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 .
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 3-5, 10, 16-18 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.
Regarding claims 3-5, claim 3 recites ‘the voice call’ There is lack of antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. Therefore, it is not clear what voice call. Claims 4-5 do not cure the deficiencies of claim 3 and are rejected for similar reasons.
Regarding claim 10, claim 10 recites ‘the other VoWiFi call’. There is no other VoWiFi call. Therefore it is not clear what you are attempting to claim.
Regarding claims 16-18, claim 16 recites ‘the voice call’ There is lack of antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. Therefore, it is not clear what voice call. Claims 17-18 do not cure the deficiencies of claim 16 and are rejected for similar reasons.
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 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao (2021/0136645) and further in view of Mattam (2022/0110041) and further in view of Zhang (2024/0196448).
Regarding claim 1, Zhao discloses a method, comprising:
initiating, by a device, a voice-over-Wi-Fi (VoWiFi) call with an access point; (See Zhao para. 109; voice call over WiFi was established by a UE; voice call could be a VoWiFI call; para. 58; access points (WiFi connections are with access points (APs))
receiving, by the device, second cell information associated with a second base station providing Long Term Evolution (LTE) access; (See Zhao para. 58, fig. 1; heterogeneous network including LTE eNB (e.g. second base station) which include a cell; para. 51; UE adjusts priority state of system information blocks (SIB24) for LTE; the radio manager, which is inside the UE) overwrites values of the SIBs (that is, by the 3GPP standard LTE the UE receives SIBs from the network (SIBs are only transmitted in the downlink)); para. 110 network signaling)
selectively:
handing over the VoWiFi call to the second base station based on the information indicating that VoNR is not supported or (See Zhao fig. 5; select LTE for handover of the voice call based upon determining VoNR is not supported,
handing over the VoWiFi call based on the information indicating that VoNR is supported. (See Zhao para. 6; Prioritizing VoNR for handover if VoNR is supported)
Zhao discloses that the UE determines whether VoNR is supported based upon network signaling (See Zhao para. 110) and discloses storing information of cells. (See Zhao para. 51; SIB) Zhao does not explicitly disclose wherein a UE receiving and storing capability information of neighboring cells for potential handoff. However, Mattam does disclose wherein a UE receiving and storing capability information of neighboring cells for potential handoff. (See Mattam fig. 5ca; UE receives information of neighboring cells and what they support and stores this information; see para. 100, 101; UE updates memory with support information) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the method of Zhao to include the teaching of wherein a UE receiving and storing capability information of neighboring cells for potential handoff of Mattam with the motivation being to meet end user goals for connectivity by taking into consideration which connect might best meet end user needs and further to ensure seamless connectivity by preparing for handover before it is necessary to prevent dropped calls and/or delays in traffic.
Zhao in view of Mattam does not explicitly disclose storing information of the WiFi connection. However, Zhang does disclose storing information of the WiFi connection. (See Zhang para. 74; ID is WLAN APN ID BSSID, SSID, MAC ID/address; fig. 5, 6) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the method of Zhao in view of Mattam to include the teaching of storing information of the WiFi connection of Zhang with the motivation being to allow for intelligent determination of handovers by knowing approximate location which may be useful in determining direction of movement or assist in determining other suitable neighboring cells and further to allow for seamless handover by identifying where the connection is being routed through and further to allow for authentication for proper routing of secured traffic.
Claim 2 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao (2021/0136645) and further in view of Mattam (2022/0110041) and further in view of Zhang (2024/0196448) and further in view of Cook (2022/0141911).
Regarding claim 2, Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang discloses the method of claim 1. Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang do not explicitly disclose receiving an indication of congestion associated with the access point; and determining to hand over the connection based on the indication of congestion with the access point. However, Cook does disclose receiving an indication of congestion associated with the access point; and determining to hand over the connection based on the indication of congestion with the access point. (See Cook para. 12, 14, 15; messages is communicated to mobile device including inability of backhaul to support communications which includes level of utilization of backhaul (e.g. congestion) exceeding a threshold; communication device initiates a handover if based on this information passed from access point (e.g. congestion associated with AP) indicates threshold has been passed; see also fig. 5) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the method of Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang to include the teaching of receiving an indication of congestion associated with the access point; and determining to hand over the connection based on the indication of congestion with the access point of Cook with the motivation being to prevent delay and jitter and further to prevent a dropped connection and further to meet end user goals for quality of service and further to better utilize limited wireless resources by better load balancing across different parts of the network and thereby meeting end user goals and network goals for reliability.
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 8, 10, 11, 12, and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao (2021/0136645) and further in view of Mattam (2022/0110041) and further in view of Zhang (2024/0196448) and further in view of Cook (2022/0141911).
Regarding claim 8, Zhao discloses a device, comprising:
one or more processors configured to: (See Zhao fig. 2; processors, para. 71)
initiate a voice-over-Wi-Fi (VoWiFi) call with an access point; (See Zhao para. 109; voice call over WiFi was established by a UE; voice call could be a VoWiFI call; para. 58; access points (WiFi connections are with access points (APs))
receive second cell information associated with a second base station providing Long Term Evolution (LTE) access; (See Zhao para. 58, fig. 1; heterogeneous network including LTE eNB (e.g. second base station) which include a cell; para. 51; UE adjusts priority state of system information blocks (SIB24) for LTE; the radio manager, which is inside the UE) overwrites values of the SIBs (that is, by the 3GPP standard LTE the UE receives SIBs from the network (SIBs are only transmitted in the downlink)); para. 110 network signaling)
selectively:
hand over the VoWiFi call to the second base station based on the information indicating that VoNR is not supported; or (See Zhao fig. 5; select LTE for handover of the voice call based upon determining VoNR is not supported)
hand over the VoWiFi call based on the information indicating that VoNR is supported. (See Zhao para. 6; Prioritizing VoNR for handover if VoNR is supported)
Zhao discloses that the UE determines whether VoNR is supported based upon network signaling (See Zhao para. 110) and discloses storing information of cells. (See Zhao para. 51; SIB) Zhao does not explicitly disclose wherein a UE receiving and storing capability information of neighboring cells for potential handoff. However, Mattam does disclose wherein a UE receiving and storing capability information of neighboring cells for potential handoff. (See Mattam fig. 5ca; UE receives information of neighboring cells and what they support and stores this information; see para. 100, 101; UE updates memory with support information) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the method of Zhao to include the teaching of wherein a UE receiving and storing capability information of neighboring cells for potential handoff of Mattam with the motivation being to meet end user goals for connectivity by taking into consideration which connect might best meet end user needs and further to ensure seamless connectivity by preparing for handover before it is necessary to prevent dropped calls and/or delays in traffic.
Zhao in view of Mattam does not explicitly disclose storing information of the WiFi connection. However, Zhang does disclose storing information of the WiFi connection. (See Zhang para. 74; ID is WLAN APN ID BSSID, SSID, MAC ID/address; fig. 5, 6) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the method of Zhao in view of Mattam to include the teaching of storing information of the WiFi connection of Zhang with the motivation being to allow for intelligent determination of handovers by knowing approximate location which may be useful in determining direction of movement or assist in determining other suitable neighboring cells and further to allow for seamless handover by identifying where the connection is being routed through and further to allow for authentication for proper routing of secured traffic.
Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang do not explicitly disclose receiving an indication of congestion associated with the access point; and determining to hand over the connection based on the indication of congestion with the access point. However, Cook does disclose receiving an indication of congestion associated with the access point; and determining to hand over the connection based on the indication of congestion with the access point. (See Cook para. 12, 14, 15; messages is communicated to mobile device including inability of backhaul to support communications which includes level of utilization of backhaul (e.g. congestion) exceeding a threshold; communication device initiates a handover if based on this information passed from access point (e.g. congestion associated with AP) indicates threshold has been passed; see also fig. 5) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the method of Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang to include the teaching of receiving an indication of congestion associated with the access point; and determining to hand over the connection based on the indication of congestion with the access point of Cook with the motivation being to prevent delay and jitter and further to prevent a dropped connection and further to meet end user goals for quality of service and further to better utilize limited wireless resources by better load balancing across different parts of the network and thereby meeting end user goals and network goals for reliability.
Regarding claim 10, Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook discloses the device of claim 8, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
assess quality metrics associated with the VoWiFi call; and (See Zhao fig. 11a, para. 128; determine WLAN signal measurement)
determine to hand over the other VoWiFi call based on the quality metrics. (See Zhao para. 102, 107; WLAN measurement below threshold and service triggers EPS fallback (e.g. handover); para. 109; voice call is active)
Regarding claim 11, Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook discloses the device of claim 8, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
prevent handover of the VoWiFi call to the first base station based on a core network device indicating that VoNR is not supported. (See Zhao para. 40, 44-45; VoNR not supported; para. 97, 113; prioritizing LTE RAT over NR RAT because VoNR is not supported (e.g. preventing handover); see also fig. 6)
Regarding claim 12, Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook discloses the device of claim 8, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
allow handover of the VoWiFi call to the first base station based on a core network device indicating that VoNR is supported. (See Zhao fig. 8; prioritizing NR when it is determined that VoNR is supported (e.g. allow handover))
Regarding claim 14, Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook discloses the device of claim 8, wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
monitor for threshold conditions defined for handing over the VoWiFi call; and (See Zhao fig. 11a, para. 128; determine WLAN signal measurement)
determine to hand over the VoWiFi call based on monitoring for the threshold conditions. (See Zhao para. 102, 107; WLAN measurement below threshold and service triggers EPS fallback (e.g. handover); para. 109; voice call is active)
Claim 9 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao (2021/0136645) and further in view of Mattam (2022/0110041) and further in view of Zhang (2024/0196448) and further in view of Cook (2022/0141911) and further in view of Hau (2023/0262597).
Regarding claim 9, Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook discloses the device of claim 8. Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook do not explicitly disclose wherein the information indicating whether VoNR is supported by the first base station is based on an emergency information bit indicating that VoNR is supported. However, Hau does disclose wherein the information indicating whether VoNR is supported by the first base station is based on an emergency information bit indicating that VoNR is supported. (See Hau para. 86; flags indicating emergency service support including VoNR) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the apparatus of Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook to include the teaching of wherein the information indicating whether VoNR is supported by the first base station is based on an emergency information bit indicating that VoNR is supported of Hau with the motivation being to allow for emergency services when necessary and further to make backup plans if emergency services are not supported by possibly attaching to another device that does have emergency services and further to allow the UE information to meet end user goals.
Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao (2021/0136645) and further in view of Mattam (2022/0110041) and further in view of Zhang (2024/0196448) and further in view of Cook (2022/0141911) and further in view of Gehrmann (2008/0107269).
Regarding claim 13, Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook discloses the device of claim 8. Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook do not explicitly disclose performing the steps of claim 8 again. However, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the apparatus of Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook to include the teaching of performing the steps of claim 8 again with the motivation being it is common sense (e.g. that is, performing the steps only ever in the life of the UE one time would be wasteful (e.g. getting a new phone every time one wanted to call another person and throwing the phone away)) and further it is a duplication of parts under MPEP 2144.04.
Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook do not explicitly disclose deleting old parameters. However, Gehrmann does disclose deleting old parameters. (See Gehrmann para. 86) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the apparatus of Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang in view of Cook to include the teaching of deleting old parameters of Gehrmann with the motivation being to save memory and further it is common sense (there is little point in keeping old nonvalid information which wastes memory) and further to improve performance by preventing confusion.
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 15 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao (2021/0136645) and further in view of Mattam (2022/0110041) and further in view of Zhang (2024/0196448) and further in view of Cook (2022/0141911).
Regarding claim 15, Zhao discloses a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing a set of instructions, the set of instructions comprising:
one or more instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of a device, cause the device to: (See Zhao para. 10; processor executing an algorithm stored in memory)
initiate a voice-over-Wi-Fi (VoWiFi) call with an access point; (See Zhao para. 109; voice call over WiFi was established by a UE; voice call could be a VoWiFI call; para. 58; access points (WiFi connections are with access points (APs))
receive second cell information associated with a second base station providing Long Term Evolution (LTE) access; (See Zhao para. 58, fig. 1; heterogeneous network including LTE eNB (e.g. second base station) which include a cell; para. 51; UE adjusts priority state of system information blocks (SIB24) for LTE; the radio manager, which is inside the UE) overwrites values of the SIBs (that is, by the 3GPP standard LTE the UE receives SIBs from the network (SIBs are only transmitted in the downlink)); para. 110 network signaling)
selectively:
hand over the VoWiFi call to the second base station based on the information indicating that VoNR is not supported; or (See Zhao fig. 5; select LTE for handover of the voice call based upon determining VoNR is not supported)
hand over the VoWiFi call based on the information indicating that VoNR is supported. (See Zhao para. 6; Prioritizing VoNR for handover if VoNR is supported)
Zhao discloses that the UE determines whether VoNR is supported based upon network signaling (See Zhao para. 110) and discloses storing information of cells. (See Zhao para. 51; SIB) Zhao does not explicitly disclose wherein a UE receiving and storing capability information of neighboring cells for potential handoff. However, Mattam does disclose wherein a UE receiving and storing capability information of neighboring cells for potential handoff. (See Mattam fig. 5ca; UE receives information of neighboring cells and what they support and stores this information; see para. 100, 101; UE updates memory with support information) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the method of Zhao to include the teaching of wherein a UE receiving and storing capability information of neighboring cells for potential handoff of Mattam with the motivation being to meet end user goals for connectivity by taking into consideration which connect might best meet end user needs and further to ensure seamless connectivity by preparing for handover before it is necessary to prevent dropped calls and/or delays in traffic.
Zhao in view of Mattam does not explicitly disclose storing information of the WiFi connection. However, Zhang does disclose storing information of the WiFi connection. (See Zhang para. 74; ID is WLAN APN ID BSSID, SSID, MAC ID/address; fig. 5, 6) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the method of Zhao in view of Mattam to include the teaching of storing information of the WiFi connection of Zhang with the motivation being to allow for intelligent determination of handovers by knowing approximate location which may be useful in determining direction of movement or assist in determining other suitable neighboring cells and further to allow for seamless handover by identifying where the connection is being routed through and further to allow for authentication for proper routing of secured traffic.
Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang do not explicitly disclose receiving an indication of congestion associated with the access point; and determining to hand over the connection based on the indication of congestion with the access point. However, Cook does disclose receiving an indication of congestion associated with the access point; and determining to hand over the connection based on the indication of congestion with the access point. (See Cook para. 12, 14, 15; messages is communicated to mobile device including inability of backhaul to support communications which includes level of utilization of backhaul (e.g. congestion) exceeding a threshold; communication device initiates a handover if based on this information passed from access point (e.g. congestion associated with AP) indicates threshold has been passed; see also fig. 5) Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to modify the method of Zhao in view of Mattam in view of Zhang to include the teaching of receiving an indication of congestion associated with the access point; and determining to hand over the connection based on the indication of congestion with the access point of Cook with the motivation being to prevent delay and jitter and further to prevent a dropped connection and further to meet end user goals for quality of service and further to better utilize limited wireless resources by better load balancing across different parts of the network and thereby meeting end user goals and network goals for reliability.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3-5, 16-18 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Claims 6-7, 19-20 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.
Conclusion
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/Stephen J Clawson/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2461
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