DETAILED ACTION
Claims 1-20 are presented for examination.
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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on 12/09/24, 6/17/25, 12/9/25 have been considered by the examiner.
Drawings
The drawings are objected to because descriptive labels other than numerical are needed for figures 6, 8, 10, 17, and 20. See 37 CFR 1.84(o). A proposed drawing correction or corrected drawings are required in reply to the Office action to avoid abandonment of the application. The objection to the drawings will not be held in abeyance.
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.
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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claim(s) 1, 2, 7, 8, 13 and 19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 2020/0112965 to Kim et al. in view of US 12,218,759 to Wu et al.
As per claim 1, Kim et al. substantially teach the claimed method comprising: receiving a plurality of transport blocks in a window (Paragraph [0093]), the window predefined to include a number of transport blocks (the window length is a predefined number of consecutive symbols, and R.sub.LBRM is a coding rate when transmitting a TB Paragraph [0111]); decoding at least one transport block in the plurality of transport blocks (Paragraph [0134]); and transmitting feedback corresponding to a subset of transport blocks, from the plurality of transport blocks in the window, that have not been decoded correctly (Paragraph [0134] receive, from a base station via the receiver 410, a transmission including a TB, attempt to decode the transmission, transmit a feedback message to the base station indicating that at least a portion of the transmission including the TB was unsuccessfully decoded).
Kim et al. does not explicitly state “transmitting feedback corresponding to a subset of transport blocks, from the plurality of transport blocks in the window”. However in an analogous art Wu et al. teaches “receiving a plurality of transmissions of a transport block from a transmitter by a configured Hybrid Automatic Repeat reQuest (HARQ) process, the plurality of transmissions including an initial transmission and blind transmissions planned to be performed within a time window after the initial transmission; based on at least a part of the plurality of transmissions, performing decoding for the transport block; and sending a HARQ feedback indicating whether the decoding is successful or not” (Column 3 lines 14-25 and Fig 14). Therefore it would have been obvious to a person in the art at the time of filing of the present application to have combined the system of Kim et al. with the windows Wu et al. in order to address ensuring the reliability and latency of the data transmission as suggested by Wu et al. (column 1 line 66- column 2 line 2).
Claim 7 is the computer readable storage medium claim corresponding to the method of claim 1 and is rejected for the same reasoning as claim 1.
As per claims 2 and 8 Kim et al teaches the claimed each transport block among the plurality of transport blocks is received in a corresponding physical downlink shared channel reception occasion (Paragraph [0007]).
As per claim 13, Kim et al. substantially teach the claimed transmitting a plurality of transport blocks in a window (Paragraph [0093]), the window predefined to include a number of transport blocks (the window length is a predefined number of consecutive symbols, and R.sub.LBRM is a coding rate when transmitting a TB Paragraph [0111]); and receiving feedback corresponding to a subset of transport blocks (Paragraph [0134]), from the plurality of transport blocks in the window, that have not been decoded correctly (Paragraph [0134] receive, from a base station via the receiver 410, a transmission including a TB, attempt to decode the transmission, transmit a feedback message to the base station indicating that at least a portion of the transmission including the TB was unsuccessfully decoded).
Kim et al. does not explicitly state “transmitting feedback corresponding to a subset of transport blocks, from the plurality of transport blocks in the window”. However in an analogous art Wu et al. teaches “receiving a plurality of transmissions of a transport block from a transmitter by a configured Hybrid Automatic Repeat reQuest (HARQ) process, the plurality of transmissions including an initial transmission and blind transmissions planned to be performed within a time window after the initial transmission; based on at least a part of the plurality of transmissions, performing decoding for the transport block; and sending a HARQ feedback indicating whether the decoding is successful or not” (Column 3 lines 14-25 and Fig 14). Therefore it would have been obvious to a person in the art at the time of filing of the present application to have combined the system of Kim et al. with the windows Wu et al. in order to address ensuring the reliability and latency of the data transmission as suggested by Wu et al. (column 1 line 66- column 2 line 2).
As per claim 19 Kim et al. substantially teach the claimed apparatus comprising: at least one processor (Paragraph [0008]); and a non-transitory computer readable storage medium storing instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to perform operations including (Paragraph [0010]): transmitting a plurality of transport blocks in a window (Paragraph [0093]), the window predefined to include a number of transport blocks (the window length is a predefined number of consecutive symbols, and R.sub.LBRM is a coding rate when transmitting a TB Paragraph [0111]); and receiving feedback corresponding to a subset of transport blocks (Paragraph [0134]), from the plurality of transport blocks in the window, that have not been decoded correctly (Paragraph [0134] receive, from a base station via the receiver 410, a transmission including a TB, attempt to decode the transmission, transmit a feedback message to the base station indicating that at least a portion of the transmission including the TB was unsuccessfully decoded).
Kim et al. does not explicitly state “transmitting feedback corresponding to a subset of transport blocks, from the plurality of transport blocks in the window”. However in an analogous art Wu et al. teaches “receiving a plurality of transmissions of a transport block from a transmitter by a configured Hybrid Automatic Repeat reQuest (HARQ) process, the plurality of transmissions including an initial transmission and blind transmissions planned to be performed within a time window after the initial transmission; based on at least a part of the plurality of transmissions, performing decoding for the transport block; and sending a HARQ feedback indicating whether the decoding is successful or not” (Column 3 lines 14-25 and Fig 14). Therefore it would have been obvious to a person in the art at the time of filing of the present application to have combined the system of Kim et al. with the windows Wu et al. in order to address ensuring the reliability and latency of the data transmission as suggested by Wu et al. (column 1 line 66- column 2 line 2).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3-6, 9-12, 14-18 and 20 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: The prior arts of record fail to teach “encoding the feedback using a bitmap” and “encoding the feedback using source coding” in the context of:
“… receiving a plurality of transport blocks in a window, the window predefined to include a number of transport blocks; decoding at least one transport block in the plurality of transport blocks; and transmitting feedback corresponding to a subset of transport blocks, from the plurality of transport blocks in the window, that have not been decoded correctly.”
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
US 20230118350 to Bang et al. teaches performing transmission and reception of data in a wireless communication system, wherein the terminal receives, from a base station, first configuration information for code block group (CBG)-based uplink transmission, and second configuration information including a downlink feedback information (DFI) bitmap configuration method, transmits a CBG-based uplink signal to the base station, based on the first configuration information, receives, from the base station, DFI including feedback information about the CBG-based uplink signal, based on the second configuration information, and determines a contention window value of the terminal, based on the feedback information included in the received DFI, wherein the DFI bitmap configuration method indicates whether the feedback information is for feedback in units of transport blocks (TBs) or for feedback for one or more CBGs.
US 20230188164 to Liu et al. teaches second-stage SCI (SCI-2) may be found and decoded after decoding PSCCH. The source identification (ID) and/or destination ID may be used to identify the transmitting UE and the receiving UE of the packet, respectively. The size of the sub-channels in vehicle to everything (V2X) may be 10 or more resource blocks (RBs). In CV2X, the UEs may decode all transmissions and blind decode all sub-channels.
US 2023/0216614 to Wang et al. teaches receiving, at a terminal device, control information from a network device; in accordance with a determination that transmissions of a plurality of transport blocks from the network device to the terminal device on a set of data channels are scheduled by the control information, determining a control channel for transmitting Hybrid Automatic Repeat Request, HARQ, feedback information associated with the plurality of transport blocks; and transmitting the HARQ feedback information via the control channel to the network device.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to CYNTHIA H BRITT whose telephone number is (571)272-3815. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Thursday 8-5.
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, Mark Featherstone can be reached at (571)270-3750. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
CYNTHIA H. BRITT
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 2111
/CYNTHIA BRITT/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2111