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 .
Reopening of Prosecution After Appeal Brief
In view of the appeal brief filed on 4/10/2026, PROSECUTION IS HEREBY REOPENED. New grounds of rejection are set forth below.
To avoid abandonment of the application, appellant must exercise one of the following two options:
(1) file a reply under 37 CFR 1.111 (if this Office action is non-final) or a reply under 37 CFR 1.113 (if this Office action is final); or,
(2) initiate a new appeal by filing a notice of appeal under 37 CFR 41.31 followed by an appeal brief under 37 CFR 41.37. The previously paid notice of appeal fee and appeal brief fee can be applied to the new appeal. If, however, the appeal fees set forth in 37 CFR 41.20 have been increased since they were previously paid, then appellant must pay the difference between the increased fees and the amount previously paid.
A Supervisory Patent Examiner (SPE) has approved of reopening prosecution by signing below:
/KAVITA STANLEY/ Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2153
Priority
The later-filed application must be an application for a patent for an invention which is also disclosed in the prior application (the parent or original nonprovisional application or provisional application). The disclosure of the invention in the parent application and in the later-filed application must be sufficient to comply with the requirements of 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or the first paragraph of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, except for the best mode requirement. See Transco Products, Inc. v. Performance Contracting, Inc., 38 F.3d 551, 32 USPQ2d 1077 (Fed. Cir. 1994)
The disclosure of the prior-filed applications, Application No. 14/577110, 16/676675, fails to provide adequate support or enablement in the manner provided by 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, first paragraph for one or more claims of this application. Only a claim with all of its limitations fully supported by the disclosure of the parent application is entitled to the parent’s earlier priority date.
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 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 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.
Claim(s) 1, 4, 5, 12, 13, 18, 19 are/is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Alex Berkov, “Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery” 4/15/2021, Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery | AWS Storage Blog hereinafter referenced as Berkov, in view of Timashev et al. US8332689
Regarding claim 1, Berkov teaches: Generating, a snapshot of a dataset that is stored on a storage system that is separate from a cloud computing environment (Berkov see pages 1-4, replication of data on source disk or source machine, replicated data stored on cloud, replicated data as snapshots)
creating, a cloud-based storage system in the cloud computing environment; and (Berkov see page 1 creates an EBS volume for each source disk)
populating, within the cloud-based storage system using the snapshot (Berkov see pages 1-4, replication of data on source disk or source machine, replicated data stored on cloud, replicated data as snapshots)
Berkov does not distinctly disclose: by a processing device
populating, a virtual drive layer with data of the dataset using the shot while avoiding accessing the storage system
However, Timashev teaches: by a processing device (Timashev see col. 4 lines 14-28 computing device with CPU)
populating, a virtual drive layer with data of the dataset using the shot while avoiding accessing the storage system (Timashev see col. 4 lines 66-67 col. 5 lines 1-17 col. 6 lines 44-59 col. 7 lines 48-62 backup storage storing image files and virtual storage is mounting the required backup files. Mounting to virtual storage reads on populating a virtual drive layer, mounting backup storage without mentioning production storage reads on avoiding accessing the storage system)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified a method of disaster recovery as taught by Berkov to include mounting backup files as taught by Timashev for the predictable result of more efficiently organizing and backing up data.
Regarding claim 4, Berkov as modified further teaches: wherein, the cloud-based storage system utilizes the particular portion of the dataset (Berkov see pages 1-4, replication of data on source disk or source machine, replicated data stored on cloud, replicated data as snapshots)
further comprising, storing a particular portion of the dataset in the virtual drive layer, that is stored in the virtual drive layer for accesses of the particular portion of the dataset (Timashev see col. 2 lines 59-65 col. 4 lines 66-67 col. 5 lines 1-17 col. 6 lines 44-59 col. 7 lines 48-62 accessing data stored in virtual storage, backup storage storing image files and virtual storage is mounting the required backup files)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified a method of disaster recovery as taught by Berkov to include mounting backup files as taught by Timashev for the predictable result of more efficiently organizing and backing up data.
Regarding claim 5, Berkov as modified teaches: wherein the snapshot includes a plurality of incremental updates to the dataset (Berkov see pages 3 and 4, snapshots continually created and replicated changed blocks)
Regarding claim 12, Berkov as modified teaches: further comprising configuring the storage system to generate the snapshot based on one or more recovery objectives associated with the dataset, wherein the snapshot of the dataset is generated in response to configuring the storage system to generate the snapshot based on the one or more recovery objectives (Berkov see pages 1-4, replication of data on source disk or source machine, replicated data stored on cloud, replicated data as snapshots for disaster recovery)
Regarding claims 13, 18, 19, note the rejection of claim(s) 1, 4, 5, 12. The instant claims recite substantially same limitations as the above-rejected claims and are therefore rejected under same prior-art teachings.
Claim(s) 2, 14, 20 are/is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Alex Berkov, “Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery” 4/15/2021, Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery | AWS Storage Blog hereinafter referenced as Berkov, in view of Timashev et al. US8332689 in view of Patterson et al. US2003/0182301
Regarding claim 2, Berkov as modified further teaches: loading at least a portion of the dataset into a virtual drive layer of the cloud-based storage system (Berkov see pages 1-4, replication of data on source disk or source machine, replicated data stored on cloud, replicated data as snapshots)
Berkov does not teach: using self-describing information for the dataset from the snapshot
Patterson teaches: using self-describing information for the dataset from the snapshot (Patterson see paragraph 0056 snapshot becomes self-describing)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified a method of disaster recovery as taught by Berkov to include self describing snapshots as taught by Patterson for the predictable result of more efficiently organizing and managing data.
Regarding claims 14 and 20, note the rejection of claim(s) 2. The instant claims recite substantially same limitations as the above-rejected claims and are therefore rejected under same prior-art teachings.
Claim(s) 3 and 15 are/is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Alex Berkov, “Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery” 4/15/2021, Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery | AWS Storage Blog hereinafter referenced as Berkov, in view of Timashev et al. US8332689 in view of Yang et al. US2005/0144223
Regarding claim 3, Berkov as modified further teaches: wherein populating the storage layer within the cloud-based storage system can include loading one or more portions of the dataset into a virtual drive layer of the cloud-based storage system (Berkov see pages 1-4, replication of data on source disk or source machine, replicated data stored on cloud, replicated data as snapshots)
Berkov does not teach: in response to one or more input/output (I/O) operations that are directed to the one or more those portions of the dataset
Yang teaches: in response to one or more input/output (I/O) operations that are directed to the one or more those portions of the dataset (Yang see paragraph 0038 I/O operation loading data)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified a method of disaster recovery as taught by Berkov to include I/O operations as taught by Yang for the predictable result of more efficiently organizing and managing data.
Regarding claim 15, see rejection of claim 3
Claim(s) 6 and 16 are/is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Alex Berkov, “Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery” 4/15/2021, Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery | AWS Storage Blog hereinafter referenced as Berkov, in view of Timashev et al. US8332689 in view of Wang et al. US2019/0391883
Regarding claim 6, Berkov as modified does not teach: converting the snapshot from a first format of the storage system into a second format in which the snapshot can be used for populating the virtual drive layer with the data of the dataset
However, Wang teaches: converting the snapshot from a first format of the storage system into a second format in which the snapshot can be used for populating the virtual drive layer with the data of the dataset (Wang see paragraph 0005 0100 converting snapshots from primary format to secondary format or incremental or full snapshot for storage on AWS cloud infrastructure)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified a method of disaster recovery as taught by Berkov to include converting formats for cloud as taught by Wang for the predictable result of more efficiently organizing and accessing data.
Regarding claim 16, see rejection of claim 6
Claim(s) 7 are/is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Alex Berkov, “Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery” 4/15/2021, Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery | AWS Storage Blog hereinafter referenced as Berkov, in view of Timashev et al. US8332689 in view of Zhang et al. US2022/0237089
Regarding claim 7, Berkov as modified does not teach: configuring the storage system to create subsequent snapshots in the second format.
Zhang teaches: configuring the storage system to create subsequent snapshots in the second format. (Zhang see paragraph 0045 snapshot and subsequent variations saved in qcow2 format)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified a method of disaster recovery as taught by Berkov as modified to include converting formats for snapshots as taught by Zhang for the predictable result of more efficiently organizing and accessing data
Claim(s) 8, 9 and 17 are/is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Alex Berkov, “Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery” 4/15/2021, Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery | AWS Storage Blog hereinafter referenced as Berkov, in view of Timashev et al. US8332689 in view of Guturi et al. US2020/0150897
Regarding claim 8, Berkov as modified does not teach: wherein the cloud-based storage system is created in response to detecting that the storage system has become unavailable.
Guturi teaches: wherein the cloud-based storage system is created in response to detecting that the storage system has become unavailable. (Guturi see paragraph 0030-0032 0127 generate cloud instantiation of storage system when storage system is offline)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified a method of disaster recovery as taught by Berkov as modified to include cloud instantiation as taught by Guturi for the predictable result of more efficiently organizing and accessing data
Regarding claim 9, Berkov as modified does not teach: wherein the storage system is an on-premises storage system
Guturi teaches: wherein the storage system is an on-premises storage system. (Guturi see paragraph 0031 on premise storage system)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified a method of disaster recovery as taught by Berkov as modified to include cloud instantiation as taught by Guturi for the predictable result of more efficiently organizing and accessing data
Regarding claim 17, see rejection of claim 8
Claim(s) 10 are/is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Alex Berkov, “Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery” 4/15/2021, Optimizing operational costs in CloudEndure Disaster Recovery | AWS Storage Blog hereinafter referenced as Berkov, in view of Timashev et al. US8332689 in view of Tung et al. US2013/0262678
Regarding claim 10, Berkov as modified does not teach: wherein the storage system is another cloud-based storage system
Tung teaches: wherein the storage system is another cloud-based storage system. (Tung see paragraph 0005 primary and secondary system are cloud)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified a method of disaster recovery as taught by Berkov as modified to include multiple cloud systems as taught by Tung for the predictable result of more efficiently organizing and accessing data
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ALLEN S LIN whose telephone number is (571)270-0612. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F 9-5.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Kavita Stanley can be reached on (571)272-8352. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ALLEN S LIN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2153
Prosecution Insights