Prosecution Insights
Last updated: October 02, 2026
Application No. 18/882,162

CONTENT ITEM PURGING

Non-Final OA §103
Filed
Sep 11, 2024
Priority
Nov 12, 2013 — continuation of 9442944 +3 more
Examiner
PHAM, TUAN A
Art Unit
2163
Tech Center
2100 — Computer Architecture & Software
Assignee
Dropbox Inc.
OA Round
3 (Non-Final)
84%
Grant Probability
Favorable
3-4
OA Rounds
7m
Est. Remaining
99%
With Interview

Examiner Intelligence

Grants 84% — above average
84%
Career Allowance Rate
606 granted / 725 resolved
+28.6% vs TC avg
Strong +27% interview lift
Without
With
+27.0%
Interview Lift
resolved cases with interview
Typical timeline
2y 8m
Avg Prosecution
23 currently pending
Career history
746
Total Applications
across all art units

Statute-Specific Performance

§101
18.0%
-22.0% vs TC avg
§103
48.6%
+8.6% vs TC avg
§102
9.4%
-30.6% vs TC avg
§112
10.2%
-29.8% vs TC avg
Black line = Tech Center average estimate • Based on career data from 725 resolved cases

Office Action

§103
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 . DETAILED ACTION 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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Response to Amendment The Request for continued Examination, filed on 05/05/2026, has been entered and acknowledged by the Examiner. In the Amendment, applicant amended claims 1, 8-9, 17 and 20. As to Arguments and Remarks filed in the Amendment, please see Examiner’s responses shown after Rejections - 35 U.S.C § 103 Please note claims 1-20 are pending. Information Disclosure Statement The information disclosure statement (IDS) filed on 05/05/2026 has been considered (see form-1449, MPEP 609). Examiner Notes Examiner cites particular columns, paragraphs, figures and line numbers in the references as applied to the claims below for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested that, in preparing responses, the applicant fully consider the references in their entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the examiner. 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. The text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action. The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows: 1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art. 2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue. 3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art. 4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness. Claims 1-2, 4-10, 12-17 and 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Taylor et al. (US Patent 7,421,458, hereinafter Taylor), in view of Troy Lee Bartlett (US PGPUB 2009/0300121, hereinafter Bartlett). As per as claim 1, Taylor discloses: A method for reclaiming storage space at a computing device, the method comprising: tracking, by an application installed on the computing device and associated with a content management system, an upload status of at least one content item locally stored within a file system of the computing device (Taylor, e.g., [col. 1, lines 55-67], “…creating versions of database objects and for tracking, querying, retrieving, and deploying such versioned database objects in enterprise databases, data marts, or data warehouses…” and [col. 14, lines 50-67], “version status check” (check status of upload/download/install)); determining, by the application and in response to an upload of one or more file to the content management system, that the upload status of the at least one content item indicates that a copy of the at least one content item was uploaded to the content management system for storage within the content management system (Taylor, e.g., [col. 2, lines 46-67], “… the versions of objects to be deployed can be dynamically determined by executing a query when deployment is requested… a condition for the object that indicates that it is ready to deploy…” (determine/identifying object deploying/upload)) and [col. 8, lines 1-19], “… storage space required in the database repository for saving objects is minimized by reducing redundancy. Just as the reusable Source Definition saves a complete copy of the Source Definition for each version of the Source Definition, the reusable Mapping also saves a complete copy of the Mapping for each of the three versions of the Mapping…” and further see [col. 14, lines 28-50], “…identify all dependencies of the desired objects so that they too can be included in the deploy…”); replacing, by the application and in response to determining the upload status, the at least one content item with a truncated version of the at least one content item within the file system of the computing device (Taylor, e.g., [col. 9, lines 40-50, “…Manager which enables users to manager all types of repository objects in a central place, such as check in, purge, deploy, and the like….” (the examiner asserts manager check in, purge, deploy which is equivalent to determining the upload status) [col. 11, lines 35-40], “…Object State: find object versions with the selected object state(s). Displayed states include "Active" "Frozen, allow deploy to replace," "Frozen, not allow deploy to replace…”) and [col. 13, lines 1-45], “…. Replace an entire folder, copy all versions of all versioned objects and truncate all existing objects in the target. Case D. Replace an entire folder, copy only the latest version of all versioned objects and truncate all existing objects in the target… truncating the folder to be replaced…”), wherein the truncated version reduces the storage space occupied by the at least one content item at the computing device, thereby increasing available storage space within the computing device; and providing, by the application, an indication that the file system stores the truncated version of the at least one content item (Taylor, e.g., [col. 11, lines 35-40], and [col. 13, lines 1-45], “…copying only specific versions of objects specified in the group…to the target repository…”). To make records clearer regarding to the languages of “wherein the truncated version reduces the storage space occupied by the at least one content item at the computing device, thereby increasing available storage space within the computing device” (although as stated above, Taylor functional disclose “truncated versions” (Taylor, e.g., [col. 11, lines 35-40] and [col. 13, lines 1-45]). However Bartlett, in an analogous art, discloses “wherein the truncated version reduces the storage space occupied by the at least one content item at the computing device, thereby increasing available storage space within the computing device” (Bartlett, e.g., [002-004], [007], “… truncated version of these long emails when downloading the email to the device… saves storage space on the client device, and may reduce network/processor bandwidth that would otherwise be needed to download a long email…” and [0008-0014], “… truncating markup language email messages. In one embodiment, a method involves receiving a markup-language-formatted, source email having a message size that exceeds a predetermined size limit…”). Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art BEFORE the effective filling date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Bartlett and Taylor to truncating emails/file/application to reducing bandwidth and storage space (Bartlett, e.g., [008]). As per as claim 2, the combination of Chan, Arora and Taylor disclose: The method of claim 1, further comprising: setting, by the application, a default setting to utilize the truncated version of the at least one content item (Taylor, e.g., [col. 10, lines 53-67], “…user defined search condition… modifying user, then the search returns all versions of an object by default…”) and (Bartlett, e.g., [0041-0042], [0059], [0065], “…truncated version….”). As per as claim 4, the combination of Chan, Arora and Taylor disclose: The method of claim 1, further comprising: identifying one of the at least one content item as an email attachment (Bartlett, e.g., [002-004], [007], “… truncated version of these long emails when downloading the email to the device… saves storage space on the client device, and may reduce network/processor bandwidth that would otherwise be needed to download a long email…” and [0008-0014], “… truncating markup language email messages. In one embodiment, a method involves receiving a markup-language-formatted, source email having a message size that exceeds a predetermined size limit…”); truncating the email attachment to create a truncated email attachment (Bartlett, e.g., [002-004], [007], “… truncated version of these long emails when downloading the email to the device… saves storage space on the client device, and may reduce network/processor bandwidth that would otherwise be needed to download a long email…” and [0008-0014], “… truncating markup language email messages. In one embodiment, a method involves receiving a markup-language-formatted, source email having a message size that exceeds a predetermined size limit…”); and replacing the email attachment with the truncated email attachment (Bartlett, e.g., [002-004], [007], “… truncated version of these long emails when downloading the email to the device… saves storage space on the client device, and may reduce network/processor bandwidth that would otherwise be needed to download a long email…” and [0008-0014], “… truncating markup language email messages. In one embodiment, a method involves receiving a markup-language-formatted, source email having a message size that exceeds a predetermined size limit…”). As per as claim 5, the combination of Chan, Arora and Taylor disclose: The method of claim 1, further comprising: identifying a content item from the at least one content item that is available to purge (Taylor, e.g., [col. 9, lines 35-54], [col. 12, lines 3-7], “…users to manage all types of repository objects in a central place, such as check in, purge, deploy, and the like…”) and (Bartlett, e.g., [0024], “…allows for editing of the truncated message by the user and having the truncated message properly expanded to its presumptive modified form …”); and purging the content item (Taylor, e.g., [col. 9, lines 35-54], [col. 12, lines 3-7], (the examiner asserts, workflow manger can create/schedule connections, and the like = purging) and see (Bartlett, e.g., [0024], “…allows for editing of the truncated message by the user and having the truncated message properly expanded to its presumptive modified form …” and [0034-0036], “… edited message 126 may be expanded by the truncator 110 automatically or based on a user signal. For example, the reduced message may end with text such as: "--Message truncated by server; click here to retrieve the full message or delete this text to prevent truncated portion from being included in replies/forwards--." Thus if the user did nothing, the truncated portion would be restored in the edited message 126, as represented by restored edited message…”). As per as claim 6, the combination of Chan, Arora and Taylor disclose: The method of claim 1, wherein the truncated version is stored on the computing device and the copy is stored at the content management system (Taylor, e.g., [col. 11, lines 35-40], and [col. 13, lines 1-45], “…copying only specific versions of objects specified in the group…to the target repository…”) and (Bartlett, e.g., [0028-0029], “… copying from the original message stops and any required closing tags are added that are required to make the truncated message valid according to the rules of the message's markup language…” and [0056], “… copy of the email for user editing…”). As per as claim 7, the combination of Chan, Arora and Taylor disclose: The method of claim 1, further comprising: identifying a plurality of content items that have been stored at the computing device for a minimum period of time (Taylor, e.g., [col. 9, lines 35-54], [col. 12, lines 3-7], (the examiner asserts, workflow manger can create/schedule connections, and the like = minimum period of time); and replacing the plurality of content items with truncated versions of the plurality of content items (Taylor, e.g., [col. 11, lines 35-40], “…identify all dependencies of the desired objects so that they too can be included in the deploy…”) and [col. 13, lines 1-45], “…. Replace an entire folder, copy all versions of all versioned objects and truncate all existing objects in the target. Case D. Replace an entire folder, copy only the latest version of all versioned objects and truncate all existing objects in the target… truncating the folder to be replaced…”) and (Bartlett, e.g., [0009], [0024], [0060-0061], “…received message 602 can be replaced 624 by the formerly discarded portion of the truncated email, and the restored message 628 can be sent to its target on behalf of the client with some assurance that the resulting message is properly formed…”). As per as claim 8, the combination of Chan, Arora and Taylor disclose: The method of claim 1, further comprising: identifying data associated with a content item (Bartlett, e.g., fig. 5, associating with texts description, [0055-0057], “…unique identifier, index mark, attribute data…”); determining that data similar to the data associated with the content item is stored at the content management system (Taylor, e.g., [col. 13, lines 1-45], (determining similar/identical folders/objects); and based on the data similar to the data associated with the content item being stored at the content management system, creating a truncated version of the content item (Bartlett, e.g., [002-004], [007], “… truncated version of these long emails when downloading the email to the device… saves storage space on the client device, and may reduce network/processor bandwidth that would otherwise be needed to download a long email…” and [0008-0014], “… truncating markup language email messages. In one embodiment, a method involves receiving a markup-language-formatted, source email having a message size that exceeds a predetermined size limit…”). Claims 3, 11 and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Taylor et al. (US Patent 7,421,458, hereinafter Taylor), in view of Troy Lee Bartlett (US PGPUB 2009/0300121, hereinafter Bartlett) and further in view of Badam et al. (US PGPUB 2013/0205114, hereinafter Badam). As per as claims 3, 11 and 18, the combination of Bartlett and Taylor disclose: The method of claim 1, the non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 9, the system of claim 17, further comprising: receiving, by the application, an indication to reclaim space on the computing device (Bartlett, e.g., [0007-0012], “ truncating emails, there are benefits in this practice (e.g., reducing bandwidth and storage on clients)…”); and creating the truncated version in response to the indication (Taylor, e.g., [col. 4, lines 31-40], [col. 7, lines 13-35], [col. 12, lines 1-65], “create new versions… copy all versions of all versioned objects and truncate ”). The combination of Bartlett and Taylor do not explicitly disclose “receiving, by the application, an indication to reclaim space on the computing device” (although as stated above Bartlett disclose reducing bandwidth and truncating (Bartlett, e.g., [007-0012]). However Badam, in an analogous art, discloses “receiving, by the application, an indication to reclaim space on the computing device” (Badam, e.g., [0136], “…perform operations for objects within the log structure to clean up old objects stored on the storage device and reclaim unused space”). Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art BEFORE the effective filling date of the claimed invention to combine the teaching of Badam, bartlett and Taylor to maintain tables and to perform read-modify-writes necessary for garbage collection and for compacting live objects to minimize fragmentation of data on the storage device (Badam, e.g., 002-004]). Claims 9-10, 12-16 are essentially the same as claims 1-2 and 4-8 except that they set forth the claimed invention as a non-transitory computer readable medium rather a method, respectively and correspondingly, therefore is rejected under the same reasons set forth in rejections of claims 1-2 and 4-8. Claims 1, 19-20 are essentially the same as claims 1-2 and 4-8 except that they set forth the claimed invention as a system rather a method, respectively and correspondingly, therefore is rejected under the same reasons set forth in rejections of claims 1-2 and 4-8. Response to Arguments The Examiner respectfully reminds applicant of the broadest reasonable interpretation standard (See MPEP 2111), "During examination, the claims must be interpreted as broadly as their terms reasonably allow." In re American Academy of Science Tech Center, 367 F.3d 1359, 1369, 70 USPQ2d 1827, 1834 (Fed. Cir. 2004) (The USPTO uses a different standard for construing claims than that used by district courts; during examination the USPTO must give claims their broadest reasonable interpretation.) In Phillips v. AWH Corp., 415 F.3d 1303, 75 USPQ2d 1321 (Fed. Cir. 2005), the court further elaborated on the “broadest reasonable interpretation" standard and recognized that “The Patent and Trademark Office (“PTO") determines the scope of claims in patent applications not solely on the basis of the claim language, but upon giving claims their broadest reasonable construction." Thus, when interpreting claims, the courts have held that Examiners should (1) interpret claim terms as broadly as their terms reasonably allows and (2) interpret claim phrases as broadly as their construction reasonably allows. Applicant’s arguments filed 05/01/2026 with respect to claims 1-20 have been considered but are moot in view of the new ground(s) of rejection necessitated by applicant's amendment to the claims. Applicant's newly amended features are taught implicitly, expressly, or impliedly by the prior art of record (See the new ground(s) of rejection set forth herein above). The Examiner respectfully submits that, with respect to the totally newly amended subject matter, the Examiner respectfully cited proper paragraphs from cited reference to reject the claim in responsive to the newly amended, please refer to the corresponding section of the office action. Additional Art Considered The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to the Applicants’ disclosure. The following patents and papers are cited to further show the state of the art at the time of Applicants’ invention with respect to content item purging which is a contact item purger, such as may be incorporated within a local client application of a content management system running on a user device, may leverage knowledge as to which items have been uploaded to the content management system, and how long such content items have been stored on the user device, to propose items for deletion from the user device so as to reclaim storage space. a. Patil et al. (US PGPUB 2008/0307014, hereinafter Patil) “compressing files using a Minimal amount of Memory” disclose “compressing a file in a computer and an amount of memory available for use in the computer is determined, a chunk size is determined based on the size of the file and the amount of memory available for use, then created by obtaining a chunk of chunk size from the file, and truncating the file an amount equal to the chunk size, until the file is completely truncated. A new file containing compressed chunks is created by repeatedly selecting a chunk from the set of chunks, compressing the chunk to form a compressed chunk, writing the compressed chunk to the new file, and deleting the chunk from the set of chunks, until each chunk in the set of chunks is deleted”. Patil also teaches truncating the file an amount equal to the chunk size, until the file is completely truncated [0007], [0022]. Bulpitt further teaches a new file is created for storing the compressed version of the original file [0067]. Conclusion The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure. See form 892. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to TUAN A PHAM whose telephone number is (571)270-3173. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 7:45 AM - 6:30 PM. Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Tony Mahmoudi can be reached on 571-272-4078. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000. /TUAN A PHAM/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2163
Read full office action

Prosecution Timeline

Show 4 earlier events
Oct 01, 2025
Response Filed
Dec 02, 2025
Final Rejection mailed — §103
Mar 11, 2026
Interview Requested
Mar 18, 2026
Applicant Interview (Telephonic)
Mar 21, 2026
Examiner Interview Summary
May 01, 2026
Request for Continued Examination
May 04, 2026
Response after Non-Final Action
Sep 09, 2026
Non-Final Rejection mailed — §103 (current)

Precedent Cases

Applications granted by this same examiner with similar technology

Patent 12748777
DATA PROCESSING METHOD FOR MACHINE LEARNING AND ELECTRONIC DEVICE USING THE SAME
2y 2m to grant Granted Sep 29, 2026
Patent 12737411
CONTENT RECOMMENDATION SYSTEM AND METHOD
1y 5m to grant Granted Sep 15, 2026
Patent 12717512
Write Request Fulfillment in a Storage Network
1y 7m to grant Granted Aug 25, 2026
Patent 12699741
TEMPORAL TRANSFORMATION OF LOCATION-BASED QUERIES
2y 0m to grant Granted Aug 04, 2026
Patent 12694038
OPTIMIZING GOVERNED DATA TRANSFER IN A MULTI-CLOUD ENVIRONMENT USING LINEAGE DATA
2y 11m to grant Granted Jul 28, 2026
Study what changed to get past this examiner. Based on 5 most recent grants.

Strategy Recommendation AI-generated — please review before filing

Get a prosecution strategy drawn from examiner precedents, rejection analysis, and claim mapping.
Typically takes 5-10 seconds — AI-generated, attorney review required before filing

Prosecution Projections

3-4
Expected OA Rounds
84%
Grant Probability
99%
With Interview (+27.0%)
2y 8m (~7m remaining)
Median Time to Grant
High
PTA Risk
Based on 725 resolved cases by this examiner. Grant probability derived from career allowance rate.

Sign in with your work email

Enter your email to receive a magic link. No password needed.

Personal email addresses (Gmail, Yahoo, etc.) are not accepted.

Free tier: 3 strategy analyses per month