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 .
Claim Objections
Claims 1-5 are objected to because of the following informalities: claims 1-6 have bold face type and dashes, which does not conform to US practice. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 1 has a semicolon at the end of line 4, instead of a colon. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 1 uses the term “IoT” without defining what “IoT” stands for in the claim. Appropriate correction is required.
Claims 3 and 4 mention “not shown in the drawings”, which needs to be removed from the claims. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 5 refers to various protocols by acronym without defining the acronyms in the claim. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
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.
Claims 1-5 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 applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 1 mentions “at least one IoT device using IoT technology which allows data related the environment in which it is located to be collected and to be intervened in said environment”. There are apparently words missing in the claim which are necessary to clarify the intended meaning of the claim.
Claim 1 line 3 states “characterized in that it comprises;”. It is unclear what “it” is referring to in the claim. Multiple references to “it” are present in claims 1-6, and need to be corrected to state what “it” is referring to in each instance.
Claim 1 states the at least one IoT network module “may be” connected to a wired network. It is unclear if the network module is actually connected to a wired network or not.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the IoT network module" in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. There is support for “the at least one IoT network module.”
Claim 1 recites the limitation “the IoT device” in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. There is support for “the at least one IoT device.”
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the self-knowledge data models" in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the contextual controls" in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 1 refers in multiple places to “the data”. It is unclear which data is being referred to in the claim.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the structural properties" in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the IoT devices" in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the configurations" in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the IoT gateway module" in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the digital twin integration module" in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the connection" in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 1 recites the limitation "the digital twin" in claim 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the system" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the integration of IoT devices" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the data read" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the environment" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 refers to “the same” multiple times. It is unclear what “the same” is referring to in each instance.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the controller" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the data content" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. It is unclear what “the data content” is referring to.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the self-knowledge data model" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the alarm conditions" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "said signaled data" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. It is unclear what “said signaled data” is referring to in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the data signals" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 refers to “assigning them”, but it is unclear what “them” is referring to within the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the priority queue" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the repository" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the communication channel" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the other data assets" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. It is unclear what “the other data assets” is referring to.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the data assigned to the repository and controlled" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the low priority queue" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the time interval" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the defined time interval" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the edge network communication interface" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the controlled data" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 3 recites the limitation "the digital twin" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 4 recites the limitation "the IoT devices" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 4 recites the limitation "the IoT gateway module" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
In claim 4, it is unclear what “if it is a command” is referring to.
Claim 4 recites the limitation "the place" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 4 recites the limitation "the data processing server" in claim 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 5 recites the limitation "the data flow" in claim 4. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claims 1-5 have multiple 112 issues, and this is not an exhaustive list of all issues present. The Office has made a good faith attempt to identify issues, but Applicant should carefully review the claims to place them in better format for U.S. practice.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 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.
Claims 1-5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Cakir et al., “Digital Twin Middleware for Smart Farm IoT Networks”, 2023 International Balkan Conference on Communications and Networking. İstanbul, Turkiye, 2023, pp. 1-5.
In regard to claim 1, Cakir disclosed a system comprising at least one processor, which provides the integration of loT devices used in smart applications used in locations far from urban areas, especially in rural areas, with digital twin technology, characterized in that it comprises;
- at least one loT device using loT technology which allows data related the environment in which it is located to be collected and to be intervened in said environment, (“In the sensing IoT devices, generate data when there is a change in the sensor value”)
- at least one loT network module which may be connected to a wired network with the loT gateway module comprising the networks on which loT devices are built, (“Physical IoT Network”)
- at least one loT gateway module located in the loT network module, (“received data is performed on the IoT Gateways”)
- at least one edge network communication interface providing communication between the loT device and the loT gateway module, (“Edge communication interface: The communication between the nodes and the Node Manager is enabled by this interface”)
- at least one controller keeping the self-knowledge data models (YANG) of loT devices up-to-date and providing the contextual controls over the data using these models, (“the Node Managers’ responsibility is to keep the YANG models’ state information up-to-date”)
- at least one self-knowledge data model prepared to keep the structural properties and status values of the loT devices, (“Using the YANG Models for IoT devices and the DT specific aggregation scheme”)
- at least one data processing server that manages the sending of data sent by the controller and the commands from the digital twin to the loT device, (“Dispatcher”)
- at least one configuration module responsible for the configurations for the loT gateway module and the digital twin integration module, (“Configuration Manager: This module manages the DT Middleware and IoT Gateway specific configurations”)
- at least one cloud interface that manages the communication in the connection between the loT gateway module and the digital twin located in the cloud. (“Cloud communication Interface”)
In regard to claim 2, Cakir disclosed a system as in Claim 1, characterized in that it comprises temperature, humidity and air sensors, or an irrigation valve, or a water meter, or an loT device (1) which is at least one greenhouse heating system. (Figure 2 – Physical IoT network, Figure 3 – Sensing and Actuator Domain)
In regard to claim 3, Cakir disclosed a method for the operation of the system comprising at least one processor, which provides the integration of loT devices used in smart applications used in locations far from urban areas with digital twin technology, characterized in that it comprises the steps of:
- transforming the data read and collected from the environment in which it is located by the loT device into a network packet and transferring the same to the edge network communication interface (III. …”two-way communication between the IoT devices and their digital twins is kept”)
- discretizing the data content from the network packet transferred by the edge network communication interface and transmitting the same to the controller (III.A. DT-specific Aggregation Scheme)
- updating the self-knowledge data model by the controller (YANG Data Model)
- checking the data according to the alarm conditions defined in the self- knowledge data model (YANG Model)
- signaling the data if the alarm conditions are met, or if the conditions are not met, proceeding to the step of transferring the data signed directly to the data processing server, (III.A. DT-specific Aggregation Scheme)
- transferring said signaled data to the data processing server (III.A. DT-specific Aggregation Scheme)
- checking the data signals by the data processing server (III.A. DT-specific Aggregation Scheme)
- if the data is signaled, assigning them to a high priority queue and proceeding to checking the priority queue and the communication channel of the loT network for direct data transmission adequacy, (III.A. DT-specific Aggregation Scheme)
- if the data are not signaled, assigning the data to at least one repository (III.A. DT-specific Aggregation Scheme)
- detecting the other data assets, belonging to the loT device sent at a previous time, of the data assigned to the repository, (III.A. DT-specific Aggregation Scheme)
- when there exist other data, deleting said old data, (III.A. DT-specific Aggregation Scheme)
- checking the completion of the time interval, which is a parameter defined in the system, of the data assigned to the repository and controlled (III.A. DT-specific Aggregation Scheme)
- if the defined time interval is over, aggregating the data and assigning them to the low priority queue, or if the defined time interval is not over, transforming the data read and collected from the environment in which it is located by the loT device into a network packet and transferring the same to the edge network communication interface (III.A. DT-specific Aggregation Scheme)
- checking the priority queue for data transmission adequacy and the communication channel of the loT network
- transferring the controlled data to the cloud interface and then transmitting to the digital twin in the cloud.
In regard to claim 4, Cakir disclosed a method as in Claim 3, characterized in that it comprises the following steps in order to transmit the commands to the loT devices via the loT gateway module upon the integration of the system's loT devices with digital twin technology:
- arriving the network packet sent by the digital twin at the loT gateway module, (III.C. The DT middleware architecture)
- discretizing the command content in the network packet by the edge network communication interface and transferring the command to the data processing server, (III.C. The DT middleware architecture)
- checking the place where the command should be executed by the data processing server, (III.C. The DT middleware architecture)
- if it is a command sent for the loT gateway module or digital twin integration module, then transmitting the same to the configuration module and executing the command by the configuration module, (III.C. The DT middleware architecture)
- if it is a command sent for the loT device, then transmitting the same to the controller, (III.C. The DT middleware architecture)
- transforming the command into a format that the device can understand, using the self-knowledge data model of the loT device to which the command should be transmitted by the controller and transmitting the same to the edge network communication interface, (III.C. The DT middleware architecture)
- transmitting the command to the loT device using the loT network communication channel between the edge network communication interface and the loT device. (III.C. The DT middleware architecture)
In regard to claim 5, Cakir disclosed a method as in Claim 4, characterized in that a control flow from the digital twin to the loT devices is carried out by the MQTT, HTTP, CoAP and AMQP protocols, apart from the data flow generated between the digital twin through the digital twin integration module. (“This simulation used the MQTT protocol between the IoT node and the DT.”)
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Kim KR20220131574A
Lim KR20230116608A
Rho KR20240077604A
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Jeffrey R. Swearingen
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 2445
/Jeffrey R Swearingen/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2445
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