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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on December 9, 2024 and October 2, 2025. The submissions are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Drawings
The drawings have been considered and accepted by the examiner.
Specification
The title, abstract, and specification have been considered and accepted by the examiner.
Double Patenting
The nonstatutory double patenting rejection is based on a judicially created doctrine grounded in public policy (a policy reflected in the statute) so as to prevent the unjustified or improper timewise extension of the “right to exclude” granted by a patent and to prevent possible harassment by multiple assignees. A nonstatutory double patenting rejection is appropriate where the conflicting claims are not identical, but at least one examined application claim is not patentably distinct from the reference claim(s) because the examined application claim is either anticipated by, or would have been obvious over, the reference claim(s). See, e.g., In re Berg, 140 F.3d 1428, 46 USPQ2d 1226 (Fed. Cir. 1998); In re Goodman, 11 F.3d 1046, 29 USPQ2d 2010 (Fed. Cir. 1993); In re Longi, 759 F.2d 887, 225 USPQ 645 (Fed. Cir. 1985); In re Van Ornum, 686 F.2d 937, 214 USPQ 761 (CCPA 1982); In re Vogel, 422 F.2d 438, 164 USPQ 619 (CCPA 1970); In re Thorington, 418 F.2d 528, 163 USPQ 644 (CCPA 1969).
A timely filed terminal disclaimer in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(c) or 1.321(d) may be used to overcome an actual or provisional rejection based on nonstatutory double patenting provided the reference application or patent either is shown to be commonly owned with the examined application, or claims an invention made as a result of activities undertaken within the scope of a joint research agreement. See MPEP § 717.02 for applications subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA as explained in MPEP § 2159. See MPEP § 2146 et seq. for applications not subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . A terminal disclaimer must be signed in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(b).
The filing of a terminal disclaimer by itself is not a complete reply to a nonstatutory double patenting (NSDP) rejection. A complete reply requires that the terminal disclaimer be accompanied by a reply requesting reconsideration of the prior Office action. Even where the NSDP rejection is provisional the reply must be complete. See MPEP § 804, subsection I.B.1. For a reply to a non-final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.111(a). For a reply to final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.113(c). A request for reconsideration while not provided for in 37 CFR 1.113(c) may be filed after final for consideration. See MPEP §§ 706.07(e) and 714.13.
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Claims 1-19 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1-18 of U.S. Patent No. 12,164,796. Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because the claims of the present application are broader than the claims of the ‘796 patent and would therefore be obvious.
Present application
US 12,164,796
1. A storage device comprising:
non-volatile storage;
a controller of the storage device configured to:
receive a copy command from a host to copy data from a separate source device to the storage device,
send a read request for the data to the source device pursuant to the copy command from the host,
transfer the data from the source device to the storage device pursuant to the read request from the storage device, and
write the data to the non-volatile storage of the storage device.
9. A destination device, comprising:
buffers;
a non-volatile storage; and
a controller configured to:
receive a copy request from a host;
send a read request to the source device;
…
perform transfer with a source device to transfer data from the buffer of a source device to the buffers of the destination device; and
write the data to the non-volatile storage.
2. The storage device of claim 1, wherein the copy command specifies a namespace of the data.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein the copy request defines one or more of:
at least one namespace of the data on the source device; …
3. The storage device of claim 1, wherein the copy command specifies a logical address of the data.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein the copy request defines one or more of:
…
at least one start logical address of the data on the source device; …
7. The storage device of claim 1, further comprising buffers, wherein transferring the data from the source data to the storage device includes transferring data from buffers of the source device to the buffers of the storage device.
9. …
perform transfer with a source device to transfer data from buffers of a source device to the buffers of the destination device.
8. The storage device of claim 7, wherein transferring the data further includes:
communicating with the source device to set up filling of the buffers of the source device comprises sending a message to the source device; and
the message comprises at least one of the namespace of the data on the source device, a start logical address of the data on the source device, and a length of the data.
4. The method of claim 3, wherein
communicating with the source device to set up filling of the buffers of the source device comprises sending a message to the source device; and
the message comprises at least one of the namespace of the data on the source device, a start logical address of the data on the source device, and a length of the data.
9. The storage device of claim 8, wherein the source device fills the buffers with chunks of data, and one or more of the chunks of data are transferred simultaneously.
3. The method of claim 2, further comprising…
wherein the source device fills the buffers with chunks of data, and one or more of the chunks of data are transferred simultaneously.
10. The storage device of claim 8, wherein the buffers include a reserved area, and wherein sending the message to the source device comprises writing the message to the reserved area of the buffer using the address of the reserved area.
5. The method of claim 4, wherein
the copy request further defines an address of a reserved area of a buffer of the destination device; and
sending the message to the source device comprises writing the message to the reserved area of the buffer using the address of the reserved area.
11. The storage device of claim 7, wherein
the buffers of the source device comprise buffers accessible to the storage device;
the buffers of the storage device comprise write buffers inaccessible to the source device; and
performing the transfer with the source device to transfer the data from the buffers of the source device to the buffers of the storage device comprises the controller of the storage device performing a read operation to read a chunk of the data in each of the buffers accessible to the storage device into a corresponding one of the write buffers inaccessible to the source device.
6. The method of claim 1, wherein
the buffers of the source device comprise buffers accessible to the destination device;
the buffers of the destination device comprise write buffers inaccessible to the source device; and
performing the transfer with the source device to transfer the data from the buffers of the source device to the buffers of the destination device comprises performing, by the destination device, a read operation to read a chunk of the data in each of the buffers accessible to the destination device into a corresponding one of the write buffers inaccessible to the source device
12. The storage device of claim 11, wherein
the buffers accessible to the storage device are Controller Memory Buffer (CMB) or Persistent Memory Region (PMR) buffers.
7. The method of claim 6, wherein
The buffers accessible to the destination device are Controller Memory Buffer(CMB) or Persistent Memory Region (PMR) buffers;…
13. The storage device of claim 7, wherein
the buffers of the source device comprise read buffers inaccessible to the storage device;
the buffers of the storage device comprise buffers accessible to the source device; and
performing the transfer with the source device to transfer the data from the buffers of the source device to the buffers of the storage device comprises the controller of the storage device receiving a chunk of the data in each of the buffers accessible to the source device from a corresponding one of the read buffers inaccessible to the storage device via a write operation performed by the source device.
8. The method of claim 1, wherein
the buffers of the source device comprise read buffers inaccessible to the destination device;
the buffers of the destination device comprise buffers accessible to the source device; and
performing the transfer with the source device to transfer the data from the buffers of the source device to the buffers of the destination device comprises receiving, by the destination device, a chunk of the data in each of the buffers accessible to the source device from a corresponding one of the read buffers inaccessible to the destination device via a write operation performed by the source device.
Claims 14-19 are directed to the method performed by the device of claims 1-13 and would thus be obvious over the same limitations of the ‘796 patent.
Claims 4-6 do not have corresponding limitations in the ‘796 patent but are directed to components of the device that are obvious for all networked computer storage devices.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-9, 14 and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by US PGPub 2019/0065382 to Velayuthaperumal et al. (“Velayuthaperumal”).
Regarding claim 1, Velayuthaperumal discloses a storage device comprising:
non-volatile storage (see fig. 2, flash memory 144);
a controller of the storage device (see fig. 1, controller circuit 106) configured to:
receive a copy command from a host to copy data from a separate source device to the storage device (see fig. 7 and paragraph 58, a copy back command is received from the host by second storage device 110B),
send a read request for the data to the source device pursuant to the copy command from the host (see fig. 7 and paragraph 58, the second storage device 110B issues a second copy back command to the first storage device 110A),
transfer the data from the source device to the storage device pursuant to the read request from the storage device (see fig. 7 and paragraph 58, a data transferred is commenced in which the requested data are transferred from the first device to the second device), and
write the data to the non-volatile storage of the storage device (see fig. 7 and paragraph 58).
Regarding claim 14, Velayuthaperumal discloses the method performed by the device of claim 1.
Regarding claim 2, Velayuthaperumal discloses the storage device, wherein the copy command specifies a namespace of the data (see paragraph 48, the destination ID value of the command can be a NVMe namespace value).
Regarding claim 3, Velayuthaperumal discloses the storage device, wherein the copy command specifies a logical address of the data (see paragraphs 47-48, the command includes a logical address).
Regarding claim 4, Velayuthaperumal discloses the storage device, wherein the non-volatile storage comprises NAND flash memory (see fig. 2 and paragraph 38).
Regarding claim 5, Velayuthaperumal discloses the storage device, further comprising a network interface for communicating with the host and the storage device (see paragraph 21, the storage devices may be formed in a storage cloud environment).
Regarding claim 6, Velayuthaperumal discloses the storage device, wherein the network interface comprises an Ethernet interface (see paragraph 48, the destination ID of the storage device can be an Ethernet address).
Regarding claim 7, Velayuthaperumal discloses the storage device, further comprising buffers (write cache 240, see fig. 8), wherein transferring the data from the source device to the storage device includes transferring data from buffers of the source device (read buffer 226, see fig. 8) to buffers of the storage device (see paragraph 70).
Regarding claim 8, Velayuthaperumal discloses the storage device, wherein transferring the data further includes:
communicating with the source device to set up filling of the buffers of the source device comprises sending a message to the source device (see fig. 7, the copy back command is sent from the second storage device to the first storage device); and
the message comprises at least one of a namespace of the data on the source device, a start logical address of the data on the source device, and a length of the data (see paragraph 47 and 48).
Regarding claim 9, Velayuthaperumal discloses the storage device wherein the source device fills the buffers with chunks of data and one or more chunks of data are transferred simultaneously (see paragraph 89, multiple source devices can operate concurrently to copy data to a destination device).
Regarding claim 15, Velayuthaperumal discloses the method, wherein transferring the data comprises:
communicating with the source device to set up filling of the buffers of the source device (see fig. 7, the copy back command is sent from the second storage device to the first storage device); and
performing, by the source device, transfer with the destination device to transfer the data from buffers of the source device to buffers of the destination device (see paragraph 70).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 10-13 and 16-19 would be allowable if rewritten to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims and if the double patenting rejection were overcome.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
The prior art does not disclose or suggest the buffers including a reserved area where messages sent to the source device are written to. The prior art also does not disclose the source and storage devices comprising buffers being accessible or inaccessible to the other device. Velayuthaperumal discloses the devices interfacing through a front end without direct connection access to the buffers. There is nothing to suggest any obvious reason why the buffers should be accessible or inaccessible.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DANIEL D TSUI whose telephone number is (571)270-3253. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 8am-4pm.
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/DANIEL D TSUI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2132