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 action is in response to communications filed 08/12/2024.
Claims 1-15 and 18-21 are currently pending.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on 09/05/2024, 05/29/2025, and 10/02/2025 are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-7, 9-15, and 18-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. The claims do not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter because:
Claims 1-7, 9-15, and 18-21 solely recite determination and selecting steps.
For claim 1, determine a feature and determining a trigger condition are a mental steps. Because the claimed subject matter is close to example 40 of the 2019 Patent Eligibility Guidance. Example 40 dealt with comparing traffic data to a predetermined threshold. The claimed subject matter is essentially determine a threshold and comparing traffic data to the threshold. Therefore claim 1 is mostly mental step.
The only additional elements are selecting steps. Extra solution activity is generally considered not to have practical application. This step does not pass the test under step 2A, prong 2, practical application because it is not tied to the determining. It is not clear if the determining is tied to the selecting step. Therefore, it is an extra solution activity.
This step does not pass the test under step 2B, the selecting step is not significantly more for the same reason as step 2A. It is extra-solution activity for the same reason as Prong 2 analysis. The claims, such as claim 18, that add processor and memory as additional limitations do not amount to significantly more as they are well understood to be generic computer components. Therefore, the claims are directed towards an abstract idea.
The dependent claims are mostly additional determining steps. There are not any additional elements that would change the analysis. Therefore, claims 1-7, 9-15, and 18-21 are rejected under 35 USC 101 for claiming an abstract idea (mental step) without significantly more.
On the other hand, dependent claim 8 is patent eligible because it has an additional indicating step. The indication step is not a mental step and therefore an additional element. This enables the improvement of coverage enhancement (CE), that is the inventive concept of the current application. So this claim passes the test under Prong 2 – having practical application.
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.
Claims 1-15 and 18-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Futaki (Pub. No.: US 2024/0292467 A1).
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Figure 3 of Futaki
Regarding claim 1, Futaki teaches
A method for determining a trigger condition, performed by a terminal (Futaki [0071], [0101], and [0112]: trigger for random access (RA) procedure), comprising:
determining a feature for triggering a random access (Futaki [0009], [0112], [0186], and [0023-0025]: features for random access, triggering random access);
selecting a random access channel (RACH) resource partition, and determining whether a selected RACH resource supports the feature (Futaki [0009], [0079], [0097], and [0117-0118]: RACH resource partition, whether RACH resource supports particular features);
determining that a trigger condition of the feature is met in response to the selected RACH resource supporting the feature (Futaki [0118-0122]: feature supported (condition met)); and
determining that the trigger condition of the feature is not met in response to the selected RACH resource not supporting the feature (Futaki [0118-0122]: not supported feature).
Regarding claim 2, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 1 (the limitations of parent claim 1 as indicated above), further comprising:
determining whether a feature specific RACH resource is configured on a network side (Futaki [0002] and [0009-00013]: RACH resource, network side); and
determining that the trigger condition of the feature is not met in response to the feature specific RACH resource being not configured (Futaki [0104] and figs. 7-8: feature combination is not configured, selected ‘no’ in steps 701 or 801 show trigger condition not being met in response to feature not being configured);
wherein selecting the RACH resource partition, and determining whether the selected RACH resource supports the feature comprises:
in response to the feature specific RACH resource being configured, selecting the RACH resource, and determining whether the selected RACH resource supports the feature (Futaki [0117-0122] and figs. 7-8: RACH resource configured, yes, selecting resource).
Regarding claim 3, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 1 (the limitations of parent claim 1 as indicated above), further comprising:
determining that a type of initiated random access is feature random access in response to the selected RACH resource supporting the feature (Futaki fig. 7-8, [0117-0120], and [0128-0131]: supporting feature and feature random access); and
determining that the type of the initiated random access is non-feature random access in response to the selected RACH resource not supporting the feature (Futaki fig. 7-8, [0117-0120], and [0128-0131]: random access not supporting the feature).
Regarding claim 4, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 1 (the limitations of parent claim 1 as indicated above), further comprising:
determining whether a feature specific RACH resource is configured on a network side (Futaki [0002] and [0009-00013]: RACH resource, network side);
determining that a type of initiated random access is feature random access in response to the feature specific RACH resource being configured (Futaki [0009]: configured RACH resource, feature random access); and
determining that the type of the initiated random access is non-feature random access in response to the feature specific RACH resource being not configured (Futaki [0104] and [0114]: random access not associated with feature, feature not configured).
Regarding claim 5, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 1 (the limitations of parent claim 1 as indicated above), wherein the RACH resource comprises a feature combination specific RACH resource, and a feature combination comprises at least two features (Futaki [0112]: determines a feature combination (e.g., SDT+Slicing) (at least two features)).
Regarding claim 6, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 5 (the limitations of parent claim 5 as indicated above), wherein the selected RACH resources supporting the feature comprises:
a feature combination corresponding to the RACH resource comprising the feature for triggering the random access (Futaki [0009]: RACH resource associated with feature combination, feature random access).
Regarding claim 7, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 1 (the limitations of parent claim 1 as indicated above), wherein the feature comprises at least one of: a reduced capability (Redcap); coverage enhancement (CE); radio access network (RAN) slicing; or small data transmission (SDT) (Futaki [0009]: reduced capability (RedCap), coverage enhancement, slicing, small data transmission (SDT)).
Regarding claim 8, Futaki teaches
The method according to any one of claims 1 (the limitations of parent claim 1 as indicated above), further comprising:
indicating, by a medium access control (MAC) layer, to an upper layer whether the trigger condition of the feature is met, to enable the upper layer to determine whether to trigger the feature (Futaki [0117-0118], [0070-0073], [0070], figs 7-8: MAC layer to initiate a random access procedure to transmit an RRC message for establishing or resuming the RRC connection; [0139]: reports indication to RRC layer and ability to make adjustments; RRC is in a higher layer than MAC).
Regarding claim 9, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 8 (the limitations of parent claim 8 as indicated above), wherein the feature comprises at least: small data transmission (SDT) (Futaki [0009]: small data transmission (SDT) as a feature).
Regarding claim 10, Futaki teaches
A method for configuring resource partitions, performed by a network side device, comprising:
configuring random access channel (RACH) resource partitions for a terminal, to enable the terminal to select a RACH resource partition from configured RACH resource partitions (Futaki [0009], [0079], [0097], [0116-0130], and [0117-0118]: configuring and enabling selecting of RACH resource partition), and determine whether a selected RACH resource supports a feature for triggering random access (Futaki [0009], [0079], [0097], and [0117-0118]: RACH resource partition, whether RACH resource supports particular features);
wherein, in response to the selected RACH resource supporting the feature, the terminal determines that the trigger condition of the feature is met (Futaki [0118-0122]: feature supported (condition met)); and
in response to the selected RACH resource not supporting the feature, the terminal determines that the trigger condition of the feature is not met (Futaki [0118-0122]: not supported feature).
Regarding claim 11, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 10 (the limitations of parent claim 10 as indicated above), wherein the RACH resource partitions configured for the terminal are further configured to cause the terminal to determine whether the network side is configured with a feature specific RACH resource (Futaki [0002] and [0009-00013]: RACH resource configuration, network side);
wherein, in response to the feature specific RACH resource being not configured, the terminal determines that the trigger condition of the feature is not met (Futaki [0104] and figs. 7-8: feature combination is not configured, selected ‘no’ in steps 701 or 801 show trigger condition not being met in response to feature not being configured); and in response to the feature specific RACH resource being configured, the terminal selects the RACH resource, and determines whether the selected RACH resource supports the feature (Futaki [0117-0122] and figs. 7-8: RACH resource configured, yes, selecting resource).
Regarding claim 12, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 10 (the limitations of parent claim 10 as indicated above),
wherein the RACH resource partitions configured for the terminal are further configured to cause the terminal to determine a type of initiated random access (Futaki fig. 7-8, [0117-0120], and [0128-0131]: feature or non-feature random access types);
wherein, in response to the selected RACH resource supporting the feature, the terminal determines that the type of the initiated random access is feature random access (Futaki fig. 7-8, [0117-0120], and [0128-0131]: supporting feature and feature random access); and
in response to the selected RACH resource not supporting the feature, the terminal determines that the type of the initiated random access is non-feature random access (Futaki fig. 7-8, [0117-0120], and [0128-0131]: random access not supporting the feature).
Regarding claim 13, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 10 (the limitations of parent claim 10 as indicated above), wherein the RACH resource partitions configured for the terminal are further configured to cause the terminal to determine whether the network side is configured with a feature specific RACH resource (Futaki [0002] and [0009-00013]: feature specific RACH resource, network side);
wherein, in response to the feature specific RACH resource being configured, the terminal determines that the type of the initiated random access is feature random access (Futaki [0009]: configured RACH resource, feature random access); and
in response to the feature specific RACH resource being not configured, the terminal determines that the type of the initiated random access is non-feature random access (Futaki [0104] and [0114]: random access not associated with feature, feature not configured).
Regarding claim 14, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 10 (the limitations of parent claim 10 as indicated above), wherein the RACH resource comprises a feature combination specific RACH resource, and a feature combination comprises at least two features (Futaki [0112]: determines a feature combination (e.g., SDT+Slicing) (at least two features)).
Regarding claim 15, Futaki teaches
The method according to claim 10 (the limitations of parent claim 10 as indicated above), wherein the feature comprises at least one of: a reduced capability (Redcap); coverage enhancement (CE); radio access network (RAN) slicing; or small data transmission (SDT) (Futaki [0009]: reduced capability (RedCap), coverage enhancement, slicing, small data transmission (SDT)).
Regarding claim 18, Futaki teaches
A communication device (Futaki [0169-0179]), comprising:
a processor (Futaki [0169-0179]: processor); and
a memory, configured to store a computer program (Futaki [0169-0179]: memory which stores computer programs);
wherein the processor is configured to:
determine a feature for triggering a random access (Futaki [0009], [0112], [0186], and [0023-0025]: features for random access, triggering random access);
select a random access channel (RACH) resource partition, and determine whether a selected RACH resource supports the feature (Futaki [0009], [0079], [0097], and [0117-0118]: RACH resource partition, whether RACH resource supports particular features);
determine that a trigger condition of the feature is met in response to the selected RACH resource supporting the feature (Futaki [0118-0122]: feature supported (condition met)); and
determine that the trigger condition of the feature is not met in response to the selected RACH resource not supporting the feature (Futaki [0118-0122]: not supported feature).
Regarding claim 19, Futaki teaches
A communication device (Futaki [0169-0179]), comprising:
a processor (Futaki [0169-0179]: processor); and
a memory, configured to store a computer program (Futaki [0169-0179]: memory that stores computer programs);
wherein the processor is configured to perform the method according to claim 10 (the limitations of parent claim 10 as indicated above).
Regarding claim 20, Futaki teaches
A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having a computer program stored thereon (Futaki [0185]: non-transitory computer readable storage medium), wherein, when the computer program is executed by a processor (Futaki [0169-0179]: processor), the processor is caused to perform the method according to claim 1 (the limitations of parent claim 1 as indicated above).
Regarding claim 21, Futaki teaches
A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having a computer program stored thereon (Futaki [0185]: non-transitory computer readable storage medium), wherein, when the computer program is executed by a processor (Futaki [0169-0179]: processor), the processor is caused to perform the method according to claim 10 (the limitations of parent claim 10 as indicated above).
Conclusion
The following prior art not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure.
Yang (WO 2019/214474 A1) discloses RACH resource configuration and triggering a random access procedure.
Futaki (Pub. No.: US 2024/0397555 A1) discloses feature combinations and RACH resource partitions.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RACHEL E MARKS whose telephone number is (703)756-1309. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Fri 8:30am-6pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Charles C Jiang can be reached at (571)270-7191. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/R.E.C./Examiner, Art Unit 2412 /CHARLES C JIANG/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2412
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