Response to Amendment
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 .
This action is responsive to application filed on 10/16/25. Claims 1-21 are pending.
Abstract Idea Analysis: Claims 1 and 11 are found statutory and compliant. The claimed subject matter discloses providing access to a mid-tier server over a local network in a cloud-tier server system and synchronizing by the mid-tier server data with the cloud-tier server over the internet. This concept integrates the functionality of the mid-tier server into a practical application of cloud computing.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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(s) 1-21 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Jain et al (USPN. 2024/0007414) in view of Garg et al (USPN. 2024/0086567) further in view of Sharma et al (USPN. 2017/0177613).
Regarding claims 1 and 11, Jain teaches a tiered database synchronization system and method, comprising (fig. 1):
a cloud-tier server comprising a cloud-tier database (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3 (cloud data center A130); and
a mid-tier server comprising a mid-tier database storing mid-tier data corresponding to a subset of cloud-tier data stored in the mid-tier server configured to (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3 Edge Cloud Node/Intermediate network node, pars. 103 and 181, Edge cloud A110 and A340 ):
provide access to the mid-tier data stored in the mid-tier database to one or more clients over a local network (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3, pars. 181, Edge cloud over LAN), but Jain does not explicitly teach flexible schema data structures. However, Garg teaches schema modification system providing flexible schema data structures (pars. 72-73, “ the schema modification system 102 adapts or modifies a payload schema based on detecting a change to a source network component and/or a target network component. In particular, the schema modification system 102 can receive or identify a modified payload schema to adjust for a version update to a source network component and/or a version update to a target network component”, Garg). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date to integrate Garg’s schema modification into Jain cloud system (fig. A1, items A120 and A130, Jain). One would have been motivated to integrate schema modification in Jain cloud system to manage different type of data sources in edge computing (fig. A2, vehicles, heathcare and edge cloud data handling, Jain).
Jain in view of Garg combined teach providing the flexible schema data structures in response to flexible schema data operations executed locally by the one or more clients on the flexible schema data structures (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3, pars. 181, Edge cloud over LAN, modified Jain and pars. 72-73, flexible schema is utilized based on local and target changes/executions, Garg); and,
Synchronize the flexible schema data structures of the mid tier data with the corresponding subset of the cloud tier data stored in the cloud tier database of the cloud-tier server over the Internet (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3, pars. 181-182, and 290, items F300 and F304, share/communicate between devices, cloud and nodes using modified Jain). In the case where synchronization is not explicitly synchronizing data, Sharma teaches synchronizing data between local and remote cloud systems (figs. 1 and 2, local clouds 104 and 106, remote cloud 102 and synchronizing data 108, par. 56, synchronizing local files, Sharma). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date to synchronize collected Jain Edge Cloud A110 data in view of Sharma (fig. 1, item 108, Sharma) by synchronizing/managing the local Edge cloud data collected (fig. A2, item A110 and A205, pars. 97, 100 and 101, Nodes facilitate or use Edge cloud A110, and aggregation, Jain). One would have been motivated to synchronize all data created to create a network Hub of all created data and devices (fig. A2, devices A205 and Hub A225, Jain).
Claims 2 and 12. Jain/Garg/Sharma combined teach tiered database synchronization system of claim 1, wherein the mid-tier server is configured to synchronize the mid-tier data with the cloud-tier data when (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3 (cloud data center A130 and edge cloud A110, Jain): the mid-tier data is modified by the one or more clients, and the mid-tier server detects the modification over the local network and the mid-tier data is modified at the cloud-tier server, and the mid-tier server detects the modification over the Internet (pars. 89 and 91, Edge cloud A110 provide ultra low latency response times for services and functions used by data sources A160 and reduce network backhaul traffic, note that requested context and updates are exchanged, see pars. 103-104, Jain).
Claims 3 and 13. Jain/Garg/Sharma combined teach tiered database synchronization system of claim 1, wherein the mid-tier server is configured to (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3, Jain): provide, to the one or more clients, access to the mid-tier data (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3, pars. 181, Edge cloud, loT devices in communication with each other over LAN with Server F330, Jain) in response to flexible schema data operations executed locally by the one or more client on the flexible schema data structures (pars. 72-73, “ the schema modification system 102 adapts or modifies a payload schema based on detecting a change to a source network component and/or a target network component, Garg); and request, from the cloud-tier database, access to data stored in the cloud-tier database that is not stored in the non-relational portion of the mid-tier database (par. 181, “server F330 to facilitate communication with the cloud F300”, Jain).
Claims 4 and 14. Jain/Garg/Sharma combined teach tiered database synchronization system of claim 1, wherein the mid-tier server is further configured to, while the mid-tier server is disconnected from the cloud-tier server: update the mid-tier data when modified by a first client and provide updated mid-tier data to a second client (pars. 214 and 217, servers are in communication with network 1110, and are used for “commercial transaction” such as a payment, note that the server is handling the client transaction without the cloud data center and provides “updates” to the end users, such as sale confirmation to buyer and seller, Jain).
Claims 5 and 15. Jain/Garg/Sharma combined teach tiered database synchronization system of claim 1, wherein the mid-tier server is further configured to, when the mid-tier server is reconnected to the cloud-tier server after being disconnected from the cloud-tier server, update the subset of cloud-tier data based on the updated mid-tier data (fig. A3, par. 103, “Edge cloud A110 are connected to a cloud or data center A360, which uses a backhaul network A350 to fulfill higher latency requests from a cloud/data center for websites, application database servers. LoT devices and servers are updated when requested context and updates are exchanged, see pars. 103-104, Jain).
Claims 6 and 16. Jain/Garg/Sharma combined teach tiered database synchronization system of claim 1, wherein the mid-tier server is physically located in a location with intermittent access to the Internet (fig. A3 and F1, pars. 159-160 and 162-164, loT networks connected to network Internet with wired and wireless technologies, wireless comprise intermittent connection).
Claims 7 and 17. Jain/Garg/Sharma combined teach tiered database synchronization system of claim 1, wherein the mid-tier server is configured to (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3): receive, from a first client over the local network, a first changeset that is representative of a flexible schema data operation on a data object in the mid-tier database performed by the first client (fig. A2, A205 data from Healthcare/vehicles, modified Jain); receive, from a second client over the local network, a second changeset that is representative of a flexible schema data operation on the data object performed by the second client (fig. A2, A205 data from Healthcare/vehicles concerning other users, modified Jain); and in response to receiving, from the first client over the local network, a synchronization request for synchronizing the first client at least with the second client, transmit, to the first client over the local network, the second changeset, wherein the first client is configured to merge the first changeset and the second changeset to update the data object (fig. 1 sync 108, and relevant text, Sharma).
Claims 8 and 18. Jain/Garg/Sharma combined teach tiered database synchronization system of claim 7, wherein the mid-tier server is further configured to (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3): receive, from the cloud-tier server over the Internet, a third changeset that is representative of a flexible schema data operation on a version of the data object in the cloud-tier database performed by a client that is not connected over the local network (fig. A2, A205 data from Healthcare/vehicles concerning further other users, modified Jain); and in response to receiving the synchronization request from the first client over the local network, further transmit, to the first client over the local network, the third changeset, wherein the first client is further configured to merge the first changeset and the second changeset with the third changeset (fig. 1 sync 108 all local changes from plurality of local clouds of Jain in view of Sharma, see also relevant text, Sharma).
Claims 9 and 19. Jain/Garg/Sharma combined teach tiered database synchronization system of claim 1, wherein the mid-tier server is configured to (figs. A1, A2, A3, and F3, Jain): act as a client of the cloud-tier server over the Internet (A110, A120 acts as a client to A130, Jain); act as a server for the one or more clients over the local network (A110, A120 act as a server to A161-A167, pars. 103 and 181, Edge cloud server, Jain).
Claims 10 and 20. Jain/Garg/Sharma combined teach tiered database synchronization system of claim 1, wherein the mid-tier server is configured to periodically check an Internet connection and, in response to detecting that the mid-tier server is connected to the cloud-tier server over the Internet, synchronize data with the cloud-tier server over the Internet (figs. F1 and F3, pars. 163-164 and 181, the IoTs detect mid-tier gateway F310 as an intermediate network node and connect, Jain, in modified by Sharma further teaches synchronize data over the cloud, pars. 137 and 141, Sharma).
Claim 21. Jain/Garg/Sharma combined teach wherein the flexible schema data structures comprise documents organized in collections of the mid tier data, the documents comprising attribute value pairs (pars. 509 and 518, structure data of dataset size, hardware and operator comprise next level attributes that are normalized for re-use, Jain, and par. 50, flexible schema pair data is processed, Garg).
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments filed on 10/16/25 with respect to claim(s) 1-21 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.
Please refer to the new ground rejection for teachings of the amended subject matter.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure in the field of local servers and clouds:
USPN. 20190319793: pars. 59 and 119, fig. 10, servers, cloud network
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
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January 21, 2026
/MARCIN R FILIPCZYK/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2153