Non-Final Rejection
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 .
Claims 1, 3-4, 6, 9, 11-12, 14, and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) and 102(a)(2)
Claims 2, 5, 7-8, 10, 13, 15-16, and 18-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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.
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1, 3-4, 6, 9, 11-12, 14, and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) and 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Hawkins et al. (U.S. Publication No. 2006/0242286 A1), hereinafter referred to as Hawkins.
With regards to Claim 1, Hawkins teaches:
A method for optimal service recovery, the method comprising (Paragraph 0006):
receiving, by a vendor recovery service and from a client infrastructure (Paragraph 0036; Fig. 3), a production inventory file reflecting a current configuration of a client production environment of the client infrastructure (Paragraph 0034);
processing, by the vendor recovery service and using at least one learning model, a corpus of production inventory files comprising the production inventory file to obtain a production recovery file reflecting an optimal service recovery strategy (Paragraphs 0039-0040 and Fig. 3; Paragraph 0030 and Fig. 1);
transmitting, by the vendor recovery service, the production recovery file to the client infrastructure (Fig. 3; Fig. 1 and Paragraphs 0030-0031);
receiving, by a client recovery service of the client infrastructure, the production recovery file for the client production environment (Paragraphs 0018, 0030-0031, and 0042, accessing the information; Fig. 1; Fig.3);
making a determination, by the client recovery service and based on a monitoring of the client production environment, that the client production environment is experiencing a failure (Fig. 1 and Paragraph 0022; Fig. 2, Steps 202 and 204, and Paragraph 0026);
and performing, by the client recovery service and based on the determination, an optimized recovery of the client production environment according to the optimal service recovery strategy reflected in the production recovery file (Fig. 3, Step 324, and Paragraph 0043).
With regards to Claim 3, Hawkins teaches the method of Claim 1 as cited above. Hawkins further teaches:
wherein the corpus of production inventory files further comprises a plurality of other production inventory files received previously from the client infrastructure and at least one other client infrastructure (Paragraphs 0016, 0033, 0036, and 0034).
With regards to Claim 4, Hawkins teaches the method of Claim 1 as cited above. Hawkins further teaches:
wherein the production recovery file corresponds to the production inventory file (Fig. 3 and Paragraphs 0029-0030, recommended course of action based on collected data).
With regards to Claim 6, Hawkins teaches the method of Claim 1 as cited above. Hawkins further teaches:
wherein the failure experienced by the client production environment is a partial failure impacting a portion of services operating on the client production environment (Paragraph 0022, multiple management applications 128 in the client environment depicted in Fig. 1; Fig. 1 and Paragraphs 0034 and 0029, the fault analysis is done for an individual management application 128).
With regards to Claim 9, Hawkins teaches:
A non-transitory computer readable medium (CRM) comprising computer readable program code, which when executed by a computer processor, enables the computer processor to perform a method for optimal service recovery, the method comprising (Paragraphs 0044-0045): …
All remaining limitations of Claim 9 have been addressed in the analysis of Claim 1. Please see the above rejection for further details.
All limitations of Claims 11-12 and 14 have been addressed in the analyses of Claims 3-4 and 6, respectively. Please see the above rejections for further details.
With regards to Claim 17, Hawkins teaches:
A system, comprising (Fig. 1):
a client infrastructure comprising a client production environment (Fig. 1, Paragraph 0011, client infrastructure with management applications) and a client recovery service (Fig. 1; Paragraphs 0022 and 0043, steps of recovery process implemented in the client);
and a vendor infrastructure operatively connected to the client infrastructure (Fig. 1 and Paragraph 0011), and comprising a vendor recovery service (Fig. 1 and Paragraph 0030, vendor environment contains various components to aid in recovery), wherein the vendor recovery service comprises a first computer processor configured to at least in part perform a method for optimal service recovery, the method comprising (Paragraphs 0044-0045, multiple processors/computers; Fig. 1, client environment and vendor environment depicted as running on different servers):
…
wherein the client recovery service comprises a second computer processor configured to at least in part perform the method for optimal service recovery, the method further comprising (Paragraphs 0044-0045, multiple processors/computers; Fig. 1, client environment and vendor environment depicted as running on different servers):
…
All remaining limitations of Claim 17 have been addressed in the analysis of Claim 1. Please see the above rejection for further details.
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.
Claims 2 and 10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hawkins in view of Wikipedia, “Latent Dirichlet allocation,” 2022, hereinafter referred to as Wikipedia.
With regards to Claim 2, Hawkins teaches the method of Claim 1 as cited above. Wikipedia teaches the following limitation not explicitly taught by Hawkins:
wherein the at least one learning model applies Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) on the corpus of production inventory files (Pages 1-2, LDA in machine learning).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art in which said subject matter pertains to, prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, apply LDA in the machine learning model of Hawkins, as taught by Wikipedia, because LDA is capable of better analysis of natural language in comparison to other models (Wikipedia, Pages 1-2). Hawkins is not limited to a specific type of machine learning model and mentions the processing of natural language data (Paragraphs 0037-0039).
All limitations of Claim 10 have been addressed in the analysis of Claim 2. Please see the above rejections for further details, including the motivation to combine references in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 103.
Claims 5, 7, 13, 15, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hawkins in view of Madhu et al. (U.S. Publication No. 2016/0048408 A1), hereinafter referred to as Madhu.
With regards to Claim 5, Hawkins teaches the method of Claim 1 as cited above. Hawkins further teaches:
wherein the failure experienced by the client production environment is a … failure impacting … services operating on the client production environment (Paragraph 0036, the method can handle multiple failures).
Hawkins does not explicitly teach:
… complete … all …
However, Madhu teaches:
wherein the failure experienced by the client production environment is a complete failure impacting all services operating on the client production environment (Paragraph 0003; Paragraphs 0119 and 0120, full failure relating to failure of applications; Paragraphs 0122-0124 and 0137, full failover).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art in which said subject matter pertains to, prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, have the system of Hawkins, which can handle multiple failures, be capable of handling a complete failure, as taught by Madhu, in order to have greater resistance and be able to continue normal business functions even in a total loss (Madhu, Paragraph 0003).
With regards to Claim 7, Hawkins teaches the method of Claim 1 as cited above. Hawkins further teaches:
wherein the optimized recovery of the client production environment … implement[s] the optimal service recovery strategy (Fig. 3, Step 324, and Paragraph 0043, recovery by client).
Hawkins does not explicitly teach:
… employs parallel recovery action threads to …
However, Madhu teaches:
wherein the optimized recovery of the client production environment employs parallel recovery action threads to implement the optimal service recovery strategy (Paragraph 0069, data transfer and recovery in parallel, optimization; Paragraphs 0250-0252, parallel threads).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art in which said subject matter pertains to, prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, use parallel threads to implement the recovery, as taught by Madhu, in the method of Hawkins, in order to enhance performance (Madhu, Paragraph 0250).
All limitations of Claims 13 and 15 have been addressed in the analyses of Claims 5 and 7, respectfully. Please see the above rejections for further details, including the motivation to combine references in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 103.
With regards to Claim 20, Hawkins teaches the system of Claim 17 as cited above. Madhu teaches the following limitation not explicitly taught by Hawkins:
the client infrastructure further comprising: a client backup environment configured to serve as a disaster recovery alternative to the client production environment at an onset of the failure experienced by the client production environment (Paragraphs 0048 and 0069).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art in which said subject matter pertains to, prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, utilize a backup environment in the system of Hawkins, as taught by Madhu, in order to mitigate data loss (Madhu, Paragraph 0048).
Claims 8 and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hawkins in view of Benardokasi, “Data Cleaning: Steps to Clean Data,” 2021, hereinafter referred to as Benardokasi.
With regards to Claim 8, Hawkins teaches the method of Claim 1 as cited above. Hawkins further teaches:
the method comprising: … processing the corpus of production inventory files (Fig. 3 and Paragraph 0030, vendor receives and analyzes data):
… by the vendor recovery service, the production inventory file (Fig. 3 and Paragraph 0030, vendor receives and analyzes data) …
… by the vendor recovery service … the production inventory file (Fig. 3 and Paragraph 0030, vendor receives and analyzes data) …
Benardokasi teaches the following limitations not explicitly taught by Hawkins:
… prior to (Page 1, clean before analysis) …
scanning … to identify a malicious entity therein (Pages 1-3, looking for errors in data);
and sanitizing … and based on identifying the malicious entity, … to remove the malicious entity (Pages 1-3, removing various errors in data).
Please note that Paragraph 0101 describes malicious entities as “e.g., anomalies, threats, etc.,” and that the term is being given the broadest reasonable interpretation in light of the specification.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art in which said subject matter pertains to, prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, scan and sanitize the incoming data for a malicious entity prior to the data being used for analysis in the method of Hawkins, as taught by Benardokasi, in order to minimize errors and increase the validity of the analysis (Benardokasi, Page 1).
All limitations of Claim 16 have been addressed in the analysis of Claim 8. Please see the above rejections for further details, including the motivation to combine references in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 103.
Claim 18 is rejected under 35 US.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hawkins in view of Delcourt et al. (U.S. Publication No. 2019/0297079 A1), hereinafter referred to as Delcourt.
With regards to Claim 18, Hawkins teaches the system of Claim 17 as cited above. Delcourt teaches the following limitations not explicitly taught by Hawkins:
the client infrastructure further comprising: a client infrastructure firewall configured to inspect incoming network traffic directed to the client infrastructure, wherein the client recovery service further comprises a client proxy handler configured to implement a reverse proxy to supplement the client infrastructure firewall (Paragraph 0029, reverse proxy for client; Paragraph 0032 and Fig.1, firewall connected to reverse proxy; Paragraph 0099, inbound traffic).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art in which said subject matter pertains to, prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, utilize a firewall and reverse proxy, as taught by Delcourt, in the system of Hawkins, in order to block unauthorized requests (Delcourt, Paragraph 0071).
Claim 19 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hawkins in view of Jayanthi et al. (U.S. Publication No. 2021/021509 A1), hereinafter referred to as Jayanthi.
With regards to Claim 19, Hawkins teaches the system of Claim 17 as cited above. Hawkins further teaches the following limitations:
the vendor infrastructure further comprising: a vendor infrastructure … configured to inspect incoming network traffic directed to the vendor infrastructure (Paragraphs 0018, 0031, and 0042, authenticate traffic incoming to the vendor) …
Hawkins does not explicitly teach:
… firewall …, wherein the vendor recovery service further comprises a vendor proxy handler configured to implement a reverse proxy to supplement the vendor infrastructure firewall.
However, Jayanthi teaches:
the vendor infrastructure further comprising: a vendor infrastructure firewall configured to inspect incoming network traffic directed to the vendor infrastructure, wherein the vendor recovery service further comprises a vendor proxy handler configured to implement a reverse proxy to supplement the vendor infrastructure firewall (Fig. 1A; Fig. 2A; Paragraph 0051).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art in which said subject matter pertains to, prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, implement a firewall and reverse proxy, as taught by Jayanthi, in the system of Hawkins, in order to offer protection from attacks (Jayanthi, Paragraph 0051).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
Adamson et al. (U.S. Patent No. 12,341,797 B1): teaches affiliating security threats
Ali et al. (U.S. Publication No. 2020/0241953 A1): teaches a fault orchestrator to manage fault recovery for multiple clients
Guo, Manping et al. “Normal Workflow and Key Strategies for Data Cleaning Toward Real-World Data: Viewpoint.” Interactive journal of medical research vol. 12 e44310. 21 Sep. 2023, doi:10.2196/44310: teaches scanning for anomalies in data and data cleaning
Unimrkt Research, “The Importance of Data Cleaning,” August 5th, 2023: teaches scanning for anomalies in data and data cleaning
Verma et al. (U.S. Publication No. 2024/0248790 A1): teaches prioritizing jobs that need to be remediated
Walwadkar (U.S. Publication No. 2020/0375353 A1): teaches a cluster architecture with failover mechanisms, firewalls, and reverse proxies
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/G.K.S./Examiner, Art Unit 2113
/MICHAEL MASKULINSKI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2113