DETAILED ACTION
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 .
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 1-14 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.
Claim 1 recites a processor comprising one or more circuit “to perform” an API. This language is indefinite because it does not specifically limit the processors in a manner that executes the functions, and may be interpreted as a statement of intended use. A statement of intended use may be interpreted as non-limiting. It is therefore unclear whether a circuit “to perform” a function refers to a specific circuit to perform the function (i.e., configured or programmed for the function) or a generic circuit that may be used to perform the function. The same reasoning may be applied to other instances with similar language (e.g., “the API is to identify” as in claim 2). Claim 8 is also rejected on this basis.
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 an abstract idea without significantly more. Claim 1 recites a mental process comprising a step to “identify one or more settings to be used to configure one or more processors to operate at one or more clock frequencies based… on one or more clock frequency inputs”. This step comprises a mental process because the broadest reasonable interpretation (BRI) of identifying includes judgments and evaluations that may be performed entirely in the human mind. Additionally, the BRI of this step does not require that the processors are actually configured to operate at the identified frequencies. The language “to be used” merely indicates an intended use for the settings rather than an actual step of configuring based on the settings, further evidencing that this step may be performed mentally. The language “clock frequency inputs” also does not preclude a mental process, since the BRI may include any and all information that may be used to identify a clock setting. This includes merely providing a clock frequency value which a human may observe and correlate to a particular clock setting. Since implementation of the setting is not required by the claim, this correlation by itself may be construed as identifying according the BRI of the claim language.
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because the steps of performing an API or receiving inputs to the API merely implement the abstract idea on a computer, and/or merely uses a computer as a tool to perform the abstract idea. The claim recites the use of the API at a high level of generality and provides no indication that a computer is used in any way besides general purpose computing functions.
The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. As discussed above with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, the additional limitations pertaining to an API amount to mere instructions to apply the abstract idea using a computer to perform general purpose computing functions. Mere instructions to apply an abstract idea using a computer to perform general purpose computing functions cannot provide an inventive concept. Claim 1 is therefore patent ineligible. Claims 8 and 15 are rejected on the same basis.
The dependent claims are also rejected because they provide additional limitations recited at a high level of generality that does not preclude them from being performed as part of a mental process. Claims 2, 3, 5, and 6 further specify the data used to perform the identifying step at a high level of generality and in a manner that does not preclude the additional data from being observed and evaluated by a human in a mental process. Claim 4 merely further specifies the type of settings that may identified at a high level of generality and in a manner that does not preclude the settings from being determined by a human as a mental process. Claim 7 recites that the settings are to be used in a data center, further specifying an intended use for the settings without applying the settings to that context. Similar reasoning may be applied to the other dependent claims, which are rejected on the same basis.
Double Patenting
A rejection based on double patenting of the “same invention” type finds its support in the language of 35 U.S.C. 101 which states that “whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process... may obtain a patent therefor...” (Emphasis added). Thus, the term “same invention,” in this context, means an invention drawn to identical subject matter. See Miller v. Eagle Mfg. Co., 151 U.S. 186 (1894); In re Vogel, 422 F.2d 438, 164 USPQ 619 (CCPA 1970); In re Ockert, 245 F.2d 467, 114 USPQ 330 (CCPA 1957).
A statutory type (35 U.S.C. 101) double patenting rejection can be overcome by canceling or amending the claims that are directed to the same invention so they are no longer coextensive in scope. The filing of a terminal disclaimer cannot overcome a double patenting rejection based upon 35 U.S.C. 101.
Claims 1-20 are provisionally rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 as claiming the same invention as that of claims 1-20 of copending Application No. 18/632,267 (reference application). This is a provisional statutory double patenting rejection since the claims directed to the same invention have not in fact been patented.
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 1-3, 5, 6-10, 15-17, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Srinivasan et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2019/0384348. Srinivasan was cited by the Applicant in the IDS filed on 30 October 2025.
Regarding claim 1, Srinivasan discloses a processor comprising:
one or more circuits to perform an application programming interface (API) [Fig. 2B, step 236: OS/VMM uses API to set CPU usage scenario] to identify one or more settings to be used to configure one or more processors to operate at one or more processor clock frequencies [step 238: base clock frequency] based, at least in part, on one or more clock frequency inputs to the API [step 234, 235: BRI of “clock frequency input” may include usage scenarios because they are inputs used to determine a clock frequency].
Regarding claim 2, Srinivasan discloses that the API is to identify one or more other settings [para. 0038: “At 238, power management circuit 110 may receive the new usage scenario and calculate a target base clock frequency value and optionally, a number of processing cores to operate at the target base clock frequency value.”] to be used to configure the one or more processors to perform one or more instructions based, at least in part, on one or more indications of processor performance profiles [para. 0038, Fig. 2b: usage scenarios] input to the API.
Regarding claim 3, Srinivasan discloses that the one or more settings to be used to configure the one or more processors to operate at the one or more processor clock frequencies is based, at least in part, on one or more processor performance metrics observed during performance of one or more instructions by the one or more processors [para. 0041: “…system software 122 may determine whether the current service level… satisfies a customer's request and if not, the conditions to satisfy the customer's request.”].
Regarding claim 5, Srinivasan discloses that the API is to identify the one or more settings from a data structure that correlates one or more indications of the one or more settings with the one or more clock frequency inputs [para. 0030: “In one embodiment, this may be implemented as a conversion table including mappings from usages scenarios to target base clock frequency values.”].
Regarding claim 6, Srinivasan discloses that the API is to identify the one or more settings based, at least in part, on a value used to bias one or more default settings [Fig. 2A, step 208: default usage scenario; Fig 2B, step 232: usage scenario change] used to configure the one or more processors.
Regarding claim 7, Srinivasan discloses that the API is to identify one or more other settings to be used to configure the one or more processors to perform one or more instructions in a data center [para. 0094: “…the machine may be connected (e.g., networked) to other machines in a LAN, an intranet, an extranet, or the Internet. The machine may operate in the capacity of a server or a client device in a client-server network environment, or as a peer machine in a peer-to-peer (or distributed) network environment... Further, while only a single machine is illustrated, the term “machine” shall also be taken to include any collection of machines that individually or jointly execute a set (or multiple sets) of instructions to perform any one or more of the methodologies discussed herein.”].
Claims 8-10, 12, and 15-17 are rejected on the same basis as claims 1-3, 5, and 6. Srinivasan additionally teaches the processor performance metrics are obtained during performance of one or more software workloads (claims 10 and 17) [para. 0040, 0041: “The provided service may include the provision of one or more types of software object such as, for example, virtual machines and virtualized instances of the operating system (referred to as containers). Each one of the software objects may run at a target service level which can be provided by processing cores running at different base clock frequency values… system software 122 may determine whether the current service level stored in the service level data structure satisfies a customer's request and if not, the conditions to satisfy the customer's request.”]. Srinivasan also teaches that the clock frequency inputs comprise indications of processor performance preferences of a user (claim 16) [Fig. 2A, step 204, para. 0029: “Responsive to executing instructions to set up processor 102 of system 100, at 204, the boot process may display, on the display device, a list of usage scenarios for the user to choose.”].
Regarding claim 20, Srinivasan discloses that the API is to identify the one or more settings based, at least in part, on an integer value used to increase one or more default settings used to configure the one or more processors [para. 0029: “Each usage scenario may specify a set of parameters including, for example, a target number of processing cores in the processor to be used…”].
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.
Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Srinivasan in view of Artman et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2008/0278905. Artman was cited by the Examiner during prosecution of Application No. 18/632,267, and also by the Applicant in the IDS filed on 6 January 2026.
Regarding claim 13, Srinivasan discloses the system of claim 8, but does not teach a setting based on identification of an integer value used to modify fan speed.
Artman discloses a setting based on an integer values used to modify fan speed [Fig. 8: Fan Speed Offset (PWM %)].
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to combine the teachings of Srinivasan and Artman by modifying Srinivasan to identify an integer value used to modify a fan speed as taught by Artman. Srinivasan teaches that a usage scenario may consider a target thermal design point as a constraint for heat generated by the system [para. 0031: “…the thermal energy generated by various applications running on processor 102 and may adjust the processor workload to ensure the generated thermal energy does not violate the TDP associated with processor 102…”]. However, Srinivasan is silent regarding cooling features. Artman discloses a fan that provides a cooling function in a computing system that uses an integer value to set a fan speed. Artman further teaches that an idling fan speed may be determined based on a processor TDP. It would therefore have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to apply the teachings of Artman to Srinivasan based on Srinivasan’s teachings of a target TDP, and Artman’s teaching that a fan may be used to cool the system [para. 0027] and that TDP may be used to determine the idling fan speed.
Claim 19 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Srinivasan in view of Zhao et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2017/0083364. Zhao was cited by the Examiner during prosecution of Application No. 18/632,267, and also by the Applicant in the IDS filed on 6 January 2026.
Regarding claim 19, Srinivasan discloses the method of claim 15, and also teaches that settings used to configure the one or more processors to operate at one or more clock frequencies based on a usage scenario including various parameters, including thermal parameters related to workload [para. 0020: “A usage scenario may be specified by a set of parameters including, for example, a target number of processing cores in the processor to be used, a target thermal design power (TDP) quantity, a target workload (e.g., as a percentage of the TDP), and a target reliability measurement (e.g., useful life of the processor).”], but does not teach one or more settings based on indications of one or more mathematical operation types.
Zhao discloses that a workload comprised of greater numbers of floating-point operations may cause a greater increase in temperature [para. 0041: “In some embodiments, the multi-processor computing device may estimate an energy per work item on particular processing units. In such embodiments, an observed instruction mix (e.g., type(s) of instructions to be performed, amount of floating-point operations, etc.) may be identified at compile-time or runtime in order to estimate potential impacts on power consumption and/or temperature (e.g., more floating-point operations may increase thermal level faster, etc.).”].
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to combine the teachings of Srinivasan and Zhao by modifying the usage scenarios of Srinivasan to account for numbers of floating-point operations, as taught by Zhao, and thereby configuring the processors to operate at one or more clock frequencies based on one or more indications of one or more mathematical operation types. Srinivasan teaches that the usage scenarios account for thermal parameters when determining a base clock frequency. Srinivasan’s disclosure also indicate that floating-point operations may be performed by the system [para. 0053: “Each of the physical register file(s) units 558 represents one or more physical register files, different ones of which store one or more different data types, such as… scalar floating point… packed floating point… vector floating point, etc.”], but is silent regarding the impact of floating-point operations on temperature. Zhao teaches that floating-point operations have a significant impact upon temperature. Given Srinivasan’s teaching of floating-point operations as part of the processor functionality, and thermal parameters in the usage scenario, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to apply Zhao’s teachings to Srinivasan to account for the number of floating-point instructions as a thermal parameter that may be used to affect clock frequency. The combination is based on Zhao’s teaching that the number of floating-point operations impacts temperature levels.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Narayanaswamy et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2025/0321609, is the published version of U.S. Patent Application No. 18/632,267, which was cited in the double patenting rejection.
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/JI H BAE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2176 U.S. Patent and Trademark Office
Phone: 571-272-7181
Fax: 571-273-7181
ji.bae@uspto.gov