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 .
DETAILED ACTION
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to independent claim(s) have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC §103
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.
Claim/s 1, 4, 7, 8, 9, 12, 15, 16, 19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Poddar (Pub. No. US 2022/0350642) in view of Chen (Pub. No. US 2019/0266259) in further view of Sadanandan (Pat. No. US 9,804,966).
Claim 1, 9, 16, Poddar teaches “if executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to: prior to execution of a container on a compute node, store at least one image block into … a … storage system ([0107] The new set of container images may comprise images of containers corresponding to new versions of the set of services. The new set of container images may be stored within the container repository 614. [0093] During operation 404 of method 400 of FIG. 4, the service agent 620 may retrieve a set of container images from a container repository 614 of container images. The service agent 620 may retrieve the set of container images from the container repository 614 of container images based upon the set of container images corresponding to images of containers of the set of services that are to be deployed within the cluster by the service agent 620. In this way, the service agent 620 acquires the chart package and the set of container images that can be used to deploy the set of services to the cluster)”.
However, Poddar may not explicitly teach the details of the container image repository.
Chen teaches “… store at least one image block into at least one tier of storage of a hierarchical storage system based on priority of the at least one image block, wherein the at least one image block comprises at least one portion of an image of the container and wherein the priority of the at least one image block is based on access frequency of the at least one image block ([0009] Some examples of the present disclosure overcome one or more of the abovementioned issues by (i) determining a score for each layer of an image based on the usage (e.g., popularity, accesses, or downloads) of that layer, the image, or both; and (ii) storing each layer at a particular storage destination based on the layer's score. Higher-scoring layers can be stored in storage destinations that have higher performance characteristics, such as faster input/output times, fewer input/output errors, etc. Examples of storage destinations with higher performance characteristics can include solid state drives (SSDs) and local hard drives. Additionally or alternatively, lower-scoring layers can be stored in storage destinations that have lower performance characteristics. [0014] The server 104 can determine scores 114 for the layers 112a-n of an image 108a. [0023] FIG. 3 is a block diagram of another example of a system 300 for managing container-image layers according to some aspects.)”.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was filed to apply the teachings of Chen with the teachings of Poddar in order to provide a system that teaches details of storing images. The motivation for applying Chen teaching with Poddar teaching is to provide a system that allows for improved used of storage resources. Poddar, Chen are analogous art directed towards containerized environments. Together Poddar, Chen teaches every limitation of the claimed invention. Since the teachings were analogous art known at the filing time of invention, one of ordinary skill could have applied the teachings of Chen with the teachings of Poddar by known methods before the effective filing date of the claimed invention and gained expected results.
However, the combination may not explicitly teach the priority is based on the newly added limitation.
Sadanandan teaches “… wherein the priority of the at least one image block is based on access frequency of the at least one image block and one or more of: sequence of access of the at least one image block or number of containers that access the at least one image block ([Col. 9, Lines 40-48] (52) The data priority manager 302 can process the data access information (e.g., time of access, comparison to threshold corresponding to a number of times data blocks are accessed, period of time data blocks are accessed together, and/or type of access (read/write)) to determine whether certain data blocks are interrelated/interlinked. In embodiments, a database can contain data access information for data blocks to perform interrelated/interlinked assessments and update the database…. [Col. 9, Line 60-Col. 10 Line 3] (54) Video streaming and other applications may have IO operations that are sequential in nature. However, storage arrays that store data with unique IDs, such as content fingerprint of the data blocks, may not sequentially store the data. Thus, if the first data block is accessed by a host, in embodiments, the storage system, based on past access patterns, may pre-fetch interrelated data to the cache. After the pre-fetch, the host may have the required data at a given time. In one embodiment, the required data may be cached sequentially. In other embodiments, the required data may be cached non-sequentially)”.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was filed to apply the teachings of Sadanandan with the teachings of Poddar, Chen in order to provide a system that teaches details of further priority-based configuration. The motivation for applying Sadanandan teaching with Poddar, Chen teaching is to provide a system that allows for design choice. Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan are analogous art directed towards containerized environments. Together Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan teaches every limitation of the claimed invention. Since the teachings were analogous art known at the filing time of invention, one of ordinary skill could have applied the teachings of Sadanandan with the teachings of Poddar, Chen by known methods before the effective filing date of the claimed invention and gained expected results.
Claim 4, 12, 19 the combination teaches the claim, wherein Chen teaches “the computer-readable medium of claim 1, comprising instructions stored thereon, that if executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to: based on a first level of priority of the at least one image block, store the at least one image block into a memory device accessible to the compute node and based on a second level of priority of the at least one image block, store the at least one image block into a storage device accessible to the compute node ([0029] After determining the scores 308a-b, the processing device 302 can determine that the first score 308a corresponds to a first storage destination 310a among multiple possible storage destinations 310. Additionally or alternatively, the processing device 302 can determine that the second score 308b corresponds to a second storage destination 310b among the multiple possible storage destinations 310.), wherein the first level of priority is higher than the second level of priority ([0009] Some examples of the present disclosure overcome one or more of the abovementioned issues by (i) determining a score for each layer of an image based on the usage (e.g., popularity, accesses, or downloads) of that layer, the image, or both; and (ii) storing each layer at a particular storage destination based on the layer's score.) and wherein the memory device has a lower access latency than that of the storage device ([0018] Local storage destinations may have lower latency than remote storage destinations. The server 104 is also coupled to storage destination 122d, such as a SSD or hard disk, which is internal to the server 104. A storage destination that is internal to the server 104 can be referred to as an internal storage destination. Internal storage destinations may have lower latency than local storage destinations.)”.
Rationale to claim 1 is applied here.
Claim 5, the combination teaches the claim, wherein Sadanandan teaches “the computer-readable medium of claim 1, comprising instructions stored thereon, that if executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to: determine time to retrieve the at least one image block into a memory of the compute node for execution of the image block based on a prior retrieval of the at least one image block ([Col. 8, Lines 38-64] (47) In embodiments, the timestamp information 318, which can be stored for each read and/or write operation for a given data block, can be used to analyze historical and/or time trends. In other embodiments, current information associated with the content fingerprint 310 is saved at certain time intervals that can have an associated timestamp 318. As described more fully below, the timestamp information 318 can be used to move data to cache 308 based upon historical time-of-day access information. In embodiments, one or more of the write reference information 312, access reference information 314, time information 316, and/or timestamp information 318 can be processed to generate a ranking/priority 320 for the data. For example, one or more of the write reference information 312, access reference information 314, time information 316, timestamp information 318, and/or ranking/priority 320 can be used to analyze trends and access patterns on an hourly, daily, weekly and/or monthly basis, for example. In embodiments, placement of data blocks in cache memory 308 can be controlled at least in part based upon historical time-based usage. Data blocks that are accessed relatively often at a particular time or time range can be moved to cache in advance of the particular time to improve cache hit ratios (The percentage of data block accesses that result in cache hits may be known as the hit rate or hit ratio of the cache). This can be considered pre-fetch for time-based historical access information.)”.
Rationale to claim 1 is applied here.
Claim 7, the combination teaches the claim, wherein Chen teaches “the computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the hierarchical storage system comprise memory and/or storage devices and the hierarchical storage system comprises shared storage tiers ([0021] At a subsequent point in time, the client device 102 may request the image 108a. The server 104 can respond to the request by retrieving the layers 112a-n for the image 108a from the various storage destinations (e.g., storage destination 122a, 122c, and 122d) and routing the layers 112a-n to the client device 102. [0010] As a particular example, an image can have a first layer that is shared with another image and a second layer that is not shared with any other images. Because the first layer is shared with another image, the first layer may be more frequently used than the second layer.)”.
Rationale to claim 1 is applied here.
Claim 8, the combination teaches the claim, wherein Chen teaches “the computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein an orchestrator is to cause storage of the at least one image block into at least one tier of storage of the hierarchical storage system based on a priority level of the at least one image block ([0010] As a particular example, an image can have a first layer that is shared with another image and a second layer that is not shared with any other images. Because the first layer is shared with another image, the first layer may be more frequently used than the second layer. In some examples, a computing device can determine that the first layer has a first score and the second layer has a second score that is less than the first score, because the second layer is less frequently used than the first layer. The computing device can determine that the first score corresponds to a local (e.g., higher performance) storage destination and the second score corresponds to a remote (e.g., lower performance) storage destination.)”.
Rationale to claim 1 is applied here.
Claim 15, the combination teaches the claim, wherein Poddar teaches “the apparatus of claim 9, wherein the function comprises one or more of: an application, microservice, virtual machine (VMs), microVM, or container ([0107] image container).
Claim/s 3, 11, 18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan, in view of Suarez (Pub. No. US 2017/0177877).
Claim 3, 11, 18 the combination may not explicitly teach the limitation.
Suarez teaches “the computer-readable medium of claim 1, wherein the access frequency of the at least one image block and the sequence of access of the at least one image block are based on at least one prior execution of the container ([0096] Similarly, the system of the present disclosure may track the container image that is downloaded and launched by customers, and may track, such as via an agent like the agent 206 of FIG. 2 or via scheduler of the type described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/538,663, incorporated by reference herein, which software applications are currently running container instances, when they run, and how often they are run. Using this data, the system may predict that if an update is made to a container image corresponding to a long-running (e.g., the application corresponding to the container image runs continuously, on average, for multiple days or some other threshold period) and/or frequently-running application (e.g., the application corresponding to the container image is launched, on average, multiple times per day, or some other threshold frequency), that the updated container image or the particular container image layers corresponding to the application should be cached in preparation of an update to the long running and/or frequently running application. If previous history indicates that the customer 1066B typically performs deployment at a particular time of day or day of week (e.g., midnight on Saturday), intelligent caching may make efficient use of memory resources by only loading the layers necessary for the deployment just in time (JIT) for (e.g., one minute prior to deployment time) the predicted deployment time. Caching strategies additionally or alternatively could include a least-recently used caching (LRU) strategy, a hit-based strategy, pre-fetching, and various combinations of strategies described above. Note that it is contemplated that various other cache optimization strategies alternative or in addition to those described may be used.)”.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was filed to apply the teachings of Suarez with the teachings of Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan in order to provide a system that teaches details of sequence of accesses. The motivation for applying Suarez teaching with Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan teaching is to provide a system that allows for design choice. Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan, Suarez are analogous art directed towards containerized environments. Together Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan, Suarez teaches every limitation of the claimed invention. Since the teachings were analogous art known at the filing time of invention, one of ordinary skill could have applied the teachings of Suarez with the teachings of Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan by known methods before the effective filing date of the claimed invention and gained expected results.
Claim/s 6, 14 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan, in view of Guo (Pub. No. US 2019/0196846).
Claim 6, 14 the combination may not explicitly teach the limitation.
Guo teaches “the computer-readable medium of claim 5, comprising instructions stored thereon, that if executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to: determine one or more candidate compute nodes based on hardware and/or software parameters of the container and select the compute node to execute the container from among the determined one or more candidate compute nodes ([0137] With this configuration, a more appropriate information processing apparatus may be selected as a deployment destination for a container including a program that executes a process using the device. [0138] The resource condition may be a condition regarding an apparatus resource or an apparatus performance of the information processing apparatus that are necessities for the deployment target container. [0139] With this configuration, a more appropriate information processing apparatus may be selected as the deployment destination for a container including a program dependent on the resource or the performance of the information processing apparatus.)”.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was filed to apply the teachings of Guo with the teachings of Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan in order to provide a system that teaches selecting a destination. The motivation for applying Guo teaching with Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan teaching is to provide a system that allows for design choice. Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan, Guo are analogous art directed towards deployment of software. Together Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan, Guo teaches every limitation of the claimed invention. Since the teachings were analogous art known at the filing time of invention, one of ordinary skill could have applied the teachings of Guo with the teachings of Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan by known methods before the effective filing date of the claimed invention and gained expected results.
Claim/s 13, 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan, in view of Wang (Pub. No. US 2024/0220293).
Claim 13, 20, the combination may not explicitly teach the limitation.
Wang teaches “the apparatus of claim 9, comprising instructions stored on the at least one memory, that if executed by the at least one processor, cause the at least one processor to: calculate time to retrieve the at least one image block into a memory of the compute node for execution of the function and select the compute node to execute the function to reduce a calculated time to retrieve the at least one image block ([0082] For example, a download source may be selected based on the time required for the deployment destination to perform downloading from the image file storage node. As a result thereof, it is possible to shorten the time required for until the completion of creating a network service providing environment in the deployment destination. For example, when there are one or more image file storage nodes, the download time may be estimated from each image file storage node, and based on this estimated result, one of the image file storage nodes may be selected as the download source. The download time may be estimated, for example, based on previous communication history or communication traffic. Alternatively, if the distance between an image file storage node and a deployment destination is small enough to be negligible, it may be simply considered that the download time is shorter when there is less communication traffic. Therefore, a download source may be selected based on the communication traffic. Note that a measurement result of communication traffic is obtained from the traffic management apparatus 400.)”.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was filed to apply the teachings of Guo with the teachings of Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan in order to provide a system that teaches selecting a destination. The motivation for applying Guo teaching with Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan teaching is to provide a system that allows for design choice. Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan, Guo are analogous art directed towards deployment of software. Together Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan, Guo teaches every limitation of the claimed invention. Since the teachings were analogous art known at the filing time of invention, one of ordinary skill could have applied the teachings of Guo with the teachings of Poddar, Chen, Sadanandan by known methods before the effective filing date of the claimed invention and gained expected results.
Claim/s 21 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Glikson (Pub. No. US 2011/0145816) in further view of Sadanandan (Pat. No. US 9,804,966).
Claim 21, Glikson teaches “a non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising instructions stored thereon, that if executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to: in response to a request to boot a virtual execution environment, select a node to create an instance of the virtual execution environment based on storage locations of virtual execution environment image segments and cause the selected node to boot the virtual execution environment ([0028] To summarize, deploying a VM on a temporary host 122 (i.e., a host that is local or in close proximity to an image of the VM) desirably allows for fast deployment of the VM obviating the need to wait for the VM to be copied and deployed to a remotely located destination host. If the temporary host supports instant deployment, the deployment may be immediate. Migrating the VM from a source environment (e.g., the computing system 120 to a destination environment (e.g., the computing system 110) desirably supports fast processing of service requests submitted by the destination host 112, in addition to fast deployment of the VM.)”.
However, Glikson may not explicitly teach the new limitations.
Sadanandan “wherein the storage locations of the virtual execution environment image segments are based on access frequency of the virtual execution environment image segments and one or more of: sequence of access of the virtual execution environment image segments or number of virtual execution environments that access the virtual execution environment image segments ([Col. 9, Lines 40-48] (52) The data priority manager 302 can process the data access information (e.g., time of access, comparison to threshold corresponding to a number of times data blocks are accessed, period of time data blocks are accessed together, and/or type of access (read/write)) to determine whether certain data blocks are interrelated/interlinked. In embodiments, a database can contain data access information for data blocks to perform interrelated/interlinked assessments and update the database…. [Col. 9, Line 60-Col. 10 Line 3] (54) Video streaming and other applications may have IO operations that are sequential in nature. However, storage arrays that store data with unique IDs, such as content fingerprint of the data blocks, may not sequentially store the data. Thus, if the first data block is accessed by a host, in embodiments, the storage system, based on past access patterns, may pre-fetch interrelated data to the cache. After the pre-fetch, the host may have the required data at a given time. In one embodiment, the required data may be cached sequentially. In other embodiments, the required data may be cached non-sequentially)”.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was filed to apply the teachings of Sadanandan with the teachings of Glikson in order to provide a system that teaches details of further priority-based configuration. The motivation for applying Sadanandan teaching with Glikson teaching is to provide a system that allows for design choice. Glikson and Sadanandan are analogous art directed towards containerized environments. Together Glikson, Sadanandan teaches every limitation of the claimed invention. Since the teachings were analogous art known at the filing time of invention, one of ordinary skill could have applied the teachings of Sadanandan with the teachings of Glikson by known methods before the effective filing date of the claimed invention and gained expected results.
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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to WYNUEL S AQUINO whose telephone number is (571)272-7478. The examiner can normally be reached 9AM-5PM EST M-F.
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/WYNUEL S AQUINO/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2199
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