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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 25th October 2023 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
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Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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.
Claims 1 – 5, 10 – 14 and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Glasser (US 8,954,548 B2).
Claim 10 (similarly Claims 1 and 18). Glasser shows a computing apparatus (figs. 1 and 4: local cache server 120) comprising: a processor (fig. 4: processor 402); and a memory storing instructions (fig. 4: main memory 404 + instructions 424) that, when executed by the processor, configure the apparatus to: receive a request for an element of content from a device (col. 3 lines 26-27: client system 112 may send a request for content to local cache server 120), wherein the element of content is associated with a first source address and a redundant source group identifying multiple servers in a network including the element of content (col. 3 line 67 – col. 4 line 25: the request can include a hostname of the origin server… client system can send a request for the content using the anycast address… the anycast address can be an IP address shared by the local cache server and the edge cache server… the map server table can include the anycast IP address and a unicast IP address for the edge cache server associated with the anycast IP address – first source address is the “hostname” of the origin server, redundant source group can include the local cache server and the edge cache server); determine a second source address within the redundant source group has a shorter distance to a location of the device (col. 3 lines 16-22: the best next hop can be the peer device with a shortest network distance to the destination IP address wherein the local cache server and the edge cache server can participate in a BGP group, providing NLRI information indicating that the local cache server is a preferred destination for packets addressed to the anycast address… peer routers can determine a preferred route for packets addressed to the anycast address based on network policies and their distance to the local cache server and to the edge cache server – the second source being the “edge cache server”); and route packets associated with the element of content from the second source address to the device (col. 4 lines 42-48: when the network distance from client system to local cache server is greater than the network distance from client system to the edge cache server, the edge cache server can receive the request… when the edge cache server has the content, the edge cache server can send a response including the content to the client system).
Claim 11 (similarly claim 2). Glasser shows the computing apparatus of claim 10, wherein the redundant source group is a group identification (ID) that has been configured based on one or more policies at a controller associated with the network (col. 3 lines 13-22: a router can receive network layer reachability information (NLRI) from peer devices wherein based on the NLRI, the router can determine a best next hop for network traffic destined for an IP address… the best next hop can be the peer device with a shortest network distance to the destination IP address… the local cache server and the edge cache server can participate in a BGP group, providing NLRI information indicating that the local cache server is a preferred destination for packets addressed to the anycast address).
Claim 12 (similarly claim 3). Glasser shows the computing apparatus of claim 10, wherein the first source address and the second source address are a same server of the multiple servers in the network (col. 4 lines 53-55: the anycast address can be an IP address shared by a local cache server and an edge cache server – “shared” address is interpreted as “same” address).
Claim 13 (similarly claim 4). Glasser shows the computing apparatus of claim 10, wherein the first source address and the second source address are different servers of the multiple servers in the network (col. 4 lines 16-19: the map server table can include the anycast IP address and a unicast IP address for the edge cache server associated with the anycast IP address – such that the edge server and the local server each have “different” addresses – a unicast address is a unique identifier assigned to a single network interface).
Claim 14 (similarly claim 5). Glasser shows the computing apparatus of claim 10, wherein the instructions further configure the apparatus to: list, on a forwarding routing table, one or more routes associated with one or more source addresses (col. 4 lines 16-19: the map server table can include the anycast IP address and a unicast IP address for the edge cache server associated with the anycast IP address), wherein each of the one or more routes include at least a source ID associated with a source address (col. 4 lines 50-55: the client system can request an IP address of an origin server wherein the request can include a hostname of an origin server… the DNS server can provide an anycast address and the anycast address can be an IP address shared by a local cache server and an edge cache server), a group ID associated with the redundant source group (see above: the anycast address is the redundant source group), and a distance associated with the source address (col. 4 lines 57-62: when network distance from the client system to the edge cache server is less than the network distance from the client system to the local cache server, the request can be routed to the edge cache server rather than to the local cache server; col. 4 lines 4-8: when the network distance from the client system to the edge cache server is greater than the network distance from the client system to the local cache server, the request can be routed to the local cache server rather than the edge cache server – the request has the source address for network distance determination).
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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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
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 6 – 7, 15 – 16 and 19 – 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Glasser in view of Pickens et al (US 2004/0071164 A1).
Claim 15 (similarly claims 6 and 19). Glasser shows the computing apparatus of claim 10; Glasser does not expressly describe wherein the instructions further configure the apparatus to: monitor a connection between the device to the second source address.Pickens teaches feature of monitoring a connection between a device to a second source address (fig. 3A and [0040]: it may be desirable to switch the media session to a different stream server for load balancing or switching to new content or it may be necessary to switch the media session to a different stream server because of a failure, e.g. a stream server failure, an interface failure, a link failure, etc. – monitoring of connection is implied).It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the monitoring feature as taught by Pickens in the apparatus of Glasser to facilitate faster failover.
Claim 16 (similarly claims 7 and 20). Glasser, modified by Pickens, shows the computing apparatus of claim 15, wherein the instructions further configure the apparatus to: determine the connection has failed (Pickens, fig. 3A and [0040]: it may be desirable to switch the media session to a different stream server for load balancing or switching to new content or it may be necessary to switch the media session to a different stream server because of a failure, e.g. a stream server failure, an interface failure, a link failure, etc. – monitoring of connection is implied); and route, automatically upon determining the connection has failed, the device to a third source address of the multiple servers (see above: fig. 3A stream server 3), wherein the third source address is selected according to a server selection policy (Pickens, [0043]: STUN keepalive messages are tracked by the receiving stream server, RTCP reports are logged, but they could trigger the forwarding of a flag to the sourcing stream server to indicate the quality of the stream, and RTCP NACKS are forwarded to the sourcing stream server if capacity is available or they may be dropped if capacity is not available; [0045]: RTCP messages are used to provide feedback to the stream server on the quality of service that is being provided by the RTP media stream via a second IP flow wherein the RTCP messages include statistics about the media connection such as bytes sent, packets sent, lost packets, jitter, and round trip delay – streaming servers, for example server 3, provides feedback to the sourcing stream server).
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Claims 8 and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Glasser in view of Schloss (US 2021/0099426 A1).
Claim 17 (similarly claim 8). Glasser shows the computing apparatus of claim 10; Glasser does not expressly describe wherein each of the multiple servers are associated with an individual Internet Protocol (IP) source address.Schloss teaches feature of each of a multiple of servers being associated with an individual IP source address ([0032]: CDN servers generally have unique IP addresses, so the techniques described herein can detect redirected packet streams to a CDN server and be able to determine the normal response/transmission times).It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement individual IP source address for each server as taught by Schloss in the multiple servers of Glasser to facilitate supporting an IP address by IP address jitter value, which may be set to a large number to account for varying packet flows.
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Claim 9 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Glasser in view of Seastrom et al (US 2014/0359389 A1).
Claim 9. Glasser shows the computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the element of content is the same across the multiple servers (see claim 1); Glasser does not expressly describe wherein the element of content includes one or more of a sports game, live event, television program, or broadcast.Seastrom teaches multiple servers that provide element of contents that include live event and broadcast ([0039]: multiple servers (broadcast, VOD, or otherwise) can be used, and disposed at two or more different locations if desired, such as being part of different server farms).It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to include broadcast and live event contents as taught by Seastrom in the multiple servers of Glasser as means to provide alternative and reliable content delivery process.
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Conclusion
The prior art made of record is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure.
1. Mao et al, US 2015/0288733 A1: methods that include receiving, by computing device from one or more client devices, a plurality of requests for one or more content items formatted in a first format and determining whether to multicast the one or more content items based on a data structure configured with one or more conditions associated with multicasting content.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Xavier Szewai Wong whose telephone number is 571.270.1780. The examiner can normally be reached on 11:30 am - 8:30 pm Mon to Fri.
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/XAVIER S WONG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2415 19th November 2025