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 .
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Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
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.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1-20 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 the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Regarding claims 1, 5, and 8, the meaning of the second switch forwarding the first packet according to the first address is unclear.
Further regarding claims 1, 5, and 8, “the first address” lacks antecedent basis as discussed during interview of December 16, 2025.
The claims have been interpreted to read on the prior art as explained in those grounds of rejection, infra.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
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.
Claims 1, 2, 4, 5, 7-10, 12, 14, 15, and 17-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 20150281075 (Park) in view of US 20220231942 (Hao).
Regarding claim 1, Park teaches or suggests a cross-device link packet processing method, applied to a first switch in a cross-device link aggregation switch system, wherein the link switch system comprises a second switch (¶ 43 switch 110-1 connected to switch 110-2 via a network), and the method comprises:
receiving a first packet sent by a gateway device (¶ 104 switch 110-1 receives an ARP packet from an end system of the gateway, which is a gateway device because it is connected to a gateway switch);
when the first address corresponding to the first packet is not found in the packet table entry, sending the first packet to the second switch through the first link (¶ 113 when MAC address is not found by switch 110-1, the switch transmits the ARP packet to switch 110-2 via the network);
wherein the first link is a communication link between the first switch and the second switch (¶ 73 switch 110-1 connected to switch 110-2 via an L3 network), and corresponding relationship between the first packet and the first address is stored in the packet table entry (¶ 99 network connection information database 410-1 stores related IP addresses and MAC addresses).
Park disclose that the first switch queries the first address according to the first packet or acquires the first address from a server communicatively connected to the cross-device link switching system (¶113 when the MAC address of the other end system is not found, the VTEP module 130-1 transmits the ARP packet to the cloud network management system 350 connected to the gateway switch 110-1 or the gateway switches) but does not expressly disclose the second switch queries the first address according to the first packet or acquires the first address from a server communicatively connected to the cross-device link switching system. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, for the second switch to query the first address according to the first packet or acquire the first address from a server communicatively connected to the cross-device link switching system because Park teaches that this is how its switches perform ARP (¶ 112 switch determines whether the MAC address of the other end system indicated by the received ARP packet existing in the network connection information database 410-1).
Park does not expressly disclose the second switch forwarding the first packet according to the first address. Park does teach or suggest more than two switches (¶ 109 plural gateway switches). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, for the second switch to forward the first packet according to the first address for another switch to perform ARP when the second switch fails to resolve the ARP request as the first switch did when it failed to resolve the ARP request.
By teaching or suggesting more than two connecting switches, supra, Park implies does not expressly disclose link aggregation of the connections between the switches. For its part, Hao teaches or suggests cross-device link aggregation packet processing (¶ 3 cross-device link aggregation). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to combine Park’s system and Hao’s cross-device link aggregation in order to improve link reliability.
Regarding claim 2, Park teaches or suggests the first packet comprises an address resolution protocol (ARP) packet carrying a target IP address ( ¶113); the first address comprises a target MAC address ( ¶111).
Regarding claim 4 and 12, Park teaches or suggests forwarding the ARP packet to the cloud network management server system and when the MAC address is found, returning a response to the ARP packet to the originating gateway device (¶ 113). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, for the server to forward the MAC address from the server to the switch so that the switch can return in to the originating gateway device.
Regarding claims 9, 15, and 17-20 Park teaches or suggests a switch comprising: at least one processor; and a memory communicatively connected to the at least one processor; wherein, the memory stores an instruction executable by the at least one processor, when the instruction is executed by the at least one processor, causes the at least one processor to implement the aforementioned methods (¶¶ 144-47).
Regarding claim 10, Park teaches or suggests a non-transitory computer readable storage medium, which stores a computer program, when being executed by a processor, the computer program is configured to implement the method as claimed in claim 1 (¶ 147).
Regarding claim 5, the aforementioned combination teaches or suggests the claimed limitations as explained regarding claim 1 supra, mutatis mutandis, but from the perspective of the second switch and Park further teaches or suggests storing a corresponding relationship between the first packet and the first address (¶¶ 125, 136 updates the network information database).
Regarding claim 6, Park teaches or suggests acquiring, according to the first packet, the first address from a server communicatively connected to the cross-device link aggregation switching system comprises: sending, to a server communicatively connected to the cross-device link aggregation switching system, a request for acquiring a first address of the first packet (¶ 113 transmits the ARP packet to the cloud network management system 350); when a response message of the server for the request is received, acquiring the first address according to the response message (¶ 113 MAC address of the other end system is found); when a response message of the server for the request and forwarded by the first switch is received, acquiring the first address according to the forwarded response message (¶ 113 transmit response to request).
Regarding claims 7 and 14, Park teaches or suggests the first link comprises a peer-link (¶ 73); the packet table entry comprises an ARP packet that carries a target IP address (¶ 113).
Regarding claim 8, the aforementioned combination teaches or suggests the claimed limitations as explained regarding claim 1 supra, mutatis mutandis, but from the perspective of both the first and second switches.
Claims 3, 11, 13, and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US 20150281075 (Park) in view of US 20220231942 (Hao) further in view of IT TO980909 (Filippi).
Regarding claims 3 and 11, Park teaches or suggests after the first switch receives the first packet sent by the gateway device, and when a first address corresponding to the first packet is not found in the packet table entry, querying the first address according to the first packet, or acquiring the first address from the server, and forwarding the first packet according to the first address as explained regarding claim 1 supra, mutatis mutandis.
Park does not expressly disclose but Filippi teaches or suggests part of contents in the packet table entry of the first switch are deleted (p. 11 of translation). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to combine Park’s system, Hao’s cross-device link aggregation, and Filippi’s deletion in order to remove invalid entries.
Regarding claim 13, the latter combination teaches or suggests the claimed limitations as explained regarding claim 4 supra, mutatis mutandis.
Regarding claim 16, the latter combination teaches or suggests the claimed limitations as explained regarding claim 15 supra, mutatis mutandis.
Other Art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to the instant disclosure. For example, in US 20140029618, based on the MAC destination address, the layer two switch will forward the packet to a port towards the destination without changing the packet, as occurs in layer three routing (¶ 19).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Lance Leonard Barry whose telephone number is (571) 272-5856. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 730-1630.
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/LANCE LEONARD BARRY/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2457