DETAILED ACTION
This non-final Office Action is in response to applicants’ preliminary amendment filed on 03/29/2024. Claims 1-20 are currently pending and have been considered as follows.
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 .
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
The drawings filed on 02/16/2024 are accepted.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 04/23/2024 has been placed in the application file, and the information referred therein has been considered as to the merits.
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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1, 2, 4, 5, 7-12, 14, 15, and 17-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao et al. (US 10628073 B1, hereinafter Zhao) in view of Hersans (US 20190236284 A1, IDS submitted 04/23/2024, hereinafter Hersans).
As to Claim 1:
Zhao discloses a method (e.g. Zhao “a method of tiering data in a computing environment, data service status information is obtained at a first storage environment regarding a data service operation performed on one or more data sets that qualify for storage at a second storage environment based on a given policy, and, based on the obtained data service status information, a determination is made to store the one or more data sets at the second storage environment without performing a reverse operation of the data service operation on the one or more data sets” [Abstract]), comprising:
receiving, from a requestor by a backup appliance, a request concerning a backed up dataset (e.g. Zhao receiving a data service operation performed on one or more data sets [column 1 lines 63-64]; “the tiering engine 104 identifies cold/inactive data based on configurable policies, and the target data is read” [column 5 lines 22-24]; primary storage with tiering engine FIG. 1); and either:
when the backup appliance has a decryption key (e.g. Zhao maintained metadata includes key to encrypt/decrypt a dataset [column 6 lines 56-65]): notifying, by the backup appliance, a target array that the backed up dataset is an end-to-end (EEE) dataset (e.g. Zhao “ensure solid data security in the end-end path by passing encrypted data over a network” [column 4 lines 60-61]; “detects data compression and encryption states at primary storage 102, thereby eliminating decompression and decryption for tiering, and maintaining relevant extra metadata 112… If the data is in an encrypted and/or compressed state, the data is not decompressed and/or decrypted. Instead, relevant metadata 112 is updated to track the state of the data and extra indexing is performed…” [column 5 lines 11-27]; “Tiering can be implemented in a push fashion, where the tiering engine 104 ingests cold/inactive data and the data is written to cloud storage 118… the data determined to be cold/inactive is filtered from the remaining data as the target data, and at block 206 the encryption and compression states of the target data are checked and it is determined whether the target data is encrypted and/or compressed” [column 5 lines 28-40]; [column 5 lines 49-56]; “tiering appliance 116 already deployed between primary storage 102 and cloud storage 118… a data tag, such as, for example, “encrypted”/“compressed” is added as part of metadata 112 for corresponding data files, to denote that an ingested streaming/file is already processed, and it not necessary to perform encryption/compression again on the file(s) to which the tag applies” [column 6 lines 30-38]); and
transmitting, by the backup appliance to the target array, the backed up dataset (e.g. Zhao “Referring to FIG. 1, and to block 216 of FIG. 2, the raw data 110 is copied to the cloud storage 118… results in faster data transfer due to the data being in compressed format, more secure data movement since whether the dataset is in primary storage 102, being transmitted over a network, or in cloud storage 118, the data is always encrypted” [column 6 lines 18-22]); or
But Zhao does not specifically disclose:
when the backup appliance does not have the decryption key: informing, by the backup appliance, the requestor that the backed up dataset is encrypted and the decryption key is required to access data in the backed up dataset.
However, the analogous art Hersans does disclose when the backup appliance does not have the decryption key (e.g. Hersans “ciphertext from a destroyed encryption key” [0055]): informing, by the backup appliance, the requestor that the backed up dataset is encrypted and the decryption key is required to access data in the backed up dataset (e.g. Hersans “validation server 410 may send an indication of a validation or encryption result to a user device. For example, the indication may be an email message sent to the user who initiated the encryption request or function definition. The message may indicate whether encryption was enabled, which data objects or fields had encryption enabled” [0060]; “The data storage system 705 may send an indication of which plaintexts are encrypted into ciphertexts and which plaintexts the data storage system 705 refrained from encrypting. In this way, the user device 710 may display an indication of the enablement and validation results” [0080] where encryption keys are required to decrypt the data [0044]). Zhao and Hersans are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor in encrypted data storage.
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, having the teachings of Zhao and Hersans before him or her, to modify the disclosure of Zhao with the teachings of Hersans to include when the backup appliance does not have the decryption key: informing, by the backup appliance, the requestor that the backed up dataset is encrypted and the decryption key is required to access data in the backed up dataset as claimed. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been to efficiently protect against encrypting data or saving formula field definitions that do not support encryption and support enabling and validating data encryption (Hersans [0017]; [0027]). Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Zhao and Hersans to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim(s).
As to Claim 2:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the method as recited in claim 1, wherein the target array is different from a domain where the backed up dataset was initially created (e.g. Zhao “it is to be understood that an enterprise (e.g., business, university, etc.) can implement a primary storage tier internal to the enterprise, and utilize cloud storage (external to the enterprise) through a service provider when needed” [column 1 lines 37-40]).
As to Claim 4:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the method as recited in claim 1, wherein when the backup appliance has the decryption key, the backup appliance sends the decryption key to the target array along with the backed up dataset (e.g. Zhao “Moving an encryption key generally does not save an appreciable amount of storage since the key occupies a small amount of storage space… move or share the key via a separate out-of-band channel, which is a communication channel different from that used for data tiering” [column 9 lines 31-39]).
As to Claim 5:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the method as recited in claim 1, wherein the request comprises a restore request (e.g. Zhao “Data tiering and recall from primary to cloud storage” [column 3 lines 39-40]; “Referring to FIG. 1, and to block 216 of FIG. 2, the raw data 110 is copied to the cloud storage 118, which can include, but is not necessarily limited to, object storage” [column 6 lines 11-14]; “After data recall is started, the data is in a compressed|encrypted|recalling state 318, and returns to the compressed|encrypted state 310 after recall is completed” [column 7 lines 29-32]; “Full recall (the whole file is recalled)” [column 8 line 46]).
As to Claim 7:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the method as recited in claim 1, wherein at a time when the request is received, the backed up dataset resides at a storage array volume for which end-to-end encryption has been enabled (e.g. Zhao “Data tiering and recall from primary to cloud storage (or other type of second tier storage) is optimized using new data ingest routines and extra metadata, enabling faster tiering throughput with less CPU and memory consumption, less network traffic and solid end-end security. The embodiments of the present invention can be implemented in any storage architecture that supports one or more of the data services noted above” [column 3 lines 40-47]; “the present invention eliminate decryption and decompression overhead, thereby using less of the CPU and memory, and ensure solid data security in the end-end path by passing encrypted data over a network instead of decrypted (i.e., plain) data” [column 4 lines 57-62]; [column 9 lines 15-19]).
As to Claim 8:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the method as recited in claim 1, wherein the backed up dataset was created by the backup appliance (e.g. Zhao “write data to and read data from one or more storage devices (e.g., hard disk drives, flash drives, etc.). The storage devices may be remote from the host devices (part of so-called “cloud storage”) and storage devices may be local to the host (part of so-called “primary storage”), e.g., part of the same computing device(s) that implement the host” [column 1 lines 28-34]; “Host normal read/write (R/W) input/output (IO) operations are illustrated in Step 0, where a host reads or writes data and inline or offline encryption and/or compression of the data could be performed if the service is enabled” [column 4 lines 1-4]; “where data is written to primary storage without extra compression and/or encryption” [column 8 lines 33-35]).
As to Claim 9:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the method as recited in claim 1, wherein when the backup appliance has a decryption key, decrypting, by the backup appliance, the backed up dataset using the decryption key (e.g. Zhao “cipher text is decrypted based on a locally maintained key (e.g. in primary storage) and the plain content is returned to the host” [column 8 lines 56-58]).
As to Claim 10:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the method as recited in claim 1, wherein when the backup appliance has a decryption key, the backed up dataset is decrypted, decompressed, or deduped, before being transmitted to the target array (e.g. Zhao “tiering appliance resources can be used to handle other incoming traffic… that may need other operations, such as, for example… deduplication, etc” [column 6 lines 38-41]; “Referring back to FIG. 1, encrypted and compressed data are transmitted from primary storage 102 over a network to cloud storage 118 directly or through an optional separate tiering appliance 116, where data may be cached, deduplicated” [column 8 lines 20-24]; “based on a locally maintained key (e.g. in primary storage) and the plain content is returned to the host” [column 8 lines 56-58]).
As to Claim 11:
Zhao discloses a non-transitory storage medium having stored therein instructions that are executable by one or more hardware processors to perform operations (e.g. Zhao “one or more software programs stored in memory and executed by a processor… Memory 812 (or other storage device) having such program code embodied therein is an example of what is more generally referred to herein as a processor-readable storage medium” [column 10 lines 65-67]-[column 11 lines 1-48]) comprising:
receiving, from a requestor by a backup appliance, a request concerning a backed up dataset (e.g. Zhao receiving a data service operation performed on one or more data sets [column 1 lines 63-64]; “the tiering engine 104 identifies cold/inactive data based on configurable policies, and the target data is read” [column 5 lines 22-24]; primary storage with tiering engine FIG. 1); and either:
when the backup appliance has a decryption key (e.g. Zhao maintained metadata includes key to encrypt/decrypt a dataset [column 6 lines 56-65]): notifying, by the backup appliance, a target array that the backed up dataset is an end-to-end (EEE) dataset (e.g. Zhao “ensure solid data security in the end-end path by passing encrypted data over a network” [column 4 lines 60-61]; “detects data compression and encryption states at primary storage 102, thereby eliminating decompression and decryption for tiering, and maintaining relevant extra metadata 112… If the data is in an encrypted and/or compressed state, the data is not decompressed and/or decrypted. Instead, relevant metadata 112 is updated to track the state of the data and extra indexing is performed…” [column 5 lines 11-27]; “Tiering can be implemented in a push fashion, where the tiering engine 104 ingests cold/inactive data and the data is written to cloud storage 118… the data determined to be cold/inactive is filtered from the remaining data as the target data, and at block 206 the encryption and compression states of the target data are checked and it is determined whether the target data is encrypted and/or compressed” [column 5 lines 28-40]; [column 5 lines 49-56]; “tiering appliance 116 already deployed between primary storage 102 and cloud storage 118… a data tag, such as, for example, “encrypted”/“compressed” is added as part of metadata 112 for corresponding data files, to denote that an ingested streaming/file is already processed, and it not necessary to perform encryption/compression again on the file(s) to which the tag applies” [column 6 lines 30-38]); and
transmitting, by the backup appliance to the target array, the backed up dataset (e.g. Zhao “Referring to FIG. 1, and to block 216 of FIG. 2, the raw data 110 is copied to the cloud storage 118… results in faster data transfer due to the data being in compressed format, more secure data movement since whether the dataset is in primary storage 102, being transmitted over a network, or in cloud storage 118, the data is always encrypted” [column 6 lines 18-22]); or
But Zhao does not specifically disclose:
when the backup appliance does not have the decryption key: informing, by the backup appliance, the requestor that the backed up dataset is encrypted and the decryption key is required to access data in the backed up dataset.
However, the analogous art Hersans does disclose when the backup appliance does not have the decryption key (e.g. Hersans “ciphertext from a destroyed encryption key” [0055]): informing, by the backup appliance, the requestor that the backed up dataset is encrypted and the decryption key is required to access data in the backed up dataset (e.g. Hersans “validation server 410 may send an indication of a validation or encryption result to a user device. For example, the indication may be an email message sent to the user who initiated the encryption request or function definition. The message may indicate whether encryption was enabled, which data objects or fields had encryption enabled” [0060]; “The data storage system 705 may send an indication of which plaintexts are encrypted into ciphertexts and which plaintexts the data storage system 705 refrained from encrypting. In this way, the user device 710 may display an indication of the enablement and validation results” [0080] where encryption keys are required to decrypt the data [0044]). Zhao and Hersans are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor in encrypted data storage.
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, having the teachings of Zhao and Hersans before him or her, to modify the disclosure of Zhao with the teachings of Hersans to include when the backup appliance does not have the decryption key: informing, by the backup appliance, the requestor that the backed up dataset is encrypted and the decryption key is required to access data in the backed up dataset as claimed. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been to efficiently protect against encrypting data or saving formula field definitions that do not support encryption and support enabling and validating data encryption (Hersans [0017]; [0027]). Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Zhao and Hersans to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim(s).
As to Claim 12:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the non-transitory storage medium as recited in claim 11, wherein the target array is different from a domain where the backed up dataset was initially created (e.g. Zhao “it is to be understood that an enterprise (e.g., business, university, etc.) can implement a primary storage tier internal to the enterprise, and utilize cloud storage (external to the enterprise) through a service provider when needed” [column 1 lines 37-40]).
As to Claim 14:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the non-transitory storage medium as recited in claim 11, wherein when the backup appliance has the decryption key, the backup appliance sends the decryption key to the target array along with the backed up dataset (e.g. Zhao “Moving an encryption key generally does not save an appreciable amount of storage since the key occupies a small amount of storage space… move or share the key via a separate out-of-band channel, which is a communication channel different from that used for data tiering” [column 9 lines 31-39]).
As to Claim 15:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the non-transitory storage medium as recited in claim 11, wherein the request comprises a restore request (e.g. Zhao “Data tiering and recall from primary to cloud storage” [column 3 lines 39-40]; “Referring to FIG. 1, and to block 216 of FIG. 2, the raw data 110 is copied to the cloud storage 118, which can include, but is not necessarily limited to, object storage” [column 6 lines 11-14]; “After data recall is started, the data is in a compressed|encrypted|recalling state 318, and returns to the compressed|encrypted state 310 after recall is completed” [column 7 lines 29-32]; “Full recall (the whole file is recalled)” [column 8 line 46]).
As to Claim 17:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the non-transitory storage medium as recited in claim 11, wherein at a time when the request is received, the backed up dataset resides at a storage array volume for which end-to-end encryption has been enabled (e.g. Zhao “Data tiering and recall from primary to cloud storage (or other type of second tier storage) is optimized using new data ingest routines and extra metadata, enabling faster tiering throughput with less CPU and memory consumption, less network traffic and solid end-end security. The embodiments of the present invention can be implemented in any storage architecture that supports one or more of the data services noted above” [column 3 lines 40-47]; “the present invention eliminate decryption and decompression overhead, thereby using less of the CPU and memory, and ensure solid data security in the end-end path by passing encrypted data over a network instead of decrypted (i.e., plain) data” [column 4 lines 57-62]; [column 9 lines 15-19]).
As to Claim 18:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the non-transitory storage medium as recited in claim 11, wherein the backed up dataset was created by the backup appliance (e.g. Zhao “write data to and read data from one or more storage devices (e.g., hard disk drives, flash drives, etc.). The storage devices may be remote from the host devices (part of so-called “cloud storage”) and storage devices may be local to the host (part of so-called “primary storage”), e.g., part of the same computing device(s) that implement the host” [column 1 lines 28-34]; “Host normal read/write (R/W) input/output (IO) operations are illustrated in Step 0, where a host reads or writes data and inline or offline encryption and/or compression of the data could be performed if the service is enabled” [column 4 lines 1-4]; “where data is written to primary storage without extra compression and/or encryption” [column 8 lines 33-35]).
As to Claim 19:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the non-transitory storage medium as recited in claim 11, wherein when the backup appliance has a decryption key, decrypting, by the backup appliance, the backed up dataset using the decryption key (e.g. Zhao “cipher text is decrypted based on a locally maintained key (e.g. in primary storage) and the plain content is returned to the host” [column 8 lines 56-58]).
As to Claim 20:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the non-transitory storage medium as recited in claim 11, wherein when the backup appliance has a decryption key, the backed up dataset is decrypted, decompressed, or deduped, before being transmitted to the target array (e.g. Zhao “tiering appliance resources can be used to handle other incoming traffic… that may need other operations, such as, for example… deduplication, etc” [column 6 lines 38-41]; “Referring back to FIG. 1, encrypted and compressed data are transmitted from primary storage 102 over a network to cloud storage 118 directly or through an optional separate tiering appliance 116, where data may be cached, deduplicated” [column 8 lines 20-24]; “based on a locally maintained key (e.g. in primary storage) and the plain content is returned to the host” [column 8 lines 56-58]).
Claims 3 and 13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao in view of Hersans as applied to Claims 1 and 11, and further in view of Nanivadekar et al. (US 20160110262 A1, hereinafter Nanivadekar).
As to Claim 3:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the method as recited in claim 1, but does not specifically disclose:
a request for image access.
However, the analogous art Nanivadekar does disclose a request for image access (e.g. Nanivadekar “a request to restore a file system object, the file system object being stored in backup data produced from a raw image backup of a file system” [Abstract]; “the blocks of raw image backup data necessary to restore the requested files are accessible from the on-premise storage system, the file system objects may be retrieved from the on-premise storage system 106 without restoring the entire file system. In such cases, on-premise restoration may be performed faster than off-premise restoration. In the event that the blocks of raw image backup data necessary to restore the requested files are not accessible from the on-premise storage system, the file system objects may be retrieved from the off-premise storage system” [0020]; “process for restoring a file system object from image-based backup data in accordance with implementations described herein. The process 400 may be performed, for example, by a backup server such as the backup server” [0067]; “when a request to restore a file system object stored in image-based backup data is received. The request may be a user-generated request, a system-generated request, an automated request, or another appropriate type of request” [0068]). Zhao, Hersans, and Nanivadekar are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor in backup data storage.
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, having the teachings of Zhao, Hersans, and Nanivadekar before him or her, to modify the combination of Zhao and Hersans with the teachings of Nanivadekar to include a request for image access as claimed. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been for performing image-based backups of file systems to a networked storage location, such as the cloud, while still allowing for single file restore of file system objects (Nanivadekar [0015]). Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Zhao, Hersans, and Nanivadekar to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim(s).
As to Claim 13:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the non-transitory storage medium as recited in claim 11, but does not specifically disclose:
a request for image access.
However, the analogous art Nanivadekar does disclose a request for image access (e.g. Nanivadekar “a request to restore a file system object, the file system object being stored in backup data produced from a raw image backup of a file system” [Abstract]; “the blocks of raw image backup data necessary to restore the requested files are accessible from the on-premise storage system, the file system objects may be retrieved from the on-premise storage system 106 without restoring the entire file system. In such cases, on-premise restoration may be performed faster than off-premise restoration. In the event that the blocks of raw image backup data necessary to restore the requested files are not accessible from the on-premise storage system, the file system objects may be retrieved from the off-premise storage system” [0020]; “process for restoring a file system object from image-based backup data in accordance with implementations described herein. The process 400 may be performed, for example, by a backup server such as the backup server” [0067]; “when a request to restore a file system object stored in image-based backup data is received. The request may be a user-generated request, a system-generated request, an automated request, or another appropriate type of request” [0068]). Zhao, Hersans, and Nanivadekar are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor in backup data storage.
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, having the teachings of Zhao, Hersans, and Nanivadekar before him or her, to modify the combination of Zhao and Hersans with the teachings of Nanivadekar to include a request for image access as claimed. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been for performing image-based backups of file systems to a networked storage location, such as the cloud, while still allowing for single file restore of file system objects (Nanivadekar [0015]). Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Zhao, Hersans, and Nanivadekar to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim(s).
Claims 6 and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Zhao in view of Hersans as applied to Claims 1 and 11, and further in view of Osaki et al. (US 20060005048 A1, hereinafter Osaki).
As to Claim 6:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the method as recited in claim 1, but does not specifically disclose:
acts to trigger the target array to configure a storage volume to accommodate the EEE dataset.
However, the analogous art Osaki does disclose acts to trigger the target array to configure a storage volume to accommodate the EEE dataset (e.g. Osaki “When the primary storage system fails, remote copy configuration information is loaded at tertiary storage system, and the tertiary storage system prepares for receiving encrypted data from secondary storage system-by-creating volume, loading keys and so on, based on the remote copy configuration information and then receives and decrypts encrypted data and store the data inside” [0012]; “tertiary storage system 121 receives a command which indicates to prepare for restoring data from secondary storage system” [0051]; “configuration can include creating a volume 122 whose size is indicated by 203, setting volume 112 as a remote copy source volume” [0053]). Zhao, Hersans, and Osaki are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor in backup data storage.
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, having the teachings of Zhao, Hersans, and Osaki before him or her, to modify the combination of Zhao and Hersans with the teachings of Osaki to include acts to trigger the target array to configure a storage volume to accommodate the EEE dataset as claimed. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been for realizing the need for reliable and secure backup of encryption information used to securely store data at off-site facilities (Osaki [0008]). Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Zhao, Hersans, and Osaki to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim(s).
As to Claim 16:
Zhao in view of Hersans discloses the non-transitory storage medium as recited in claim 11, but does not specifically disclose:
acts to trigger the target array to configure a storage volume to accommodate the EEE dataset.
However, the analogous art Osaki does disclose acts to trigger the target array to configure a storage volume to accommodate the EEE dataset (e.g. Osaki “When the primary storage system fails, remote copy configuration information is loaded at tertiary storage system, and the tertiary storage system prepares for receiving encrypted data from secondary storage system-by-creating volume, loading keys and so on, based on the remote copy configuration information and then receives and decrypts encrypted data and store the data inside” [0012]; “tertiary storage system 121 receives a command which indicates to prepare for restoring data from secondary storage system” [0051]; “configuration can include creating a volume 122 whose size is indicated by 203, setting volume 112 as a remote copy source volume” [0053]). Zhao, Hersans, and Osaki are analogous art because they are from the same field of endeavor in backup data storage.
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art, having the teachings of Zhao, Hersans, and Osaki before him or her, to modify the combination of Zhao and Hersans with the teachings of Osaki to include acts to trigger the target array to configure a storage volume to accommodate the EEE dataset as claimed. The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been for realizing the need for reliable and secure backup of encryption information used to securely store data at off-site facilities (Osaki [0008]). Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Zhao, Hersans, and Osaki to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim(s).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicants’ disclosure.
Irwin et al. (US 20190340136 A1)
Vijayasankar et al. (US 20190065788 A1)
Ko et al. (US 8429425 B2)
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Kenneth Chang whose telephone number is (571)270-7530. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday 9:30am-5:30pm EST.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Taghi Arani can be reached at 571-272-3787. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/KENNETH W CHANG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2438
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