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 .
This is responsive to Application 18/844,926 filed 09/06/2024 in which claims 1-19 and 21 are presented for examination.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 1-19 and 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Huang et al (US 2024/0283613 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Huang teaches a method performed by a first station (STA) in a wireless local area network (WLAN) system, the method comprising:
receiving, from a second STA, a first portion of a physical layer protocol data unit (PPDU) including at least one signal (SIG) field related to information of a multiple access point (AP) (Huang: Figs. 1A, 3 and 4, [0069]-[0070], AP2 receives from AP1, EHT MU PPDU comprising U-SIG field and EHT-SIG field); and
receiving, from the second STA, a second portion of the PPDU based on information included in the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP (Huang: Figs. 1, 3 and 4; [0069]-[0070], AP2 received data portion of the EHT MU PPDU packet and the data part is based on information in the U-SIG and EHT-SIG),
wherein the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP has a different format based on whether a minimum channel width allocated to the multiple AP is greater than or equal to 80MHz (Huang: Figs. 2A-2E; Fig. 3; [0059]-[0065] minimum frequency subblocks of 80 MHz, [0073], different EHT-SIG and U-SIG format for 80MHz channels).
Regarding claim 19, Huang teaches a first station (STA) device operating in a wireless local area network (WLAN) system, the device comprising: at least one transceiver; and at least one processor coupled with the at least one transceiver, wherein the at least one processor is configured to:
receive, through the at least one transceiver, from a second STA, a first portion of a physical layer protocol data unit (PPDU) including at least one signal (SIG) field related to information of a multiple access point (AP) (Huang: Figs. 1A, 3 and 4, [0069]-[0070], AP2 receives from AP1, EHT MU PPDU comprising U-SIG field and EHT-SIG field); and
receive, through the at least one transceiver, from the second STA, a second portion of the PPDU based on information included in the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP (Huang: Figs. 1, 3 and 4; [0069]-[0070], AP2 received data portion of the EHT MU PPDU packet and the data part is based on information in the U-SIG and EHT-SIG),
wherein the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP has a different format based on whether a minimum channel width allocated to the multiple AP is greater than or equal to 80MHz (Huang: Figs. 2A-2E; Fig. 3; [0059]-[0065] minimum frequency subblocks of 80 MHz, [0073], different EHT-SIG and U-SIG format for 80MHz channels).
Regarding claim 21, Huang teaches a second station (STA) device operating in a wireless local area network (WLAN) system, the device comprising: at least one transceiver; and at least one processor coupled with the at least one transceiver, wherein the at least one processor is configured to:
transmit, through the at least one transceiver, to a first STA, a first portion of a physical layer protocol data unit (PPDU) including at least one signal (SIG) field related to information of a multiple access point (AP) (Huang: Figs. 1A, 3 and 4, [0069]-[0070], AP2 receives from AP1, EHT MU PPDU comprising U-SIG filed and EHT-SIG field); and
transmit, through the at least one transceiver, to the second STA, a second portion of the PPDU based on information included in the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP (Huang: Figs. 1, 3 and 4; [0069]-[0070], AP2 received data portion of the EHT MU PPDU packet and the data part is based on information in the U-SIG and EHT-SIG),
wherein the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP has a different format based on whether a minimum channel width allocated to the multiple AP is greater than or equal to 80MHz (Huang: Figs. 2A-2E; Fig. 3; [0059]-[0065] minimum frequency subblocks of 80 MHz, [0073], different EHT-SIG and U-SIG format for 80MHz channels).
Regarding claim 2, Huang teaches wherein: based on the minimum channel width being less than the 80MHz, the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP includes information distinguished per unit of the minimum channel width (Huang: [0054]-[0057], [0067] non-punctured 20 MHz units of channels).
Regarding claim 3, Huang teaches wherein based on the minimum channel width exceeding 20MHz: same information is duplicated in a 20MHz unit within each minimum channel width unit, or information distinguished in the 20MHz unit within the each minimum channel width unit is included (Huang: [0073], duplicated per 20 MHz).
Regarding claim 4, Huang teaches wherein: based on the minimum channel width being less than the 80MHz, the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP includes information distinguished per unit of the 80MHz, and a same content for at least one AP participating in a multiple AP operation within each 80MHz unit is included (Huang: [0057]-[0058], U-SIG field have the same content).
Regarding claim 5, Huang teaches wherein: the same content is provided by a master AP to the at least one AP (Huang: Fig. 4; AP1 sharing AP/master AP).
Regarding claim 6, Huang teaches wherein: the same content includes a representative value based on information for each of the at least one AP, or a union of the information for the each of the at least one AP (Huang: [0057]-[0058], U-SIG field have the same content).
Regarding claim 7, Huang teaches wherein: a type of the information for the each of the at least one AP includes at least one of: information on an available channel or sub-channel; Information on an unavailable channel or sub-channel; basic service set (BSS) color information (Huang: [0067]); or modulation and coding scheme (MCS) information for another SIG field.
Regarding claim 8, Huang teaches wherein: a portion of the type of the information for the each of the at least one AP is set as the representative value, and a remaining portion is set as the union (Huang: Figs. 1A, 3 and 4, [0067]-[0070], AP2 receives from AP1, EHT MU PPDU comprising U-SIG field/representative and EHT-SIG field/union).
Regarding claim 9, Huang teaches wherein: the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP further includes a universal(U)-SIG field and a non-legacy SIG field (Huang: Figs. 1A, 3 and 4, [0069]-[0070], AP2 receives from AP1, EHT MU PPDU comprising U-SIG field and EHT-SIG field/non-legacy).
Regarding claim 10, Huang teaches wherein: based on indication information for the multiple AP operation being included in the U-SIG field, at least one of the type of the information for the each of the at least one AP is included in the non-legacy SIG field (Huang: Figs. 1A, 3 and 4, [0069]-[0070], AP2 receives from AP1, EHT MU PPDU comprising U-SIG field and EHT-SIG field/non-legacy).
Regarding claim 11, Huang teaches wherein: the U-SIG field includes a representative value for at least one of the type of the information for the each of the at least one AP, the non-legacy SIG field includes a union for the at least one of the type of the information for the each of the at least one AP (Huang: Figs. 1A, 3 and 4, [0069]-[0070], AP2 receives from AP1, EHT MU PPDU comprising U-SIG field and EHT-SIG field/non-legacy).
Regarding claim 12, Huang teaches wherein: based on the minimum channel width being greater than or equal to the 80MHz, the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP includes information distinguished per 80MHz unit, and same information is duplicated in a 20MHz unit within each 80MHz unit (Huang: [0073], duplicated per 20 MHz).
Regarding claim 13, Huang teaches wherein based on: the first STA having a capability for a multiple AP operation; indication information for the multiple AP operation being included in the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP; or information included in a trigger frame from a master AP being obtained by the first STA (Huang: Fig. 4, [0048]-[0049] sharing AP and shared APs, MAPC capable APs): the information included in the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP is obtained by the first STA.
Regarding claim 14, Huang teaches wherein: the information included in the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP is obtained by the first STA within a 80MHz band including a primary channel among operating channels of the first STA or not including the primary channel (Huang: Figs. 2A-2E, [0099]-[0100]).
Regarding claim 15, Huang teaches wherein: the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP includes information on a specific resource where the second portion is transmitted, the second portion includes a data field of the PPDU (Huang: Figs. 1, 3 and 4; [0069]-[0070], AP2 received data portion of the EHT MU PPDU packet and the data part is based on information in the U-SIG and EHT-SIG).
Regarding claim 16, Huang teaches wherein: the PPDU is a downlink PPDU, the second STA is an AP STA participating in the multiple AP operation, the first STA is a non-AP STA associated with the AP STA (Huang: Fig. 4).
Regarding claim 17, Huang teaches wherein: the PPDU is an uplink PPDU, the uplink PPDU is transmitted based on a trigger frame from the first STA, a portion of the information included in the at least one SIG field related to the information of the multiple AP are based on a portion of information included in the trigger frame, the first STA is an AP STA participating in the multiple AP operation, the second STA is a non-AP STA associated with the AP STA (Huang: Figs. 1, 3 and 4; [0069]-[0070], AP2 received data portion of the EHT MU PPDU packet and the data part is based on information in the U-SIG and EHT-SIG).
Regarding claim 18, Huang teaches wherein: the multiple AP operation includes a coordinated-orthogonal frequency division multiple access (C-OFDMA)-based multiple AP operation, the specific resource is defined on a frequency domain (Huang: Fig. 1, [0050], [0054]).
Conclusion
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/KODZOVI ACOLATSE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2478
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