmitting an indication of the joint codebook over a physical sidelink feedback channel resource in accordance with the sidelink feedback configuration (Section 2.1 – PSFCH comprises the feedback information).
Re: Claim(s) 13
Huawei in view of Zhou discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 1 above.
Huawei further discloses disclose generating a first codebook that comprises acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement bits corresponding to a first subset of sidelink messages from the plurality of sidelink messages, Examiner notes that this would mean that there would be a HARQ-ACK for unicast and a HARQ-ACK for groupcast).
Huawei in view of Zhou does/do not appear to explicitly disclose that the first subset of sidelink messages associated with a first priority level; and the second subset of sidelink messages associated with a second priority level that is different from the first priority level.
However, further attention is directed to ZTE which discloses said limitation (see as analyzed in the rejection of claim 2).
Re: Claim(s) 15
Huawei in view of Zhou discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 1 above.
Huawei further discloses wherein transmitting the set of feedback messages comprises: transmitting, over a first physical sidelink feedback channel resource, a first feedback message indicating a first codebook of the one or more codebooks, the first codebook comprising acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement bits corresponding to a first subset of sidelink messages from the plurality of sidelink messages,
Huawei in view of Zhou does/do not appear to explicitly disclose that the first subset of sidelink messages associated with a first priority level, a first group index, or both; and the second subset of sidelink messages associated with a second priority level, a second group index, or both.
However, attention is directed to ZTE which discloses said limitation (see as analyzed in the rejection of claim 2).
Re: Claim(s) 40
Huawei in view of Zhou discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 1 above.
Huawei in view of Zhou does/do not appear to explicitly disclose receiving radio resource control signaling indicating a sidelink control information format that comprises a group index field, a hybrid automatic repeat request acknowledgement trigger field, a first acknowledgment feedback indicator field associated with a first physical sidelink shared channel group, a second acknowledgement feedback indicator field associated with a second physical sidelink shared channel group, a counter sidelink assignment index field, a first total sidelink assignment index field associated with the first physical sidelink shared channel group, a second total sidelink assignment index field associated with the second physical sidelink shared channel group, or a combination thereof.
However, attention is directed to ZTE which discloses said limitation (Proposal 2 - To support HARQ combination for broadcast, groupcast and unicast, L1 destination ID, HARQ process ID, RV, NDI and L1 source ID are always present in SCI. Proposal 14 - The used communication range requirement for a PSSCH is implicit indicated by the L1 destination group ID in the SCI associated with the PSSCH).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the Huawei in view of Zhou invention by employing the teaching as taught by ZTE to provide at least an SCI (i.e., control information) that comprises a group ID (i.e., an index) in order to correctly interpret the corresponding HARQ feedback. The motivation for the combination is given by ZTE (Section 1).
Claim(s) 4 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Huawei in view of Zhou in view of ZTE as applied to claim 2 above, and further in view of US 20210028910 A1 to Cheng; Yu-Hsin et al.
Re: Claim(s) 4
Huawei in view of Zhou in view of ZTE discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 2 above.
Huawei further discloses wherein generating the joint codebook comprises: generating a first subset of the joint codebook that comprises acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement bits corresponding to a first subset of sidelink messages from the plurality of sidelink messages,
Huawei in view of Zhou in view of ZTE does/do not appear to explicitly disclose that the first subset of sidelink messages is associated with a first group index; and, the second subset of sidelink messages is associated with a second group index.
However, attention is directed to Cheng which discloses said limitation (see at least claim 8 - determining whether to transmit the PSFCH for at least one of the first HARQ feedback and the second HARQ feedback according to service types of the first and second PSSCH transmissions, wherein the service types are differentiated by at least one of a logical channel (LCH), a logical channel group identifier (LCG ID) of a transport block (TB)/data in a medium access control (MAC) configuration and a priority indicator either in the first or second SCI).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the Huawei in view of Zhou in view of ZTE invention by employing the teaching as taught by Cheng to provide the ability to differentiate between unicast and groupcast sidelink communications (as disclosed by Huawei) (i.e., service types as disclosed by Cheng) based upon an LCG ID (i.e., different group indices). The motivation for the combination is given by Cheng (0002).
Claim(s) 6 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Huawei in view of Zhou in view of ZTE as applied to claim 2 above, and further in view of US 20220225283 A1 to Ye; Chunxuan et al.
Re: Claim(s) 6
Huawei in view of Zhou in view of ZTE discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 2 above.
Huawei in view of Zhou in view of ZTE does/do not appear to explicitly disclose concatenating different subsets of the joint codebook in ascending order or descending order with respect to priority level or group index.
However, attention is directed to Ye which discloses said limitation (0070 - When multiple PSFCH transmissions are to be performed in a single PSFCH transmit occasion, additional considerations may be used. For example, N.sub.max,psfch may represent a maximum number of simultaneous PSFCH transmissions in a single PSFCH transmit occasion that is supported (e.g., by a UE capability). N.sub.req,psfch may represent the number of scheduled PSFCH transmissions for the single PSFCH transmit occasion. In such cases, a UE may use N.sub.max,psfch and/or N.sub.req,psfch to select N PSFCHs for actual transmission with ascending order of PSFCH priority).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the Huawei in view of Zhou in view of ZTE invention by employing the teaching as taught by Ye to provide the ability to order multiple PSFCH transmissions in a single PFSCH according to ascending priority. The motivation for the combination is given by Ye (Abstract).
Claim(s) 14, 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Huawei in view of Zhou as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Cheng
Re: Claim(s) 14
Huawei in view of Zhou discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 1 above.
Huawei further discloses wherein generating the one or more codebooks comprises: generating a first codebook that comprises acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement bits corresponding to a first subset of sidelink messages from the plurality of sidelink messages
Huawei in view of Zhou does/do not appear to explicitly disclose that the first subset of sidelink messages is associated with a first group index; and, the second subset of sidelink messages is associated with a second group index.
However, attention is directed to Cheng which discloses said limitation (see at least claim 8 - determining whether to transmit the PSFCH for at least one of the first HARQ feedback and the second HARQ feedback according to service types of the first and second PSSCH transmissions, wherein the service types are differentiated by at least one of a logical channel (LCH), a logical channel group identifier (LCG ID) of a transport block (TB)/data in a medium access control (MAC) configuration and a priority indicator either in the first or second SCI).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the Huawei in view of Zhou invention by employing the teaching as taught by Cheng to provide the ability to differentiate between unicast and groupcast sidelink communications (as disclosed by Huawei) (i.e., service types as disclosed by Cheng) based upon an LCG ID (i.e., different group indices). The motivation for the combination is given by Cheng (0002).
Re: Claim(s) 15
Huawei in view of Zhou discloses those limitations as set forth in the rejection of claim(s) 1 above.
Huawei further discloses wherein transmitting the set of feedback messages comprises: transmitting, over a first physical sidelink feedback channel resource, a first feedback message indicating a first codebook of the one or more codebooks, the first codebook comprising acknowledgement or negative acknowledgement bits corresponding to a first subset of sidelink messages from the plurality of sidelink messages,
Huawei in view of Zhou does/do not appear to explicitly disclose that the first subset of sidelink messages is associated with a first priority level, a first group index, or both; and the second subset of sidelink messages associated with a second priority level, a second group index, or both.
However, attention is directed to Cheng which discloses said limitation (see as analyzed in the rejection of claim 14).
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 nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) 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 mailing date of this final action.
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/KASHIF SIDDIQUI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2415
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