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 .
The following is a Non-Final Office Action in response to communications received on January 24, 2023. Claims 1-7 are pending and addressed below.
Specification
For the record, Examiner acknowledges that the Specification submitted on January 24, 2023 has been accepted.
Drawings
For the record, Examiner acknowledges that the Drawings submitted on January 24, 2023 have been accepted.
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 1-7 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 recites the limitation “the data asset” in several places in the last limitation. There are two previously recited data assets and it is unclear as to which particular data asset the limitation is referring. Dependent claims 2-7 are rejected for containing the same indefinite language as parent claim 1 without further remedying the indefinite language.
Claim 3 recites the limitations “the data base” and “the data warehouse”. There is insufficient antecedent basis for these limitations.
Claim 5 recites the limitation “the data asset”. There are two previously recited data assets and it is unclear as to which particular data asset the limitation is referring. Dependent claims 6-7 are rejected for containing the same indefinite language as parent claim 5 without further remedying the indefinite language.
Claim 7 recites the limitation “the data asset”. There are two previously recited data assets and it is unclear as to which particular data asset the limitation is referring.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-7 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. The claim(s) does/do not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter. Claim 1 is directed towards a system comprising a clone determiner engine, the engine comprising various parts. An “engine” is well-known in the art as a software term. Neither the claims nor the instant specification define the “engine” as hardware. Since the system only comprises the “engine”, the claim is considered to be directed towards software per se and is non-statutory. Applicant may overcome this rejection by adding a specific piece of hardware (e.g. memory or CPU) to store/run the engine. Dependent claims 2-7 are rejected for failing to further define parent claim 1 as statutory.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-7 would be allowable if rewritten or amended to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, and 35 U.S.C. 101 set forth in this Office action.
Claim 1 recites, inter alia, “wherein the timestamp analyzer engine determines the data asset is a primary asst or a secondary asset… wherein the fingerprints analyzer then uses the fingerprints to determine that the data asset is the clone data asset of an already known asset in conjunction with an output of the timestamp analyzer engine and the log data analyzer”.
The closest prior art made of record are:
Taylor et al. (U.S. Pub. No. 2023/0050601) which discloses determining if a file is an original or duplicate based on a hash (paragraphs [0005], [0049] and claim 5)
Bateman (U.S. Pub. No. 2014/0037133) which discloses fingerprinting a video for later verification on whether a video is a copy (Abstract)
Barrett et al. (U.S. Pub. No. 2023/0004582) which discloses using a timestamp and hash as identifiers for original data (paragraphs [0049]-[0050])
While the prior art does generally disclose determining if a file is original or a copy using hashes and verification using hashes/timestamps, the prior art was not found to disclose the particular cited claim limitations. Therefore, claim 1 is considered to recite allowable subject matter over the prior art. Dependent claims 2-7 are considered to recite allowable subject matter over the prior art based on their dependency.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to THADDEUS J PLECHA whose telephone number is (571)270-7506. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8-4:30.
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/THADDEUS J PLECHA/Examiner, Art Unit 2438