DETAILED ACTION
Claims 1-20 rejected under 35 USC § 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 .
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, 14, and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Koushik et al., U.S. Patent No. 11,068,136 B1 (hereinafter KOUSHIK), in view of Kairali et al., U.S. PG-Publication No. 2024/0126530 A1 (hereinafter KAIRALI).
Claim 1
KOUSHIK discloses a method for managing operation of a data processing system. Col. 51, ll. 42-63: Computer system 1300 implements the application delivery techniques using processors and system memory.
KOUSHIK discloses identifying, by a management controller of the data processing system, that a software compliance event for hardware resources of the data processing system has occurred. Col. 45, ll. 31-53: Reconciliation occurs automatically when an instance is rebuilt or restarts, or when agent’s scheduler initiates a periodic compliance check.
KOUSHIK discloses comparing, by the management controller, the list of applications to a required list of applications to identify whether any required applications are not hosted by the hardware resources. Col. 46, ll. 44-53: The local application delivery agent receives intended state information and uses information stored locally to determine whether actual state matches intended state. Col. 45, ll. 18-26: The intended list contains applications A, B, C, D, and E; the current list contains A, C, and E; the agent identifies B and D for reinstallation.
KOUSHIK discloses in an instance of the comparing where at least one of the required applications is not hosted by the hardware resources: initiating, by the management controller, installation of at least one of the required applications that is not hosted by the hardware resources to place the hardware resources into compliance with the required applications. Col. 46, ll. 54-67: If actual state does not match intended state, the local delivery agent initiates reconciliation workflows, including a workflow causing an application to be pushed to the device.
KOUSHIK discloses providing, by the hardware resources, at least a portion of computer implemented services using the at least one of the required applications. Col. 43, ll. 42-53: Application are restored through reinstallation workflows, after which the user “launches an application on the new instance.”
KOUSHIK does not expressly disclose based on the identifying of the software compliance event: identifying, by the management controller and using an observability entity, a list of applications hosted by the hardware resources.
KAIRALI discloses based on the identifying of the software compliance event: identifying, by the management controller and using an observability entity, a list of applications hosted by the hardware resources. ¶ 0029: An installed scanning agent collects information about software in the managed environment and reports it to a host service. ¶ 0073: Agent 252 identifies software programs and their components and sends that information to host process 250. ¶ 0101: Agent 422 can “identify the software within the hybrid environment 410 by name;” the resulting list includes an identifier for each program.
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the application inventory collection of JOUSHIK to incorporate the local scanning agent and software identity reporting taught by KAIRALI. One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to integrate the local scanning agent and software identity reporting into KOUSHIK, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to obtain the installed software inventory through local access and automatically reconcile compliance mismatches without user involvement, as taught by KAIRALI at ¶¶ 0007-0008.
Claim 14
Claim 14 is rejected utilizing the rationale for claim 1; the claim is directed to a medium storing instructions corresponding to the method.
Claim 18
Claim 18 is rejected utilizing the rationale for claim 1; the claim is directed to a system performing the method.
Claims 2, 15, and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over KOUSHIK, in view of KAIRALI, further in view of Chan et al., U.S. Patent No. 9,110,679 B1 (hereinafter CHAN).
Claim 2
CHAN discloses wherein the required list of applications is based on applications
installed on the hardware resources when the data processing system is manufactured. Col. 21, ll. 64-67; col. 22, ll. 1-15: Manufacturing tracking covers installed devices, including “all the device drivers and other, similar programs,” and preserves revision information. Col. 22, ll. 16-37: A system identifier links the manufactured system to production records. Software installation and changes before shipment are recorded, and the information is transferred to a BIOS database for later updates. Col. 24, ll. 45-58: Server lists derived from manufacturing tracking support repair and maintenance of individual machines.
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the required application list of KOUSHIK-KAIRALI to incorporate the manufacturing records of installed software into KOUSHIK-KAIRALI, with a reasonable expectation of success, In order to reduce restoration of software versions unsuited to the particular system by retaining its recorded configuration, an inferred benefit supported by CHAN at col. 22, ll. 1-37.
Claim 15
Claim 15 is rejected utilizing the rationale for claim 2; the claim is directed to a medium storing instructions corresponding to the method.
Claim 19
Claim 19 is rejected utilizing the rationale for claim 2; the claim is directed to a system performing the method.
Claims 3-4, 16-17, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over KOUSHIK, in view of KAIRALI, further in view of CHAN, further in view of Downum et al., U.S. PG-Publication No. 2021/0240491 A1 (hereinafter DOWNUM).
Claim 3
DOWNUM discloses wherein the identifying that the software compliance event is performed after the data processing system is sold by a manufacturer to an end user. ¶ 0027: Describes the initial configuration when the system was “shipped from the manufacturer” and subsequent changes or upgrades by a customer. ¶ 0045: Configuration records include hardware, software, and services “at the point of sale,” together with shipping date, country of purchase, software licenses, and warranty information. ¶ 0029: During later recovery, the system scans its current configuration, compares it with the configuration at sale, and determines whether compatible software is available when they differ.
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the timing of compliance event identification of KOUSHIK-KAIRALI-CHAN to incorporate operation during customer use after sale taught by DOMAIN. One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to integrate operation during customer use after sale into KOUSHIK-KAIRALI-CHAN, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to reduce recovery failures caused by configuration changes following delivery by checking and reconciling software needed for the customer’s system, as taught by DOWNUM at ¶¶ 0027-0029.
Claim 4
KAIRALI discloses wherein the end user is a legal entity, and an onboarding process is performed by an agent of the legal entity to initiate use of the data processing system by the end user. ¶ 0105: Required software controls may be provided “during an onboarding process of the software with the host platform.” ¶ 0106: A developer or owner receives an installation request and authorizes installation. The host process then triggers agent 422, which installs the software update within the hybrid environment.
Claim 16
Claim 16 is rejected utilizing the rationale for claim 3; the claim is directed to a medium storing instructions corresponding to the method.
Claim 17
Claim 17 is rejected utilizing the rationale for claim 4; the claim is directed to a medium storing instructions corresponding to the method.
Claim 20
Claim 20 is rejected utilizing the rationale for claim 3; the claim is directed to a system performing the method.
Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over KOUSHIK, in view of KAIRALI, further in view of CHAN, further in view of DOWNUM, further in view of Sood et al., U.S. PG-Publication No. 2024/0193066 A1 (hereinafter SOOD).
Claim 5
SOOD discloses wherein the onboarding process comprises removing, at least, the at least one of the required applications from hosting by the hardware resources. ¶ 0013: Application profile changes include “uninstalling an application from the device.” ¶ 0014: Corrective actions include “installing an application that was uninstalled from the device during the one or more application profile changes.”
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the onboarding application configuration of KOUSHIK-KAIRALI-CHAN-DOWNUM to incorporate application profile removal and corrective restoration taught by SOOD. One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to integrate application profile removal and corrective restoration into KOUSHIK-KAIRALI-CHAN-DOWNUM, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to reduce device downtime and support incidents caused by detrimental application profile changes through correction of those changes, as taught by SOOD at ¶ 0037.
Claims 6, 7, and 9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over KOUSHIK, in view of KAIRALI, further in view of Lagergren et al., U.S. PG-Publication No. 2012/0266169 A1 (hereinafter LAGERGREN).
Claim 6
LAGERGREN discloses after the identifying the occurrence of the software compliance event and prior to identifying the list of applications: initiating, by the management controller, performance of a conversion of natively hosted applications by the hardware resources to hosting in a new virtual entity. ¶ 0021: An appliance builder takes a JAVA application and can “convert the application into a virtual server image” deployable in a hypervisor. ¶ 0031: Computer 102 runs a general operating system whose file system contains application code, application data, and appliance configuration. ¶ 0032: Builder 106 uses the configuration to create virtual server image 116, including a bootloader and image file system. ¶ 0033: The image contains the application code and data and supports execution of that application in the virtual server.
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the application compliance workflow of KOUSHIK-KAIRALI to incorporate the application to virtual server conversion taught by LAGERGREN, initiating conversion after the compliance event and before identifying the resulting application inventory. One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to integrate application to virtual server conversion into KOUSHIK-KAIRALI, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to prepare portable virtual application environments efficiently and reduce their boot work by using the appliance builder, as taught by LAGERGREN at ¶ 0022.
Claim 7
LAGERGREN discloses wherein identifying the list of applications comprises: reading, by the observability entity, an image of the new virtual entity to identify each application hosted by the new virtual entity. ¶ 0063: The virtual server image contains a file system with application code and application data. Its updater includes a file system mounter. ¶ 0067: The updater “mounts the file system located within the virtual server image.” File system reading and writing may be implemented in the updater itself.
Claim 9
LAGERGREN discloses wherein the new virtual entity is a virtual machine, the reading of the image is facilitated by a hypervisor hosted by the hardware resources. ¶ 0050: A hypervisor operates between server hardware and its operating system, supports virtual servers, and receives virtual machine images containing applications. ¶ 0074: In one embodiment, “the updater is part of the hypervisor.”
KOUSHIK discloses the hypervisor is adapted to manage resource access by the virtual machine and the observability entity. Col. 16, ll. 1-23: Management processes create virtual machines, provision their resources, and may execute in a control plane or hypervisor. Components on the same node may communicate through local APIs.
Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over KOUSHIK, in view of KAIRALI, further in view of LAGERGREN, further in view of Ramaiah et al., U.S. PG-Publication No. 2024/0346125 A1 (hereinafter RAMAIA H).
Claim 8
RAMAIA H discloses wherein the occurrence of the software compliance event is a startup of the data processing system after completing onboarding to a domain of a new owner of the data processing system. ¶ 0063: A final owner contracts to acquire the endpoint, and an ownership change certificate documents the transfer. ¶ 0064: After taking possession, the final owner onboards the endpoint into deployment 100, including component validation. ¶ 0039: “Once onboarded,” the endpoint undergoes verification, including “at boot,” by comparing expected and actual configurations. ¶ 0085: After onboarding, similar checks may occur during later boots.
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the compliance event scheduling of KOUSHIK-KAIRALI-LAGERGREN to incorporate startup validation after onboarding to a new owner’s deployment taught by RAMAIA H. One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to integrate startup validation after onboarding into JOUSHIK-KAIRALI-LAGERGREN, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to maintain the endpoint’s ability to operate cooperatively within the deployment by repeating validation after onboarding, as taught by RAMAIA H at ¶¶ 0037 and 0039.
Claims 10 and 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over KOUSHIK, in view of KAIRALI, further in view of Itkin, U.S. PG-Publication No. 2016/0248619 A1 (hereinafter ITKIN).
Claim 10
ITKIN discloses wherein the data processing system comprises a network module adapted to separately advertise network endpoints for the management controller and the hardware resources of the data processing system, the network endpoints being usable by a server to address communications to the hardware resources using an in-band communication channel and the management controller using an out-of-band communication channel. ¶ 0014: A control server communicates management traffic with the BMC through the compute server’s network adapter and may also exchange data traffic with the host. ¶ 0029: Adapter filter 46 separates incoming host data packets from management packets using MAC or IP address rules. ¶ 0030: BMC 50 communicates through network adapter 40 and a “dedicated sideband channel 54” ¶ 0031: The BMC’s MAC address uniquely identifies it relative to other network elements. ¶ 0039: The control server addresses management packets using the BMC instance’s IP address; the adapter routes them using that IP address and the BMC MAC address. ¶ 0063: Management IP addresses may be static or dynamically obtained from DHCP. ¶ 0066: The adapter emulates separate NICs, allowing the control server to communicate separately with BMC instances.
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the local management and network communication architecture of KOUSHIK-KAIRALI to incorporate the shared network adapter and separately addressable management controller architecture taught by ITKIN. One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to integrate the shared network adapter and separately addressable management controller architecture into KOUSHIK-KAIRALI, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to provide a control server with independent management communication for associated hosts through one adapter, as taught by ITKIN at ¶¶ 0024 and 0066.
Claim 12
ITKIN discloses wherein the out-of-band communication channel runs through the network module, and the in-band communication channel that services the hardware resources also runs through the network module. ¶ 0049: Network adapter 40 handles bidirectional host data and management traffic. It directs host data to network communication interfaces 68 and management traffic to BMC 50. ¶ 0030: BMC 50 sends and receives management packets through network adapter 40 and dedicated sideband channel 54. ¶ 0037: Management traffic between the external control server and BMC passes through ports 44 of the network adapter 40 and sideband channel 54.
Claims 11 and 13 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over KOUSHIK, in view of KAIRALI, further in view of ITKIN, further in view of ZHANG et al., U.S. PG-Publication No. 2023/0205719 A1 (hereinafter ZHANG).
Claim 11
ZHANG discloses wherein the management controller and the network module are on separate power domains from the hardware resources so that the management controller and the network module are operable while the hardware resources are inoperable. ¶ 0007: When the host is powered off, power can remain applied to both the management controller and the PCIe slot containing the smartNIC. The host’s PCIe root complex is offline. ¶ 0045: When the host is off, an alternate sideband path connects the network interfaces to the management controller’s internal PCIe root complex. ¶ 0046: Circuitry detects host power loss and changes the connections so the management controller communicates with the network interfaces thorough the new sideband path.
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the management network architecture of KOUSHIK-KAIRALI-ITKIN to incorporate the independently powered controller and network module with an alternate management communication path taught by ZHANG. One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to integrate that power and communication arrangement into JOUSHIK-KAIRALI-ITKIN, with a reasonable expectation of success, as taught by ZHANG at ¶ 0048.
Claim 13
ZHANG discloses wherein the network module hosts a transmission control
protocol/internet protocol (TCP/IP) stack to facilitate network communications via the out-of-band communication channel. Network interface 106 supports communication using TCP/IP. ¶ 0038: The SmartNIC has an independent management domain, its own operating system, processor, memory, and remote access. ¶ 0044: A service executes on the network interface to access the management controller through its management connection.
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the management network implementation of KOUSHIK-KAIRALI-ITKIN to incorporate the SmartNIC management service architecture taught by ZHANG, implementing the service’s TCP/IP processing within the SmartNIC’s own software environment. One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to integrate that SmartNIC management service architecture into KOUSHIK-KAIRALI-ITKIN, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to preserve access to management services across changes in the host communication path, as taught by ZHANG at ¶ 0048.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to FRANK D MILLS whose telephone number is (571)270-3194. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9-5:30 CT.
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/FRANK D MILLS/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2194 September 28, 2026
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