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 1-21 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.
Specifically to the independent claims limitations,
A person of ordinary skill in the art would not be able to determine the boundaries of the claim with reasonable certainty. The claim recites that “each of the plurality of electronic control devices belongs to at least one of a plurality of communication groups”, yet the claim provides no definition of what constitutes a communication group, how a group is formed, or whether group membership is static or dynamic. The term “activation group”, introduced later as “one of the plurality of communication groups to be set to the wake-up state”, is also unclear because no distinction is provided between a communication group and an activation group, leaving scope open to multiple interpretations. The further requirement that “one or more electronic control devices … is switchable as a whole between a wake-up state and a sleep state for each of the communication groups individually” introduces ambiguity because the phrase “as a whole” does not explain whether all devices must transition collectively or whether a subset is sufficient. These omissions prevent a skilled artisan from determining the intended scope of group-based power management.
The claim additionally recites that “each of the first control device and the second control device stores a diagnosis mask table”, but the structure, format, content, and operational use of a “diagnosis mask table” are not defined. Because the table is central to the operation of the claimed system, the absence of objective limits renders the term indefinite. The claim further states that the table “defines one or more activation stop combinations”, but no explanation is provided for what an “activation stop combination” is, how such combinations are generated, or what conditions must be present to constitute one. The clause describing such combinations as containing “one of the electronic control devices as a cutoff device” and “another one of the electronic control devices as a sleep device” does not resolve the ambiguity, because the claim does not identify functional or behavioral differences between a “cutoff device” and a “sleep device”, nor does it specify whether these states refer to different power levels, network activity states, or separate diagnostic roles.
Indefiniteness is further created by the limitation reciting “non-received frame identification information”, defined in the claim as “identification information of the communication frame not received”. It is unclear how a communication frame that was never received can be identified, whether this refers to an expected message that times out, a stored ID for a missing frame, or some other inferred condition. The terms “activation trigger information” and “management frame” also introduce uncertainty because neither is described with structural or message-format limitations, leaving open whether any network message, event, or command could qualify. Without objective criteria to distinguish qualifying signals from non-qualifying ones, the scope of the claim cannot be determined.
Because the above-identified terms — including “communication groups,” “activation group,” “switchable as a whole,” “diagnosis mask table,” “activation stop combinations,” “cutoff device,” “sleep device,” “non-received frame identification information,” “activation trigger information,” and “management frame” — lack clear boundaries and are susceptible to more than one reasonable interpretation, thus the claims are considered indefinite.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MASUD AHMED whose telephone number is (571)270-1315. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9:00-8:30 PM PST with IFP.
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MASUD . AHMED
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 3657A
/MASUD AHMED/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3657