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 .
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Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
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 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.
Claims 1, 3, 7, 9, 10, 13, and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over 3GPP TS 23.502 (3GPP) in view of US 20210120484 (Thorat) further in view of CN 112566072 (Wang).
Regarding claim 9, 3GPP teaches or suggests a network device (4.17.4), comprising:
receive a service discovery request message from a consumer network function (NF), the service discovery request message representing a service requirement of the consumer NF (4.17.4);
determine a target provider NF according to the service discovery request message (4.17.4); and
send a service discovery response message to the consumer NF, wherein the service discovery response message comprises first information of the target provider NF, and the first information at least comprises basic parameters of the target provider NF (4.17.4).
3GPP does not expressly disclose but Thorat teaches or suggests the basic parameters comprise Internet protocol (IP) address information and port number information (¶ 38). 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 3GPP’s services and Thorat’s parameters in order to allow access to services.
3GPP does not expressly disclose but Wang teaches or suggests the first information is smaller than registration information of the target provider NF, wherein the first information is obtained by tailoring the registration information of the target provider NF (description of steps 204-05). 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 3GPP’s services, Thorat’s parameters, and Wang’s smallness in order to reduce the data transmission complexity in the service discovery process of the network storage network element, improve the service processing speed of the NF request party, improve the speed of the service discovery process.
Regarding claims 1 and 10, the aforementioned combination teaches or suggests the claimed limitations as explained regarding claims 9 supra, mutatis mutandis.
Regarding claims 3 and 13, the aforementioned combination teaches or suggests the first information includes reference parameters, and the reference parameters comprise at least one of protocol type information, load information, and capacity information (Thorat ¶ 38). A rationale to combine teachings and suggestions of the references would have been for the same reason as for claim 9.
Regarding claims 7 and 17, 3GPP teaches or suggests before receiving the service discovery request message from the consumer NF, the one or more programs further cause the one or more processors to:
receive the registration information of the target provider NF (3GPP 4.17.1); and
store the registration information locally (3GPP 4.17.1). A rationale to combine teachings and suggestions of the references would have been for the same reason as for claim 9.
Claims 2, 4, 9, 12, 14, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over 3GPP TS 23.502 (3GPP) in view of US 20210120484 (Thorat) further in view of CN 112566072 (Wang) and US 20220191294 (Yang).
Regarding claims 2, 12, and 20, 3GPP does not expressly disclose but Yang teaches or suggests after sending the service discovery response message to the consumer NF, the one or more programs further cause the one or more processors to:
receive an information acquisition request sent by the consumer NF ( Yang ¶¶ 46, 50); and
in response to the information acquisition request, send second information to the consumer NF, wherein the second information comprises a portion or all of attribute parameters of the target provider NF (Yang ¶¶ 46, 50). 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 3GPP’s services, Thorat’s parameters, Wang’s smallness, and Yang’s request to learn the omitted information.
Regarding claims 4 and 14, the aforementioned combination teaches or suggests the attribute parameters comprise at least one of tracking area identity (TAI) information, subscription permanent identity (SUPI) information, general public subscription identity (GPSI) information, and network protocol version information served by binding support function (BSF) (Yang tbl. A). A rationale to combine teachings and suggestions of the references would have been for the same reason as for claims 2, 12, and 20.
Claims 5 and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over 3GPP TS 23.502 (3GPP) in view of US 20210120484 (Thorat) further in view of CN 112566072 (Wang) and AU 2018246615 (Nagahara).
3GPP does not expressly disclose but Nagahara teaches or suggests before sending the service discovery response message to the consumer NF, the one or more programs further cause the one or more processors to:
determine whether a current network load is greater than a preset threshold; and in response to a situation that the current network load is greater than the preset threshold, trigger to send the service discovery response message to the consumer NF, wherein the service discovery response message only includes the first information (eleventh aspect). 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 3GPP’s services, Thorat’s parameters, Wang’s smallness, and Nagahara’s trigger in order to reduce load.
Claims 6 and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over 3GPP TS 23.502 (3GPP) in view of US 20210120484 (Thorat) further in view of US CN 112566072 (Wang) and US 20180338008 (Trinte).
3GPP does not expressly disclose but Trinte teaches or suggests before sending the service discovery response message to the consumer NF, the one or more programs further cause the one or more processors to: in response to a situation that an information integrity parameter in the service discovery request message is a target parameter, trigger to send the service discovery response message to the consumer NF, wherein the service discovery response message only includes the first information, and the information integrity parameter represents whether the consumer NF requires to acquire integral registration information (¶¶ 145, 174).
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 3GPP’s services, Thorat’s parameters, Yang’s smallness, and Trinte’s parameter in order to ensure integrity.
Claims 8, 11, 18, and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over 3GPP TS 23.502 (3GPP) in view of US 20210120484 (Thorat) further in view of CN 112566072 (Wang) and US 20210068172 (Jeong).
Regarding claims 8 and 18, 3GPP does not expressly disclose but Jeong teaches or suggests the one or more programs further cause the one or more processors to: divide the registration information into the first information and second information, and storing the first information and the second information locally (¶ 65). 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 3GPP’s services, Thorat’s parameters, Wang’s smallness, and Jeong’s division in order to distinguish different information.
Regarding claims 11 and 19, 3GPP does not expressly disclose but Jeong teaches or suggests wherein the second information comprises a portion or all of attribute parameters of the target provider NF (¶ 65). A rationale to combine teachings and suggestions of the references would have been for the same reason as for claims 8 and 18.
Response to Arguments
The arguments have been fully considered. The applicant argues that “Yang only discloses limiting the number of returned NF Profiles, but is silent about tailoring registration information of a single NF instance.” (Resp. 9.) Wang has been added, however, to teach or suggest the argued limitations.
Other Art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to the instant disclosure. For example, US 20250119376 determines a value of an NF profiles limit parameter, selecting a first number of NF profiles that is less than the value of the NF profiles limit parameter, selecting a second number of NF profiles, wherein the NF profiles in the second number of NF profiles correspond to NF set mates of NFs corresponding to NF profiles in the first number of NF profiles and a sum of the first and second numbers number is less than or equal to the value of the NF profiles limit parameter, and generating and transmitting an NF discovery response including the NF profiles in the first and second numbers of NF profiles (abs.).
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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/LANCE LEONARD BARRY/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2457
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