DETAILED ACTION
1. This Office Action is taken in response to Applicants’ application 19/263,285 filed on 7/8/2025.
Claims 2-24 are pending for consideration.
2. Examiner’s Note
(1) In the case of amending the Claimed invention, Applicant is respectfully requested to indicate the portion(s) of the specification which dictate(s) the structure relied on for proper interpretation and also to verify and ascertain the metes and bounds of the claimed invention. This will assist in expediting compact prosecution. MPEP 714.02 recites: “Applicant should also specifically point out the support for any amendments made to the disclosure. See MPEP § 2163.06. An amendment which does not comply with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.121(b), (c), (d), and (h) may be held not fully responsive. See MPEP § 714.” Amendments not pointing to specific support in the disclosure may be deemed as not complying with provisions of 37 C.F.R. 1.131(b), (c), (d), and (h) and therefore held not fully responsive. Generic statements such as “Applicants believe no new matter has been introduced” may be deemed insufficient.
(2) Examiner has cited particular columns/paragraph and line numbers in the references applied to the claims above for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings of the art and are applied to specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested from the applicant in preparing responses, to 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.
Double Patenting
3. 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. See 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); and, 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) may be used to overcome an actual or provisional rejection based on a nonstatutory double patenting ground provided the conflicting application or patent is shown to be commonly owned with this application. See 37 CFR 1.130(b).
Effective January 1, 1994, a registered attorney or agent of record may sign a terminal disclaimer. A terminal disclaimer signed by the assignee must fully comply with 37 CFR 3.73(b).
4. Claims 2-24 are rejected under the judicially created doctrine of obvious-type double patenting as being unpatentable over independent claims 1-9 of US Patent 12,386,510. Although not all of the conflicting claims are exactly identical, they are extremely similar and are not patentably distinct from each other as shown in the example below:
19/263,285
12,386,510
2. (New) A method of operating a storage device, the method comprising: migrating, when a first memory die in a first memory die group among a M memory die groups in the storage device is determined to be in an unusable state, user data stored in user data blocks of the first memory die to a first overprovisioning block group, wherein M is a natural number of 2 or more, and the first overprovisioning block group is included in the first memory die group; monitoring a data storage status of each of overprovisioning blocks included in the M memory die groups; monitoring a number of free overprovisioning blocks included in the first overprovisioning block group after the migrating; determining whether the number of free overprovisioning blocks included in the first overprovisioning block group is less than or equal to a threshold free block number after the migrating; and migrating, when the number of free overprovisioning blocks included in the first overprovisioning block group is determined to be less than or equal to the threshold free block number, part of the user data stored in the first overprovisioning block group to a second overprovisioning block group, wherein the second overprovisioning block group is included in a second memory die group and a number of free overprovisioning blocks included in the second overprovisioning block group is greater than the threshold free block number.
1. A storage device comprising: a memory including a plurality of memory dies, each including a plurality of user data blocks and a plurality of overprovisioning blocks; and a controller configured to: group the plurality of memory dies into M memory die groups, and migrate, when a first memory die in a first memory die group among the M memory die groups is determined to be in an unusable state, user data stored in user data blocks of the first memory die to a first overprovisioning block group, wherein the first overprovisioning block group includes overprovisioning blocks of memory dies other than the first memory die among the memory dies in the first memory die group and does not include overprovisioning blocks of the first memory die, wherein M is a natural number of 2 or more, wherein the controller is further configured to: migrate a part of the user data stored in the first overprovisioning block group to a second overprovisioning block group when a number of free overprovisioning blocks in the first overprovisioning block group after migrating the user data to the first overprovisioning block group is less than or equal to a threshold free block number, wherein the second overprovisioning block group includes overprovisioning blocks of memory dies in a second memory die group among the M memory die groups, and wherein the controller is further configured to: determine the threshold free block number as a value obtained by subtracting a deviation from an average of numbers of free overprovisioning blocks respectively included in the M memory die groups.
Allowable Subject Matter
5. Claims 2-24 are rejected under double patenting rejections, but would be allowable if able to overcome the double patenting rejections by filing a Terminal Disclosure.
Conclusion
6. Claims 2-24 are rejected as explained above.
Claims 2-24 are rejected under double patenting rejections, but would be allowable if able to overcome the double patenting rejections by filing a Terminal Disclosure.
7. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SHENG JEN TSAI whose telephone number is 571-272-4244. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday-Friday, 9-6.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Reginald Bragdon can be reached on 571-272-4204. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/SHENG JEN TSAI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2139
Prosecution Insights