DETAILED ACTION
1. This Office Action is in response to an application filed on Jun. 01, 2023. Claims 1-20 have been presented. Therefore, Claims 1-20 are presented for examination. Now claims 1-20 are pending.
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
2. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . 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.
Drawings
3. The drawing filed on 06/01/2023 are accepted.
Oath/Declaration
4. For the record, the Examiner acknowledges that the Oath/Declaration submitted on 06/01/2023 has been accepted by the office.
Information Disclosure Statement
5. The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 06/01/2023 has been considered. The submissions are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Form PTO-1449 is signed and attached hereto.
Priority
6. Applicant Claims NO priority on the instant application.
Claim Objections
7. Claim 4 is objected due to wrong status of the claims “The network monitoring device of claim 1” where it should have said “The network cyber device of claim 1”. Appropriate
corrections are requested.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
8. 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.
Claims 15 and 19 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 applicant regards as the invention.
9. Claim 15 in line 2 recites “the network monitoring device”; and lacks antecedent basis. Also claim 19 has same antecedent bases as claim 15.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
10. 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.
11. Claims 1, 3-7, 9-14, 16-18 and 20 are not patent eligible for directed to an abstract idea.
12. Claim 1 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. As drafted, is a process that, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components. That is, other than reciting “network cyber device”, “host connector”, “circuit board of a host network device”, “network cable”, “data cable”, “wireless interface”, “processors”, “memory” nothing in the claim element precludes the step from practically being performed in the mind. For example, but for the “network cyber device”, “host connector”, “circuit board of a host network device”, “network cable”, “data cable”, “wireless interface”, “processors”, “memory” language, in the context of this claim encompasses the steps from practically being performed in the mind.
Similarly, the limitation of applying, at the network entity, “determine, … and based on comparison to one or more criteria of one or more classification rules, one or more matches to criteria of one or more matched rules of the one or more classification rules; transmit, …”, as drafted, is a process that, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components. For example, but for the “network cyber device”, “host connector”, “circuit board of a host network device”, “network cable”, “data cable”, “wireless interface”, “processors”, “memory” language, in the context of this claim encompasses determining user level of consent according to data type.
If a claim limitation, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components, then it falls within the “Mental Processes” grouping of abstract ideas. Accordingly, the claim recites an abstract idea. This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. The claim is directed to an abstract idea.
The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because. As discussed above with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, steps amounts to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component. Mere instructions to apply an exception using a generic computer component cannot provide an inventive concept. The claim is not patent eligible.
13. Claim 3-7 and 9-13 recites more details regarding the switches, … optical/electrical converters and connectors to circuit board and classification rules… and Ethernet, BLUETOOTH, chip and ports and do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because it does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. Hence, claims 3-7 and 9-13 do not add significantly more limitations and is rejected with the same rationale as claim 1 above.
14. Claims 14, 16-18, and 20, recites substantially the same limitations as claims 1, 3-7, and 9-13 do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because it does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. Hence, claims 14, 16-18, and 20 do not add significantly more limitations and is rejected with the same rationale as claims 1, 3-7, and 9-13 above.
Examiner Note: The Examiner would like to point out the claims limitations recite wherein clauses that recite intended use and therefore, the claim scope is not limited by claim language that suggests or makes optional but does not require steps to be performed. (MPEP2111.04)].
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
15. 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.
16. Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Litichever et al. WO 2019/123447 hereinafter “Litichever” Published Jun. 27, 2019.
Regarding claim 1, Litichever teaches: A network cyber device (Litichever, see Abstract along with FIG. 8, items 41, 81, 70, 23c, 23d, 24c,24d) comprising: at least one processor; at least one memory including computer program code (Litichever, see FIG. 8d, items 81, 23c, 23d); the at least one memory and the computer program code being configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to (Litichever, see page 40 lines 3-13 and many others):
a host connector configured to physically and electrically mate with a connector mounted to a circuit board of a host network device (Litichever, see pages 48 and 133); a network cable connector configured to connect to a mating connector of a data cable (Litichever, see page 13); a wireless interface configured to send and receive data via wireless communications (Litichever, see abstract, page 13 line 1, page 29 lines 7- 22 and many others) one or more processors; and memory storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, configure the network cyber device to (Litichever, see pages 2 lines 7-17, 29 lines 4-25):
receive, via the host connector or the network cable connector, data frames communicated via a network (Litichever, see pages 7 lines 1-7 and 214 lines 24-33 along with FIG 15a);
determine, for one or more of the received data frames and based on comparison to one or more criteria of one or more classification rules, one or more matches to criteria of one or more matched rules of the one or more classification rules (Litichever, see page 142 lines 20-32; also see page 66 lines 16-29);
transmit, via the other of the host connector or the network cable connector, at least a portion of the received data frames (Litichever, see page 230 lines 3-20, “internal communications mechanisms such as message passing, interprocess communications, and shared memory. Such networks or portions thereof may utilize any one or more different topologies (e.g., ring, bus, star, loop, etc.), transmission media (e.g., wired/RF cable, RF wireless”; also see page 32 lines 9-27); and transmit, via the wireless interface (Litichever, see page 28 lines 9-8, “based upon the restriction information transmitted from the information terminal” then see page 29 lines 20-23), one or more of:
copies of the one or more of the received data frames, or data based on the one or more of the received data frames (Litichever, see page 42 lines 4-13, then see page 36 lines 20-36).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 2, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: perform, based on the one or more matches, and for the one or more of the received data frames, one or more actions indicated by the matched rules, wherein the one or more actions comprise one or more of: forwarding a received data frame, blocking a received data frame, modifying a received data frame and forwarding the modified received data frame, or generating a data frame and forwarding the generated data frame (Litichever, see page 65 lines 27-34 and page 66 lines 1-4).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 3, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: perform, based on the one or more matches, and for the one or more of the received data frames, one or more actions indicated by the matched rules, wherein the one or more actions comprise one or more of: forwarding a received data frame, blocking a received data frame, modifying a received data frame and forwarding the modified received data frame, or generating a data frame and forwarding the generated data frame (Litichever, see page 47 line 27-34 and page 48 lines 1-11 along with FIG 12-FIG 12a-d item 70).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 4, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: wherein the host network device comprises a network switch, a router, or a firewall (Litichever, see page 67 line 13-22).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 5, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: wherein the network cable connector comprises an optical cable connector, and wherein the network cyber device further comprises an optical/electrical converter configured to convert between electrical data signals and optical data signals (Litichever, see page 45 lines 12-28).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 6, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: wherein the network cyber device is configured to receive electrical power from the host network device via the connector mounted to a circuit board of the host network device (Litichever, see page 47 lines 26-34 and page 48 lines 1-5).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 7, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: wherein the instructions, when executed by the one or more processors, configure the network cyber device to generate and transmit data frames via at least one of the host connector or the network cable connector (Litichever, see abstract).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 8, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: wherein the instructions, when executed by the one or more processors, configure the network cyber device to receive, via the wireless interface, instructions comprising the one or more classification rules (Litichever, see page 66 lines 16-29).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 9, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: wherein the instructions, when executed by the one or more processors, configure the network cyber device to receive, via the wireless interface, instructions comprising one or more of network interface configuration instructions or sleep/wake configuration instructions associated with the wireless interface (Litichever, see page 31 lines 13-22).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 10, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: wherein the network comprises an Ethernet network and the data frames comprise Ethernet frames (Litichever, see page 108 lines 1-13 and many more).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 11, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: wherein the wireless interface comprises one or more of an IEEE 802.11 wireless interface or a BLUETOOTH wireless interface (Litichever, see page 177 lines 22-32).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 12, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: wherein the one or more processors and the memory comprise one or more of a system on a chip or a multichip module (Litichever, see page 227 lines 5-14).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 13, Litichever teaches all the limitations of claim 1. Further Litichever teaches: wherein the host network device comprises a network switch, and wherein the instructions, when executed by the one or more processors, configure the network cyber device to operate as a port of the network switch (Litichever, see page 58 lines 1-21).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement Litichever’s method for achieving the same claimed limitation in order to achieve the same result with different implementations. Thus, the implementations would have been obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify the invention of Litichever for achieving the same claimed limitation.
Regarding claim 14, this claim defines a device claim that corresponds to device claim 1 and does not define beyond limitations of claim 1. Therefore, claim 14 is rejected with the same rational as in the rejection of claim 1.
Regarding claim 15, this claim defines a device claim that corresponds to device claim 2 and does not define beyond limitations of claim 2. Therefore, claim 15 is rejected with the same rational as in the rejection of claim 2.
Regarding claim 16, this claim defines a device claim that corresponds to device claim 3 and does not define beyond limitations of claim 3. Therefore, claim 16 is rejected with the same rational as in the rejection of claim 3.
Regarding claim 17, this claim defines a device claim that corresponds to device claims 4 and 5 and does not define beyond limitations of claim 4 and 5. Therefore, claim 17 is rejected with the same rational as in the rejection of claims 4 and 5.
Regarding claim 18, this claim defines a device claim that corresponds to device claims 1 and claim 5 and do not define beyond limitations of claims 1 and 5. Therefore, claim 18 is rejected with the same rational as in the rejection of claims 1 and 5.
Regarding claim 19, this claim defines a device claim that corresponds to device claim 2 and does not define beyond limitations of claim 2. Therefore, claim 19 is rejected with the same rational as in the rejection of claim 2.
Regarding claim 20, this claim defines a device claim that corresponds to device claim 3 and does not define beyond limitations of claim 3. Therefore, claim 20 is rejected with the same rational as in the rejection of claim 3.
Examiner note:
17. In the case of amending the Claimed invention, Applicant is respectfully requested to indicate the portion(s) of the specification which dictate(s) the structure relied on for proper interpretation and also to verify and ascertain the metes and bounds of the claimed invention. This will assist in expediting compact prosecution. MPEP 714.02 recites: “Applicant should also specifically point out the support for any amendments made to the disclosure. See MPEP § 2163.06. An amendment which does not comply with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.121(b), (c), (d), and (h) may be held not fully responsive. See MPEP § 714.” Amendments not pointing to specific support in the disclosure may be deemed as not complying with provisions of 37 C.F.R. 1.131(b), (c), (d), and (h) and therefore held not fully responsive. Generic statements such as “Applicants believe no new matter has been introduced” may be deemed insufficient.
Conclusion
18. The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Lihua Yuan US 20200382329 discloses receiving a stream of data packets (205) at a top of rack (TOR) switch, in which the data packet stream has an associated line (235) rate. The received data packets are identified by a network interface controller (NIC) that is a arranged.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to KHALIL NAGHDALI whose telephone number is (571) 272-9884. The examiner can normally be reached on Thursday-Friday and Monday-Tuesday (Thursday and Friday first week of PTO bi-week and Monday and Tuesday second week of PTO bi-week) 7 AM-4:30 PM.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner's supervisor, ALEXANDER LAGOR can be reached on (571) 270-5143. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/KHALIL NAGHDALI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2437