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 office action is in response to the Applicant’s communication filed on 09/11/2026.
The applicant’s arguments have been considered but are moot in view of new ground(s) of rejections necessitated by the applicant’s amendment.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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.
Claims 1 – 7, 9, 18 – 22, 24, 25 and 27 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 20160127108 (Jindal) in view of US 20110064126 (Ishiko).
Regarding claims 1, 9 and 20, Jindal teaches “A method comprising:
operating a first node in a…” “…system comprising at least three nodes (three devices are shown in FIG 2A), wherein the at least three nodes are in a full-duplex working mode (abstract, paragraphs 0035 and 0044: in-band full-duplex operation. FIG 2C and paragraph 0048: Devices A, B and C are full duplex capable);
transmitting, by the first node, first information (paragraph 0039: the first device detects a transmission from a third device, and determines to stop, delay or modify the transmission of the frame based on the detection of the transmission from the third device. Stopping the transmission means that the first device is currently “transmitting” “first information”)…”
“…receiving, by the first node and from a second node, second information …” “…while the first node is transmitting the first information, wherein the second node is any node in the at least three nodes other than the first node (paragraph 0039: the first device detects a transmission from a third device (“receiving, by the first node and from a second node, second information”), and determines to stop, delay or modify the transmission of the frame based on the detection of the transmission from the third device.)); and
interrupting, by the first node and based on a first priority of the second node or a second priority of the second information, transmission of the first information …” “…to cause the second node or the second information to preferentially occupy the…” “…channel (paragraph 0039: the first device detects a transmission from a third device, and determines whether to … stop … the transmission of the frame (“interrupting, by the first node … transmission of the first information”) based on a priority of the transmission from the third device (“based on a … a second priority of the second information”). Paragraph 0057: all devices currently transmitting to the sender of the collision message, end their transmission(s). The collision message specifies or identifies the device(s) that are to end transmission (e.g., to allow one transmission, such as a transmission with the most power or priority, to continue or proceed without interference). Also paragraph 0059).”
While teaching that the method may be used in various communication system types without limiting it to any particular type, Jindal does not disclose that the method is performed in “power line communication (PLC)” system so that all transmissions are “over a power line channel of the PLC system.”
Ishiko teaches communication through the power line. Particularly, in paragraph 0059, Ishiko describes exactly same method as Jindal, in which a communication apparatus checks the signal on the electric power line after superimposing the modulated sending signal to the electric power line, can recognize that another apparatus is currently sending information which has a priority higher than the priority of own signal, and thus can receive the sending signal from said another apparatus after stopping to send own signal.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application to take the method of communication disclosed by Jindal and apply it to disclosed by Ishiko power line communication system with predictable results since, according to the Supreme Court, “[t]he combination of familiar elements according to known methods is likely to be obvious when it does no more than yield predictable results.” KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 416 (2007). Doing so would have also allowed to expand the areas where Jindal’s method may be used.
Regarding claim 2, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “wherein interrupting the transmission comprises interrupting the transmission of the first information over the power line channel when the first priority is higher than a third priority of the first node (paragraph 0039: the first device determines the priority based on at least one or more of: content, message length, duration, a most recent transmission, or battery status associated with the transmission from the third device. Paragraph 0060: the control module 233 determines a battery status or power supply level (e.g., low power devices generally allowed to proceed with a transmission) to determine a priority for the corresponding device. A high or preferred priority is assigned to a new device and/or a new connection, or a higher or preferred priority is assigned to a specific type of device relative to another type of device. Therefore, since it is clear from paragraph 0057 that the transmissions with the highest priority are to proceed while the transmissions with a lower priority are to be terminated, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application to allow the device with a highest priority to proceed with the transmission while the device with a lower priority is to stop the transmission. Doing so would have simply been one of the practical implementations of the method disclosed by Jindal when the priorities of the devices are different).”
Regarding claim 3, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches “wherein interrupting the transmission comprises interrupting the transmission of the first information over the power line channel when the second priority is higher than a third priority of the first information (Jindal, paragraph 0059: a protocol assigns different priorities to different transmissions, e.g., control messages have top or preferred priority. If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority (i.e. “the second priority [of the message received from another device] is higher than a third priority of the first information” being transmitted by the device itself), the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission is to terminate.).”
Regarding claim 4, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “wherein interrupting the transmission comprises interrupting the transmission of the first information of the power line channel when the first priority is higher than a third priority of the first node (paragraph 0039: the first device determines the priority based on at least one or more of: content, message length, duration, a most recent transmission, or battery status associated with the transmission from the third device. Paragraph 0060: the control module 233 determines a battery status or power supply level (e.g., low power devices generally allowed to proceed with a transmission) to determine a priority for the corresponding device. A high or preferred priority is assigned to a new device and/or a new connection, or a higher or preferred priority is assigned to a specific type of device relative to another type of device. Therefore, since it is clear from paragraph 0057 that the transmissions with the highest priority are to proceed while the transmissions with a lower priority are to be terminated, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application to allow the device with a highest priority to proceed with the transmission while the device with a lower priority is to stop the transmission. Doing so would have simply been one of the practical implementations of the method disclosed by Jindal when the priorities of the devices are different) and when the second priority is higher than a fourth priority of the first information (paragraph 0059: a protocol assigns different priorities to different transmissions, e.g., control messages have top or preferred priority. If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority (i.e. “the second priority [of the message received from another device] is higher than a fourth priority of the first information” being transmitted by the device itself), the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission is to terminate.).”
Since both criteria individually indicate that the device with lower priority is to stop transmission while the device with higher priority is to continue the transmission, as well as the device transmitting information of lower priority is to stop the transmission while the device transmitting information of higher priority is to continue the transmission, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application that when both criteria are fulfilled for the same first device, so that if the first device has lower priority than the second device, and transmits information of lower priority than that of transmitted by the second device, to terminate the transmission by the first device and continue the transmission by the second device. Doing so would have simply been one of the practical implementations of the method disclosed by Jindal when the priorities of the devices are different as well as priorities of the information transmitted by the devices are different.
Regarding claim 5, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “wherein interrupting the transmission comprises interrupting the transmission of the first information over the power line channel when the first priority is lower than a third priority of the first node (paragraph 0039: the first device determines the priority based on at least one or more of: content, message length, duration, a most recent transmission, or battery status associated with the transmission from the third device. Paragraph 0060: the control module 233 determines a battery status or power supply level (e.g., low power devices generally allowed to proceed with a transmission) to determine a priority for the corresponding device. A high or preferred priority is assigned to a new device and/or a new connection, or a higher or preferred priority is assigned to a specific type of device relative to another type of device.), when the second priority is higher than a fourth priority of the first information (paragraph 0059: a protocol assigns different priorities to different transmissions, e.g., control messages have top or preferred priority. If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority (i.e. “the second priority [of the message received from another device] is higher than a fourth priority of the first information” being transmitted by the device itself), the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission is to terminate.), and when the second information is first-type information (paragraph 0060: priority depends on content of the message, and/or other parameters, such as: message length).”
The claim requires three different criteria to determine whether the first device continues or stops its own transmission when a colliding transmission is detected from the second device. This may be summarized in the following table:
Criterion
First device
Second device
Result as would follow from the teaching of Jindal
Node priority
Higher
Lower
Transmits first device
Information priority (disclosed as transmission priority)
Lower
Higher
Transmits second device
Type of second information
First-type information
As may be seen, the first two criteria yield conflicting results. Therefore, a person of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to resolve the situation. Paragraph 0060 of Jindal’s disclosure provides a solution: vary priority based on the content of the message or such message parameters as message length. Therefore, in the situation when two criteria based on device priority and information (disclosed as transmission) priority result in conflicting decisions, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to base the final determination of which device to transmit and which device to terminate its ongoing transmission on the content or the length of the message to be transmitted. For example, when the message includes first type of content or is of a first length (corresponds to the claimed “the second information is first-type information”), to allow the second device to proceed with the transmission while the first device to interrupt its own transmission. Doing so would have simply been a particular implementation of the method disclosed by Jindal when decisions based on the priorities of the devices conflict with the decisions based on the priorities of the information transmitted by the devices.
Regarding claim 6, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “further comprising not interrupting the transmission of the first information of the power line channel when the first priority is lower than a third priority of the first node (paragraph 0039: the first device determines the priority based on at least one or more of: content, message length, duration, a most recent transmission, or battery status associated with the transmission from the third device. Paragraph 0060: the control module 233 determines a battery status or power supply level (e.g., low power devices generally allowed to proceed with a transmission) to determine a priority for the corresponding device. A high or preferred priority is assigned to a new device and/or a new connection, or a higher or preferred priority is assigned to a specific type of device relative to another type of device.), when the second priority is higher than a fourth priority of the first information (paragraph 0059: a protocol assigns different priorities to different transmissions, e.g., control messages have top or preferred priority. If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority, the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission is to terminate.), and when the second information is second-type information (paragraph 0060: priority depends on content of the message, and/or other parameters, such as: message length).”
The claim requires three different criteria to determine whether the first device continues or stops its own transmission when a colliding transmission is detected from the second device. This may be summarized in the following table:
Criterion
First device
Second device
Result as would follow from the teaching of Jindal
Node priority
Higher
Lower
Transmits first device
Information priority (disclosed as transmission priority)
Lower
Higher
Transmits second device
Type of second information
Second-type information
As may be seen, the first two criteria yield conflicting results. Therefore, a person of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to resolve the situation. Paragraph 0060 of Jindal’s disclosure provides a solution: vary priority based on the content of the message or such message parameters as message length. Therefore, in the situation when two criteria based on device priority and information (disclosed as transmission) priority result in conflicting decisions, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to base the final determination of which device to transmit and which device to terminate its ongoing transmission on the content or the length of the message to be transmitted. For example, when the message includes second type of content or is of second length (corresponds to the claimed “the second information is second-type information”), to allow the first device to continue with the ongoing transmission (i.e. not interrupting it). Doing so would have simply been a particular implementation of the method disclosed by Jindal when decisions based on the priorities of the devices conflict with the decisions based on the priorities of the information transmitted by the devices.
Regarding claim 7, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “further comprising resuming, by the first node and after a preset time, the transmission of the first information over the power line channel (paragraph 0055: the transmitting device 103 includes a scheduler 221 configured to determine a time to begin a transmission, stop/delay/hold the transmission, and/or determine a time to continue the transmission or to restart the transmission. This corresponds to “resuming” “the transmission of the first information”. Paragraph 0059: If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority, the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission is to back off, terminate or be delayed. Backing off the transmission at least implies that it is to be resumed at a later time. Thus, Jindal teaches or at least fairly suggest that the transmission “of the first information” is to be resumed at a later time. Although Jindal is silent with respect to restarting the transmission specifically “after a preset time”, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application to set this time to be sufficient for the completion of the message which has higher priority. Doing so would have allowed to avoid any further collisions by refraining from restarting the transmission until such time as the higher priority transmission is no longer being received).”
Regarding claim 18, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “wherein interrupting the transmission comprises interrupting the transmission of the first information over the power line channel when the first priority is equal to a third priority of the first node (paragraph 0039: the first device determines the priority based on at least one or more of: content, message length, duration, a most recent transmission, or battery status associated with the transmission from the third device. Paragraph 0060: the control module 233 determines a battery status or power supply level (e.g., low power devices generally allowed to proceed with a transmission) to determine a priority for the corresponding device. A high or preferred priority is assigned to a new device and/or a new connection, or a higher or preferred priority is assigned to a specific type of device relative to another type of device. Although not explicitly disclosed, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application that when multiple devices are present in the network, there may be devices which have the same priorities) and when the second priority is higher than a fourth priority of the first information (paragraph 0059: a protocol assigns different priorities to different transmissions, e.g., control messages have top or preferred priority. If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority (i.e. “the second priority [of the message received from another device] is higher than a fourth priority of the first information” being transmitted by the device itself), the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission by the first device is to terminate.).”
The claim requires two different criteria to determine whether the first device continues or stops its own transmission when a colliding transmission is detected from the second device. This may be summarized in the following table:
Criterion
First device
Second device
Result as would follow from the teaching of Jindal
Node priority
Equal
Equal
No preference
Information priority (disclosed as transmission priority)
Lower
Higher
Transmits second device
As may be seen, the first criterion does not provide any preference to any of the devices, while the second criterion stipulates transmission by the second device which means that the first device is to interrupt its transmission.
Therefore, in the situation when one of the criteria does not provide any preference to any of the devices, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application to utilize the second criterion which provides specific instruction of which device to transmit and which device to interrupt its transmission. In this specific case, this would result in interrupting the transmission by the first device.
Regarding claim 19, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “wherein interrupting the transmission comprises interrupting the transmission of the first information of the power line channel when the first priority is higher than a third priority of the first node (paragraph 0039: the first device determines the priority based on at least one or more of: content, message length, duration, a most recent transmission, or battery status associated with the transmission from the third device. Paragraph 0060: the control module 233 determines a battery status or power supply level (e.g., low power devices generally allowed to proceed with a transmission) to determine a priority for the corresponding device. A high or preferred priority is assigned to a new device and/or a new connection, or a higher or preferred priority is assigned to a specific type of device relative to another type of device.) and when the second priority is equal to a fourth priority of the first information (paragraph 0059: a protocol assigns different priorities to different transmissions, e.g., control messages have top or preferred priority. If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority, the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission is to terminate. Although not explicitly disclosed, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application that when multiple devices are present in the network and/or devices transmitting different types of information, there may be transmissions of information which have the same priorities).”
The claim requires two different criteria to determine whether the first device continues or stops its own transmission when a colliding transmission is detected from the second device. This may be summarized in the following table:
Criterion
First device
Second device
Result as would follow from the teaching of Jindal
Node priority
Lower
Higher
Transmits second device
Information priority (disclosed as transmission priority)
Equal
Equal
No preference
As may be seen, the second criterion does not provide any preference to any of the devices, while the first criterion stipulates transmission by the second device which means that the first device is to interrupt its transmission.
Therefore, in the situation when one of the criteria does not provide any preference to any of the devices, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application to utilize the second criterion which provides specific instruction of which device to transmit and which device to interrupt its transmission. In this specific case, this would result in interrupting the transmission by the first device.
Regarding claim 21, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “further comprising operating, by the first node, in an in-band full-duplex working mode (abstract, paragraphs 0035 and 0044: in-band full-duplex operation. FIG 2C and paragraph 0048: Devices A, B and C are full duplex capable) by transmitting the first information over the power line channel while receiving the second information over the power line channel in a same frequency band (Abstract: A first device transmits a frame to a second device wirelessly within a first frequency band. The first device detects, while the transmission of the frame is ongoing, feedback from the second device (thus, “full-duplex working mode”) within the first frequency band.).”
Regarding claim 22, Jindal teaches or fairly suggests “receiving, by the first node, the second information through a receive channel while transmitting the first information through a transmit channel; and
canceling, by the first node, self-interference from a transmit signal coupled from the transmit channel to the receive channel during the receiving of the second information (paragraph 0036: under in-band full-duplex operation, a device's transmitted signal sometimes leaks into the device's receiver circuit (referred to as “self-interference”). The self-interference is known to or understood by the device, because the leakage signal is based on signals generated and/or transmitted by the device. The use of self-interference cancellation makes in-band operation a viable communication solution. Paragraph 0046: as illustrated in Case 1 of FIG. 2B, device A receives interference from its own transmission, and device B receives interference from its own transmission. Thus, devices A and B each performs self-interference cancellation (e.g., based on knowledge of each device's own transmission), so that each device is able to simultaneously transmit and receive. Paragraph 0047: in Case 2 of FIG. 2B, device A performs self-interference cancellation since it is the source of its own interference. Paragraph 0049: In in-band full-duplex operation, two devices 103 maintain a bi-directional link using a common spectrum (frequency band) in both directions. Using the bi-directional link (in which a device A transmits to a device B, and device B transmits to device A), one or both of devices A and B perform self-interference cancellation).”
Regarding claim 24, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “receiving, by the first node over the power line channel, a packet carrying the second information, the packet including a preamble sequence associated with the first priority of the second node (paragraph 0059: the control module of a device 103 is designed and/or implemented to modify one or more transmission parameters of the host device 103, for example, based on received feedback, detection of an additional transmission on the air, and/or results from decoding a received transmission. If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority… When combined with the disclosure of Ishiko, the transmissions would be performed over power line.
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to apply the same criterion for those cases when it is not the transmission with a higher priority, as disclosed by Jindal, but the higher priority of the device itself which sent the transmission (“the first priority of the second node”). Doing so would have allowed to prioritized not only the transmission, but also the device sending the transmission); and
interrupting, by the first node, transmission of the first information over the power line channel based on the preamble sequence (paragraph 0059: the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission is to back off, terminate.).”
Regarding claim 25, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “wherein the first information comprises data currently transmitted by the first node, wherein the second information comprises a control instruction received from the second node over the power line channel, and wherein the method further comprises interrupting, by the first node, transmission of the data based on the control instruction having a higher priority than a priority of the data (paragraph 0059: a protocol assigns different priorities to different transmissions, e.g., control messages have top or preferred priority. If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority, the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission is to back off, terminate. Therefore, taking these two disclosures together, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the on at the effective filing date of the application that if the received message comprises control message having top priority, and the current transmission comprises data having lower priority, to terminate the current transmission to allow reception of the control message. Doing so would have simply conformed with Jindal’s disclosure).”
Regarding claim 27, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “wherein in response to the interrupting, the method further comprises: releasing, by the first node, the power line channel from transmission of the first information; and
refraining, by the first node, from transmitting the first information while the second information is being received over the power line channel (paragraph 0055: the scheduler 221 of the transmitting device 103 stops or holds its transmission (“releasing, by the first node, the … channel from transmission of the first information”) until the transmitting device 103 receives the confirmation message or feedback (“refraining, by the first node, from transmitting … while the second information is being received”).).”
Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 20160127108 (Jindal) in view of US 20110064126 (Ishiko) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of US 20140241148 (Ryoo).
Regarding claim 8, while teaching in paragraph 0060 that the battery status or power supply level may determine a priority for the corresponding device, as well as assigning a high or preferred priority to a new device and/or a new connection, or a specific type of device relative to another type of device, Jindal and Ishiko do not teach “identifying, by the first node and based on any one of a media access control (MAC) address, an Internet Protocol (IP) address, or a network identifier of the second node in the PLC system, the first priority.”
Ryoo teaches determination of priorities “based on any one of a media access control (MAC) address (abstract: link priorities between nodes or node priorities are determined based on media access control (MAC) addresses. Paragraphs 0030 – 0033: the node A acquires port information of the node B (that is, the MAC address of the port in a direction of the link connected to the node A: 26) through a message received from the node B. The node A and node B compare the MAC address of the port connected to the link which receives the message with the MAC address of the source existing in the payload (or a source address field) of the message received through the link and determines the MAC address having a higher value from among the compared MAC addresses as link priority (LP).) … or a network identifier of the second node (paragraph 0034: since each node has a node ID, the link priority between each node may be determined based on the node IDs. Node numbers designated by a user may be used as the node priority, in addition to the node IDs, or separate node priority numbers may be given to each node so as to be used as the node priority.).”
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application to utilize priorities based on MAC addresses and/or network identifiers of the nodes in the network, as disclosed by Ryoo, in the system of combined Jindal and Ishiko’s disclosures as an additional way of priority determination. Doing so would have increased flexibility of the system by allowing it to assign and determine priorities using additional factors.
Claims 23 and 26 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 20160127108 (Jindal) in view of US 20110064126 (Ishiko) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of US 20100158039 (Koide).
Regarding claim 23, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “receiving, by the first node over the power line channel, a packet carrying the second information, the packet including…” [a preamble] “…associated with the first priority of the second node (paragraph 0059: the control module of a device 103 is designed and/or implemented to modify one or more transmission parameters of the host device 103, for example, based on received feedback, detection of an additional transmission on the air, and/or results from decoding a received transmission. If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority… When combined with the disclosure of Ishiko, the transmissions would be performed over power line); and
interrupting, by the first node, transmission of the first information over the power line channel based on the priority (paragraph 0059: the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission is to back off, terminate.)…”
While disclosing prioritizing transmissions with higher priority based on the decoded preamble, Jindal does not disclose that it is actually “a header carrying a priority flag.”
Koide in par. 0077 teaches that a priority can be set on a per-data basis or for each individual communication device (i.e., on a per-terminal basis), which is similar to the disclosure of Jindal. Further, paragraphs 0104 – 0105 teach that a header of a data frame contains at least a source address and priority information, and paragraph 0116 teaches that a priority request flag is a flag provided in a header for sending a request of a preference.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application to take the teaching of Jindal regarding decoding a preamble of a data frame to determine priority, and extend it to the handling of a header of the data frame having specific priority flag, as disclosed by Koide, so that if a data frame is received having a header which has higher priority, to terminate the current outgoing transmission. Doing so would have allowed to ensure that the device having higher priority is allowed to access the communication channel.
Regarding claim 26, Jindal in combination with Ishiko with respect to the usage of the method in power line communication systems teaches or fairly suggests “wherein the second information comprises a…” “…control instruction, and wherein the method further comprises: receiving, by the first node over the power line channel, the…” “…control instruction from the second node; and interrupting, by the first node, transmission of the first information based on the…” “…control instruction (paragraph 0059: a protocol assigns different priorities to different transmissions, e.g., control messages have top or preferred priority. If the transmitting device 103 decodes a preamble of another frame or transmission with a higher priority, the control module 233 and/or scheduler 221 determines that the current transmission is to back off, terminate. Therefore, taking these two disclosures together, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the on at the effective filing date of the application that if the received message comprises control message having top priority, and the current transmission comprises data having lower priority, to terminate the current transmission to allow reception of the control message. Doing so would have simply conformed with Jindal’s disclosure)…”
Jindal does not disclose that the control instruction is “broadcast” “being addressed for reception by the at least three nodes.”
Koide in FIG 5 and paragraph 0072 teaches transmission, by the PLC modem 100M at given intervals, information for managing communication among the PLC modems as broadcast frames (also called "control frames" or "beacon frames") B1, B2, B3, . . . . Additionally, paragraph 0078, as shown in FIG. 8B, the PLC modem 100M periodically notifies the slave units A to C (the PLC modems 100Ta to 100Tc) of updated allocation information by means of broadcast control frames (beacon frames, and the like). In other words, Koide teaches transmission of “broadcast control instruction” “being addressed for reception by the at least three nodes.”
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application to extend the teaching of Jindal with regards to preferential handling of control instructions, to the handling of “broadcast control instructions” to be received by plurality of nodes, so that they would be treated as having higher priority than the data frames. Doing so would have ensured that no transmissions of lower priority data frames would interfere with transmissions of broadcast control instructions.
Claim 28 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 20160127108 (Jindal) in view of US 20110064126 (Ishiko) as applied to claim 1 above, or alternatively in further in view of US 20170099080 (Yoon).
Regarding claim 28, “wherein after the interrupting, the method further comprises: waiting, by the first node, while the second information is being received over the power line channel; and resuming, by the first node, transmission of the first information over the power line channel in a subsequent time segment after completion of reception of the second information”, Jindal, in paragraph 0055, teaches detecting additional transmission(s) in the frequency band. The transmitting device 103 includes a scheduler 221 configured to determine a time to begin a transmission, stop/delay/hold the transmission, and/or determine a time to continue the transmission or to restart the transmission. The transmitting device 103 stops, delays or holds its transmission until the transmitting device 103 receives the confirmation message or feedback.
In the citation above, delaying or holding the transmission until reception of the incoming message corresponds to the claimed “waiting, by the first node, while the second information is being received” and “resuming, by the first node, transmission of the first information … in a subsequent time segment after completion of reception of the second information”.
Similarly, Ishiko also teaches in paragraph 0009 that in the CAN (“power line communication system”), only one communication apparatus can send data among a plurality of communication apparatuses connected with each other through a communication line, and the other communication apparatuses are controlled to wait until said one communication apparatus has completed the data sending operation. When plural communication apparatuses try to send data concurrently, it causes conflicts of sending data.
Additionally or alternatively, Yoon in paragraphs 0080 and 0099 teaches that when another node with a higher priority is detected, the node suspends packet transmission and waits until packet transmission of the other node is complete. The process is disclosed in more details in FIG 3 and paragraph 0045.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the application to utilize, in the system of combined Jindal and Ishiko’s disclosures, disclosed by Yoon arbitration between the nodes based on priorities so that the node receiving information with higher priority waits until the reception is completed and only then initiates its transmission. Doing so would have allowed to avoid any collisions between the transmissions.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
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/GENNADIY TSVEY/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2648
