DETAILED ACTION
Remarks
This communication is in response to the amendment/arguments filed on May 26, 2026 has been fully considered. The rejection is made final. Claims 1-20 are pending for examination.
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
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.
Examiner Notes
Examiner cites particular columns and line numbers in the references as applied to the claims below for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested that, in preparing responses, the applicant fully consider the references in entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the examiner.
The examiner requests, in response to this Office action, supports are 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.
When responding to this office action, 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).
Information Disclosure Statement
As required by M.P.E.P. 609(C), the applicant’s submissions of the Information Disclosure Statements dated July 22, 2026 is acknowledged by the examiner and the cited references have been considered in the examination of the claims now pending. As required by M.P.E.P 609 C (2), a copy of the PTOL-1449 initialed and dated by the examiner is attached to the instant office action.
Response to Amendment
Objection to claim(s) 7 imposed in the previous office action has been withdrawn because of the amendment to the claim(s).
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments/amendment filed on March 2, 2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of amended claim(s) 11-19 under 35 U.S.C. § 101 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn.
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1-20 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 have been considered but are moot in view of Tracey et al. (US Patent No. 12,632,436 B1).
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 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 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 11, 13, 14, 16 and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bhadkaria et al. (US Patent No. 9,720,930 B2, ‘Bhadkaria’, hereafter) in view of Miller et al. (US Patent Publication No. 2020/0201854, ‘Miller’, hereafter) and further in view of Tracey et al. (US Patent No. 12,632,436 B1, ‘Tracey’, hereafter).
Regarding claim 1. Bhadkaria teaches a method for indexing data in an event logging system a log indexing system for indexing log data generated by one or more computers (Bhadkaria, Abstract, Col 3, lines 5-40), comprising:
providing a data file for storing a set of log data (The travel management system thus provides an efficient framework for storing and organizing data related to a trip, and further, for efficient sharing of data from a client to the database and vice-versa (i.e., storing and indexing trip log files), Bhadkaria, Col 4, lines 20-23);
arranging the set of log data as a plurality of key-value pairs in the summary index (The database may include data organized in a trip data store table including unique keys respectively identifying trips. The database may further include index tables related to attributes of the trips and identified by the unique keys (i.e., arranging the set of log data as a plurality of key-value pairs in the summary index), Bhadkaria, Col 2, line 65 – Col 3, line 2, Col 5, lines 39-57, Col 6, lines 46-67);
Bhadkaria does not teach
generating a summary index associated with the data file;
analyzing each key of the key-value pairs to select, based on characteristics of the key, a corresponding index of the plurality of indexes in the summary index for adding each value of the key-value pairs;
However, Miller teaches
generating a summary index associated with the data file (Miller Fig. 7, item 704 discloses a corresponding summary table is generated, based on hash values of the hash table (i.e., generating a summary index associated with the data file), Miller [0236]);
analyzing each key of the key-value pairs to select, based on characteristics of the key, a corresponding index of the plurality of indexes in the summary index for adding each value of the key-value pairs (Miller [0204-0205]); and
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made having the teachings of Bhadkaria and Miller before him/her, to modify Bhadkaria with the teaching of Miller’s dynamically resizable structures for approximate membership queries. One would have been motivated to do so for the benefit of tracking deletion and addition of items of the table and summary table through the first indicators. (Miller, Abstract).
Bhadkaria and Miller do not teach
determining, in response to a search of the plurality of indexes in the summary index, whether to skip the data file without accessing the data file, wherein skipping the data file avoids loading the data file into memory and scanning the data file for matches.
However, Tracey teaches
determining, in response to a search of the plurality of indexes in the summary index, whether to skip the data file without accessing the data file, wherein skipping the data file avoids loading the data file into memory and scanning the data file for matches (Tracey, Col 3, lines 54-65, Col 4, line 53 – Col 5, line 7).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made having the teachings of Bhadkaria, Miller and Tracey before him/her, to further modify Bhadkaria with the teaching of Tracey’s adaptive indexing system that dynamically selects index keys based on observed query statistics. One would have been motivated to do so for the benefit of improving indexing techniques by autonomously selects a small set of the most frequently used query keys in the index, which limits the size of the index without sacrificing query performance (Tracey, Abstract, Col 1, lines 5-35).
Regarding claim 3. Bhadkaria teaches, wherein the summary index stores a number of unique keys that is less than or equal to a first threshold (Bhadkaria, Col 6, lines 17-56).
Regarding claim 4. Bhadkaria does not teach, wherein the plurality of indexes in the summary index includes a dictionary encoded index, a probabilistic index, and a numeric index (Miller [0205], [0245], [0249]).
Regarding claim 6. Bhadkaria as modified teaches, wherein the numeric index is configured to store values of numeric only key-value pairs in the numeric index (Miller [0245]).
Regarding claim 7. Bhadkaria as modified teaches, wherein the probabilistic index is configured to store values that repeat under a same key more than a third threshold (Miller [0249]).
Regarding claim 11. Bhadkaria teaches a log indexing system for indexing log data generated by one or more computers (Bhadkaria, Abstract, Col 3, lines 5-40), comprising:
a persistent storage that stores at least one data file that includes main data to be indexed, the main data arranged according to a predetermined structure (The travel management system thus provides an efficient framework for storing and organizing data related to a trip, and further, for efficient sharing of data from a client to the database and vice-versa (i.e., a data repository that stored at least one data file that includes main data to be indexed). The travel management system further provides for efficient handling of large sets of unstructured data, elastic scalability in management of rapid growth of data (i.e., main data arranged according to a predetermined structure), Bhadkaria, Col 4, lines 20-27. The database may include multiple index tables, such as, for example, a location index table, an image index table, and a landmark index table, Bhadkaria, Col 6, lines 17-45);
Bhadkaria does not teach
a summary index associated with the data file, the summary index including a plurality of indexes that hold values of a plurality of key-value pairs, wherein each key of the key-value pairs is analyzed to select, based on characteristics of the key, a corresponding index of the plurality of indexes for adding each value of the key-value pairs,
However, Miller teaches
a summary index associated with the data file, the summary index including a plurality of indexes that hold values of a plurality of key-value pairs, wherein each key of the key-value pairs is analyzed to select, based on characteristics of the key, a corresponding index of the plurality of indexes for adding each value of the key-value pairs (Miller [0204-0205], [0232] and Figs 4-6), and
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made having the teachings of Bhadkaria and Miller before him/her, to modify Bhadkaria with the teaching of Miller’s dynamically resizable structures for approximate membership queries. One would have been motivated to do so for the benefit of tracking deletion and addition of items of the table and summary table through the first indicators. (Miller, Abstract).
Bhadkaria and Miller do not teach
wherein the summary index is configured to enable skipping the at least one data file without accessing the at least one data file in response to a search of the plurality of indexes in the summary index by an external search system, wherein skipping the at least one data file avoids loading the at least one data file into memory and scanning the at least one data file for matches.
However, Tracey teaches
wherein the summary index is configured to enable skipping the at least one data file without accessing the at least one data file in response to a search of the plurality of indexes in the summary index by an external search system, wherein skipping the at least one data file avoids loading the at least one data file into memory and scanning the at least one data file for matches (Tracey, Col 3, lines 54-65, Col 4, line 53 – Col 5, line 7).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made having the teachings of Bhadkaria, Miller and Tracey before him/her, to further modify Bhadkaria with the teaching of Tracey’s adaptive indexing system that dynamically selects index keys based on observed query statistics. One would have been motivated to do so for the benefit of improving indexing techniques by autonomously selects a small set of the most frequently used query keys in the index, which limits the size of the index without sacrificing query performance (Tracey, Abstract, Col 1, lines 5-35).
Regarding claims 13, 14, 16 and 17, the method steps of claims 3, 4, 6 and 7 substantially encompass the system recited in claims 13, 14, 16 and 17. Therefore, claims 13, 14, 16 and 17 are rejected for at least the same reason as claims 3, 4, 6 and 7 above.
Claims 2 and 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bhadkaria et al. (US Patent No. 9,720,930 B2, ‘Bhadkaria’, hereafter) in view of Miller et al. (US Patent Publication No. 2020/0201854, ‘Miller’, hereafter) in view of Tracey et al. (US Patent No. 12,632,436 B1, ‘Tracey’, hereafter) and further in view of Moser et al. (European Patent Application No. EP 4086771 A1, ‘Moser’, hereafter).
Regarding claim 2. Bhadkaria, Miller and Tracey do not teach, wherein analyzing each key of the key-value pairs further comprises determining a cardinality and a type of each value.
However, Moser teaches wherein analyzing each key of the key-value pairs further comprises determining a cardinality and a type of each value (receiving a second key-value pair of interest; determining cardinality of dimension sets containing value of datum in the first key-value pair; determining cardinality of an intersection of dimension sets containing value of datum in the first key-value pair and dimension sets containing value of datum in the second key-value pair; and calculating an overlap score by dividing the cardinality of the intersection by the cardinality of the dimension sets containing value of datum in the first key-value, wherein the overlap score is indicative of a relationship between the first key-value pair of interest and the second key-value pair of interest (i.e., analyzing each key of the key-value pairs further comprises determining a cardinality and a type of each value), Moser [0052]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made having the teachings of Bhadkaria, Miller, Tracey and Moser before him/her, to further modify Bhadkaria with the teaching of Moser’s method and systems for the on-demand generation of graph-like models out of multidimensional observation data. One would have been motivated to do so for the benefit of interpretating monitoring artifacts, like unexpected monitoring data potentially unrelated monitoring data sources, deployed to an observed environment, into one unified monitoring data space (Moser, Abstract).
Regarding claim 12, the method steps of claim 2 substantially encompass the system recited in claim 12. Therefore, claim 12 is rejected for at least the same reason as claim 2 above.
Claims 5, 8, 15 and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bhadkaria et al. (US Patent No. 9,720,930 B2, ‘Bhadkaria’, hereafter) in view of Miller et al. (US Patent Publication No. 2020/0201854, ‘Miller’, hereafter) in view of Tracey et al. (US Patent No. 12,632,436 B1, ‘Tracey’, hereafter) and further in view Araki et al. (US Patent Publication No. 2014/0129567 A1, ‘Araki’, hereafter).
Regarding claim 5. Bhadkaria, Miller and Tracey do not teach, wherein the dictionary encoded index is configured to store a maximum number of key-value pairs of the plurality of key-value pairs that is less than or equal to a second threshold.
However, Araki teaches wherein the dictionary encoded index is configured to store a maximum number of key-value pairs of the plurality of key-value pairs that is less than or equal to a second threshold (Araki [0085], [0088]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made having the teachings of Bhadkaria, Miller, Tracey and Araki before him/her, to further modify Bhadkaria with the teaching of Araki’s system for generating an index that is resistant against divulging of information, an index generation device, and a method therefor. One would have been motivated to do so for the benefit of generating an index that is resistant against divulging of information (Araki, Abstract, [0001]).
Regarding claim 8. Bhadkaria as modified teaches, wherein a key of the plurality of key-value pairs that do not have values that repeat under the key more than the third threshold are indexed in a not- indexed list (Araki [0085], [0088]).
Regarding claims 15 and 18, the method steps of claims 5 and 8 substantially encompass the system recited in claims 15 and 18. Therefore, claims 15 and18 are rejected for at least the same reason as claims 5 and 8 above.
Claims 9 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bhadkaria et al. (US Patent No. 9,720,930 B2, ‘Bhadkaria’, hereafter) in view of Miller et al. (US Patent Publication No. 2020/0201854, ‘Miller’, hereafter) in view of Tracey et al. (US Patent No. 12,632,436 B1, ‘Tracey’, hereafter) and further in view of Borthakur et al. (US Patent No. 11,030,242 B1, ‘Borthakur’, hereafter).
Regarding claim 9. Bhadkaria, Miller and Tracey do not teach, further comprising:
storing a count of a number of values of each key in a dedicated field of the summary index.
However, Borthakur teaches
storing a count of a number of values of each key in a dedicated field of the summary index (Borthakur, Col 14, lines 47-61).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made having the teachings of Bhadkaria, Miller, Tracey and Borthakur before him/her, to further modify Bhadkaria with the teaching of Borthakur’s indexing and querying semi-structured documents using a key-value store. One would have been motivated to do so for the benefit of efficient querying of information stored in the documents, indexing semi-structured documents using a key-value store (Borthakur, Abstract, Col 1, lines 5-10).
Regarding claim 19, Bhadkaria as modified teaches, further comprising a key count field that stores count of a number of values of each key (Borthakur, Col 14, lines 47-61).
Claim 20 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Miller et al. (US Patent Publication No. 2020/0201854, ‘Miller’, hereafter) in view Chen et al. (US Patent Publication No. 2017/0154099 A1, ‘Chen’, hereafter) and further in view of Tracey et al. (US Patent No. 12,632,436 B1, ‘Tracey’, hereafter).
Regarding claim 20. Miller teaches a computer-implemented method for performing a database search on log data generated by one or more computers (a summary table that corresponds to a hash table, for efficient and deterministic searching (Hash tables find wide use for associative arrays, database indexing, data deduplication, and other data structures and tasks involving large amounts of data and key-value pairs (i.e., hash tables works with database), [0002]), Miller [0034]), comprising:
executing a search request (The summary table is constructed, based on the hash values of the hash table, and then later used for searching for a hash value of interest (i.e., executing a search request), Miller [0034]. Consider a search in a summary table for a bucket that matches the bucket address value, prefix value and signature value, i.e., the bits of the bucket address field, prefix field and signature field. By contrast to a Bloom filter, a first aspect of the summary table is that, if such a search finds such a bucket (i.e., executing a search request), Miller [0232]);
accessing a summary index in a summary index file that holds a key and values of the key (The summary table is constructed, based on the hash values of the hash table, and then later used for searching for a hash value of interest. In some embodiments have multiple summary tables and multiple hash tables, and multiple levels of summary tables and multiple levels of hash tables and hash table has key/value pairs … each key/value pair having an entry in the hash table as appropriate to the nature of the key/value pair … the hash table is constructed by adding keys one at a time to locations corresponding to the hash value of the key (i.e., accessing a dictionary index in a summary index file that holds a key and values of the key), Miller [0204-0205], [0232] and Figs 4-6);
analyzing each key of the key-value pairs to select, based on characteristics of the key, a corresponding index of the plurality of indexes in the summary index for adding each value of the key-value pairs (Miller [0204-0205]); and
Miller does not teach
generating a Bloom filter in response to the number of values for the key exceeding a predetermined threshold;
However, Chen teaches
generating a Bloom filter in response to the number of values for the key exceeding a predetermined threshold (modifying at least a portion of the plurality of Bloom filters to create a modified Bloom filter array comprising a modified plurality of Bloom filters each of which having a same size, wherein the same size is greater than the size of the first Bloom filter … duplicating the first Bloom filter to create a modified first Bloom filter comprising two or more concatenated copies of the first Bloom filter and the size of the Bloom filters may be defined so as to ensure that the false positive rate may be below a predetermined maximal threshold. In some cases, one Bloom filter may encode a smaller number of items than a second Bloom filter, and in view of the maximal false positive rate threshold requirement, the second Bloom filter may be of a larger size than the first Bloom filter (i.e., generating a Bloom filter in response to the number of values for the key exceeding a predetermined threshold));
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made having the teachings of Miller and Chen before him/her, to modify Miller with the teaching of Chen’s efficient lookup in multiple bloom filters. One would have been motivated to do so for the benefit of efficient lookup in multiple bloom filters by performing lookup in the Bloom filter array by computing a hash value of a key and accessing a bit in the hash value location in each Bloom filter of the modified Bloom filter array to determine lookup outcome in each Bloom filter (Chen, Abstract).
Miller and Chen do not teach
determining, in response to a search of the plurality of indexes in the summary index, whether to skip the data file without accessing the data file, wherein skipping the data file avoids loading the data file into memory and scanning the data file for matches.
However, Tracey teaches
determining, in response to a search of the plurality of indexes in the summary index, whether to skip the data file without accessing the data file, wherein skipping the data file avoids loading the data file into memory and scanning the data file for matches (Tracey, Col 3, lines 54-65, Col 4, line 53 – Col 5, line 7).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made having the teachings of Miller, Chen and Tracey before him/her, to further modify Miller with the teaching of Tracey’s adaptive indexing system that dynamically selects index keys based on observed query statistics. One would have been motivated to do so for the benefit of improving indexing techniques by autonomously selects a small set of the most frequently used query keys in the index, which limits the size of the index without sacrificing query performance (Tracey, Abstract, Col 1, lines 5-35).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 10 is objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims and overcome any objection and/or any rejection of the claims.
If the Applicant agreed to the allowable subject matter, Examiner respectfully request the Applicant to make the similar modification to the other independent claims.
Conclusion
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 nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) 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 mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to HASANUL MOBIN whose telephone number is (571)270-1289. The examiner can normally be reached on 9AM to 6:00PM EST M-F.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Charles Rones can be reached at 571-272-4085. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding 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 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.
/HASANUL MOBIN/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2168
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