3Notice 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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments regarding the 103 rejection have been considered and they are moot because they do not apply to the new references used in the 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.
Claims 1-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tsai (US 20220210798) in view of ZTE (RRM requirements for SDT, 3GPP TSG-RAN4#101-e R4-2118590, Electronic meeting, 1st – 12th November, 2021) further in view of TS36-133 (3GPP TS 36.133 V17.3.0, 2021-09).
Regarding claim 1, Tsai discloses a baseband processor of a user equipment (UE) configured to perform operations (Fig. 13) of:
receiving, from a base station, configuration information, the configuration information specifying a configuration for reference signal received power (RSRP) change-based timing advance (TA) validation to be met in order to perform a small data transfer (SDT) while in a radio resource control (RRC) inactive state ([0006], claim 11, fig. 1, receiving, through the transceiver, a configuration from a base station (BS), wherein the configuration indicates a first reference signal received power (RSRP) threshold and a second RSRP threshold; initiating a SDT procedure via a configured grant (CG) resource in response to a RSRP of a downlink (DL) pathloss reference being higher than the first RSRP threshold, S130 in-active state), the RSRP change-based TA validation using configured TA validation criteria that is evaluated based on two measurement windows for TA validation, at least one boundary of at least one of the two measurement windows for TA validation being based on a minimum, existing at a time of TA validation criteria evaluation, of either a frequency range 2 (FR2) measurement period and a scaled discontinuous reception (DRX) cycle period; wherein the scaled DRX cycle period is scaled by a scaling factor that is selected from a group of scaling factors; determining whether a TA is valid based on an RSRP change associated with measured RSRP values obtained during the measurement windows for the TA validation; and
transmitting, in response to determining the TA is valid, uplink data using a configured grant (CG)-SDT (CG-SDT) resource while the UE is in the RRC inactive state (([0006], claim 11, initiating a SDT procedure via a configured grant (CG) resource in response to a RSRP of a downlink (DL) pathloss reference being higher than the first RSRP threshold).
Tsai does not explicitly disclose the RSRP change-based TA validation using configured TA validation criteria that is evaluated based on two measurement windows for TA validation, at least one boundary of at least one of the two measurement windows for TA validation being based on a minimum, existing at a time of TA validation criteria evaluation, of either a frequency range 2 (FR2) measurement period and a scaled discontinuous reception (DRX) cycle period; wherein the scaled DRX cycle period is scaled by a scaling factor that is selected from a group of scaling factors; determining whether a TA is valid based on an RSRP change associated with measured RSRP values obtained during the measurement windows for the TA validation.
ZTE discloses the RSRP change-based TA validation using configured TA validation criteria that is evaluated based on two measurement windows for TA validation (ZTE, section 3 and figure 1 of page 3; section 4, proposals 3 and 4, introduce two windows for SSB RSRP measurement with different window sizes for the TA validation for CG-SDT), at least one boundary of at least one of the two measurement windows for TA validation being based on a minimum, existing at a time of TA validation criteria evaluation, of either a frequency range 2 (FR2) measurement period and a scaled discontinuous reception (DRX) cycle period (ZTE, figure 1 of page 3; page 3, lines 1-18: wherein a FR2 measurement period is, for example, delta T1 max/ 2 and a scaled DRX cycle period is DRX cycle scaled with a factor 1);
determining whether a TA is valid based on an RSRP change associated with measured RSRP values obtained during the measurement windows for the TA validation (ZTE, section 3 and figure 1 of page 3; section 4, proposals 3 and 4, introduce two thresholds for the change of SSB RSRP as the criterion of validating TA for CG-SDT, and the UE is allowed to perform CG-SDT transmission only if it meets the criterion).
ZTE also discloses transmitting, in response to determining the TA is valid, uplink data using a configured grant (CG)-SDT (CG-SDT) resource while the UE is in an RRC inactive state (ZTE, page 1, lines 21-22; page 2, lines 4-8; page 3, lines 22-23; section 4, proposal 4, perform CG-SDT transmission only if it meets the criterion).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the time of effective filing to combine the teachings as given by Tsai with the teachings given by ZTE. The motivation for doing so would have been to compliance with standard implementation.
ZTE only disclose the scale factor is 1, ZTE does not explicitly disclose wherein the scaled DRX cycle period is scaled by a scaling factor that is selected from a group of scaling factors.
TS36-133 discloses the two measurement windows for TA validation being based on a minimum, existing at a time of TA validation criteria evaluation, of either a frequency range 2 (FR2) measurement period and a scaled discontinuous reception, wherein the scaled DRX cycle period is scaled by a scaling factor that is selected from a group of scaling factors (TS36-133, sections 4.7.4.3, 8.1.2.4.1.1.12, TMeasurement_Period UTRA_FDD = 480 ms, RSRP1 is considered valid provided that the following condition is met when in normal coverage:
(T1 – min(480 ms, NxDRX cycle)) ≤ T1’ ≤ (T1 + min(480 ms, NxDRX cycle),
where N is scaling factor, N is given by Table 4.7.2.1.1A-1 or section 4.9.2.4).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the time of effective filing to combine the teachings as given by Tsai and ZTE with the teachings given by TS36-133. The motivation for doing so would have been to compliance with standard implementation.
Claims 17 and 19 are rejected similarly with claim 1.
Regarding claims 2, 18, Tsai, TS36-133 and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 1 wherein boundaries of one of the measurement windows for the TA validation include: a first time minus the minimum of either the FR2 measurement period and a product of a first scaling factor and a DRX cycle period, existing at the time of the TA validation criteria evaluation, and a second time equal to the first time plus the minimum of either the FR2 measurement period and the scaled DRX cycle period, existing at the time of the TA validation criteria evaluation (ZTE, figure 1 of page 3; page 3, lines 1-10; TS36-133, sections 4.7.4.3, 8.1.2.4.1.1.12).
Regarding claim 3, Tsai, TS36-133 and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 2 wherein the first time is a time when a latest NTA was obtained by the UE via a TA command MAC control element or physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) for transmission on the CG-SDT resource (ZTE, figure 1 of page 3; page 3, lines 3-10).
Regarding claim 4, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 2, wherein the FR2 measurement period comprises a FR2 serving cell measurement period (ZTE, section 2, to ensure the validity of the TA for the same serving cell).
Regarding claim 5, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 4 wherein the FR2 serving cell measurement period comprises one selected from a group consisting of:
a maximum of either a predetermined value or a measurement period without gaps multiplied by a SSB-based measurement timing configuration (SMTC) periodicity of the serving cell; or
a first predetermined amount of time multiplied by a second scaling factor (ZTE, figure 1 of page 3; page 3, lines 1-18; a scaled DRX cycle period is DRX cycle scaled with a factor 1); or
a maximum of either a second predetermined amount of time or a product of a beam sweeping factor, a physical (PHY) sample number for cell measurement, and the SMTC periodicity of the serving cell or a maximum SMTC periodicity between the serving cell and inter-frequency cells.
It is noted that the applicant uses selective language in this claim and the examiner is only showing one of the claimed options.
Regarding claim 6, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 2, wherein the FR2 measurement period considering a FR2 serving cell measurement period and inter-frequency cells (Tsai, figs. 5-6, frequency index; ZTE, section 2, to ensure the validity of the TA for the same serving cell).
Regarding claim 7, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 6, wherein the FR2 serving cell measurement period comprises one selected from a group consisting of:
a maximum of either a predefined lower boundary or a product of a sharing factor representing a target carrier number for inter-frequency, a beam sweeping factor, a physical (PHY) sample number for cell measurement, and a synchronization signal block (SSB)-based measurement timing configuration (SMTC) periodicity of a serving cell or a maximum SMTC periodicity between the serving cell and the inter-frequency cells; or
a first predetermined amount of time multiplied by a second scaling factor (ZTE, figure 1 of page 3; page 3, lines 1-18; a scaled DRX cycle period is DRX cycle scaled with a factor 1).
It is noted that the applicant uses selective language in this claim and the examiner is only showing one of the claimed options.
Regarding claim 8, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 2, wherein the first scaling factor is one selected from a group consisting of:
a common beam sweeping factor (Tsai, [0609][0619]);
a DRX-beam sweeping factor (Tsai, [0609][0619]); or
a product of the DRX-beam sweeping factor and a power savings factor.
It is noted that the applicant uses selective language in this claim and the examiner is only showing one of the claimed options.
Regarding claim 9, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 1, wherein boundaries of one of the measurement windows for the TA validation include:
a first time equal to a time when the UE performs the TA validation for transmission using the CG-SDT resource; and a second time equal to first time minus a minimum of either the FR2 measurement period and a product of a first scaling factor and a DRX cycle period, existing at the time of the TA validation criteria evaluation (Tsai, [0128]; ZTE, figure 1 of page 3; page 3, lines 11-16).
Regarding claim 10, Tsai, TS36-133 and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise measuring first and second RSRP values during a first and second windows of the measurement windows for the TA validation, respectively, based on a highest N synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) of all transmitted SSBs, wherein N is an integer, and wherein the first and second RSRP values are based on an average of RSRPs of the highest N SSBs (Tsai, [04040][0405]; ZTE, figure 1 section 3, there are two windows defined for measuring SSB RSRP).
Regarding claim 11, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise measuring first and second RSRP values during a first and second windows of the measurement windows for the TA validation, respectively, based on a highest N synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) of all transmitted SSBs, wherein N is an integer, and wherein the first and second RSRP values are based on a top-ranked RSRP of the highest N SSBs (Tsai, [0258][0404][0405], ZTE, figure 1 section 3, there are two windows defined for measuring SSB RSRP, RSRP1 and RSRP2).
Regarding claim 12, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise measuring first and second RSRP values during a first and second windows of the measurement windows for the TA validation, respectively, based on a highest N synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) of all transmitted SSBs, wherein N is an integer, and wherein the first and second RSRP values are based on an average RSRP of SSBs with a same index in the highest N SSBs (ZTE, figure 1 section 3, there are two windows defined for measuring SSB RSRP).
Regarding claim 13, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise measuring first and second RSRP values during a first and second windows of the measurement windows for the TA validation, respectively, based on a highest N synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) of all transmitted SSBs, wherein N is an integer, and wherein the first and second RSRP values are based on an average RSRP of SSBs with same or different indices in the highest N SSBs (ZTE, figure 1 section 3, there are two windows defined for measuring SSB RSRP, RSRP1 and RSRP2).
Regarding claim 14, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise determining if the SDT can be initiated to transmit the uplink data, and wherein determining if the SDT can be initiated to transmit the uplink data comprises determining whether the UE supports beam correspondence, the SDT being initiated only if the UE supports the beam correspondence (Tsai, [0231][0417], when/after initiating a procedure for SDT, to provide to higher layers (e.g., MAC layer of UE) a corresponding set of RSRP measurements (for the configured beam).
Regarding claim 15, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise determining if the SDT can be initiated to transmit the uplink data, wherein determining if the SDT can be initiated to transmit the uplink data comprises determining whether the UE is synchronized towards a serving cell prior to CG-SDT transmission, and wherein the operations further comprise: dropping the CG-SDT transmission if no synchronization signal block (SSB) is available at the UE during a last predetermined length of time (Tsai, [0040][0049][0266], the Primary SCG Cell (PSCell) may be an SCG cell in which the UE performs random access (e.g., when performing the reconfiguration with a sync procedure; if none of the beams (e.g., SSB) with RSRP (e.g., SS-RSRP) above the RSRP threshold (among the beams in the configured beam list), UE may stop/cancel the procedure for CG-based SDT).
Regarding claim 16, Tsai and ZTE disclose the baseband processor of claim 15, wherein the last predetermined length of time comprises one selected from a group consisting of:
a predefined length of time (Tsai, [0129]; CG period configured by a configuration; ZTE, section 3, the maximum duration of the windows), a length of a DRX cycle; a first length of time equal to a beam sweeping factor multiplied by a predetermined number; or a second length of time equal to the beam sweeping factor multiplied by the length of the DRX cycle.
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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ZHENSHENG ZHANG whose telephone number is (571)270-1985. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Thursday 8:00am-6:00pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Michael Thier can be reached at 571-272-2832. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ZHENSHENG ZHANG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2474
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