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 .
Specification
The specification is objected to as failing to provide proper antecedent basis for the claimed subject matter. See 37 CFR 1.75(d)(1) and MPEP § 608.01(o). Correction of the following is required: “a max timer window begins after the expiration of a first time window” found in claims 9 and 19 does not appear in the specification.
Appropriate correction required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 9 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention. Claims 9 and 19 state the expiration of a first time window in which the UE “should sleep submitting the uplink information”. It is unclear what is being claimed here. If a UE is sleeping, then the UE cannot be submitting the uplink information, thus it is unclear what is meant by “Should sleep submitting the uplink information”.
Appropriate correction required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 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)(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.
Claim(s) 1, 3, 6, 11, 13, 16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Iwai et al. “Iwai” US 2019/0090229.
Regarding claims 1 and 11, Iwai teaches a method and an apparatus comprising processing circuitry and memory on which are stored instructions that are operable, when executed by the processing circuitry (Figure 15), to cause the processing circuitry to perform operations comprising:
maintaining a queue with at least one entry for high priority data transmissions with a user equipment that submits uplink information as part of a request for multi-access edge computing processing by one or more computers (a communication even can include a UL transmission of user data such as a request message from a UE to a MEC server; Paragraph 50. Figure 5 shows a plurality of DL buffers (502) for the UE which are used for holding/sending data to the UE based on the requested information; Paragraphs 79-80. Paragraph 92 further teaches that the queues/buffers give higher priority to specific packets with respect to transmission order. Thus there is a queue with at least one entry for high priority data transmission);
receiving, from the one or more computers, result data responsive to the uplink information and placing the result data in a high priority data transmission entry in the queue (for a requested communication event, the information with respect to the event (i.e. information from the request such as image data) can be discarded; Paragraph 67. Thus, this shows the result (i.e. requested data from the MEC server) is stored in the DL buffers); and
providing, to the user equipment, the result data based at least in part on the high priority data transmission entry in the queue (the data requested is eventually transmit to the UE from the DL buffers; Paragraphs 62 and 79-80).
Regarding claims 3 and 13, Iwai teaches the queue includes one or more non-high priority data transmission (Paragraph 92 further teaches that the queues/buffers give higher priority to specific packets with respect to transmission order. Thus there is a queue with at least one entry for high priority data transmission and other non-high priority data).
Regarding claims 6 and 16, Iwai teaches reserving a guaranteed bitrate for network transmissions for the high priority data transmission (the DL scheduler takes into account GBR (reserved guaranteed bit rate) for transmissions to a UE with respect to priority; Paragraph 80).
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.
Claim(s) 2 and 12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Iwai in view of Gould et al. “Gould” US 2021/0165664.
Regarding claims 2 and 12, while Iwai teaches multiple buffers (see figure 5), Iwai does not teach one buffer is for priority and one is for non-priority data. Gould teaches there are priority queues for certain types of events and other, non-priority queues, for other types of events/information; Paragraph 132.
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the effective filing to modify the teachings of Iwai to include two buffers, one for priority and one for non-priority information as taught by Gould.
One would be motivated to make the modification such that certain events that should not be delayed from being processed can be stored in the high priority queue as taught by Gould; Paragraph 132.
Claim(s) 4, 5, 14, and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Iwai in view of Lu et al. “Lu” US 2022/0231956.
Regarding claims 4 and 14, Iwai does not expressly disclose a placeholder in the queue for high priority data; however, Lu teaches reserving buffer space (i.e. placeholder) for packets of high transmission priority; Paragraph 2.
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the effective filing to modify the teachings of Iwai to include reserving buffers space (placeholder) for high priority data as taught by Lu.
One would be motivated to make the modification such that low priority data can be discarded and high priority data have space to be stored as taught by Lu; Paragraph 2.
Regarding claims 5 and 15, Iwai teaches placing the result into the high priority buffers as discussed in claims 1 and 11; however, Iwai does not expressly disclose a placeholder in the queue for high priority data; however, Lu teaches reserving buffer space (i.e. placeholder) for packets of high transmission priority; Paragraph 2. Thus, when combined with Iwai, when the result comes from the MEC server with high priority information it would be stored in the reserved buffers space.
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the effective filing to modify the teachings of Iwai to include reserving buffers space (placeholder) for high priority data as taught by Lu.
One would be motivated to make the modification such that low priority data can be discarded and high priority data have space to be stored as taught by Lu; Paragraph 2.
Claim(s) 7, 8, 17, 18, is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Iwai in view of Yamagishi US 2023/0216725.
Regarding claims 7 and 17, Iwai teaches the ability to predict if the transmission of data can be competed within a certain deadline (i.e. time window Figure 6: 601) and reserving guaranteed bit rates for transmissions to a UE with respect to priority; Paragraph 80. Iwai does not expressly disclose making these predictions prior to receiving the result data. Yamagishi teaches the use of GBR as well as being able to predict transmission information before event data is transferred; Paragraph 227. When combined with Iwai, one can see that the event data from the MEC is not sent prior to the predictions with respect to GBR being determined.
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the effective filing to modify the teachings of Iwai to include performing the predictions prior to receiving the result/event data as taught by Yamagishi.
One would be motivated to make the modification such that network resources can be properly reserved based on the predicted information to be received/transmit as taught by Yamagishi; Paragraphs 227-228.
Regarding claims 8 and 18, Iwai teaches a max timer window (Figure 6: 601 teaches predicting transmission of packets with respect to a deadline. The deadline is viewed as a “max timer window” because the deadline is the absolute maximum amount of time that the information can be transmit.
Claim(s) 10 and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Iwai in view of Yamagishi in view of Lundqvist et al. “Lundqvist” US 2018/0242191.
Regarding claims 10 and 20, the prior art does not expressly disclose a time window being 20 milliseconds; however, Lundqvist teaches the use of prediction periods with respect to GBR (See paragraph 198) and also that a Max time value can be with respect to milliseconds; Paragraphs 184-185 and Figures 11-12. Thus a person of skill in the art could use 20 milliseconds.
Thus it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the effective filing to modify the teachings of the prior art to include the max timer to be 20 milliseconds as taught by Lundqvist.
One would be motivated to make the modification such that the system knows the max time for transmission as taught by Lundqvist; Paragraphs 184-185 and Figures 11-12.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to BRANDON M RENNER whose telephone number is (571)270-3621. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 7am-5pm EST.
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/BRANDON M RENNER/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2411
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