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
This office action is in response to the application filed on 07/19/2024.
Claims 1-15 are currently pending.
Claims 1, 6, 11 are amended via a preliminary amendment.
Claims 1-15 are rejected.
Claim Objections
Claims 1-15 are objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 1 recites the limitations “an MPDU” and “an SN” in lines 7-8. Examiner believes these limitations should instead read -- a MPDU-- and --a SN--.
A similar issue exists in claim 2, lines 3-4; claim 6, lines 9-10; claim 8, lines 3-4; claim 11, lines 9-10; claim 12, lines 3-4.
Claim 1 further recites the limitation “no MPDU in another A-MPDU received before the first A- MPDU is not being responded by a block acknowledgment (BA), any MPDU in any A-MPDU received before the first A-MPDU responds by a BA, or all MPDUs carried in any A-MPDU received before the first A-MPDU respond by a BA”.
Examiner believes these limitations should instead read -- no MPDU in another A-MPDU received before the first A- MPDU is not being responded to by a block acknowledgment (BA), any MPDU in any A-MPDU received before the first A-MPDU is responded to by a BA, or all MPDUs carried in any A-MPDU received before the first A-MPDU is responded to by a BA--.
A similar issue exists in claim 6 and claim 11.
Additionally, Claim 1 recites the limitation “no MPDU in another A-MPDU received before the first A- MPDU is not being responded by a block acknowledgment (BA)”. Aside from noting the double negation, Examiner objects that it is impossible for another A-MPDU to be received before the first A- MPDU. Else, the first A- MPDU would not be the first A- MPDU, therefore.
A similar issue exists in claim 9, and claim 14.
Claim 2 recites the fourth condition with multiple sub-conditions that would be better clarified if those sub-conditions were separated by a semi colon. For example, “the fourth condition comprises: no other MPDU with an SN in the first A-MPDU already meets the first condition, the second condition, and the third condition ; an MPDU with an SN received by a STA affiliated with the receiver is a 1st MPDU that is in the first A-MPDU and that meets the first condition, the second condition, and the third condition ; or a scoreboard context of a STA affiliated with the receiver has not been refreshed based on an MPDU in the first A-MPDU”.
A similar issue exists in claim 7 and claim 12.
Claim 4 is objected to for reciting the phrase “capable of,” found in line 2. This phrase generally refers/relates to claim limitations that can be interpreted as not positively stated and may be considered optional. It is recommended that the phrase "capable of” either be removed from the claim, or replaced with “configured to”.
A similar issue exists in claim 9 and claim 14.
Claims 3, 5, 8, 10, 13, 15 are also objected to for depending from objected base claims.
Appropriate correction is 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 1-15 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.
Claim 1 recites the limitation “no MPDU in another A-MPDU received before the first A- MPDU is not being responded by a block acknowledgment (BA)”.
A similar issue exists in claim 9 and claim 14.
Claims 3, 5, 8, 10, 13, 15 are also objected to for depending from objected base claims.
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)(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.
Claims 1-15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102 (a)(2) as being anticipated by Rojan Chitrakar et al (US 20070149206 A1).
For Claim 1, Chitrakar discloses a multi-link communication method (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0116, a method for multi-link communication), comprising:
receiving, by a receiver, a first aggregate media access control protocol data unit (A-MPDU) (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0094, that recipient MLD contains a common receive reordering buffer control and is responsible for recording and reordering the MSDUs/A-MSDUs arriving from each of the affiliated STAs); and obtaining, by the receiver, a locally recorded scoreboard context (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0095, that each affiliated STA of the recipient MLD contains a per-link Scoreboard context control per {peer affiliated STA MAC address, TID}); and when the first A-MPDU meets any one or more of the following conditions, refreshing the scoreboard context based on a sequence number (SN) of the first A-MPDU,
wherein a first condition comprises: a station (STA) affiliated with the receiver receives an MPDU with an SN that satisfies WinStartR < = SN<WinStartR+211 (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0098, that WinStart.sub.R is updated only if WinStartR<SSN≤WinStartR+2.sup.11);
a second condition comprises: none of MPDUs with SNs that satisfy WinStartB-WinSizeR < = SN < WinStartB is received by the STA, or all MPDUs with SNs that satisfy WinStartB-WinSizeR < = SN < WinStartB are received by another STA affiliated with the receiver; and a third condition comprises: no any-MPDU in another A-MPDU received before the first A- MPDU is not being responded by a BA, any MPDU in any A-MPDU received before the first A- MPDU responds by a block acknowledgment (BA), or all MPDUs carried in any A-MPDU received before the first A-MPDU respond by a BA.
For Claim 2, Chitrakar discloses a multi-link communication method, wherein the first A-MPDU further meets the following fourth condition: the fourth condition comprises: no other MPDU with an SN in the first A-MPDU already meets the first condition, the second condition, and the third condition, an MPDU with an SN received by a STA affiliated with the receiver is a 1i4 MPDU that is in the first A-MPDU and that meets the first condition, the second condition, and the third condition, or a scoreboard context of a STA affiliated with the receiver has not been refreshed based on an MPDU in the first A-MPDU (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0098, that If the bit is not set, recipient shall not update [WinStartR] based on the value of SSN in BAR frames).
For Claim 3, Chitrakar discloses a multi-link communication method, wherein the receiver has separate scoreboard context control in each link, and the link is a link between the receiver and a transmitter (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0095, that each affiliated STA of the recipient MLD contains a per-link Scoreboard context control per {peer affiliated STA MAC address, TID}).
For Claim 4, Chitrakar discloses a multi-link communication method, wherein the STA affiliated with the receiver is capable of using reordering buffer information to update the scoreboard context (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0094, that The recipient MLD contains a common receive reordering buffer control per {Originator MLD MAC address, TID} and is responsible for recording and reordering the MSDUs/A-MSDUs arriving from each of the affiliated STAs).
For Claim 5, Chitrakar discloses a multi-link communication method, wherein SNs in the first A-MPDU belong to a same traffic identifier (TID) (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0062, that the AP 102 can proceed to initiate the multi-link transmission 530 to the STA 104, the multi-link transmission 530 involving simultaneous transmission of frames belonging to the same TS (TID/AC) to the multi-link recipient 304 over the three links).
For Claim 6, Chitrakar discloses a communication apparatus (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0119, as shown in FIG. 27, the multi-link device 2700 may include circuitry), comprising a processor and a memory, wherein the memory is configured to store instructions; and the processor is configured to execute the instructions (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0126, that The Upper MAC functions may be implemented as software within a central processing unit (CPU) 2840 which, in operation, may be coupled to a memory 2842 that may be used to store the multi-band BA scoreboard), to enable the communication apparatus to performing operations comprising:
receiving, by a receiver, a first aggregate media access control protocol data unit (A-MPDU) (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0094, that recipient MLD contains a common receive reordering buffer control and is responsible for recording and reordering the MSDUs/A-MSDUs arriving from each of the affiliated STAs); and obtaining, a locally recorded scoreboard context (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0095, that each affiliated STA of the recipient MLD contains a per-link Scoreboard context control per {peer affiliated STA MAC address, TID}); and when the first A-MPDU meets any one or more of the following conditions,
refreshing the scoreboard context based on a sequence number (SN) of the first A-MPDU, wherein a first condition comprises: a station (STA) affiliated with the receiver receives an MPDU with an SN that satisfies WinStartR < = SN<WinStartR+211 (Chitrakar teaches, in ¶ 0098, that WinStart.sub.R is updated only if WinStartR<SSN≤WinStartR+2.sup.11);
a second condition comprises: none of MPDUs with SNs that satisfy WinStartB-WinSizeR < = SN < WinStartB is received by the STA, or all MPDUs with SNs that satisfy WinStartB-WinSizeR < = SN < WinStartB are received by another STA affiliated with the receiver; and a third condition comprises: no any-MPDU in another A-MPDU received before the first A- MPDU is not being responded by a BA, any MPDU in any A-MPDU received before the first A- MPDU responds by a block acknowledgment (BA), or all MPDUs carried in any A-MPDU received before the first A-MPDU respond by a BA.
For Claims 7-10, please refer to the rejection of Claims 2-5, above.
For Claim 11, please refer to the rejection of Claim 6, above.
For Claims 12-15, please refer to the rejection of Claims 2-5 above.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. ADACHI et al (US 20150264685 A1) teaches a wireless terminal including: a first communication unit assigning a sequence number to the allocated frame and transmitting the frame to the another wireless terminal through a first channel or a first mode, wherein, when the first transceiver 10 of the wireless terminal on the receiving side receives the A-MPDU, the sequence numbers of the correctly received frames are recorded in the scoreboard (first scoreboard) 14 in the first MAC processor 11.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MOHAMED A KAMARA whose telephone number is (571)270-5629. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9AM-4PM.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, CHARLES JIANG can be reached on 5712707191. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MOHAMED A KAMARA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2412
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