DETAILED ACTION
This action is in response to the filing 12/17/2024. Claims 1-21 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
Claim 18 has been cancelled.
Claims 1, 4, and 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103.
Claims 2-3, 5-17, and 21 contain allowable subject matter but are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim.
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, 4, and 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yang (CN103885869A) in view of Parthiban et al. (U.S. PGPub No. 20170322816).
Regarding Claim 1, and similarly Claims 19-20, Yang teaches,
A control method for a baseboard control unit, comprising: obtaining current system information of the baseboard control unit when the baseboard control unit runs to a preset status (an acquisition module obtains configuration parameters ("system information") of a baseboard management controller ("baseboard control unit") at a specified time interval ("preset status") [0028]);
storing the system information (the acquired system information is stored in a parameter storage area [0028]);
and restoring the baseboard control unit based on the system information … (a detection module is employed to detect an abnormality in the running of the baseboard management controller and, if an abnormality is detected, the stored system information is read to restore the baseboard management controller [0030]; where the BMC stores firmware [0008]).
While Yang discloses restoring the BMC after an abnormality is detected [0030], Yang does not explicitly disclose [in bold] and Parthiban teaches,
and restoring the baseboard control unit based on the system information after a kernel panic occurs in an operating system of the baseboard control unit (a BMC may run an embedded LINUX OS [0017] where the BMC OS may encounter a fatal error at boot ("kernel panic") [0025] and, in this case, previously stored booting/backup image is used to boot the BMC [0026]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify the BMC restoration in the instance of an abnormality as disclosed by Yang to be specifically tailored to an operating system unrecoverable error as disclosed by Parthiban. The resulting combination allows for BMCs requiring firmware images to be operational to have a firmware recovery mechanism [Parthiban; 0004], where it is necessary to ensure normal operation of a baseboard management controller to maintain abnormality reporting in a system [Yang; 0004-0007].
Regarding Claim 4, Yang teaches,
The control method for a baseboard control unit according to claim 1, wherein the obtaining current system information of the baseboard control unit when the baseboard control unit runs to a preset status comprises: obtaining the current system information of the baseboard control unit at preset time intervals after the baseboard control unit runs to a shell login status (system information is stored at a specified time interval during the runtime of the firmware program of the baseboard management computer ("after the baseboard control unit runs to a shell login status") [0028]).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-3, 5-17, and 21 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims. The following is the Examiner’s statement of reasons for indicating allowable subject matter:
Regarding Claim 2, Yang discloses obtaining current system information on a specified time interval [0028]. Parthiban discloses that restoration is performed during boot (when the BMC is started) [0018]. However, the prior art of record does not disclose without the use of impermissible hindsight reasoning obtaining the current system information of the baseboard control unit when the operating system of the baseboard control unit is started.
Regarding Claim 3, Yang discloses obtaining current system information on a specified time interval [0028]. Parthiban discloses performing restoration of the baseboard management controller upon expiration of a hardware watchdog timer ("time node") [0018]. However, the prior art of record does not disclose, without the use of impermissible hindsight reasoning, obtaining the current system information of the baseboard control unit when the baseboard control unit runs to a time node for shell login.
Regarding Claim 5, Yang teaches that system information is stored at a specified time interval during the runtime of the firmware program of the baseboard management computer [0028]. However, the prior art of record does not disclose, without the use of impermissible hindsight reasoning, obtaining the preset time intervals from a device tree.
Regarding Claim 6, Yang discloses that a dedicated, partitioned area of the storage device is used to generate the parameter storage area ("system information storage area") [0008] and configuration parameters ("system information") is stored in a parameter storage area ("system information storage area") [0028]. Parthiban discloses that two SPIs or one "large" SPI may be used to store two copies of the BMC OS [0017]. The prior art of record does not disclose, without the use of impermissible hindsight reasoning, reading a base address and size of a synchronous dynamic random access memory and a base address and size of a system information storage area from a device tree; and determining, based on the base address of the synchronous dynamic random access memory and the base address of the system information storage area, a storage size provided to the operating system. Claim 7 depends from Claim 6.
Regarding Claim 8, Yang discloses storing system information [0028]. Parthiban discloses storing copies of the OS [0017]. The prior art of record does not disclose, without the use of impermissible hindsight reasoning, storing the system information in a JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) format.
Regarding Claim 9, Yang discloses, "the configuration parameters include bootloader environment parameters, operating system kernel environment parameters, root file system image environment parameters, and IPMI (Intelligent Platform Management Interface) application parameters" [0021]. The Examiner additionally points to prior art not previously relied upon, Yamagami (U.S. PGPub No. 20120124420) as disclosing when a service processor ("baseboard control unit") itself generates an abnormality (including a LINUX panic reboot), the service processor will be unable to retain fault information and materials for the fault check must be obtained [0004]. Yamagami further discloses that fault check materials include various voltage levels, fan rotational speeds, etc. [0031] where the device being monitored by the service processor may include a CPU [0025]; reboot instructions are provided to the service processor via known hardware registers within the SVP [0032], however this value is not stored as restoration information. The prior art of record does not disclose the system information comprises a combination of any one or more of register data of a central processing unit, register data of peripheral, and page table data. Claims 10-17 depend upon Claim 9.
Regarding Claim 21, Yang discloses obtaining current system information on a specified time interval [0028]. Parthiban discloses that restoration is performed during boot (when the BMC is started) [0018]. The prior art of record does not disclose, without the use of impermissible hindsight reasoning, obtaining the current system information of the baseboard control unit when the operating system of the baseboard control unit enters a start point.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
Ganesan et al. (U.S. PGPub No. 20230023869) discloses that an AI processor acquires logs for the server from the baseboard management controller of the system, including logs that include kernel and stop-type errors [0037]. The Examiner does not find, however, that the logs pertain to the baseboard management controller itself.
Kaminski (U.S. Patent No. 10924350) discloses monitoring performance metrics for a BMC, where the performance metrics include sensor data [Col. 2, line 61- Col. 3, line 8] and performance data/files generated by the BMC during operation [Col. 3, lines 25-27].
Zeavlou et al. (U.S. Patent No. 11093321) discloses a process for updating an information handling system upon an information handling system crash, where the crash includes a stop error (kernel panic [Col. 6, lines 28-36]) [Abstract] where the update metadata includes a stop code associated with the stop error and which may be stored as a JSON file, and a rollback may be performed as remediation [of the information handling system] [Col. 9, lines 41-61].
Bishop et al. (U.S. PGPub No. 20180074909) discloses a system to provide fault tolerance for a service processor such that the service processor maintains high [0017]. Checkpoints in memory may be used to restore the state of a service processor [0019]. The service processor is monitored via a heartbeat signal (“regular intervals”) [0040]. The state of the service processor is preserved in memory [0049].
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/MICHAEL MASKULINSKI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2113
/A.E.W./Examiner, Art Unit 2113
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