DETAILED ACTION
This action is responsive to RCE filed on April 27th, 2026.
Claims 1~4 and 8~20 are examined.
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 04/27/26 has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1~4 and 8~20 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
Claims 1~4, 8~10, and 16~20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Shalev et al. hereinafter Shalev (U.S 2017/0187629) and Hira et al. hereinafter Hira (U.S 2024/0022515) in view of Mao (CN115733799A).
Regarding Claim 1,
Shalev taught a device comprising:
a processor; a network interface controller configured to provide access to a network; and a memory communicatively coupled to the processor, wherein the memory comprises a flow entropy management logic that is configured to:
identify a flowlet of a traffic flow, wherein the flowlet is associated with a source port value [¶106, for each packet of the plurality of packets, based on the determined flowlet, the value of a field in the packet used by a network switch of the network to route the packet, such as a source UDP port number, may be determined and set]:
obtain a unique unused source port value in response to identifying the flowlet [¶106, different source UDP ports may be used for different flowlets for flowlet detection]; and
replace the source port value associated with the flowlet with the unique unused source port value [¶23, manipulating a field in the data packet header, such as assigning different source ports in the packet header for some packets of the data flow, so that the packets may be routed to different physical ports of a switch]; and
transmit the flowlet having the unique unused source port value to a destination [¶23, packets may be routed to different physical ports of a switch and take different paths through a switched network fabric].
Shalev did not specifically teach determine, for each received packet, whether the packet belongs to a previous flowlet or a new flowlet based on an inter-packet gap, such that when the inter-packet gap between a current packet and a preceding packet is less than a threshold value, the current packet is determined to belong to the previous flowlet; and wherein the threshold value corresponds to a round-trip time (RTT) associated with a destination of the traffic flow.
Hira taught determine, for each received packet, whether the packet belongs to a previous flowlet or a new flowlet based on an inter-packet gap, such that when the inter-packet gap between a current packet and a preceding packet is less than a threshold value, the current packet is determined to belong to the previous flowlet [¶74, new flowlet may be detected whenever a time interval between the arrival of two consecutive packets within the same flow (i.e., inter-packet gap) exceeds a predetermined threshold (e.g., Tflowlet seconds). All subsequent packets that do not exceed the threshold are considered to be part of the same flowlet]; and
wherein the threshold value corresponds to a round-trip time (RTT) associated with a destination of the traffic flow [¶76, Tflowlet may be set based on the network RTT].
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention was made, to combine, Hira’s teaching of limitations with the teachings of Shalev, because the combination would avoid or ameliorate packet reordering issues associated with transport layer protocols such as TCP [¶74].
The combination of Shalev and Hira did not specifically teach re-write the unique source port value in a source port field of each packet in the identified flowlet.
Mao taught re-write the unique source port value in a source port field of each packet in the identified flowlet [¶113, before sending the message of the first data flow, the first network device may change tuple information in the message of the first data flow by using a preset tuple adjustment granularity, where the preset tuple adjustment granularity may be a continuous message sequence (Flowlet). The changing of the tuple information in the first data stream message mainly changes the source port number in the first data stream message. That is, in order to share the first data flow over the n paths for transmission, the source port number in the packet of the first data flow may be mapped to n different virtual source port numbers]. Note: although field is not mentioned, changing the source port in the packet by mapping is equivalent to re-writing the source port field of a flowlet since the mapping requires newly generated ports to be assigned to the flowlets.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention was made, to combine, Hira’s teaching of limitations with the teachings of Shalev and Hira, because the combination implements adaptive routing allowing more active paths to exist, better handling of network faults and congestion, and better network performance [¶103].
Regarding Claim 2,
Shalev taught wherein the flowlet comprises at least one packet [¶106, for each packet of the plurality of packet, based on the flowlet].
Regarding Claim 3,
Shalev taught wherein one or more headers of the at least one packet comprise the source port value [¶23, data packet header field].
Regarding Claim 4,
Shalev taught wherein replacing the source port value comprises replacing the source port value in the one or more headers of the at least one packet with the unique unused source port value [¶23, manipulating a field in the data packet header].
Regarding Claim 8,
Shalev taught wherein the flow entropy management logic determines the round-trip time based on one or more response times associated with the destination [¶70, each flowlet may be associated with a different path that can be re-assigned in case of timeout or excessive packet loss].
Regarding Claim 9,
Shalev-Hira taught wherein to determine the round-trip time, the flow entropy management logic is further configured to: transmit a probe packet to the destination, wherein the probe packet comprises a source timestamp; receive a probe response from the destination in response to transmitting the probe packet, wherein the probe response comprises the source timestamp and a destination processing time value; and determine a time of arrival of the probe response, wherein the round-trip time is determined based on the source timestamp, the destination processing time value, and the time of arrival [¶30, probe packets may be initiated periodically at any suitable time interval; ¶76, Tflowlet may be set based on the network RTT; ¶87]. The rationale to combine as discussed in claim 1, applies here as well.
Regarding Claim 10,
Shalev-Hira taught wherein the flow entropy management logic is further configured to periodically update the round-trip time associated with the destination [¶86, switch state information 190 that is periodically updated to reflect the congestion dynamics in the entire network]. The rationale to combine as discussed in claim 9, applies here as well.
Regarding Claim 16,
Shalev taught wherein the NIC is further configured to execute the flow entropy management logic [¶23, data flow splitting may be done at a network interface card].
Regarding Claims 17~20, the claims are similar in scope to claim 1 and therefore, rejected under the same rationale.
Claims 11~15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Shalev, Hira, and Mao in view of Shalev et al. hereinafter Shalev_2 (U.S 2019/0363989).
Regarding Claim 11,
Shalev-Hira-Mao-Shalev_2 taught wherein to obtain the unique unused source port value, the flow entropy management logic is further configured to: look-up in a flow table; and select, from a plurality of source port values, a unique source port value that is absent in the flow table, wherein the selected unique source port value corresponds to the unique unused source port value [¶27, a flowlet table (which may also include an egress port table that maps flows to their designated egress ports). If the entry is invalid, the load balancer identifies a new flowlet, randomly picks a port from the available choices, and forwards the packet to that port].
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention was made, to combine, Shalev_2’s teaching of limitations with the teachings of Shalev, Hira, and Mao, because the combination would result in overall less congested networks with minimal reordering [of packets] [¶34].
Regarding Claim 12,
Shalev-Hira-Mao-Shalev_2 taught wherein the flow entropy management logic is further configured to store the unique unused source port value in the flow table in response to the replacement of the source port value with the unique unused source port value [¶27; ¶28]. The rationale to combine as discussed in claim 11, applies here as well.
Regarding Claim 13,
Shalev-Hira-Mao-Shalev_2 taught wherein the flow table is configured to maintain an outstanding flow state on a per-port basis of the device [¶58, selector circuit 510 may include an FGAR algorithm that selects an output path non-randomly, such as by identifying a least congested output path from among the plurality of available output paths]. The rationale to combine as discussed in claim 12, applies here as well.
Regarding Claim 14,
Shalev-Hira-Mao-Shalev_2 taught wherein the flow entropy management logic is further configured to store in a mapping table, a mapping between the source port value and the unique unused source port value [¶27, a flowlet table (which may also include an egress port table that maps flows to their designated egress ports)]. The rationale to combine as discussed in claim 11, applies here as well.
Regarding Claim 15,
Shalev taught wherein the flow entropy management logic is further configured to: receive at least one response packet in response to transmitting the flowlet, wherein the at least one response packet comprises, as a destination port value, the unique unused source port value; obtain, from the mapping table, the source port value mapped to the unique unused source port value; replace the destination port value in the at least one response packet with the obtained source port value; and transmit the at least one response packet having the replaced source port value to a corresponding source port [¶84, newly started sender may not send additional packets after the “start of sequence” packet, until it gets an ACK from the receiver; ¶77, the destination endpoint may recover the flowlet index or the packet sequence number from a received packet in the header of the packet, and send an acknowledgement of receiving the packet to the source endpoint].
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to HEE SOO KIM whose telephone number is (571)270-3229. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9AM-5PM.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Nicholas Taylor can be reached on (571) 272-3889. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/HEE SOO KIM/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2443
