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
This communication is in response to the application filed 17 August 2023. Claims 1-20 are pending. The rejections are as stated below.
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 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. In particular, claims are directed to a judicial exception (abstract idea) without significantly more.
Claim 8 (exemplary) recites a series of steps for managing a distributed switch executing in a host cluster.
The claim is directed to a process, which is a statutory category of invention.
The claim is then analyzed to determine whether it is directed to a judicial exception.
Independent method claims 8, recites the limitations of receiving a request to add a first host to a group of the hosts; determining enabled features; determining a hypervisor version requirement in response to the enabled features; and adding the first host to the group in response to a version of a hypervisor satisfying the hypervisor version requirement.
These limitations, as drafted, are processes that, under its broadest reasonable interpretation covers steps directed to organizing human activity, namely a fundamental economic practice of evaluating compatibility requirements and based on specific conditions satisfying the requirement, validate the addition in managed distributed system. Under the Guidance, certain methods of organizing human activity, including a fundamental economic practice, represent an abstract idea. See Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 52. In addition to raising the abstract recitation of “‘organizing human activity,’ the claims recite “mental processes”. Claim 8, includes steps that reasonably can be performed by a human (pen and paper). For example, by evaluating compatibility requirements and based on specific conditions, validate the addition, a person can perform the steps recited above in claim 8, receive a request to add a host to a group of the hosts; determine enabled features; determine a version requirement in response to the enabled features; and add the host to the group in response to a version satisfying the version requirement. Under the Guidance, “mental processes—concepts performed in the human mind (including an observation, evaluation, judgment, opinion)” also constitute an abstract idea. See Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 52. Accordingly, the above recitations, and the claim as a whole, recite an abstract idea involving mental processes.
Therefore, it is clear that exemplary independent claim 8 recites limitations, under the Revised Guidance, fall under the category of abstract ideas related to “certain methods of organizing human activity” and/or “mental processes” 2019 Revised Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 52. See MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2). Accordingly, independent claim 8 recites an abstract idea.
Next, the claim is analyzed to determine if it is integrated into a practical application. The recited judicial exception may be integrated into a practical application by identifying whether there are any additional elements recited in the claim beyond the judicial exception and evaluating those additional elements individually and in combination to determine whether they integrate the exception into a practical application. The claim recites additional limitation of a virtualization management server that manages hypervisors executing in hosts of the host cluster, a distributed switch to perform the steps. The server in the steps is recited at a high level of generality, i.e., as a generic computer performing a generic computer function of processing data (see Applicant’s specification ¶¶ 0018-0020). This generic computer limitations are no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using generic computer component. Also, these limitations are an attempt to limit the abstract idea to a particular technological environment. Accordingly, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(h). The claim is directed to the abstract idea.
Next, the claim is analyzed to determine if there are additional claim limitations that individually, or as an ordered combination, ensure that the claim amounts to significantly more than the abstract ideas (whether claim provides inventive concept). As discussed above, the recitation of the claimed limitations amounts to mere instructions to implement the abstract idea on a server (using the computer as a tool to implement the abstract idea). Taking the additional elements individually and in combination, the server at each step of the process performs purely generic computer functions. As such, there is no inventive concept sufficient to transform the claimed subject matter into a patent-eligible application. The same analysis applies here, i.e., mere instructions to apply an exception using a generic computer component cannot integrate a judicial exception into a practical application at or provide an inventive concept. See MPEP 2106.05(h).
Viewing the limitations as an ordered combination does not add anything further than looking at the limitations individually. When viewed either individually, or as an ordered combination, the additional limitations do not amount to a claim as a whole that is significantly more than the abstract idea itself. Therefore, the claim does not amount to significantly more than the recited abstract idea. Therefore, the claim is not patent eligible.
The analysis above applies to the statutory category of invention of claims 1, 8 and 15. Furthermore, dependent claims 2-7, 9-14 and 16-20 do not add limitations that meaningfully limit the abstract idea. The dependent claims do not impart patent eligibility to the abstract idea of the independent claims. Therefore, none of the dependent claims alone or as an ordered combination add limitations that qualify as integrating the abstract idea into a practical application.
Lastly, dependent claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because the additional elements are simply steps performed by a generic computer. The claim merely amounts to the application or instructions to apply the abstract idea on a processor, and is considered to amount to nothing more than requiring a generic server to merely carry out the abstract idea itself.
Accordingly, claims 1-20 are rejected as ineligible for patenting under 35 U.S.C. 101 based upon the same analysis.
The instant claims are rejected under 35 USC 101 in view of The Decision in Alice Corporation Ply. Ltd. v. CLS Bank International, et al. in a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court held that the patent claims in Alice Corporation Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank International, el al. ("Alice Corp. ") are not patent-eligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to Applicant's disclosure.
Lambeth et al. US 20090292858 A1 discloses a method for persisting a state of a virtual port in a virtualized computer system.
TARASUK-LEVIN et al. US 20200034190 A1 discloses an approach for dynamically creating CPU compatibility between a set of hosts to facilitate migration of virtual machines within the set of hosts. The approach involves obtaining CPU features of all hosts, finding a common denominator of features among the hosts, and creating a mask to block discovery of heterogeneous CPU features. Discovery of only common CPU features among hosts, by a VM, creates an appearance to the VM that all CPUs among the set of hosts are the same.
Murrell et al., US 11321108 B2 discloses a user interface for managing allocations of network resources in a virtualized computing environment. The user interface also provides graphical elements that allow the user to modify the virtual network, to migrate virtual machines from individual virtual switches to a distributed virtual switch, and/or to modify the arrangement of physical network adapters that provide network backing for the virtual machines. The user interface can allow the user to efficiently and safely manage the virtual network in the virtual computing environment.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Hani Kazimi whose telephone number is (571) 272-6745. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday from 8:30 AM to 5:00 PM.
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Respectfully Submitted
//HANI M KAZIMI/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3691