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 office action is in response to the application filed on 10/25/2024.
Claims 1-10 are currently pending.
Claims 1, 7-8 and10 are rejected.
Claims 2-6 and 9 are objected to.
Claims 1 and 10 are independent claims.
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Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
6. 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 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.
7. 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 of this title, 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.
8. The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied for establishing a background for determining obviousness under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 103(a) 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.
9. Claims 1, 7-8 and10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gyeongcheol LEE et al. (US 2020/0205029 A1), hereinafter LEE, in view of 3GPP, ("TSG-RAN WG2 Meeting #124 R2-2311768", Chicago, USA, November 13-17, 2023, 25 pages. Cited in IDS filed on 10/25/2024), hereinafter D2.
For claim 1, LEE teaches a method by a terminal, the method comprising:
receiving from a base station a radio resource control (RRC) message, wherein the RRC message comprises one or more parameters related to additional buffer size table (LEE, Fig. 14 and paragraph 289 teach receiving from gNB to UE LCG ID configuration. Fig. 12 and paragraphs 261-263 teach a wireless node is configured with at least one LCG, which is associated with an LCG ID by receiving a configuration of LCG via L2 or L3 signaling. The L2 or L3 signalling can be one of the MAC, RLC, PDCP, or RRC signaling. Thus, LEE teaches receiving from a base station a radio resource control (RRC) message, wherein the RRC message comprises one or more parameters related to additional buffer size table.);
triggering a buffer status report (BSR) (LEE, Fig. 14 and paragraph 290 teach the MAC entity triggers a BSR and may generate a BSR MAC CE when the MAC entity has a UL grant.);
generating the BSR (LEE, Fig. 14 and paragraph 290 teach the MAC entity triggers a BSR and may generate a BSR MAC CE when the MAC entity has a UL grant.); and
transmitting a medium access control (MAC) protocol data unit (PDU), wherein the MAC PDU comprises the BSR (LEE, Fig. 14 and paragraph 292 teach After generating the BSR MAC CE including two octets including LCG field and the associated Buffer Size information, the MAC entity transmits the generated BSR MAC CE using the UL grant.),
wherein:
the BSR comprises logical channel group fields; LOP fields; and one or more buffer size fields (LEE, Fig. 12 and paragraph 256 teach a wireless node (for example, a UE or IAB node) may generate a BSR MAC CE including a LOP field, a LCG field and a buffer size field (S1001).), and
wherein a first logical channel group field and a first LOP field are associated with a first logical channel group (LEE, Fig. 12 and paragraphs 257-260 teach The maximum number of octets to be included in the BSR MAC CE and the size of the LOP field (e.g. the number of LOP bits) may be determined based on the maximum number of LCGs that can be configured to the UE or IAB node, or based on the highest LCG ID configured to the UE or IAB node.).
D2 further teaches the BSR comprises three or more octets;
first octet comprises a constant number of logical channel group fields;
second octet comprises the constant number of buffer table fields; and
one or more octets comprise one or more buffer size fields (D2, section 3.1 on page 2 teach option 1 which indicates the BSR comprises three or more octets;
first octet comprises a constant number of logical channel group fields; second octet comprises the constant number of buffer table fields; and one or more octets comprise one or more buffer size fields.).
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 method taught in LEE with the BSR comprises three or more octets; first octet comprises a constant number of logical channel group fields; second octet comprises the constant number of buffer table fields; and one or more octets comprise one or more buffer size fields taught in D2. Because both references teach generating and transmitting BSR, D2 explicitly teach with the BSR comprises three or more octets; first octet comprises a constant number of logical channel group fields; second octet comprises the constant number of buffer table fields; and one or more octets comprise one or more buffer size fields in the same technical field.
For claim 7, LEE and D2 further teach the method of claim 1, wherein the first logical channel group field is in least significant bit of the first octet (D2, section 3.1 on page 2 teach option 1 which indicates the first logical channel group field is in least significant bit of the first octet.).
For claim 8, LEE and D2 further teach the method of claim 1, wherein the first buffer table field is in least significant bit of the second octet (D2, section 3.1 on page 2 teach option 1 which indicates the first buffer table field is in least significant bit of the second octet.).
For claim 10, LEE teaches a terminal (LEE, Fig. 2 item 100) comprising:
a transceiver (LEE, Fig. 2 item106),
a memory (LEE, Fig. 2 item 104), and
a controller (LEE, Fig. 2 item 102) coupled to the transceiver and the memory, wherein the controller is configured to cause the terminal to:
receive from a base station a radio resource control (RRC) message, wherein the RRC message comprises one or more parameters related to additional buffer size table (LEE, Fig. 14 and paragraph 289 teach receiving from gNB to UE LCG ID configuration. Fig. 12 and paragraphs 261-263 teach a wireless node is configured with at least one LCG, which is associated with an LCG ID by receiving a configuration of LCG via L2 or L3 signaling. The L2 or L3 signalling can be one of the MAC, RLC, PDCP, or RRC signaling. Thus, LEE teaches receiving from a base station a radio resource control (RRC) message, wherein the RRC message comprises one or more parameters related to additional buffer size table.);
trigger a buffer status report (BSR) (LEE, Fig. 14 and paragraph 290 teach the MAC entity triggers a BSR and may generate a BSR MAC CE when the MAC entity has a UL grant.);
generate the BSR (LEE, Fig. 14 and paragraph 290 teach the MAC entity triggers a BSR and may generate a BSR MAC CE when the MAC entity has a UL grant.); and
transmit a medium access control (MAC) protocol data unit (PDU), wherein the MAC PDU comprises the BSR (LEE, Fig. 14 and paragraph 292 teach After generating the BSR MAC CE including two octets including LCG field and the associated Buffer Size information, the MAC entity transmits the generated BSR MAC CE using the UL grant.),
wherein:
the BSR comprises logical channel group field; LOP field; and one or more buffer size fields (LEE, Fig. 12 and paragraph 256 teach a wireless node (for example, a UE or IAB node) may generate a BSR MAC CE including a LOP field, a LCG field and a buffer size field (S1001).), and
wherein a first logical channel group field and a first LOP field are associated with a first logical channel group (LEE, Fig. 12 and paragraphs 257-260 teach The maximum number of octets to be included in the BSR MAC CE and the size of the LOP field (e.g. the number of LOP bits) may be determined based on the maximum number of LCGs that can be configured to the UE or IAB node, or based on the highest LCG ID configured to the UE or IAB node.).
D2 further teaches the BSR comprises three or more octets;
first octet comprises a constant number of logical channel group fields;
second octet comprises the constant number of buffer table fields; and
one or more octets comprise one or more buffer size fields (D2, section 3.1 on page 2 teach option 1 which indicates the BSR comprises three or more octets;
first octet comprises a constant number of logical channel group fields; second octet comprises the constant number of buffer table fields; and one or more octets comprise one or more buffer size fields.).
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 method taught in LEE with the BSR comprises three or more octets; first octet comprises a constant number of logical channel group fields; second octet comprises the constant number of buffer table fields; and one or more octets comprise one or more buffer size fields taught in D2. Because both references teach generating and transmitting BSR, D2 explicitly teach the BSR comprises three or more octets; first octet comprises a constant number of logical channel group fields; second octet comprises the constant number of buffer table fields; and one or more octets comprise one or more buffer size fields in the same technical field.
Allowable Subject Matter
10. Claims 2-6 and 9 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
11. Claims 2-6 and 9 are considered allowable because the prior art does not teach limitations including:
"a value to be set in the first logical channel group field in the first octet is determined based on presence of data across all logical channels of the first logical channel group; and
a value to be set in the first buffer table field in the second octet is determined based on the value to be set in the first logical channel group field and amount of data across all logical channels of the first logical channel group" in claim 2.
"number of octets of the one or more octets is determined based on values set in the first octet; and
number of binary 1s of the second octet is limited by number of binary 1s of the first octet" in claim 9.
Conclusion
12. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to WILL W LIN whose telephone number is (571)272-8749. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:00-5:00.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Charles 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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/WILL W LIN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2412
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