DETAILED ACTION
This Office action responds the Application No. 18/894609, filed 09/24/2024.
At this point, claims 1, 5-7, 10, and 14-20 have been amended. Claims 1-20 are pending.
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
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.
Examiner notes Applicant’s amended claims dated 12/16/2025; in view of the amended claims, Examiner’s previous rejections to claims 5 and 14 under 35 USC § 112(b) are maintained. Furthermore, amended claim 20 contains the same language as that of claims 5 and 15, and is accordingly rejected for the same reasons. Re Examiner’s first reason for rejection, claims 1 and 10 refer to “physical pages” (plural); accordingly, the limitation “the physical page” in claims 5 and 14 has ambiguous antecedent basis, as it unclear which one is “the physical page”. It is noted that claims 4 and 13 contain separate antecedent basis for “a physical page”; if this is the specific page that is being referred to in claims 5 and 14, then Applicant is respectfully requested to utilize a specific, rather than generic, name for this particular physical page. Re Examiner’s second reason, it is noted that all powers of the integer ‘1’ resolve to ‘1’; for example, 1^2 = 1*1 = 1. Accordingly, since the value of M can be 1, it is unclear how the logical page size can be 1x the size of the physical page while still being different. Examiner interprets this to be a typographical error in which the minimum values were inadvertently transposed – for example, if M >= 2 and N >=1, then the minimum value of the ratio would be 2^1 = 2, which is different than 1.
Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claims 1-3, 7, 10-12, 16, and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Koseki (US 2014/0281168 A1) in view of Pattisam et al (US 5357614 A1), further in view of Månsson et al (US 2010/0017578 A1).
Re claim 1, Koseki discloses the following:
A storage device comprising: a nonvolatile memory device (¶ 63). The storage system is implemented using flash memory (non-volatile);
To provide a physical address space (¶ 102). The system has a physical address space;
at least one processor configured to implement: a flexible mapper configured to: (¶ 80 and 104). The storage system (storage device) is controlled by a control processor (¶ 80). The controller handles mapping (¶ 104);
obtain a size of compressed data, the compressed data being obtained by compressing raw data in a logical page of a logical address space; and (¶ 102). The storage system compresses logical pages in the logical address space that have yet to undergo compression (raw data in a logical page of a logical address space), compresses them, and then determines the size of the compressed data;
determine, based on the size of the compressed data, a first number of physical pages of the physical address space for storing the compressed data (¶ 102). The storage system determines how many pages, or codeword portions of pages, are required to store the physical size of the compressed data;
a physical page manager configured to [assign] physical pages according to the first number of physical pages (Fig. 5; ¶ 102). The physical pages necessary to store the compressed data are assigned to the respective compressed data;
a write controller configured to […] write the compressed data to the physical pages [assigned] by the physical page manager; and (¶ 17 and 102). The storage controller (write controller) writes the compressed data to the physical memory (¶ 17) which was selected to hold the compressed data (¶ 102).
Koseki does not explicitly disclose comparing compressed and uncompressed data.
Pattisam discloses the following:
wherein the raw data is received from a host (Fig. 3, host 200, uncompressed data 212). The host sends uncompressed (raw) data to the compression coprocessor;
based on the first [size…] of the physical address space for storing the compressed data being less than a second [size…] required for storing the raw data, write the compressed data (col. 15, lines 46-65). Based on the size of the compressed data being smaller than the original (raw) data, the compressed data is written to storage;
based on the first [size…] not being less than the second [size…], write the raw data (col. 15, lines 46-65). Based on the compressed data being larger than the original data, the original (raw) data is written to storage.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention (AIA ) to modify the compression system of Koseki to compare compressed and uncompressed size, and bypass compression if it is larger than the original, as in Pattisam, because it would be applying a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way. Koseki discloses compressing and storing data. Pattisam also discloses compressing and storing data, which has been improved in a similar way to the claimed invention, to compare compressed and uncompressed sizes. It would have been obvious to modify the compression of Koseki utilize the comparison of Pattisam to bypass compressing data that would be larger after compression, because it would yield the predictable improvement of increasing storage efficiency by avoiding storing compressed data when it would be larger than raw data. Furthermore, as Koseki discloses determining size on the basis of physical page size, and storing data in physical pages, it would have been obvious to utilize the page size as a standard unit of size in Pattisam, as it would be a mere change in size to use pages instead of bits or bytes (MPEP § 2144.04(IV)(A).
As noted above, Koseki (combined with Pattisam) discloses selecting or assigning physical pages to store the compressed data; while it is well known in the art that in order for memory to be used to store information, it must be allocated, this is not explicitly stated; accordingly, in the interest of furthering compact prosecution, Examiner has provided Månsson.
Månsson discloses to allocate physical pages […] and write data to the allocated physical pages (¶ 32 and 85). The memory system allocates virtual (logical) and physical memory pages, and stores (writes) compressed data into them.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention (AIA ) to modify the data compression device of Koseki (combined with Pattisam) to allocate pages to store data, as in Månsson, because it would be applying a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way. Koseki (combined with Pattisam) discloses compressing data and storing it in physical pages. Månsson also discloses compressing data and storing it in physical pages, which has been improved in a similar way to the claimed invention, to allocate those pages. It would have been obvious to allocate physical pages for the compressed data, as in Månsson, because this would yield the predictable improvement of allowing the pages to be used.
Re claim 2, Koseki, Pattisam, and Månsson disclose the device of claim 1, and Koseki further discloses that the nonvolatile memory device comprises a solid state drive, and wherein the physical pages are allocated in a NAND block of the stolid state drive (¶ 136). The nonvolatile memory can be a NAND SSD.
Re claim 3, Koseki, Pattisam, and Månsson disclose the device of claim 1, and Månsson further discloses that the allocated physical pages are consecutive physical pages of the nonvolatile memory device (¶ 32). The system allocates a consecutive range of pages.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention (AIA ) to modify the data compression device of Koseki (combined with Pattisam) to allocate pages to store data, as in Månsson, because Månsson suggests that doing so would provide for a simpler mapping between physical and logical addresses (¶ 32).
Re claim 7, Koseki, Pattisam, and Månsson disclose the device of claim 1, and Koseki further discloses the following:
the physical page manager is further configured to generate a physical page number based on an [assigned] physical page, the physical page number representing information about a location of a physical page in the physical address space; and (¶ 102). The physical page numbers correspond to actual locations in the physical address space;
wherein the at least one processor is further configured to implement a mapping relationship module configured to store a mapping relationship between the physical page number and a logical page number, the logical page number representing a location of the logical page in the logical address space (¶ 102). The physical page numbers correspond to logical page numbers in the logical address space.
Månsson further discloses allocating physical pages (¶ 32 and 85). See claim 1 above.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention (AIA ) to combine Koseki, Pattisam, and Månsson, for the reasons noted in claim 1 above.
Re claims 10-12 and 16, Koseki, Pattisam, and Månsson disclose the devices of claims 1-3 and 7 above, respectively. Accordingly, they also disclose methods implemented by those devices, as in claims 10-12 and 16, respectively (see Koseki, claim 15).
Re claim 19, Koseki, Pattisam, and Månsson disclose the device of claim 1 above. Accordingly, they also disclose a computer readable medium implementing the same functionality as that device, as in claim 19 (see Månsson, claim 29).
Claims 4-5, 13-14, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Koseki in view of Pattisam, further in view of Månsson, and further in view of Mazzola et al (US 2009/0177853 A1).
Re claim 4, Koseki, Pattisam, and Månsson disclose the device of claim 1; furthermore, they disclose codewords, which are structures which are smaller than logical pages (Fig. 5). While these could arguably be called “pages”, in the interest of furthering compact prosecution, Examiner has provided Mazzola, which more clearly shows different logical and physical page sizes.
Mazzola discloses that the size of the logical page is different from that of a physical page in the physical address space (¶ 116). The logical page size is twice the size of a physical page.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention (AIA ) to modify the logical and physical pages of Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson) to have different sizes, as in Mazzola, because It would be applying a known technique to a known device ready for improvement to yield predictable results. Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson) discloses data storage including physical and logical pages, which is ready for the improvement of using different physical and logical page sizes. Mazzola discloses setting the logical page size as larger than the physical page size, which is applicable to the logical and physical pages of Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson). It would have been obvious to modify the physical and logical page sizes of Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson) so that logical pages are larger than physical pages, as in Mazzola, because it would yield the predictable result that physical pages could be programmed at a finer granularity than logical pages, thus allowing for programming of partial logical pages.
Re claim 5, Koseki, Pattisam, Månsson, and Mazzola disclose the device of claim 4, and Mazzola further discloses that the size of the logical pages is an Nth power of M times larger than that of the physical page, and wherein M is a positive integer greater than or equal to 1 and N is a positive integer greater than or equal to 2 (¶ 116). This limitation is indefinite, as noted above. Examiner interprets this to be a typographical error which should read that M >= 2 and N >= 1, since 2^1 = 2, and this would cause the logical page size to be at least twice the physical page size. Mazzola discloses that the logical pages are twice the size of physical pages.
Re claims 13-14, Koseki, Pattisam, Månsson, and Mazzola disclose the devices of claims 4-5 above, respectively. Accordingly, they also disclose methods implemented by those devices, as in claims 13-14, respectively (see Koseki, claim 15).
Re claim 20, Koseki, Pattisam, Månsson, and Mazzola disclose the device of claim 4 above. Accordingly, they also disclose a computer readable medium implementing the same functionality as that device, as in claim 20 (see Månsson, claim 29).
Claims 6, and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Koseki in view of Pattisam, further in view of Månsson, further in view of Funk (US 2012/0084531 A1).
Re claim 6, Koseki, Pattisam, and Månsson disclose the device of claim 1, and Koseki further discloses NAND blocks comprising a plurality of physical pages (¶ 6 and 96).
Månsson further discloses allocating […] consecutive physical pages (¶ 32). See claim above.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention (AIA ) to combine Koseki, Pattisam, and Månsson, for the reasons noted in claim 3 above.
Funk discloses the following:
The physical manager is further configured to: provide a plurality of workgroups (¶ 2). The storage system is partitioned into a plurality of partitions (workgroups),
each of the plurality of workgroups having a preset number of […] blocks (¶ 23). The plurality of partitions (workgroups) each contain a preset number of blocks;
each of the plurality of workgroups being separately used to perform an allocation operation for a different number of […] physical pages (¶ 2-3). Each partition is in charge of allocating pages between compressed and uncompressed portions of the partition;
and the plurality of workgroups being capable of performing the allocation operation in parallel (¶ 17-19). The respective logical partitions corresponding to the physical partitions are managed in parallel using partitioned logical resources, which may include sharing a single processor, or multiple processors. The management processes, including allocation of resources, is accordingly multithreaded, and thus “parallel”;
select a target […] block from a workgroup, among the plurality of workgroups, based on the first number of physical pages (¶ 25). Data is compressed, and moved into the compressed area, based on the number of pages required to store that data in compressed form. It is also noted that this claim language does explicitly require the number of pages in a NAND block to be more than one; accordingly, the pages of Funk can broadly be interpreted as “blocks”;
allocate the physical pages from the target […] block based on the first number of physical pages; and (¶ 32). The physical pages needed to store data that is compressed and moved to the compressed area are allocated to the compressed area;
allocate a new […] block to one of the plurality of workgroups based on all physical pages in one […] block in the workgroup being used (¶ 15). The statistics used to allocate new pages (new block) include whether compressed pages have been accessed (all physical pages in one […] block in the workgroup being used).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention (AIA ) to modify the compression system of Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson), to separate the memory into a plurality of partitions (workgroups), as in Funk, because it would be applying a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way. Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson) discloses compressing data and storing it in pages. Funk also discloses compressing data and storing it in pages, and has been improved in a similar way to the claimed invention, to logically divide the storage into a plurality of separately managed systems. It would have been obvious to modify the compression system of Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson) to logically divide the storage into partitions, as in Funk, because it would yield the predictable improvement of allowing the partitions to be managed and operated separately, thus increasing parallelism.
Re claim 15, Koseki, Pattisam, Månsson, and Funk disclose the device of claim 6 above. Accordingly, they also disclose a method implemented by that device, as in claim 15, respectively (see Koseki, claim 15).
Claims 8-9 and 17-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Koseki in view of Pattisam, further in view of Månsson, and further in view of Li (US 2022/0058136 A1).
Re claim 8, Koseki, Pattisam, and Månsson disclose the device of claim 1, but do not specifically disclose determining which blocks satisfy a collection condition based on the number of valid pages.
Li discloses the following:
The nonvolatile memory device comprises a solid-state drive (SSD) comprising a plurality of NAND blocks, and (¶ 59). The nonvolatile memory is an SSD comprising a plurality of NAND blocks;
wherein the physical page manager is further configured to: identify a number of valid physical pages which contain valid data for each of the plurality of NAND blocks (¶ 4, 52, and 59). The memory controller (physical page manager) conducts a garbage collection process, which involves identifying the number of valid pages in each NAND block (¶ 59). The NAND blocks correspond to physical block addresses, and sub-physical block addresses corresponding to specific locations (i.e. physical pages) in each NAND block (¶ 4 and 52);
identify, for a NAND block of the plurality of NAND blocks, whether the NAND block satisfies a collection condition based on a number of valid physical pages of the NAND block; and collect the NAND block based on the NAND block satisfying the collection condition (¶ 59). The blocks with a number of valid pages below a threshold (collection condition) are garbage collected.
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention (AIA ) to modify the compression system of Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson), utilize garbage collection as in Li, because it would be applying a known technique to a known device ready for improvement, to yield predictable results. Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson) discloses a storage system comprising logical and physical pages, which is ready for the improvement of using garbage collection. Li discloses garbage collection, which would be applicable to the logical and physical pages of the storage system of Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson). It would have been obvious to modify the storage of Koseki (combined with Pattisam and Månsson) to utilize garbage collection, as in Li, because it would yield the predictable result of recovering expired data and freeing up data blocks for reuse, thus increasing available memory resources.
Re claim 9, Koseki, Pattisam, Månsson, and Li disclose the device of claim 8, and Li further discloses the following:
the physical page manager is further configured to, based on the NAND block satisfying the collection condition: copy data in a valid physical page to a physical page in a NAND block that does not satisfy the collection condition; and (¶ 59). The valid pages in the collected blocks are copied to a destination page or block (NAND block that does not satisfy the collection condition);
generate a physical page number based on the physical page to which the data is copied, and wherein the flexible mapper is further configured to update a mapping relationship (¶ 59). The pages from the garbage collected blocks are written to the new page/block, and the mapping information is overwritten with the new mapping information (i.e. physical page number).
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention (AIA ) to combine Koseki, Pattisam, Månsson, and Li, for the reasons noted in claim 8 above.
Re claims 17-18, Koseki, Pattisam, Månsson, and Li disclose the devices of claims 8-9 above, respectively. Accordingly, they also disclose methods implemented by those devices, as in claims 17-18, respectively (see Koseki, claim 15).
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF ISSUES RAISED BY THE APPLICANT
Response to Amendment
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1-20 filed on 12/16/2025 have been fully considered, but are either not deemed persuasive, or are rendered moot in view of new grounds for rejection.
As required by M.P.E.P. § 707.07(f), a response to these arguments appears below.
ARGUMENTS CONCERNING 35 USC § 112(b) REJECTIONS
Re claims 1-20, Examiner notes Applicant’s amended claims dated 12/16/2025. In view of the amended claims, Examiner’s prior rejections under 35 USC § 112(b) have been maintained, for the reasons noted above.
ARGUMENTS CONCERNING PRIOR ART REJECTIONS
Claims must be given the broadest reasonable interpretation during examination and limitations appearing in the specification but not recited in the claim are not read into the claim (See M.P.E.P. 2111 [R-1]).
Re claims 1, 10, and 19, Applicant argues that Koseki and Månsson do not disclose the newly amended limitation “based on the first number of physical pages of the physical address space for storing the compressed data being less than a second number of physical pages required for storing the raw data, write the compressed data to the physical pages allocated by the physical page manager; based on the first number of physical pages not being less than the second number of physical pages, write the raw data to the physical pages”. In response, Applicant’s argument has been fully considered, but is not deemed persuasive. New reference Pattisam discloses comparing the uncompressed (raw) size to the compressed size, and bypassing compression and storing the uncompressed data when the compressed data is larger than the uncompressed data (col. 15, lines 46-65). It is noted that while Pattisam does not specifically mention pages, it would have been obvious to modify Pattisam to compare the sizes using any size granularity, including the page size of Koseki (combined with Månsson), because it would be a mere change in size (MPEP § 2144.04(IV)(A)).
Re claims 2-9, 11-18, and 20, Applicant argues that the claims are allowable by virtue of their dependence upon one of claims 1, 10, and 19 above, respectively. Accordingly, Applicant is directed to Examiner’s comments regarding claims 1, 10, and 19 above, respectively.
All arguments by the Applicant are believed to be covered in the body of the office action; thus, this action constitutes a complete response to the issues raised in the remarks dated 12/16/2025.
Conclusion
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.
Per the instant office action, claims 1-20 have received an action on the merits and are subject to a final rejection.
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/CRAIG S GOLDSCHMIDT/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2132