The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Detailed Action
Claim(s) 1-4 and 6-15 has/have been examined.Claim(s) 1-4 and 6-15 have been rejected.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed July 27, 2027 have been fully considered but are not persuasive. Regarding the 101 rejection, Applicant argues that invention of claim 1 provides a technical improvement and thus integrates the abstract idea into a practical application. The examiner respectfully disagrees. To integrate the abstract idea into a practical application, the improvement must be claimed. The system of claim 1 outputs a result to a user terminal. Displaying a result of an analysis does not, in itself, result in any realized technical improvement. Regarding the 103 rejection, Applicant argues that limitations of claim 1 are not disclosed by the prior art of record. The examiner respectfully disagrees. No specific limitations have been argued, but the rejection below shows how Hasegawa teachers or renders obvious the various limitations of the claim.
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 1-4 and 6-15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 as being directed to an abstract idea without significantly more.
Below is an evaluation using the 2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance.
Regarding claim 1, Step 1 is satisfied because method steps are processes.
At step 2a prong 1, an abstract idea is recited: steps of the claim could be performed as a mental process. These steps include calculating information on a difference based on operation definition information including preset operation specifications of an apparatus or a system and operation data; identify the apparatus or the system which performs an operation different from the same kind of apparatus or the same kind of systems on the basis of the information on the difference; and generate a result, wherein the operation definition information includes data processing specification information related to an internal operation of the apparatus or the system and external input/output specification information with respect to an interface provided in a component of the apparatus or the system.
At step 2a prong 2, the claim recites additional elements but these elements do not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application. Recited details about the nature of the information calculated or information used are not additional elements but instead describe steps of the mental process. The claim recites use of an inspection device comprising memory and processing circuitry. These elements do not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application because they only apply the mental process to a generic computer system. The claim recites displaying a result on a terminal. This limitation does not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application because it is a post solution activity that is not integrated into the claim as a whole.
At step 2b, the claim recites additional elements but these elements do not amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. The claim recites use of an inspection device comprising memory and processing circuitry. These elements do not amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because they are conventional computing devices which are only generally linked to the abstract idea without meaningfully limiting the mental process. The claim recites displaying a result on a terminal. This limitation does not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea because it is use of a machine that contributes only nominally or insignificantly to the execution of the claimed method
Regarding claims 2-3, 6 and 9-15, these claims recite additional limitations of the mental process but their inclusion does not push the mental process beyond what can practically be performed in the human mind, with or without the use of a physical aid such as pen and paper. See MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2)(III). The claims do not recite additional elements which must be evaluated in step 2a prong 2 or step 2b.
Regarding claim 4, this claims recites use of an external storage device. The use of an external storage device does not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application (step 2a prong 2) because it only apply the mental process to a generic computer system. The additional element also do not amount to significantly more than the judicial exception (step 2b) because it is a conventional computing device which are only generally linked to the abstract idea without meaningfully limiting the mental process.
Regarding claims 7 and 8, these claims recite limitations found in claim 1 and are rejected on the same grounds as claim 1.
Claim Objections
Claims 9 and 11 are objected to as failing to further limit the parent claim. Each of claims 9 and 11 recite limitations already recited in parent claim 1.
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 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.
Claims 1-4 and 6-12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hasegawa (EP 2523115).
Regarding claim 1, Hasegawa discloses an inspection device comprising:
a memory (Figure 1, the device includes storage and accumulation units, in addition to various controllers which generally require temporary data storage to operate); and
processing circuitry (Figure 1, server operation management apparatus) configured to:
calculate information on a difference based on operation definition information including preset operation specifications of an apparatus or a system and operation data (paragraph 22, determine whether the measured data of each metric is normal or abnormal based on comparison with model data; the model data is based on multiple performance metrics for each server and based on normal performance information for each server; a failure detection unit determines whether or not a difference satisfies a predetermined error range); and
identify the apparatus or the system which performs an operation different from a same kind of apparatuses or a same kind of systems based on the information on the difference (paragraphs 14 and 22, when analyzing abnormal metrics, exclude abnormal items that are common to all servers in the group being monitored; this serves to isolate abnormal metrics that are different than metrics of the same kind of device); and
output an identification result to a user terminal (paragraph 42, the monitoring terminal displays the monitoring information based on the abnormality score of each server to be monitored), wherein the operation definition information includes data processing specification information related to
an internal operation of the apparatus or the system (paragraph 39, internal metrics include memory usage are used to determine abnormal operation) and
external input/output specification information with respect to an interface provided in a component of the apparatus or the system (end of paragraph 39, packets received and sent are metrics that may be compared to expected for indicating an abnormal operation).
Hasegawa does not expressly disclose that the identified apparatus or system performs a different operation.
Hasegawa teaches determining that a server has different performance metrics (paragraphs 21 and 22). The detection of differing metrics, particularly performance metrics such as CPU usage or memory usage (paragraph 21), would indicate to one of ordinary skill in the art that the affected device is performing operations which differ from devices that have less CPU usage or memory usage.
Regarding claim 2, Hasegawa discloses the inspection device according to claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry
compares the operation definition information in which configuration information including components with respect to a configuration of the apparatus or the system is associated with operation specifications based on the components with the operation data that is information on an actual operation of the apparatus or the system (paragraphs 29 and 38, the servers are associated with different tiers based on their configuration as different types of servers (i.e. web server or application server) and having differing software components), and
calculates, as the information on the difference, information on presence/absence of a difference between the operation specifications and the operation data and information on content of a difference between the operation specifications and the operation data (paragraph 27, determine that a difference satisfies a condition of a predetermined error range).
Regarding claim 3, Hasegawa discloses the inspection device according to claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry identifies a component that causes the difference using previously acquired information on differences in the same kind of apparatuses or the same kind of systems as the apparatus or the system (paragraph 3, a cause of abnormality within a server may be due to memory capacity, CPU load, or network load; these metrics are closely associated with components).
Regarding claim 4, Hasegawa discloses the inspection device according to claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to acquire the operation definition information from a predetermined storage device (paragraph 27, the correlation model storage unit stores the models; Figure 1 shows the correlation model storage unit being external to the failure detection unit).
Hasegawa does not expressly disclose the system wherein the storage device is external.
The examiner has taken official notice that it is well known in the art to maintain and utilize a remote data backup.
Prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to modify the server monitoring system disclosed by Hasegawa such that a remote data backup of operational data is stored and retrieved, as is known in the art. This modification would have been obvious because, as would be clear to one of ordinary skill in the art, a local event or failure may cause locally stored data to be corrupted and use of a remote backup would allow the system to recover data after such a failure and continue operating.
Regarding claim 6, Hasegawa discloses the inspection device according to claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to update the operation definition information when the information on the difference calculated by the calculation unit and the information on differences in the same kind of apparatuses or the same kind of systems as the apparatus or the system satisfy predetermined conditions (paragraph 27, the model data is generated based on a series of performance metrics for each server, it is therefore updated as more metrics are generated, based on the metrics not being abnormal and being for the same tier of server).
Regarding claims 7 and 8, these claims recite limitations found in claim 1 and are rejected on the same grounds as claim 1.
Regarding claims 9 and 11, these claims recite limitations found in claim 1 and are rejected on the same grounds as claim 1.
Regarding claims 10 and 12, Hasegawa discloses:
10. (New) The inspection device according to claim 9, wherein the data processing specification information includes specification information related to
log data (paragraph 41, a table is recorded having applications and abnormality scores; this table is related to the specification information for the application which indicates when the application is abnormal), a data file (paragraph 41, a table is recorded having applications and abnormality scores; this table is related to the specification information for the application which indicates when the application is abnormal; while this is not specifically described as being saved in a file, use of a file to contain the data would have been obvious because the table may then be manipulated by the operating system), and a memory (paragraph 39, memory usage is a metric which may indicate the server is abnormal).
12. (New) The inspection device according to claim 1, wherein the operation definition information includes communication specification information on operations with respect to communication of the apparatus or the system (end of paragraph 39, packets received and sent are metrics that may indicate abnormal operation).
Claim 14 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hasegawa in view of Lake (PG-PUB 2011/0320168).
Lake teaches a system that monitors parameters of components (see abstract) and does so by uniquely identified by manufacturer part number and serial number (paragraph 27).
Prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to modify the system monitoring disclosed by Hasegawa such that monitored components are referenced by their part number and serial number, as taught by Lake. This modification would have been obvious because use of these identifiers allows for uniquely identifying a component and identifying the particular component as being a rogue (paragraph 8).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
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.
This action is a final rejection and closes the prosecution of this application. Applicant’s reply under 37 CFR 1.113 to this action is limited to an appeal to the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, an amendment complying with the requirements set forth below, or a request for continued examination (RCE) to reopen prosecution where permitted. Please note that the Office also offers initiatives that are available to applicants after the close of prosecution. See https://www.uspto.gov/patents/initiatives/uspto-patent-applications-iniatives-timeline for more information.
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The page is best reviewed promptly after applicant has received a final rejection or the claims have been twice rejected because some of the noted assistance must be requested within one month from the date of the latest rejection. See MPEP § 1204 for more information on filing a notice of appeal.
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If applicant should desire to file an after-final amendment, entry of the proposed amendment cannot be made as a matter of right unless it merely cancels claims or complies with a formal requirement made in a previous Office action. Amendments touching the merits of the application which otherwise might not be proper may be admitted upon a showing of good and sufficient reasons why they are necessary and why they were not presented earlier.
A reply under 37 CFR 1.113 to a final rejection must include cancellation of or appeal from the rejection of, each rejected claim. The filing of an amendment after final rejection, whether or not it is entered, does not stop the running of the statutory period for reply to the final rejection unless the examiner holds all of the claims to be in condition for allowance.
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The application will become abandoned unless a Notice of Appeal, an after final reply that places the application in condition for allowance, or an RCE has been filed properly within the period for reply, or any extension of this period obtained under either 37 CFR 1.136(a) or (b).
Contact Information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JOSEPH SCHELL whose telephone number is (571) 272-8186. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday through Friday 9AM-5:00PM (Pacific Time).
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, Applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice. Please note that all agendas or related documents that Applicant would like reviewed should be sent at least one full business day (i.e. 24 hours not including weekends or holidays) before the interview.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Ashish Thomas can be reached at (571) 272-0631. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. The fax phone number for the examiner is 571-273-8186. The examiner may be e-mailed at joseph.schell@uspto.gov though communications via e-mail are not permitted without a written authorization form (see MPEP 502.03).
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JS/JOSEPH O SCHELL/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2114
Prosecution Insights