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 .
Status of Claims
Claims 1-20 remain pending and are ready for examination.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 19-20 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. The claims do not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter because the term “machine-readable storage media” can be directed to a transitory signal, carrier wave, or similar embodiment capable of storing information.
Regarding Claim 19, under a recent precedential opinion, the scope of the recited “machine-readable storage media” encompasses transitory media such as signals or carrier waves, where, as here the Specification does not limit the “machine-readable storage media” to non-transitory forms. See Ex parte Mewherter, 107 USPQ2d 1857, 1862. The claim in using the term “machine-readable storage media”, and the Spec does not appear to limit “machine-readable storage media” to non-transitory only embodiments. While examples are provided in paragraphs [0065] they are just examples and do not limit to non-transitory only embodiments.
Claim 20 rejected based on dependency.
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more.
Step 1:
Independent claim 1 recites a compute device, independent claim 9 recites a method, independent claim 19 recites a machine-readable storage media. Therefore, step 1 is satisfied for claims 1-18 wherein claims 19-20 is not satisfied.
Step 2A Prong One:
The claim(s) recite(s) mental process steps of:
construct, as a function of the data set, an index to determine whether a record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in the database (this step recite abstract mental processes that can be performed by the human mind or practicably with pen and paper. MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2)(II). The concept constructing data is a mental process (e.g., observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions) that is applied and performed in a computing environment—i.e., an abstract idea. See MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2)(I]); see also Elec. Power Grp., 830 F.3d at 1354 (“[A]nalyzing information by steps people go through in their minds, or by mathematical algorithms, without more, [are] essentially mental processes within the abstract-idea category.”’). );
determine, using the constructed index, whether an existing record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in a secondary table designated to contain temporary records associated with write requests from a predefined period; (this step recite abstract mental processes that can be performed by the human mind or practicably with pen and paper. MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2)(II). The concept of determining an existing of records is a mental process (e.g., observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions) that is applied and performed in a computing environment—i.e., an abstract idea. See MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2)(I]); see also Elec. Power Grp., 830 F.3d at 1354 (“[A]nalyzing information by steps people go through in their minds, or by mathematical algorithms, without more, [are] essentially mental processes within the abstract-idea category.”’). )
perform, in response to a determination that an existing record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in the secondary table, a corrective action to remediate concurrent writes to the database pertaining to the property of the entity. (this step recite abstract mental processes that can be performed by the human mind or practicably with pen and paper. MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2)(II). The concept of performing a corrective action feature is a mental process (e.g., observations, evaluations, judgments, and opinions) that is applied and performed in a computing environment—i.e., an abstract idea. See MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2)(I]); see also Elec. Power Grp., 830 F.3d at 1354 (“[A]nalyzing information by steps people go through in their minds, or by mathematical algorithms, without more, [are] essentially mental processes within the abstract-idea category.”’). )
Step 2A Prong Two:
The claim/s recites the combination of the additional elements, the additional elements in the claim are:
circuitry (in claim 1)
receive a request to write, to a primary table of a database, a data set pertaining to a property of an entity; (in all independent claims)
The bold elements above are directed to mere insignificant extra-solution activity. See MPEP 2106.04(d)(I) and 2106.05(g). The act of transmitting data based on the abstract idea fails to integrate the judicial exception into a practical application as it does not differ from those actions that have previously been held to be extra-solution activity, such as “presenting offers to potential customers and gathering statistics generated based on the testing about how potential customers responded to the offers; the statistics are then used to calculate an optimized price”, “selecting information, based on types of information and availability of information in a power-grid environment, for collection, analysis and display”, and “requiring a request from a user to view an advertisement and restricting public access.” The judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because the remaining additional elements amount to nothing more than generic components recited at a high-level of generality such that it amounts to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using generic computer components. See MPEP 2106.04(d)(I) and 2106.05(f).
Step 2B:
The claim(s) does/do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. As discussed above, the additional elements amount to nothing more than mere instructions to apply the exception using generic computer component(s) and insignificant extra-solution activity. These cannot provide an inventive concept, and thus the claims are patent-ineligible.
Claims 2-9, 11-18 and 20 directed to the same abstract idea without significantly more. The claims either recite an additional insignificant extra-solution activity OR recite an additional mental process to evaluate and judge using pen and paper. There are no additional elements recited in these claims that integrates the abstract idea into a practical application or amounts to significantly more than the abstract idea. Therefore, the claims are rejected under the same abstract idea as claim 1, 10 or 19.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
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 of this title, 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 factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied 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 333 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Anderson et al., U.S. Patent No: US 9092447 B1 (Hereinafter “Anderson”) in view of Colgrove et al., U.S. Patent No: US 8589640 B2 (Hereinafter “Colgrove”).
Regarding claim 1, Anderson discloses A compute device comprising:
circuitry (fig.3) configured to:
receive a request to write, to a primary table of a database, a data set pertaining to a property of an entity (see col.2 line [42-67], wherein receiving electronic data that comprises accounting data associated with one or more transactions and applying a Bloom filter using four hash functions to the character string. );
construct, as a function of the data set, an index to determine whether a record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in the database (see col.2 line [42-67], wherein creating a character string from a subset of the accounting data for each of the one or more transactions. Determining that a transaction is a potential suspected duplicate if each bit value read is equal to a first value; determining that the transaction is not a suspected duplicate if at least one bit value is not equal to the first value);
determine, using the constructed index, whether an existing record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in a secondary table designated (see col.2 line [42-67], wherein creating a character string from a subset of the accounting data for each of the one or more transactions. Determining that a transaction is a potential suspected duplicate if each bit value read is equal to a first value; determining that the transaction is not a suspected duplicate if at least one bit value is not equal to the first value. See also col.4); and
perform, in response to a determination that an existing record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in the secondary table, a corrective action to remediate concurrent writes to the database pertaining to the property of the entity (see col. 17-18, wherein corrective action (e.g. logging, adding to duplicate work queue, blocking/flagging, etc.)).
Anderson fail to explicitly discloses a secondary table designated to contain temporary records associated with write requests from a predefined period.
Colgrove discloses a secondary table designated to contain temporary records associated with write requests from a predefined period (see col.24 line [1-24], wherein the separate table may include a given level ID and a list of the page IDs stored within the given level ID. The given level ID corresponds to the second table with predefined period as claimed.).
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 system of Anderson to include the missing limitation above, as taught by Colgrove, since doing so would improve storage efficiency and may reduce overall costs. Further, improved efficiencies may in turn enable the use of more expensive storage technologies, which may provide improved performance (Colgrove; col.1 line [39-42]).
Regarding claim 2, Anderson in view of Colgrove further disclose wherein to determine, using the constructed index, whether a record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in the secondary table comprises to determine whether a record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in the secondary table after determining whether a record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in the primary table (Anderson, see col.2 line [42-67], wherein creating a character string from a subset of the accounting data for each of the one or more transactions. Determining that a transaction is a potential suspected duplicate if each bit value read is equal to a first value; determining that the transaction is not a suspected duplicate if at least one bit value is not equal to the first value. See also col.4. See Colgrove fig.2).
Regarding claim 3, Anderson in view of Colgrove further disclose wherein the circuitry is further configured to write a record indicative of the property of the entity to the secondary database table (see for example Colgrove, col. 24 line [1-24].).
Regarding claim 4, Anderson in view of Colgrove further disclose wherein the circuitry is further configured to write one or more records from the secondary table to the primary table after expiration of the predefined time period (see for example Colgrove, col. 24 line [1-24].).
Regarding claim 5, Anderson in view of Colgrove further disclose wherein to determine, using the constructed index, whether an existing record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in a secondary table designated to contain temporary records associated with write requests from a predefined period comprises to determine whether an existing record pertaining to the property of the entity is present in a secondary table designated to contain temporary records associated with write requests from a twenty four hour period (see Colgrove col.24 line [1-24], wherein the separate table may include a given level ID and a list of the page IDs stored within the given level ID.).
Regarding claim 6, Anderson in view of Colgrove further disclose wherein to perform the corrective action comprises to write a supplemental record to the secondary table with an indication that the supplemental record originated after the existing record that was determined to be present in the secondary table (see for example Colgrove, col. 24 line [1-24].).
Regarding claim 7, Anderson in view of Colgrove further disclose wherein to write the supplemental record with an indication that the supplemental record originated after the existing record comprises to write one or more of: (i) a record number defined based on a count of existing records pertaining to the entity and property in the secondary table; and/or (ii) a time stamp indicative of when the supplemental record is written to the secondary table (see for example Colgrove, col. 24 line [1-24].).
Regarding claim 8, Anderson in view of Colgrove further disclose wherein the circuitry is configured to: receive a request indicating discontinuance of a relationship with the entity; and write, to the database, data indicating discontinuance of a relationship with the entity (Anderson, see col. 18 line [5-20]. See also Colgrove col. 7 line [43-58]).
Regarding claim 9, Anderson in view of Colgrove further disclose wherein to write, to the database, data indicating discontinuance of a relationship with the entity comprises to write data indicating that an address of a customer is inactive as of a defined date (See also Colgrove col. 15 line [1-19], wherein in/valid entry (in/active)).
Claims 1-18 are rejected under the same rationale as claims 1-9.
Claims 19-20 are rejected under the same rationale as claims 1-2.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MAHER N ALGIBHAH whose telephone number is (571)272-0718. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday-Thursday.
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/MAHER N ALGIBHAH/Primary Examiner , Art Unit 2165