DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
1. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Status of Claims
2. This communication is responsive to Application No. 19/070,424 filed on March 04, 2025, Claims 1-16 are subject to examination.
Specification/Drawings
3. The lengthy Specification has not been checked to the extent necessary to determine the presence of all possible minor errors. Applicant’s cooperation is requested in correcting any errors of which Applicant may become aware in the Specification.
For example, Paragraph 84 of the Specification talks about the features of Figure 8. However, Figure 8 does not show these features. It appears that “FIG. 8” in Paragraph 84 should have been “FIG. 6”. Appropriate correction is required.
Information Disclosure Statement (IDS)
4. The IDS submitted on 08/21/25 has been entered and considered by the Examiner.
Claim Objections
5. Following claims are objected to because of the following informality:
in claims 1, 4 and 13-14 the acronyms “PAM”, “SerDes” and “DC” must be defined on first use; for example, “PAM” should be spelled it out as “Pulse Amplitude Modulation (PAM)”;
in claim 9, line 7 “the convolutional trellis,” should be replaced with “the convolutional trellis, and”; and
in claims 14 and 16 the term/s “using/use” should be replaced with “utilizing/utilize”.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
6. The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
7. Claims 1-12 and 14-16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor, or for pre-AIA the Applicant regards as the invention.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the serialized group of PAM-modulated symbols" in line 6. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. Hence, renders claim 1 and its dependent claims indefinite.
Claim 14 recites the limitation "the evaluation" in line 9. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. Hence, renders claim 14 and its dependent claims indefinite.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
8. The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office Action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
9. Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Agazzi (US 2010/0135372 A1).
Regarding claim 13, Agazzi teaches a method, (Figure 3: 300 trellis encoder & Paragraph 4: a method of a high-speed communication system) comprising: receiving eight bits of information (Figure 3: “8-bits”/“D0…D7”); determining a state transition of a convolutional trellis (Figure 3: 302 convolutional encoder) at least partially based on a two-bit portion (Figure 3: “D0”/308 & “D1”/307) of the eight bits of information (Figure 3: “8-bits”/“D0…D7”); determining a group of PAM-modulated symbols (Figure 3: 306 “Pair A…Pair D”, Figures 4A-4B, Paragraph 86: FIG. 4A depicts PAM-5 & Paragraph 95: referring to FIG. 3 with reference to FIGS. 4A and 4B) at least partially based on the determined state transition of the convolutional trellis (Figure 3: “D0”/308 & “D1”/307), the eight bits of information (Figure 3: “8-bits”/“D0…D7”), and a set of predetermined groups of PAM-modulated symbols pre-associated with the determined state transition of the convolutional trellis (Figure 3: “D0”/308 & “D1”/307 & Figure 4B: “s0…s7”); and encoding the eight bits of information into the determined group of PAM-modulated symbols (Figure 3: 306 “Pair A…Pair D”).
Reason for Allowance
10. As stated above that Agazzi teaches in Figure 3 a mapper to encode bits information (304 “Signal Mapper”). In addition, Raychaudhuri (US 2023/0011466 A1) discloses in Figure 4 a serializer (58) and a driver (60), and Shokrollahi (US 10,348,436 B2) discloses in Figure 1 an encoder (112) and a driver (118). However, the prior art of record when implemented, would not produce said apparatus as claimed in claim 1 and said method as claimed in claim 14.
Conclusion
11. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the Examiner should be directed to SHAWKAT M. ALI whose telephone number is (571) 270-1639. The Examiner can normally be reached on Monday-Thursday 8:30AM-3:30PM 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 AIR at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the Examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the Examiner’s Supervisor, SAM K. AHN can be reached on (571) 272-3044. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/SHAWKAT M ALI/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2633
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