Detailed Action
This action is in response to the application filed on 07/09/2026. Claims 1-2, 4-15, and 17-22 are pending and have been fully examined.
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 .
Status of the Claims
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103
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.
Claims 1-2, 4-15, and 17-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Cai et al. (U.S. Patent No. 10,416,919 B1), hereinafter referred to as Cai, in view of Pradhan et al. (U.S. Publication No. 2023/0168970 A1), hereinafter referred to as Pradhan.
Regarding Claim 1, Cai teaches:
A system comprising:
a first storage device configured to store a data copy in a form of a data backup chain, (Col. 2, lines 28-30; regarding, “A primary storage system may store data associated with one or more content files.”; Col. 8, lines 54-67; regarding, “The tree data structure allows a chain of snapshot trees corresponding to different versions of backup… ”);
wherein the data backup chain records, in a backup time sequence, data copies that are backed up to the first storage device; (Col. 6, lines 34-38; regarding, “The file tier client may communicate with file tier agent 127 on secondary storage system 122 and provide time-series data of a plurality of access events associated with the portions of the plurality of content files stored on the primary storage system.”);
a second storage device comprising a first storage space and configured to: receive a data access request; (Col. 7, lines 10-13; regarding, “Secondary storage system 122 is configured receive file access requests…”);
access first data in the first storage space based on the data access request; (Col. 7, lines 14-16; regarding, “Secondary storage system 122 has access to file information beyond a last file access timestamp associated with a file.”);
back up the first data from the first storage space to the first storage device, (Col. 7, lines 40-45; regarding, “File tier agent 127 may implement a policy to migrate data associated with a content file from secondary storage system 122 to primary storage system 112.”);
wherein data backed up by the second storage device each time is one data copy in the data backup chain; (Fig. 1-2, Col. 7, lines 42-46; regarding, “data associated with a content file (e.g., tax document) may be stored on secondary storage system 122. The data associated with the content file may be migrated to primary storage system 112”);
determine, for second data that is low-level data in the first storage space, a data copy that was backed up to the storage device by the second storage device and that includes the second data as a part of the data copy; (Col. 8, lines 24-28; regarding, “The backup may be comprised of data associated with one or more content files. The one or more content files may correspond to files that are not frequently accessed on primary storage system 112 (e.g., cold file).”);
obtain location information indicating a storage location of the second data within the data copy in the data backup chain of the storage device; (Col. 9, lines 1-20; regarding, “The file tree is a metadata structure and is configured to store the file metadata associated with a content file… A file tree is similar to a snapshot tree, but a leaf node of a file tree includes an identifier of a data brick storing one or more data chunks of the content file or a pointer to the data brick storing one or more data chunks of the content file. The location of the data brick may be identified using a table stored in a metadata store that matches brick numbers to a physical storage location”);
delete, after obtaining the location information, the second data from the first storage space; (Col. 22, lines 60-67; regarding, “Portions of a content file that is stored in either the secondary storage system or the cloud storage system may have, at one time, been stored on the primary storage system. The portions may include some of or an entire content file. When the portion of the content file is migrated, the migrated portion of the content file is deleted from the primary storage system and replaced with a file stub.”);
and store the location information in the first storage space to enable retrieval of the second data from the first storage device; (Col. 9, lines 60-67; regarding, “A tree data structure may be used to represent the content file data that is stored on a secondary storage system, such as secondary storage system 122. The content file data may include metadata for a distributed file system and may include information, such as chunk identifier, chunk offset, file size, directory structure, file permissions, physical storage locations of the content files…”);
Cai fails to explicitly disclose Pradhan discloses:
and a third storage device configured to: replace, when the second storage device is faulty, the second storage device; ([0255]; regarding, “FIG. 2A illustrates a system 200 configured to address these and other issues by using backup or other secondary copy data to synchronize a source subsystem 201 (e.g., a production site) with a destination subsystem 203 (e.g., a failover site)”);
process the data access request; ([0256]; regarding, “the source data agent(s) 242a and source media agent(s) 244a work together to write backup or other secondary copies of the primary data generated by the source client computing devices 202a into the source secondary storage device(s) 208a.”)
and access the data copy in the first storage device based on the data access request. ([0258]; regarding, “destination media agent(s) 244b write the received backup/secondary copy data to the destination secondary storage device(s) 208b”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to one of ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains to combine Cai with the teachings of Pradhan. Doing so can enhance scalability and improve system performance. (Pradhan, [0080]).
Regarding Claim 2, Cai in view of Pradhan teaches the system of claim 1 as referenced above. Cai in view of Pradhan further teaches:
wherein the third storage device comprises a second storage space (Pradhan, [0258]; regarding, “destination media agent(s) 244b write the received backup/secondary copy data to the destination secondary storage device(s) 208b.”);
and is further configured to back up third data in the second storage space to the first storage device, (Cai, Col. 4, lines 59-61; regarding, “The data associated with such content files may be migrated from the cloud storage system to the secondary storage system or the primary storage system”);
and wherein data backed up by the third storage device each time is one data copy in the data backup chain. (Cai, Fig. 1-2, Col. 7, lines 42-46; regarding, “data associated with a content file (e.g., tax document) may be stored on secondary storage system 122. The data associated with the content file may be migrated to primary storage system 112”).
Examiners note: Pradhan’s storage device fault recovery combined with Cai’s storage device backups teach the above limitations.
Regarding Claim 4, Cai in view of Pradhan teaches the system of claim 1 as referenced above. Cai in view of Pradhan further teaches:
wherein when the first data in the first storage space is damaged or lost, the second storage device is further configured to:
obtain the data copy from the data backup chain, and recover the first data using the data copy. (Cai, Fig. 1-2, Col. 6, lines 46-50; regarding, “Secondary storage system 122 may unify end-to-end protection infrastructure—including target storage, provide backup, replication of data, disaster recovery, and/or cloud tiering.”; Col. 7, lines 42-46; regarding, “data associated with a content file (e.g., tax document) may be stored on secondary storage system 122. The data associated with the content file may be migrated to primary storage system 112”).
Regarding Claim 5, Cai in view of Pradhan teaches the system of claim 1 as referenced above. Cai in view of Pradhan further teaches:
further configured to further back up the first data from the first storage space to the first storage device in a data increment manner or in a full data manner. (Pradhan, [0142]; regarding, “Backup operations can include full backups, differential backups, incremental backups”).
Regarding Claim 6, Cai in view of Pradhan teaches the system of claim 1 as referenced above. Cai in view of Pradhan further teaches:
wherein the first storage device is the same as the second storage device or the third storage device. (Pradhan, [0060]; regarding, “Storage devices can generally be of any suitable type including, without limitation, disk drives, storage arrays (e.g., storage-area network (SAN) and/or network-attached storage (NAS) technology), semiconductor memory (e.g., solid state storage devices), network attached storage (NAS) devices, tape libraries, or other magnetic, non-tape storage devices, optical media storage devices, DNA/RNA-based memory technology, combinations of the same, etc.”).
Regarding Claim 7, Cai in view of Pradhan teaches the system of claim 1 as referenced above. Cai in view of Pradhan further teaches:
wherein the data access request is based on a portable operating system interface (POSIX) protocol, a network file system (NFS) protocol, a server message block (SMB) protocol, or a Hadoop distributed file system (HDFS) protocol. (Pradhan, [0260]; regarding, “management system 200 having an architecture that provides such advantages, and incorporates use of a standard file system protocol between primary and secondary storage subsystems 217, 218. As shown, the use of the network file system (NFS) protocol”).
Regarding Claim 8, Cai in view of Pradhan teaches the system of claim 1 as referenced above. Cai in view of Pradhan further teaches:
wherein the second storage device is further configured to:
obtain a backed-up data copy of the first data from the first storage device;
and perform an analysis on the backed-up data copy, wherein the analysis comprises query and statistics collection. (Cai, Col. 8, lines 21-24; regarding, “Secondary storage system 122 may receive a backup from primary storage system 112 and store content file data associated with the backup across a plurality of storage nodes.”; Col. 3, lines 25-47; regarding, “The secondary storage system may include a file tier agent… A file tier agent is able to determine statistics associated with a content file”).
Regarding Claim 9, Cai teaches:
A method comprising:
receiving, by a first data access instance in a first storage device, a data access request; (Col. 5, lines 59-62; regarding, “the data associated with the requested file is stored on primary storage system 112. In response to the request, primary storage system 112 may provide the data associated with the content file.”);
accessing first data in a first storage space of the first data access instance based on the data access request; (Col. 7, lines 14-16; regarding, “Secondary storage system 122 has access to file information beyond a last file access timestamp associated with a file.”);
backing up, by the first data access instance, the first data to a storage device other than the first storage device, (Col. 7, lines 40-45; regarding, “File tier agent 127 may implement a policy to migrate data associated with a content file from secondary storage system 122 to primary storage system 112.”);
wherein the storage device stores a data copy in a form of a data backup chain, (Col. 2, lines 28-30; regarding, “A primary storage system may store data associated with one or more content files.”; Col. 8, lines 54-67; regarding, “The tree data structure allows a chain of snapshot trees corresponding to different versions of backup… ”);
wherein the data backup chain records, in a backup time sequence, data copies that are backed up to the storage device, (Col. 6, lines 34-38; regarding, “The file tier client may communicate with file tier agent 127 on secondary storage system 122 and provide time-series data of a plurality of access events associated with the portions of the plurality of content files stored on the primary storage system.”);
and wherein data backed up by the first data access instance each time is one data copy in the data backup chain; (Fig. 1-2, Col. 7, lines 42-46; regarding, “data associated with a content file (e.g., tax document) may be stored on secondary storage system 122. The data associated with the content file may be migrated to primary storage system 112”);
determining, by the first data access instance and for second data that is low-level data in the first storage space, a data copy that was backed up to the storage device by the first data access instance and that includes the second data as a part of the data copy; (Col. 8, lines 24-28; regarding, “The backup may be comprised of data associated with one or more content files. The one or more content files may correspond to files that are not frequently accessed on primary storage system 112 (e.g., cold file).”);
obtaining, by the first data access instance, location information indicating a storage location of the second data within the data copy in the data backup chain of the storage device; (Col. 9, lines 1-20; regarding, “The file tree is a metadata structure and is configured to store the file metadata associated with a content file… A file tree is similar to a snapshot tree, but a leaf node of a file tree includes an identifier of a data brick storing one or more data chunks of the content file or a pointer to the data brick storing one or more data chunks of the content file. The location of the data brick may be identified using a table stored in a metadata store that matches brick numbers to a physical storage location”);
deleting, by the first data access instance and after obtaining the location information, the second data from the first storage space; (Col. 22, lines 60-67; regarding, “Portions of a content file that is stored in either the secondary storage system or the cloud storage system may have, at one time, been stored on the primary storage system. The portions may include some of or an entire content file. When the portion of the content file is migrated, the migrated portion of the content file is deleted from the primary storage system and replaced with a file stub.”);
storing, by the first data access instance, the location information in the first storage space to enable retrieval of the second data from the storage device; (Col. 9, lines 60-67; regarding, “A tree data structure may be used to represent the content file data that is stored on a secondary storage system, such as secondary storage system 122. The content file data may include metadata for a distributed file system and may include information, such as chunk identifier, chunk offset, file size, directory structure, file permissions, physical storage locations of the content files…”);
Cai fails to explicitly disclose Pradhan discloses:
and replacing, by a second data access instance, the first data access instance with the second data access instance when the first data access instance is faulty, to process the data access request, and access the data copy based on the data access request. ([0255]; regarding, “FIG. 2A illustrates a system 200 configured to address these and other issues by using backup or other secondary copy data to synchronize a source subsystem 201 (e.g., a production site) with a destination subsystem 203 (e.g., a failover site)”; [0256]; regarding, “the source data agent(s) 242a and source media agent(s) 244a work together to write backup or other secondary copies of the primary data generated by the source client computing devices 202a into the source secondary storage device(s) 208a.”; [0258]; regarding, “destination media agent(s) 244b write the received backup/secondary copy data to the destination secondary storage device(s) 208b”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to one of ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains to combine Cai with the teachings of Pradhan. Doing so can enhance scalability and improve system performance. (Pradhan, [0080]).
Claim 10 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 under the same grounds of rejection as claim 2.
Regarding Claim 11, Cai in view of Pradhan teaches the method of claim 9 as referenced above. Cai in view of Pradhan further teaches:
obtaining, by the first data access instance when the low-level data is converted into high-level data, the second data from the first storage device based on the stored location information; and storing the second data in the first storage space. (Cai, Col. 7, lines 44-52; regarding, “The data associated with the content file may be migrated to primary storage system 112 for a period when the content file is likely to be frequently accessed (e.g., January to April). The data associated with a content file may be migrated to primary storage system 112 in the event the content file is access more than a threshold number of times within a specific period. The data associated with the content file may include some or all of a content file.”).
Regarding Claim 12, Cai in view of Pradhan teaches the method of claim 9 as referenced above. Cai in view of Pradhan further teaches:
wherein the first data access instance or the second data access instance is deployed on the storage device. (Cai, Col. 5, liens 59-62; regarding, “the data associated with the requested file is stored on primary storage system 112. In response to the request, primary storage system 112 may provide the data associated with the content file.”).
Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 under the same grounds of rejection as claim 7.
Regarding Claim 14, Cai teaches:
A device comprising: a memory configured to store instructions; one or more processors coupled to the memory and configured to execute the instructions to cause the device to:
receive, by a first data access instance in a first storage device, a data access request; (Col. 5, lines 59-62; regarding, “the data associated with the requested file is stored on primary storage system 112. In response to the request, primary storage system 112 may provide the data associated with the content file.”);
access first data in a first storage space of the first data access instance based on the data access request; (Col. 7, lines 14-16; regarding, “Secondary storage system 122 has access to file information beyond a last file access timestamp associated with a file.”);
back up, by the first data access instance, the first data to a storage device other than the first storage device, (Col. 7, lines 40-45; regarding, “File tier agent 127 may implement a policy to migrate data associated with a content file from secondary storage system 122 to primary storage system 112.”);
wherein the storage device stores a data copy in a form of a data backup chain, (Col. 2, lines 28-30; regarding, “A primary storage system may store data associated with one or more content files.”; Col. 8, lines 54-67; regarding, “The tree data structure allows a chain of snapshot trees corresponding to different versions of backup… ”);
wherein the data backup chain records, in a backup time sequence, data copies that are backed up to the storage device, (Col. 6, lines 34-38; regarding, “The file tier client may communicate with file tier agent 127 on secondary storage system 122 and provide time-series data of a plurality of access events associated with the portions of the plurality of content files stored on the primary storage system.”);
and wherein data backed up by the first data access instance each time is one data copy in the data backup chain; (Fig. 1-2, Col. 7, lines 42-46; regarding, “data associated with a content file (e.g., tax document) may be stored on secondary storage system 122. The data associated with the content file may be migrated to primary storage system 112”);
determine, by the first data access instance and for second data that is low-level data in the first storage space, a data copy that was backed up to the storage device by the first data access instance and that includes the second data as a part of the data copy; (Col. 8, lines 24-28; regarding, “The backup may be comprised of data associated with one or more content files. The one or more content files may correspond to files that are not frequently accessed on primary storage system 112 (e.g., cold file).”);
obtain, by the first data access instance, location information indicating a storage location of the second data within the data copy in the data backup chain of the storage device; (Col. 9, lines 1-20; regarding, “The file tree is a metadata structure and is configured to store the file metadata associated with a content file… A file tree is similar to a snapshot tree, but a leaf node of a file tree includes an identifier of a data brick storing one or more data chunks of the content file or a pointer to the data brick storing one or more data chunks of the content file. The location of the data brick may be identified using a table stored in a metadata store that matches brick numbers to a physical storage location”);
delete, by the first data access instance and after obtaining the location information, the second data from the first storage space; (Col. 22, lines 60-67; regarding, “Portions of a content file that is stored in either the secondary storage system or the cloud storage system may have, at one time, been stored on the primary storage system. The portions may include some of or an entire content file. When the portion of the content file is migrated, the migrated portion of the content file is deleted from the primary storage system and replaced with a file stub.”);
store, by the first data access instance, the location information in the first storage space to enable retrieval of the second data from the storage device; (Col. 9, lines 60-67; regarding, “A tree data structure may be used to represent the content file data that is stored on a secondary storage system, such as secondary storage system 122. The content file data may include metadata for a distributed file system and may include information, such as chunk identifier, chunk offset, file size, directory structure, file permissions, physical storage locations of the content files…”);
Cai fails to explicitly disclose Pradhan discloses:
and replace, by a second data access instance, the first data access instance with the second data access instance when the first data access instance is faulty, to process the data access request, and access the data copy in the first storage device based on the data access request. ([0255]; regarding, “FIG. 2A illustrates a system 200 configured to address these and other issues by using backup or other secondary copy data to synchronize a source subsystem 201 (e.g., a production site) with a destination subsystem 203 (e.g., a failover site)”; [0256]; regarding, “the source data agent(s) 242a and source media agent(s) 244a work together to write backup or other secondary copies of the primary data generated by the source client computing devices 202a into the source secondary storage device(s) 208a.”; [0258]; regarding, “destination media agent(s) 244b write the received backup/secondary copy data to the destination secondary storage device(s) 208b”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to one of ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains to combine Cai with the teachings of Pradhan. Doing so can enhance scalability and improve system performance. (Pradhan, [0080]).
Claims 17-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 under the same grounds of rejections as claims 12-13, 4, and 5 respectively.
Regarding Claim 21, Cai in view of Pradhan teaches the system of claim 1 as referenced above. Cai in view of Pradhan further teaches:
wherein the second storage device is further configured to:
obtain, when the second data is converted from low-level data to high-level data, the second data from the determined data copy in the first storage device based on the location information; (Cai, Col. 8, lines 24-28; regarding, “The backup may be comprised of data associated with one or more content files. The one or more content files may correspond to files that are not frequently accessed
store the second data in the first storage space; (Col. 9, lines 60-67; regarding, “A tree data structure may be used to represent the content file data that is stored on a secondary storage system, such as secondary storage system 122. The content file data may include metadata for a distributed file system and may include information, such as chunk identifier, chunk offset, file size, directory structure, file permissions, physical storage locations of the content files…”);
and delete the location information from the first storage space. (Cai, Col. 22, lines 60-67; regarding, “Portions of a content file that is stored in either the secondary storage system or the cloud storage system may have, at one time, been stored on the primary storage system. The portions may include some of or an entire content file. When the portion of the content file is migrated, the migrated portion of the content file is deleted from the primary storage system and replaced with a file stub.”);
Regarding Claim 22, Cai in view of Pradhan teaches the system of claim 1 as referenced above. Cai in view of Pradhan further teaches:
wherein, to obtain the location information, the second storage device is configured to:
when the second storage device backs up data in a full backup manner, determine a data copy backed up last time in the data backup chain of the first storage device, (Pradhan, [0145]; regarding, “A synthetic full backup is created from the most recent full backup (i.e., standard or synthetic) and subsequent incremental and/or differential backups.”);
and use, as the location information, a storage location of the second data in the data copy backed up last time; (Pradhan, [0076]; regarding, “a pointer or other location indicia (e.g., a stub) may be placed in primary data 112, or be otherwise associated with primary data 112, to indicate the current location of a particular secondary copy 116. Since an instance of a data object or metadata in primary data 112 may change over time as it is modified by application 110 (or hosted service or the operating system), system 100 may create and manage multiple secondary copies 116 of a particular data object or metadata, each copy representing the state of the data object in primary data 112 at a particular point in time.”);
and when the second storage device backs up data in an incremental backup manner, determine a time at which the second data is written into the first storage space, determine a data copy backed up last time in the data backup chain after the time at which the second data is written into the first storage space, (Pradhan, [0144]; regarding, “An incremental backup operation generally tracks and stores changes since the most recent backup copy of any type”);
and use, as the location information, a storage location of the second data in the data copy backed up last time after the time. (Pradhan, [0076]; regarding, “a pointer or other location indicia (e.g., a stub) may be placed in primary data 112, or be otherwise associated with primary data 112, to indicate the current location of a particular secondary copy 116. Since an instance of a data object or metadata in primary data 112 may change over time as it is modified by application 110 (or hosted service or the operating system), system 100 may create and manage multiple secondary copies 116 of a particular data object or metadata, each copy representing the state of the data object in primary data 112 at a particular point in time.”);
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments filed 07/09/2026 have been fully considered.
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1, 9, and 14 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.
Conclusion
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/M.D.G./Examiner, Art Unit 2113 /BRYCE P BONZO/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2113
