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 . Claims of the 27 November 2024 preliminary amendment have been examined and are pending.
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a)-(d).
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 1-15, 17, and 19-22 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 the limitation "the data to be loaded"; it is not clear which one of “a plurality of pieces of data to be loaded” corresponds to "the data to be loaded." There is insufficient antecedent basis for "the data to be loaded" in the claim. Claims 2-22 are likewise rejected for including similar subject matter or being respective dependent claims.
Claim 2 is recited as occurring after claim 1’s step of loading/obtaining the loaded data, however, it ends with a step of “using the incremental version as the data package version…” which changes the scope of claim 1’s last step. Thus, it is not clear what the scope of claim 2 is. Analogous claim 20 and all respective dependent claims are likewise rejected.
Claims 1, 15, 17 and 19 include two instances of “an item to be loaded” followed by “the item to be loaded.” It is not clear which one of the two “an item to be loaded” provides antecedent basis for “the item to be loaded.” All respective dependent claims are likewise rejected.
Claim 3 includes “the previously loaded data in the online state” and “all the previously loaded data.” There is insufficient antecedent basis for these limitations in the claim. Analogous claim 21 and all respective dependent claims are likewise rejected.
Claim 11 includes “The method according to claim 1, further comprising: creating the data package, and setting the data package version as an initial version when the data package is not created in advance.” However, the data package already exists in claim 1; it is not clear what it means for a further limitation to claim 1 to create a thing that already exists.
Claim 19 includes “the at least one processor”. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation.
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.
Claim 19 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. The claim does not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter. The claim is directed to “A computer program product, comprising a computer program…”. As claimed, the computer program product requires no hardware elements and exists purely as software carried on a non-transitory computer readable medium. Because the claim is directed to the computer program product (software) rather than to the a non-transitory computer readable medium, the claimed subject matter does not constitute a machine, manufacture, composition of matter, or process.
Claims 1-15, 17, and 19-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. Claims 1-15, 17, 20-22 are directed to one of the eligible categories of subject matter and claim 19 can be amended to be directed to statutory subject matter as indicated above.
With respect to independent claims 1, 17 and 19, the performing incremental processing covers performance of the limitations manually and/or in the mind (mental processes abstract idea). The obtaining, loading, using limitations are recited at a high level of generality and do not add meaningful limitations to the abstract idea; these limitations are directed to insignificant extra solution activities. The claims as a whole merely describe how to generally “apply” the exception in a computer environment using generic computer functions or components. Even when viewed in combination, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. The claims are not patent eligible.
With respect to dependent claim 2, 7, 12, 14, 20 the deploying, determine, delete, viewing cover performance of the limitations manually and/or in the mind (mental processes abstract idea). The setting, using, obtain, return are recited at a high level of generality and do not add meaningful limitations to the abstract idea; these limitations are directed to insignificant extra solution activities. The claims as a whole merely describe how to generally “apply” the exception in a computer environment using generic computer functions or components. Even when viewed in combination, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. The claims are not patent eligible.
With respect to dependent claims 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 21, 22 the updating, determining, adding, deleting, deploy, create cover performance of the limitations manually and/or in the mind (mental processes abstract idea). No additional elements are recited and so the claims do not provide a practical application and are not considered to be significantly more. The claims are not eligible.
With respect to dependent claims 15, loading, using are recited at a high level of generality and do not add meaningful limitations to the abstract idea. The claims as a whole merely describe how to generally “apply” the exception in a computer environment using generic computer functions or components. Even when viewed in combination, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. The claims are not patent eligible.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 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 1-15, 17, and 19-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Vishnumurty et al., Pub. No.: US 20060070019 A1, hereinafter Vishnumurty.
As per claim 1, Vishnumurty discloses A version control method, comprising:
in response to a data loading instruction, obtaining a plurality of pieces of data to be loaded, a data package corresponding to the plurality of pieces of data to be loaded, and a data package version of the data package (pars. 34, 38, 40-43, 55 disclose that upon a change threshold based save/sync event (i.e. data loading instruction), client transmits accumulated new, updated and deleted project data (i.e. data package) to the project server, which receives the data items together with the project ID to which they belong and reads the current/present associated project version stamp (i.e. data package version)), wherein the data package corresponds to a pool to be loaded, the pool to be loaded comprises an item pool or an item cluster pool to be loaded, the data package comprises at least one item table, and the data to be loaded corresponds to an item to be loaded in the pool to be loaded (par. 42, 44-50 discloses that the backend database maintains a plurality of primary tables corresponding to project entities such as project, resource, task, calendar, with each row of a table uniquely identified by a key and carrying a version stamp, wherein Project P1 has a set (i.e. pool to be loaded) of individual tasks (i.e. items to be loaded) all of which are associated with the TASKS table (i.e. item table));
performing incremental processing on the data package version to obtain an incremental version (pars. 38, 43 include “When the project server/database 210 receives new or updated data from a client, it generates a version stamp … an auto-incremented number … and associates the version stamp with the project” and “determines a new version stamp for the project … by incrementing the current version stamp”);
loading, for each piece of data to be loaded based on an item to be loaded that corresponds to the data to be loaded, the data to be loaded into an item table corresponding to the item to be loaded among the at least one item table, to obtain loaded data, and using the incremental version as a data version of the loaded data (par. 43 discloses new and/or updated data in tables is associated with the new version stamp as the created/modified version; pars. 50-52 disclose tables with record specific version/incrementing stamping); and
using the incremental version as the data package version when the data version of the loaded data corresponding to each piece of data to be loaded is obtained (pars. 38, 55 disclose that the server, having generated the new version stamp, associates that version stamp with the project itself to return to client as the project’s current version; pars. 49, 53-54, 62 disclose after all rows are written, server “returns the latest project version stamp”).
As per claims 17 and 19, they include the same or similar subject matter as claim 1 and are therefore likewise rejected.
As per claim 2, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein after the loaded data is obtained, the method further comprises:
setting a data state of the loaded data as a to-be-deployed state when the data package is not loaded with already loaded data corresponding to the data to be loaded, or when the data package is loaded with already loaded data corresponding to the data to be loaded, and the data version of the already loaded data is earlier than the data package version (pars. 39-45 disclose that new project data is placed in a “new data” bucket before being inserted into the server database. Claim interpretation note: since this limitation is recited as occurring after claim 1’s step of loading/obtaining the loaded data (i.e. before claim 1’s final step of “using the incremental version…”), the recited “the data package version” refers to the version that it was before what it changes to in the final step of claim 1); and
the using the incremental version as the data package version when the data version of the loaded data corresponding to each piece of data to be loaded is obtained comprises: deploying the loaded data in the to-be-deployed state, and updating the data state of the deployed loaded data from the to-be-deployed state to an online state when the data version of the loaded data corresponding to each piece of data to be loaded is obtained (pars. 43, 45-47, 50-52 disclose new and updated data are inserted/updated in the corresponding database tables with the new version stamp); and
using the incremental version as the data package version when the data state of each piece of loaded data is the online state (pars. 50-53).
As per claim 3, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 2, further comprising:
for previously loaded data that is previously loaded into the data package and does not correspond to data to be loaded, updating the data state of the previously loaded data in the online state among all the previously loaded data from the online state to the to-be-deployed state (par. 50 discloses that previously stored task T2 is deleted and placed in a “deleted data bucket” pending application to the server); and
determining data to be deployed that is in the to-be-deployed state from data package data in the data package, wherein the loaded data in the to-be-deployed state is first deployment data whose data version is later than the data package version among the data to be deployed (pars. 48-50 disclose T3 is updated and T4 is newly created, placed in respective updated/new data buckets, and assigned the next higher version stamp “2” relative to project version “1”); and
the deploying the loaded data in the to-be-deployed state, and updating the data state of the deployed loaded data from the to-be-deployed state to an online state comprises: determining the first deployment data from the data to be deployed, deploying the first deployment data based on a first deployment manner corresponding to the first deployment data, and updating the data state of the deployed first deployment data from the to-be-deployed state to the online state (pars. 43, 50-52 disclose that the server applies the updated/new buckets by updating T3 and inserting T4 into the Tasks table with version “2”).
As per claim 4, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 3, wherein the previously loaded data in the to-be-deployed state is second deployment data whose data version is the same as the data package version among the data to be deployed (pars. 46, 48-50 disclose previously stored task T2 has version stamp “1” corresponding to project P1 version “1”), and the method further comprises:
determining the second deployment data from the data to be deployed, deploying the second deployment data based on a second deployment manner corresponding to the second deployment data, and updating the data state of the deployed second deployment data from the to-be-deployed state to an offline state (pars. 43, 50-52 disclose T2 is identified in the deleted data bucket, deleted from the Tasks table, and recorded in the TaskShadow table).
As per claim 5, Vishnumurty discloses the method according to claim 4, wherein at least one of the following is satisfied: the first deployment manner comprises adding a data package label corresponding to the data package; or the second deployment manner comprises deleting a data package label corresponding to the data package (pars. 42, 50-51 disclose Project ID/GUID as unique project identifiers and data corresponding to a task is stored with the Project ID, and newly deployed task T4 is inserted into Tasks with Project ID “1” corresponding to project P1).
As per claim 6, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 2, wherein after the data package corresponding to the plurality pieces of data to be loaded is obtained, the method further comprises: updating a data package state of the data package from an effective state to a loading state (pars. 48-49 disclose current project version “1”, pars. 40-41, 50 disclose subsequent saves/modifications are collected in new, updated, delete data buckets and transmitted for updating the project which is a loading state); updating the loading state to a deploying state after each piece of data to be loaded has been loaded (pars. 43, 50); and updating the deploying state to the effective state when the data state of each piece of loaded data is the online state (pars. 50-53 wherein project P1 receives latest version stamp of “2”).
As per claim 7, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 6, further comprising: in response to a breakpoint resumption instruction, obtaining the data package state; and determining, based on the data package state, to perform an update operation on the obtained data to be loaded or on the loaded data in the to-be-deployed state, and performing the update operation based on a determination result (see rejection of claim 6 and par. 58).
As per claim 8, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 7, wherein when the data package state is the loading state, the determination result is to perform the update operation on the obtained data to be loaded (par. 58, when a save is pending or fails, the system retries or resends the data); and the performing the update operation based on a determination result comprises: determining historical loaded data whose data version is earlier than or the same as the data package version from the data package data in the data package (pars. 37-38, 54 wherein cache maintains previous synchronized project version “1” while the server maintains newer version “2”), and using data to be loaded that corresponds to the historical loaded data among the obtained data to be loaded as breakpoint loading data (pars. 54, 59-62 wherein the server determines the deleted, new, updated records since the clients stored version and sends those as delta); and updating the obtained data to be loaded based on the breakpoint loading data (pars. 54, 60-63 wherein cache applies the received delta).
As per claim 9, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 7, wherein when the data package state is the deploying state, the determination result is to perform the update operation on the loaded data in the to-be-deployed state (pars. 39-43, 50 disclose pending project changes are maintained as new, updated and deleted data until applied to server database); and the performing the update operation based on a determination result comprises: determining breakpoint deployment data in the to-be-deployed state from the data package data in the data package (pars. 54, 59-63 wherein upon synchronization, the system determines the particular deleted, new and updated records that require application based on stored version info), and updating the loaded data in the to-be-deployed state based on the breakpoint deployment data (see rejection of previous limitation).
As per claim 10, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 6, wherein the updating the loading state to a deploying state after each piece of data to be loaded has been loaded comprises:
updating the loading state to a loaded state after each piece of data to be loaded has been loaded (pars. 38-40, 50 data buckets used to organize new, updated, deleted data); and in response to a data deployment instruction input by a user, updating the loaded state to the deploying state (pars. 33, 40-41, 50 wherien the user selects save or check-in); and
the deploying the loaded data in the to-be-deployed state when the data version of the loaded data corresponding to each piece of data to be loaded is obtained comprises: deploying the loaded data in the to-be-deployed state when the data version of the loaded data corresponding to each piece of data to be loaded is obtained, and the data package is in the deploying state (pars. 43, 50-53 wherein the server applies new, updated, deleted buckets to corresponding tables using the new version stamp and then the latest project version is returned).
As per claim 11, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 1, further comprising: creating the data package, and setting the data package version as an initial version when the data package is not created in advance (pars. 44-48 creating new project P1 which is assigned initial version stamp “1” along with all its tasks).
As per claim 12, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 1, further comprising: in response to a data package deletion instruction for the data package, setting a data state of data package data in the data package to an offline state; and setting a data package state of the data package to an ineffective state (pars. 42-43).
As per claim 13, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 12, wherein data package data in an online state is associated with a data package label corresponding to the data package, and the method further comprises: deleting an association relationship between the data package data in the online state and the data package label (pars. 42-47, 50-52 wherein each task row has the Project ID identifying the project to which the task belongs and when task T2 is deleted, its row containing the project ID association is deleted from Tasks table and deletion is recorded in TaskShadow).
As per claim 14, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 1, further comprising: in response to a data package viewing instruction for the data package, determining online data whose data version is the same as the data package version from data package data in the data package; and returning the online data to an instruction triggering device for the data package viewing instruction (par. 49 discloses requesting to open project P1, retrieving project and task records having stamp “1” and returning them with current project version stamp “1”).
As per claim 15, Vishnumurty discloses The method according to claim 1, wherein the pool to be loaded is the item cluster pool, the item cluster pool comprises at least one item cluster, an item to be loaded in each item cluster comprises a first item or a second item clustered based on the first item, and the at least one item table comprises at least one base table, and at least one relationship table associated with each base table (par. 42); and
the loading, for each piece of data to be loaded based on an item to be loaded that corresponds to the data to be loaded, the data to be loaded into an item table corresponding to the item to be loaded among at least one item table, to obtain loaded data comprises: for each item cluster, using data to be loaded that corresponds to the first item in the item cluster among each piece of data to be loaded as first loading data, and using data to be loaded that corresponds to each second item in the item cluster as second loading data (par. 45);
loading the first loading data into a target table corresponding to the first item in the item cluster among the at least one base table, to obtain loaded data of the first item in the item cluster (pars. 45-46); and
for each piece of second loading data, using the second item corresponding to the second loading data in the item cluster as a current item, and loading the second loading data into a relationship table corresponding to the current item among the at least one relationship table associated with the target table, to obtain loaded data of the current item (pars. 45-47).
As per claims 20-22, they are analogous to claims above and therefore likewise rejected.
Conclusion
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/SYED H HASAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2154
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