DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
2. 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. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis 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.
Status of Claims
1. The following is a non-final office action in response to the applicant’s submission received on 11/11/2024.
2. Claims 1 – 30 are currently pending and have been examined.
Foreign Priority/Domestic benefit
There is no claim to foreign priority according to the application data sheet and filing receipt.
Domestic benefit is claimed with regard to 371 National Stage of PCT Application No. PCT/CN2022/109010, filed on July 29, 2022.
Oath/Declaration
1. The applicant’s oath/declaration filed on 11/11/2024 has been reviewed by the examiner and is found to conform to the requirements prescribed in 37 C.F.R. 1.63.
Information Disclosure Statement
1. The information disclosure statement filed on 11/11/2024 is in compliance with the provision of 37 CFR 1.97, 1.98 and MPEP § 609. It has been placed in the application file and the information referred to therein has been considered as to the merits.
Drawings
1. The applicant’s drawings submitted on 11/11/2024 are acceptable for examination purposes.
Objection to the specification
Applicants are reminded of the proper language and format for an abstract of the disclosure.
The abstract should be in narrative form and generally limited to a single paragraph on a separate sheet within the range of 50 to 150 words. The form and legal phraseology often used in patent claims, such as "means" and "said," should be avoided. The abstract should describe the disclosure sufficiently to assist readers in deciding whether there is a need for consulting the full patent text for details.
The language should be clear and concise and should not repeat information given in the title. It should avoid using phrases which can be implied, such as, "The disclosure concerns," "The disclosure defined by this invention," "The disclosure describes," etc.
In this application the abstract does not appear to be on a separate sheet of paper, appropriate correction is required.
Claim interpretation
1. Limitations appearing in the specification but not recited in the claim should not be read into the claim. E-Pass Techs., Inc. v. 3Com Corp., 343 F.3d 1364, 1369, 67 USPQ2d 1947, 1950 (Fed. Cir. 2003) (claims must be interpreted "in view of the specification" without importing limitations from the specification into the claims unnecessarily) [MPEP 2106 Sec I, C]. “Though understanding the claim language may be aided by explanations contained in the written description, it is important not to import into a claim limitations that are not part of the claim. For example, a particular embodiment appearing in the written description may not be read into a claim when the claim language is broader than the embodiment.” Superguide Corp. v. DirecTV Enterprises, Inc., 358 F.3d 870, 875, 69 USPQ2d 1865, 1868 (Fed. Cir. 2004). [MPEP 2111.01 Sec II]. Thus, the Examiner interprets Applicant’s claims "in view of the specification" and does not “import into a claim limitation that are not part of the claim”.
2. When multiple limitations are connected with “OR”, one of the limitations does not have any patentable weight since both limitations are optional.
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(s) 1 – 6, 10 – 11, 13 – 16, 18, 21 – 24, 26 - 29 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Fakoorian et al. (US 2020/0413424 A1) in view of Zhou et al. (US 2022/0104187 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Fakoorian discloses: A network node for wireless communication, comprising:
a memory; [figure 2, label 282] and
one or more processors coupled to the memory, the one or more processors configured to: [figure 2, label 280 and 282]
receive configuration information indicative of a plurality of semi- persistent communication configurations, wherein each semi-persistent communication configuration corresponds to a respective configuration index of a plurality of configuration indexes; [¶ 0045: the RRC is used first to send the various configurations pertaining to SPS. It is implied the configuration index is present since in the next step below a certain subset of SPS index is/are used in view of the DCI activation after RRC configurations]
receive a downlink control information (DCI) transmission comprising a joint activation indication indicative of an activation of a set of semi-persistent communication configurations of the plurality of semi-persistent communication configurations, the set of semi-persistent communication configurations comprising one or more semi-persistent communication configurations; and [¶ 0045: “…the UE may receive, a single DCI message that includes a bit sequence to indicate CG and/or SPS configurations to be jointly activated and/or released.”…“Accordingly, in FIG. 3, the single DCI message received by the UE may be communicated to jointly activate one or more CG configurations, to jointly release one or more CG configurations, to jointly activate one or more SPS configurations, to jointly release one or more SPS configurations, and/or the like.”. In the earlier part of ¶ 0045, the RRC is sent first with a plurality of SPS configuration and subsequently the DCI is sent with an indicator to activates jointly multiple SPS configuration (SPS set) from the initial set of SPS earlier sent. Note in ¶ 0046 - ¶ 0047, a bit sequence is mapped in the DCI message which provides the exact index of the SPS/CG configuration to be jointly activated, this implies in the RRC step above, the configuration must involve indexes in order for the DCI to later select those indexes jointly for activation]
communicate based on the set of semi-persistent communication configurations. [¶ 0045: “…the UE may receive scheduled downlink transmissions according to the activated SPS configuration…”]
Two details are missing from the primary reference of Fakoorian: indexes being associated with regards to the SPS configuration in view of the first receiving step of claim 1 and a network node performing the steps of claim 1, such difference is seen in the reference of Zhou, see ¶ 0419: “…A base station may transmit to a wireless device one or more RRC messages comprising one or more configuration parameters of a plurality of semi-persistent schedulings (SPSs) … each of the plurality of SPSs may be identified with a SPS configuration index or SPS ID.”. Note, ¶ 0420 of Zhou also describes the second receiving step of claim 1. ¶ 0237 presents the fact that the wireless device (which can be called a UE ¶ 0217) can be refer to as a node in the network.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Fakoorian in view of Zhou. The motivation for making the above modification would have been to identify the different SPS configurations for subsequent activation and deactivation.
Claims 13, 21 and 26 recite similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 1.
Claim 2, Fakoorian and Zhou discloses: The network node of claim 1, wherein the plurality of semi-persistent communication configurations comprises at least one of a configured grant configuration or a semi-persistent scheduling configuration. [see ¶ 00045 of Fakoorian and ¶ 0419 of Zhou].
Claims 14, 22 and 27 recite similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 2.
Claim 10, Zhou further discloses: The network node of claim 1, wherein the DCI transmission comprises a set of redundancy version (RV) fields associated with the set of semi-persistent communication configurations. [¶ 0420, “…The base station may set one or more fields (e.g., HARQ Process ID, RV, MCS, and/or frequency domain resource assignment) of the first DCI to predefined values indicating the activation of the SPS.”].
Claim 3, Fakoorian further discloses: The network node of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors, to receive the configuration information, are configured to receive a radio resource control message that includes the configuration information, [¶ 0045: the RRC is used first to send the various configurations pertaining to SPS.]
wherein the joint activation indication is associated with a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) identifier (ID). [¶ 0057: “ … Accordingly, in any of the first through third techniques, the bit sequence in the single DCI message may indicate one of the HARQ indices associated with a particular CG configuration, a particular SPS configuration, and/or the like to be activated or released. In other words, the HARQ indices can be used as proxies for the CG and/or SPS configurations to be activated or released.”]
Claims 15, 23 and 28 recite similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 3.
Claim 4, Fakoorian further discloses: The network node of claim 3, wherein the configuration information comprises a semi-persistent communication configuration activation state set that includes the plurality of semi-persistent communication configurations, and wherein the joint activation indication comprises a value of a HARQ process number field of the DCI transmission. [¶0057: “ For example, an existing DCI field that may be reinterpreted or repurposed may be a HARQ process number, which is a 4-bit field….For example, the above-mentioned field for the HARQ process number has 4 bits because there can be up to 16 HARQ indices…the HARQ indices can be used as proxies for the CG and/or SPS configurations to be activated or released.].
Claims 16, 24 and 29, recite similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 3.
Claim 6, Fakoorian discloses: The network node of claim 3, [¶ 0057: “ … Accordingly, in any of the first through third techniques, the bit sequence in the single DCI message may indicate one of the HARQ indices associated with a particular CG configuration, a particular SPS configuration, and/or the like to be activated or released. In other words, the HARQ indices can be used as proxies for the CG and/or SPS configurations to be activated or released.”]. At the same time Zhou further discloses: wherein the DCI transmission has a multi-shared channel DCI format [¶ 0420: “…a first DCI (e.g., with DCI format 0_0, 0_1, 1_0, 1_1, or a new DCI format designed for future release) indicating an activation of a SPS of the plurality of SPSs to the wireless device…”].
Claim 18, recite similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 6.
Claim 11, Zhou further discloses: The network node of claim 1, wherein the DCI transmission indicates at least one common parameter value associated with the set of semi-persistent communication configurations, wherein the at least one common parameter value indicates at least one of a frequency allocation, a modulation and coding scheme (MCS), a transmission configuration indicator (TCI) state, a set of demodulation reference signal (DMRS) ports, a set of precoders, or a combination of two or more of the MCS, the TCI state, the set of DMRS ports, or the set of precoders. [¶ 0420: “…The base station may set one or more fields (e.g., HARQ Process ID, RV, MCS, and/or frequency domain resource assignment) of the first DCI to predefined values indicating the activation of the SPS.”].
Claim 5, Fakoorian further discloses: The network node of claim 4, wherein the semi-persistent communication configuration activation state set comprises at least one of a configured grant configuration deactivation state list, a semi-persistent scheduling configuration deactivation state list, or a combination of a configured grant configuration deactivation state list and a semi-persistent scheduling configuration deactivation state list.
Claim(s) 7 – 8, 12, 19 - 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Fakoorian et al. (US 2020/0413424 A1) in view of Zhou et al. (US 2022/0104187 A1) and Zhang et al. (US 2025/0056522 A1).
Regarding claim 7, Fakoorian in view of Zhou discloses: A network node of claim 1 (see rejected claim 1).
Fakoorian and Zhou does not disclose: wherein the DCI transmission comprises a time domain resource allocation (TDRA) field that indicates a set of TDRA entries associated with the set of semi-persistent communication configurations. However, such difference is seen in the analogous art of Zhang, see ¶ 0333 - ¶ 0334, which discloses the DCI transmits the second configuration and later in ¶ 0337 discloses a time domain configuration pertaining to the SPS is carried in the TDRA field of the DCI. See ¶ 0203 for multiple entries in the TDRA.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Fakoorian in view of Zhou and Zhang. The motivation for making the above modification would have been to resolve a Mismatch between the SPS resource and the data frame of the XR service which results in a waste of resources such as power consumption of the UE and a system capacity of the base station. [see ¶ 0004 in view of ¶ 0009]. See ¶ 0203 for multiple entries in the TDRA.
Claims 19 recite similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 7.
Claim 8, Zhang further discloses: The network node of claim 7, wherein the TDRA field indicates the set of TDRA entries based on a time domain allocation set for multi-shared channel communications. [¶ 0337 discloses a time domain configuration pertaining to the SPS is carried in the TDRA field of the DCI. See ¶ 0203 for multiple entries in the TDRA. A multi-channel shared communication entails different format of DCI which is seen in ¶ 0150].
Claim 12, Zhang further discloses: The network node of claim 1, wherein the one or more processors, to communicate, are configured to communicate extended reality information. [¶ 0003 and ¶ 0112].
Claim 20 recite similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 12.
Allowable Subject Matter
1. Claims 5, 9, 17, 25 and 30 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
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
LG Electronics Inc (Joint activation of multiple CG/SPS configurations, Prague, Czech, 26th August – 30th August 2019, R2-1911200), see observation 2 on the second page, which discloses the core concept of the applicant’s claimed invention, that is, a single DCI is able to activate multiple CG/SPS.
Klaus et al. (WO 2021/040681 A1) discloses in ¶ 0041: “…In one example embodiment, where configurable DCI fields of varying size are defined for URLLC, concatenation of bits of different DCI fields may be used to provide a larger (and potentially sufficient) number of bits for the indication of the applicable SPS/Type 2 CG configuration (s).”.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MAHARISHI V KHIRODHAR whose telephone number is (571)270-7909. The examiner can normally be reached 6:00 AM - 3:00 PM.
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MAHARISHI V. KHIRODHAR
Examiner
Art Unit 2463
/MAHARISHI V KHIRODHAR/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2428
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