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 .
Designations of the Particular Relevance of the Art
The Examiner has pointed out particular references contained in the prior art of record within the body of the Action for Applicant’s convenience. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages, paragraphs and figures may apply. Applicant, in preparing the response, should consider fully the reference in totality as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or explained by the Examiner. MPEP § 707.05.
Manner of Making Amendments under 37 C.F.R. § 1.121
Any subsequent submission by Applicant's amending the claims must comply with the requirements of 37 C.F.R. § 1.121(c) and MPEP § 714(II)(C) regarding the manner of presenting amended claims. That is, amended text must be properly indicated. Failure to provide a compliant amendment may result in the amendment being treated as non-compliant and not entered.
Pursuant to MPEP § 714(II)(C), all changes to currently amended claims must be shown relative to the immediate prior version of the claims. Deleted matter ordinarily must be shown by strike-through; however, when deleting five (5) or fewer consecutive characters, deletion by double brackets may be used and, in certain circumstances, is required. In particular, where strike-through cannot be readily perceived—such as when deleting a single numeral, punctuation mark, or other short character string—double brackets must be used to clearly identify the deleted matter. For example, deletion of punctuation marks standing alone (e.g., commas, periods, semicolons, parentheses, or quotation marks) should be indicated by double brackets rather than strike-through.
Similarly, the text of any added subject matter must be presented in a manner such that the underlining is readily perceptible. Where underlining of added matter cannot be easily perceived, including, for example, the addition, deletion, or substitution of one or more characters, punctuation marks, numerals, or word fragments, the amendment shall instead be presented by deleting the entire affected text and adding the complete replacement text with underlining. Examples include, without limitation, amendments correcting misspellings, changing a singular term to a plural term or vice versa, adding or deleting prefixes or suffixes, or modifying punctuation or numerals.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. § 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claims 1-3, 23, and 32 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over US 2014/0177500 (hereinafter, “HAN”) in view of US 2022/0272748 (hereinafter, “XIONG”).
Regarding claim 1, HAN discloses:
A method for controlling transmit power of an uplink control channel, the method comprising: (See Fig. 9)
obtaining a physical random access channel (PRACH) transmit power ramp-up when random access between a user equipment (UE) and a base station succeeds; (¶ 0069: ΔPrampup is a total power ramping value of the UE that is obtained according to the RA configuration information of the SRCell in the RA process)
obtaining a radio resource control (RRC) . . . message sent by the base station; (¶ 0139: [T]he UE obtains configuration information; ¶ 0118: UE may obtain the configuration information by parsing a dedicated configuration message, for example, an RRC Connection Reconfiguration message)
adjusting, when the RRC . . . message comprises a power configuration field corresponding to a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH), the PRACH transmit power ramp-up based on the PRACH transmit power ramp-up (¶ 0137: S304: The UE sets a PUSCH and/or PUCCH initial power adjustment value(s) of the Scell according to the configuration parameter of the Scell in the configuration information; ¶ 0138: [I]f the UE initiates an RA on any one SRCell in one Scell group, for the SRCell where the RA is initiated in the Scell group, the UE sets the PUSCH initial power adjustment value of the SRCell to fc(0)=ΔPrampup+δmsg2) and/or a value of the power configuration field;
determining, based on an adjusted PRACH transmit power ramp-up, a target power adjustment value corresponding to the PUCCH; and (¶ 0069: δmsg2 is a power adjustment value represented by a TPC Command included in the RAR message received by the UE from the base station in the RA process)
determining, based on a preset PUCCH transmit power calculation formula, the value of the power configuration field, and the target power adjustment value, target transmit power corresponding to the PUCCH. (¶ 0146: In step S306, the UE may substitute the set gc(0) into a PUCCH transmit power calculation formula, to obtain through calculation the PUCCH transmit power value of the UE on the Scell. The PUCCH transmit power calculation formula is:
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HAN does not explicitly disclose:
RCC setup message
In the same field of endeavor, however, XIONG teaches:
RCC setup message (¶ 0070: [O]btaining the resource configuration information of the uplink signal from a system message transmitted by a network side or a radio resource control (RRC) configuration message obtained by the UE)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify HAN’s power control procedures to provide an RRC configuration message as taught by XIONG to operate a user equipment (UE) in a wireless communication so as to address the problem of how to implement transmission for two-step random access. See XIONG, at ¶ 0006.
Regarding claim 2, the combination of HAN and XIONG, as applied above, renders obvious the method of claim 1. HAN does not explicitly disclose:
wherein the adjusting the PRACH transmit power ramp-up based on the PRACH transmit power ramp-up and/or a value of the power configuration field comprises:
setting the PRACH transmit power ramp-up to 0 if the PRACH transmit power ramp-up is less than or equal to a first threshold; or
maintaining the PRACH transmit power ramp-up unchanged if the PRACH transmit power ramp-up is greater than the first threshold.
In the same field of endeavor, however, XIONG teaches:
setting the PRACH transmit power ramp-up to 0 if the PRACH transmit power ramp-up is less than or equal to a first threshold; (¶ 0201: [T]he UE may transmit a power ramping suspension indication to the higher layer due to one or more of the . . . conditions [set forth in ¶¶ 0202-0210)
Regarding claim 3, the combination of HAN and XIONG, as applied above, renders obvious the method of claim 1. The Examiner further finds that claim 3’s limitations are not entitled to patentable weight as reciting a non-selected option of the alternative limitations presented with the disjunctive “and/or.” That is, a “power configuration field” does not amount to a claim requirement.
wherein the adjusting the PRACH transmit power ramp-up based on the PRACH transmit power ramp-up and/or a value of the power configuration field comprises:
setting the PRACH transmit power ramp-up to 0 if the value of the power configuration field is greater than a second threshold; or
maintaining the PRACH transmit power ramp-up unchanged if the value of the power configuration field is less than or equal to the second threshold.
Regarding claim 23, HAN discloses:
An apparatus (UE), comprising:
a storage medium including executable instructions; and (¶ 0234)
a processor; (processing module 302)
wherein the executable instructions, when executed by the processor, cause the apparatus to:
obtain a physical random access channel, PRACH, transmit power ramp-up when random access between a user equipment, UE, and a base station succeeds; (¶ 0069: ΔPrampup is a total power ramping value of the UE that is obtained according to the RA configuration information of the SRCell in the RA process)
obtain a radio resource control, RRC, . . . message sent by the base station; (¶ 0139: [T]he UE obtains configuration information; ¶ 0118: UE may obtain the configuration information by parsing a dedicated configuration message, for example, an RRC Connection Reconfiguration message)
adjust, when the RRC setup message comprises a power configuration field corresponding to a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH), the PRACH transmit power ramp-up based on the PRACH transmit power ramp-up (¶ 0137: S304: The UE sets a PUSCH and/or PUCCH initial power adjustment value(s) of the Scell according to the configuration parameter of the Scell in the configuration information; ¶ 0138: [I]f the UE initiates an RA on any one SRCell in one Scell group, for the SRCell where the RA is initiated in the Scell group, the UE sets the PUSCH initial power adjustment value of the SRCell to fc(0)=ΔPrampup+δmsg2)and/or a value of the power configuration field;
determine, based on an adjusted PRACH transmit power ramp-up, a target power adjustment value corresponding to the PUCCH; and (¶ 0069: δmsg2 is a power adjustment value represented by a TPC Command included in the RAR message received by the UE from the base station in the RA process)
determine, based on a preset PUCCH transmit power calculation formula, the value of the power configuration field, and the target power adjustment value, target transmit power corresponding to the PUCCH. (¶ 0146: In step S306, the UE may substitute the set gc(0) into a PUCCH transmit power calculation formula, to obtain through calculation the PUCCH transmit power value of the UE on the Scell. The PUCCH transmit power calculation formula is:
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HAN does not explicitly disclose:
RCC setup message
In the same field of endeavor, however, XIONG teaches:
RCC setup message (¶ 0070: [O]btaining the resource configuration information of the uplink signal from a system message transmitted by a network side or a radio resource control (RRC) configuration message obtained by the UE)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify HAN’s power control procedures to provide an RRC configuration message as taught by XIONG to operate a user equipment (UE) in a wireless communication so as to address the problem of how to implement transmission for two-step random access. See XIONG, at ¶ 0006.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4-10 and 23-31 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
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the Examiner should be directed to Garth D Richmond whose telephone number is (703)756-4559. The Examiner can normally be reached M-F 8 a.m. - 5 p.m. ET.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, Applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the Examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the Examiner’s supervisor, Kathy Wang-Hurst can be reached at 571-270-5371. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/GARTH D RICHMOND/Examiner, Art Unit 2644
/KATHY W WANG-HURST/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2644
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