DETAILED ACTION
This Office action has been issued in response to amendment filed December 10, 2025.
Claims 1, 5, 6, 16 and 17 have been amended. Claims 1-20 are pending. Applicant’s arguments are carefully and respectfully considered and some are persuasive, while others are not. Accordingly rejections have been removed where arguments were persuasive, but rejections have been maintained where arguments were not persuasive. Also, a new rejections based on the newly added amendments have been set forth. Accordingly, claims 1-20 are rejected and this action has been made FINAL, as necessitated by amendment.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s remarks and arguments directed to 35 USC 103 rejection, presented on 12/10/25 have been fully considered. Amended claims changed the scope of the claimed invention. The remarks and arguments are moot in view of the new ground of rejection presented in this office action.
Objection
The specification is objected to as failing to provide proper antecedent basis for the claimed subject matter. See 37 CFR 1.75(d)(1) and MPEP § 608.01(o). Correction of the following is required: the claim recited limitations “compute express link (CXL) or pooled memory system” are not defined in the original specification. Certainly, Applicant’s original application described data storage system include a compute express link (CXL) memory system or pooled memory system ([0030]). However, these does not define what constitute a “compute express link (CXL) or pooled memory system”. Any type of communication link can be compute express link (CXL), any type of retrieval or extract can be pool. The claim recited limitations are not disclosed in the original specification or does not defined in the claims. The claim, as best understood, has been rejected based on a teaching of the prior art.
Claim Rejections- 35 USC § 103
5. 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 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.
6. 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 may not be obtained though the invention is not identically disclosed or described as set forth in section 102 of this title, if the differences between the subject matter sought to be patented and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains. Patentability shall not be negatived by the manner in which the invention was made.
7. Claims 1-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Leu et al. (US 2016/0267141 A1; Filing date 11/26/2013), hereinafter Leu in view of Batsakis et al. (US 12,093,272 B1: Filing date: 04/29/2022 ), hereinafter Batsakis.
As for claim 1, Leu teaches a distributed processing system comprising: a storage device configured to store a database including a plurality of tables (see [0003], e.g., table stored in computing node);
a plurality of computing nodes configured to generate a target map of a first table indicating a mapping created by applying a target function to the first table among the plurality of tables, and divide a second table among the plurality of tables into a plurality of partitions; and……device accessible by the plurality of computing nodes and configured to store the target map of the first table (see [0003], e.g., tables or table partition are stored in multiple computing nodes, [0017], e.g., in a distributed database tables are connected by nodes, the tables can by A, B, C, [0018], e.g., nodes and table are communicatively connected, [0022], e.g., data accessed by a particular application, other tables that are also associated with that application. Distribute database tables and different nodes in a distributed database. Database tables that are regularly joined can be stored on a same node or transferred between nodes (e.g. across a network connection (plurality of computing nodes)),
wherein the plurality of computing nodes is configured to execute queries including a target operation using different partitions among the plurality of partitions of the second table and the target map (see [0016], e.g., performs queries requiring data from multiple database tables, the query joins the tables or other activities can be performed. If the tables do not reside on the same node, the tables that reside on remote nodes need to be transported across the network),
the target operation comprises a first join operation and a second join operation, and the plurality of computing nodes comprises, a first computing node configured to perform the first join operation by……identical entries from a first partition of the second table, and a second computing node configured to perform the second join operation by…….identical entries from a second partition of the second table (see [0003], e.g., tables or table partition are stored in multiple computing nodes, [0017], e.g., in a distributed database tables are connected by nodes, the tables can by A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I etc., contains first, second, third tables, nodes, distribute and redistribute, among nodes or storages. [0018], join tables or results sets can be moves across network, between nodes, [0022], e.g., database tables can be regularly joined on separate node, [0025], all database tables can have group name, an entry in this repository, [0026], tables can have rules or classification information, define expected behavior (identical) for the tables in the distributed database, [0032], all tables with the same group name will be partitioned into the same number of partitions (identical)).
Leu teaches the claimed invention including the limitations of device accessible by the plurality of computing nodes and configured to store the target map of the first table ([0017], [0022]), but does not explicitly teach the limitations of “a shared memory device accessible by the plurality of computing nodes and configured to store the target map of the first table; extracting only identical entries”. Although, Leu teaches share group name with partitions ([0030], ). However, in the same field of endeavor, Batsakis teaches “a shared memory device accessible by the plurality of computing nodes and configured to store the target map of the first table; extracting only identical entries” (see column 4, lines 48-67, field name “UserID” with a corresponding field value “12345” cause the system to field-search the machine data of events to identify events having that field-value pair. Each field name is associated with a corresponding extraction rule and a set of events to which that extraction rule applies, column 6, lines 22-34, shares computing resources, column 15, lines 1-11).
Leu and Batsakis both references teach features that are directed to analogous art and they are from the same field of endeavor, such as distributed databases includes tables and nodes, partitioning a logical division of data, data stream. Transferring data among the computing nodes in a network environment.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate Batsakis’s teaching to Leu’s system for storing raw data and performing analysis on that data later, which provide a greater flexibility, efficient retrieval and analysis. Thus, enables an analyst to analyze all of the generated data instead of only a fraction of it. An efficient data analysis help opportunities to derive new insights, saving storage capacity (see Batsakis, column 1, 45-59).
As for claim 16,
The limitations therein have substantially the same scope as claim 1 because claim 16 is a method claim for implementing those steps of claim 1. Therefore, claim 16 is rejected for at least the same reasons as claim 1.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate Batsakis’s teaching to Leu’s system for storing raw data and performing analysis on that data later, which provide a greater flexibility, efficient retrieval and analysis. Thus, enables an analyst to analyze all of the generated data instead of only a fraction of it. An efficient data analysis help opportunities to derive new insights, saving storage capacity (see Batsakis, column 1, 45-59).
As to claim 2, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein the storage device and the shared memory device are included in a data storage system (see Leu, [0003]; Also see, Batsakis, column 6, lines 22-34).
As to claim 3, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein the data storage system comprises a compute express link (CXL) memory system or a pooled memory system (see Leu, [0051]).
As to claim 4, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein each of the storage device and the shared memory device is a memory region partially allocated from the CXL memory system or the pooled memory system (see Leu, [0051]; Also see, Batsakis, column 6, lines 22-34).
As to claim 5, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
Wherein: the first computing node is configured to perform the first join operation using the first partition of the second table and the target map, and the second computing node is configured to perform the second join operation using the second partition of the second table and the target map (see Leu, [0003], [0016]-[0017]).
As to claim 6, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein: the first computing node is configured to perform the first join operation by looking up for the identical entries, a first entry identical to an entry of the first partition in the target map; and the second computing node is configured to perform the second join operation by looking up, for the identical entries, a second entry identical to an entry of the second partition in the target map (see Leu, [0017], [0022], [0032]).
As to claim 7, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein each of the first partition and the second partition includes partitions into which entries of the second table are randomly divided (see Leu, [0020]).
As to claim 8, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein: the target map comprises a first sub-target map and a second sub-target map; the first computing node is configured to generate the first sub-target map by applying the target function to a third partition of the first table; and the second computing node is configured to generate the second sub-target map by applying the target function to a fourth partition of the first table (see Leu, [0017], [0029]).
As to claim 9, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein elements included in entries of the third partition are disjoint from elements included in entries of the fourth partition (see Leu, [0029], [0032]).
As to claim 10, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein each of the first computing node and the second computing node is configured to access the shared memory device based on a virtual address corresponding to an entire storage region of the shared memory device (see Leu, [0029], [0032]).
As to claim 11, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein the first computing node and the second computing node are allocated a first storage region and a second storage region, respectively, among the entire storage region (see Leu, [0003]).
As to claim 12, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein: the first computing node is granted a read right to the entire storage region and a write right to the first storage region; and the second computing node is granted a read right to the entire storage region and a write right to the second storage region (see Leu, [0015], [0054]).
As to claim 13, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein: the first computing node is configured to, when accessing the second storage region, request the second computing node to translate a virtual address corresponding to the second storage region into a physical address of the second storage region; and the second computing node is configured to, when accessing the first storage region, request the first computing node to translate a virtual address corresponding to the first storage region into a physical address of the first storage region (see Leu, [0002], [0048], [0053]).
As to claim 14, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein a virtual address of the shared memory device is mapped one-to-one to a physical address corresponding to the entire storage region of the shared memory device (see Leu, [0002], [0017]).
As to claim 15, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein: the target function includes a hash function; and the target map includes a hash map generated by applying the hash function to the first table (see Leu, [0034]).
As to claim 17, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein: performing the first join operation comprises performing, by the first computing node, the first join operation by looking up, for the identical entries, a first entry identical to an entry of the first partition in the target map; and performing the second join operation comprises performing, by the second computing node, the second join operation by looking up, for the identical entries, a second entry identical to an entry of the second partition in the target map (see Leu, [0017], [0022], [0026], [0032]; Also see, Batsakis, column 15, lines 1-11).
As to claim 18, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein: generating the target map comprises dividing entries of the first table into a third partition and a fourth partition, generating, by the first computing node, a first sub-target map by applying the target function to the third partition, and generating, by the second computing node, a second sub- target map by applying the target function to the fourth partition; and elements included in entries of the third partition are disjoint from elements included in entries of the fourth partition (see Leu, [0017], [0029]).
As to claim 19, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
wherein storing the target map in the shared memory device comprises: flushing, by the first computing node, the first sub-target map to the shared memory device in response to a flush request; and flushing, by the second computing node, the second sub-target map to the shared memory device in response to the flush request (see Leu, [0017], [0048], [0051]).
As to claim 20, this claim is rejected based on the same reason as above to reject the claim above and are similarly rejected including the following:
Leu and Batsakis teaches:
further comprising: allocating a first storage region out of an entire storage region of the shared memory device to the first computing node; allocating a second storage region out of the entire storage region to the second computing node; granting a read right to the entire storage region and a write right to the first storage region to the first computing node; and granting a read right to the entire storage region and a write right to the second storage region to the second computing node (see Leu, [0015], [0054]).
Prior Arts
8. US 2019/0377813 A1 teaches groups of rows in tables are mapped into individual micro-partitions, organized in a columnar fashion. Granular pruning of very large tables, which can be comprised of millions, or even hundreds of millions, of micro-partitions. Metadata automatically gathered about all rows stored in a micro-partition, including: the range of values for each of the columns in the micro-partition; the number of distinct values ([0046]).
US 2019/0102408 A1 teaches a query router determines a target node to route a query to. The query router is a service, function, application, or other feature of, for example, a client application, a connection pool, a database listener, a software or hardware router, or a network switch. In an embodiment, the query router receives a database request, determines the target node, and forwards the database request to the target node ([0019]).
WO 2020/005808 A1 teaches multi-table partitions implemented in a key-value database. Partitioning scheme applied to identify which partition to access for the requests. (page 2).
Also see, EP 4610844, US 10642840, US 20150120698, US 20180322157, US 20210034598, US 20200334254, WO2005076160, US 20140181076, US 20200278967, US 20180075101, US 20190377813, US 20160026667, US 20190392047, US 20180075101, US 20190102408, US 20190102408, WO2018052519A1, US 20140379691, EP2342634B1, US 20160267141, US 20190146972, US 10289723, these references also read the claim recited limitation. These references are state of the art at the time of the claimed invention.
Conclusion
9. The examiner suggests, in response to this Office action, support being shown for language added to any original claims on amendment and any new claims. That is, indicate support for newly added claim language by specifically pointing to page(s) and line no(s) in the specification and/or drawing figure(s). This will assist the examiner in prosecuting the application (see 37 C.F.R. § 1.75(d)(1), 37 C.F.R. § 1.83(f)).
10. The prior art made of record on form PTO-892 and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Applicant is required under 37 C.F.R. § 1.111(c) to consider these references fully when responding to this action (see MPEP § 7.96). Applicant is advised to clearly point out the patentable novelty which he or she thinks the claims present, in view of the state of the art disclosed by the references cited or the objections made. He or she must also show how the amendments avoid such references or objections See 37 CFR 1.111(c).
11. Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). 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 extension fee 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 date of this final action.
12. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communication from the examiner should be directed to Daniel A Kuddus whose telephone number is (571) 270-1722. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday to Thursday 8.00 a.m.-5.30 p.m. The examiner can also be reached on alternate Fridays from 8.00 a.m. to 4.30 p.m.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor Boris Gorney can be reached on (571) 270-5626. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or processing is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from the either Private PAIR or Public PAIR. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only.
For more information about the PAIR system, see http://pair-direct.uspto.gov. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative or access to the automated information system, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/DANIEL A KUDDUS/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2154
02/20/26