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 .
Claims 1-20 are presented for examination.
Priority
The claim for priority from US Provisional 63/637,297 filed on 22 April 2024 is duly noted.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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, 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.
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.
Claim(s) 1-11 and 15-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yang et al. (US 2021/0312065 A1 and Yang hereinafter) and Chu et al. (US 2023/0396619 A1 and Chu hereinafter).
As to claims 1, 11, and 20, Yang discloses a system and method for universal access layer for accessing heterogeneous data stores, the system and method having:
receiving, from an endpoint device (second computing device), a request to perform at least one data operation (read request) associated with at least one datastore (0018, lines 12-13, 19-23; 0019, lines 9-11; 0032, lines 5-6);
identifying, based on the request, a data abstraction layer instance (validation ADO) (0036, lines 2-3, 10-13; 0037, lines 13-16; 0042, lines 1-3);
transmitting the request to the data abstraction layer instance, wherein the data abstraction layer instance performs the at least one data operation upon receiving the request (0036, lines 2-3, 10-13; 0037, lines 13-16; 0042, lines 1-3);
receiving at least one response from the data abstraction layer instance based on the at least one data operation (0050, lines 1-4); and
transmitting the at least one response to the endpoint device (0050, lines 36-39).
Yang fails to specifically disclose:
implemented by the data gateway.
Nonetheless, this feature is well known in the art and would have been an obvious modification of the teachings disclosed by Yang, as taught by Chu.
Chu discloses a system and method for anonymous rate limiting for services, the system and method having:
implemented by the data gateway (0040).
Given the teaching of Chu, a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have readily recognized the desirability and advantages of modifying the teachings of Yang with the teachings of Chu by using a gateway. Chu recites motivation by disclosing that a gateway is used to provide an abstraction layer in order to securely manage communications (0040). It is obvious that the teachings of Chu would have improved the teachings of Yang by using a gateway in order to securely manage communications.
As to claims 2 and 15, Yang discloses:
wherein the data abstraction layer instance includes security logic to perform an authentication with the at least one datastore (0029, lines 2-7).
As to claims 3 and 16, Yang discloses:
receiving at least one first authentication credential from the endpoint device (0030, lines 18-21);
validating the at least one first authentication credential (0030, lines 21-22); and
causing the data abstraction layer instance to perform an authentication with the at least one datastore using at least one second authentication credential (0030, lines 10-22).
As to claims 4 and 17, Yang discloses:
wherein the data abstraction layer instance includes data operation logic for performing at least the at least one data operation (0032, lines 1-13).
As to claims 5 and 18, Yang discloses:
wherein a software application executing on the endpoint device issues the request by calling at least one function of the data abstraction layer instance that is associated with the at least one data operation (0018; 0019).
As to claims 6 and 19, Yang discloses:
wherein the at least one function accepts a first parameter as input, and the request includes a first value for the first parameter (0020, lines 29-35).
As to claim 7, Yang discloses:
wherein the at least one datastore comprises at least one of a relational database, a key-value store, a document store, a columnar database, a graph database, a file system, an object storage system, a cache, an in-memory database, a distributed database, a time-series database, a NoSQL database, a block storage system, a data lake, or a hybrid storage system (0033).
As to claim 8, Yang discloses:
wherein the data abstraction layer instance and at least one other data abstraction layer instance are concurrently implemented and are controlled by the data gateway (0038; 0039).
As to claim 9, Yang fails to specifically discloses:
wherein each data abstraction layer instance implemented by the data gateway is associated with a different unique identifier, and the data abstraction layer instance is identified using a unique identifier included in the request.
Nonetheless, this feature is well known in the art and would have been an obvious modification of the teachings disclosed by Yang, as taught by Chu.
Chu discloses:
wherein each data abstraction layer instance implemented by the data gateway is associated with a different unique identifier, and the data abstraction layer instance is identified using a unique identifier included in the request (0029, lines 1-4).
Given the teaching of Chu, a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have readily recognized the desirability and advantages of modifying the teachings of Yang with the teachings of Chu by using a unique identifier. Please refer to the motivation recited above with respect to claims 1, 11, and 20 as to why it is obvious to apply the teachings of Chu to the teachings of Yang.
As to claim 10, Yang discloses:
wherein the data abstraction layer instance is implemented by a virtual server (0020, lines 9-11),
Yang fails to specifically disclose
is controlled by the data gateway.
Nonetheless, this feature is well known in the art and would have been an obvious modification of the teachings disclosed by Yang, as taught by Chu.
Chu discloses:
is controlled by the data gateway (0040).
Given the teaching of Chu, a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have readily recognized the desirability and advantages of modifying the teachings of Yang with the teachings of Chu by using a gateway. Please refer to the motivation recited above with respect to claims 1, 11, and 20 as to why it is obvious to apply the teachings of Chu to the teachings of Yang.
Claim(s) 12-14 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yang in view of Chu as applied to claim 11 above, and further in view of Flores.
As to claim 12, Yang in view of Chu fails to specifically disclose:
wherein each data abstraction layer instance implemented by the data gateway is associated with a different configuration file.
Nonetheless, this feature is well known in the art and would have been an obvious modification of the teachings disclosed by Yang in view of Chu, as taught by Flores.
Flores discloses a system and method for adapter orchestration as a services, the system and method having:
wherein each data abstraction layer instance implemented by the data gateway is associated with a different configuration file (0031; 0034; 0052).
Given the teaching of Flores, a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have readily recognized the desirability and advantages of modifying the teachings of Yang in view of Chu with the teachings of Flores by associating each instance with a configuration. Flores recites motivation by disclosing that using a different configuration for each instance allows them to be user specific (0052). It is obvious that the teachings of Flores would have improved the teachings of Yang in view of Chu by using a different configuration for each instance in order to allow for user specific configuration.
As to claim 13, Yang in view of Chu fails to specifically disclose:
wherein the data abstraction layer instance is implemented by applying the respective configuration file against a data abstraction layer to which the data abstraction layer instance corresponds.
Nonetheless, this feature is well known in the art and would have been an obvious modification of the teachings disclosed by Yang in view of Chu, as taught by Flores.
Flores discloses:
wherein the data abstraction layer instance is implemented by applying the respective configuration file against a data abstraction layer to which the data abstraction layer instance corresponds (0031; 0034; 0052).
Given the teaching of Flores, a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have readily recognized the desirability and advantages of modifying the teachings of Yang in view of Chu with the teachings of Flores by using a configuration file with an abstraction layer. Please refer to the motivation recited above with respect to claim 12 as to why it is obvious to apply the teachings of Flores to the teachings of Yang in view of Chu.
As to claim 14, Yang in view of Chu fails to specifically disclose:
wherein each data abstraction layer instance is implemented based on a respective data abstraction layer that is managed by the data gateway.
Nonetheless, this feature is well known in the art and would have been an obvious modification of the teachings disclosed by Yang in view of Chu, as taught by Flores.
Flores discloses:
wherein each data abstraction layer instance is implemented based on a respective data abstraction layer that is managed by the data gateway (0031; 0034; 0052).
Given the teaching of Flores, a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have readily recognized the desirability and advantages of modifying the teachings of Yang in view of Chu with the teachings of Flores by using a configuration file with an abstraction layer. Please refer to the motivation recited above with respect to claim 12 as to why it is obvious to apply the teachings of Flores to the teachings of Yang in view of Chu.
Prior Art Made of Record
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Chanak et al. (US 2023/0247003 A1) discloses a system and method for zero trust private application access for government applications.
D’Souza et al. (US 2017/0085554 A1) discloses a system and method for cloud key directory for federating data exchanges.
Filippou et al. (US 2022/0116445 A1) discloses a system and method for disintermediated attestation in a MEC service mesh framework.
Garcia et al. (US 2014/0201850 A1) discloses a system and method for providing access control to secured data.
McCaig et al. (US 2018/0262533 A1) discloses a system and method for monitoring device and gateway data.
McKegney et al. (US 2020/0396220 A1) discloses a system and method for secure online ID validation and review.
Mclaughlin et al. (CN 108293017 B) discloses a system and method for using Internet of Things edge safety gateway.
Ni et al. (CN 107920065 A) discloses a system and method for heterogeneous network access control.
Pandey et al. (US 2021/0112067 A1) discloses a system and method for secure data access control.
Seewald et al. (WO 2020/106342 A3) discloses a system and method for attribute-based encryption for microservices.
Zimmerman et al. (WO 2025/226520 A1) discloses a system and method for techniques for accessing and interacting with data abstraction layers implemented by a data gateway.
Zimmerman et al. (WO 2025/226521 A1) discloses a system and method for techniques for accessing and interacting with data abstraction layers implemented by a data gateway.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SARAH SU whose telephone number is (571)270-3835. The examiner can normally be reached 6:30 AM - 3:00 PM.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Lynn Feild can be reached at 571-272-2092. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/SARAH SU/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2431
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