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 .
Election/Restrictions
Claims 21-24 are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to a nonelected invention, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on 05/04/2026.
Claims 21-24 are withdrawn. Claims 1-20 are pending.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on 10/21/2024, 11/12/2024, 02/27/2025, 01/22/2026, and 05/12/2026 were in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the Examiner.
Claim Objections
Claim 15 is objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 15 contains an extra space before the period in line 13, which appears to be a typographical error.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of 35 U.S.C. 112(a):
(a) IN GENERAL.—The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor or joint inventor of carrying out the invention.
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112:
The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor of carrying out his invention.
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), first paragraph, as failing to comply with the written description requirement. The claim(s) contains subject matter which was not described in the specification in such a way as to reasonably convey to one skilled in the relevant art that the inventor or a joint inventor, or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the inventor(s), at the time the application was filed, had possession of the claimed invention.
Claim 1 recites the limitation “evaluating a rate bucket to determine how to process I/O operations based upon available credits generated by the rate bucket from an I/O processing rate recommendation” in line 2. This limitation is not adequately supported by the disclosure such that one of ordinary skill in the art could reasonably conclude that the inventor had possession of the claimed invention. The disclosure contains no instance of evaluation of a rate bucket, let alone performing such evaluation of a rate bucket in order to determine how to process I/O operations based on available credits. In contrast, the Specification discloses that “rate buckets will be used to evaluate I/O operations” (Specification, ¶[0026]; see also ¶[0027], [0038], [0039], [0043]). That is, the Specification appears to disclose evaluation of I/O operations by rate buckets, not of rate buckets as claimed. Therefore, the disclosure does not support “evaluating a rate bucket to determine how to process I/O operations…” as claimed, and claim 1 is rejected accordingly. Claims 10 and 15 recite a similar limitation and are rejected under the same rationale. Claims 2-9, 11-14, and 16-20 are rejected as depending from claims 1, 10, and 15, respectively.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Banse et al. (U.S. Pat. 10,257,098) disclosed controlling the rate of packet flows using buckets tracking credits.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JOSEPH R MANIWANG whose telephone number is (571)270-7257. The examiner can normally be reached 8:30AM - 4:30PM.
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/JOSEPH R MANIWANG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2453
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