DETAILED ACTION
This communication is responsive to the application, filed August 21, 2025. Claims 1-18 are pending in this application.
Examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA
The present application was filed on August 21, 2025, which is on or after March 16, 2013, and thus is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
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.
Claims 1, 7, and 13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gupta et al. (US 10,552,330 B2) in view of Cheng et al. (US 2022/0253238 A1).
As per claim 1: A synchronous remote replication method, wherein the method comprises:
Gupta discloses [col. 1, lines 25-40] synchronous remote replication between the primary data storage device and the secondary data storage device.
obtaining, by a primary storage device of a storage system, a write request from a host, wherein the write request comprises target data;
Gupta discloses [col. 1, lines 30-67] a storage controller managing I/O (read/write) requests from hosts and cache storage used for host write (target data) I/O operations.
writing, by the primary storage device, the target data into a cache of the primary storage device;
Gupta discloses [col. 1, lines 41-67] a storage controller controls a plurality of storage devices for writing target data, including a write cache. The storage controller uses cache-write processing for high-speed write operations into a cache. The write requests of the target data are written to the cache and then written to the external storage devices.
sending, by the primary storage device, a write success response to the host in response to writing the target data into the cache; and
Gupta discloses [col. 1, lines 26-40] in a synchronous relationship between the primary storage device and the secondary storage device, any write updates to the primary data storage device are synchronized with the secondary storage device, before the primary data storage device reports to the host that the data storage I/O operations has been successfully completed.
sending, by the primary storage device, the target data to a remote storage device of the storage system.
Gupta discloses [col. 8, lines 62-67; col. 9, lines 1-2] writes from the host are initially written to the primary storage system and can be mirrored by a storage manager of the primary storage system to the secondary storage system. Gupta further discloses [col. 1, lines 18-25] the primary storage system and the secondary storage system may be geographically remote systems.
writing, by the primary storage device, the target data into a primary interface card of the primary storage device;
Gupta discloses [col. 1, lines 25-67] receiving host write data at a primary storage controller and storing the write data in a cache of the primary storage system, but fails to explicitly disclose writing the target data into a primary interface card of the primary storage device. Cheng discloses a similar method, which further teaches [0038] a storage node including a network interface card having memory, where the network interface card receives a client data-write request and writes the data into memory of the network interface card before the data is stored in an SSD.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the teachings of Gupta with that of Cheng. One would have been motivated to write the target data into memory of a network interface card because it improves data-transfer efficiency in the primary storage device [Cheng; 0038].
As per claim 7: Although claim 7 is directed towards a device claim, it is rejected under the same rationale as the method claim 1 above.
As per claim 13: Although claim 13 is directed towards a system claim, it is rejected under the same rationale as the method claim 1 above.
Claims 2, 8, and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gupta in view of Cheng and further in view of Ji et al. (US 7,152,182 B2).
As per claim 2: The method according to claim 1, by the primary storage device, the target data into the primary interface card, the method further comprises:
As set forth in the rejection of claim 1, Gupta in view of Cheng discloses a remote-replication method in which the host write data is written into memory of a network interface card of a primary storage device, written into a cache of the primary storage device, acknowledged to the host, and sent to remote storage.
wherein the primary storage device further comprises a backup interface card; and after writing, writing, by the primary storage device, the target data into the backup interface card.
However, Gupta in view of Cheng fail to explicitly disclose that the primary storage device includes a backup interface card, or that the target data written into the primary interface card is also written into the backup interface card. Ji discloses [col. 1, lines 55-67] a similar method, which further teaches a redundant data storage architecture in which a first redundancy appliance is the master and a second redundancy appliance is a shadow/slave that assumes the first appliance’s role upon failure. Ji further discloses [col. 4, lines 29-67] propagating information concerning changes made in response to a write operation from the master appliance to the shadow appliance by sending write records and corresponding data to a log and forwarding write records for write requests in the redundancy arrangement.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the interface card arrangement of Gupta and Cheng to include a redundant backup interface-card module that receives a copy of the write data after it is written into the primary interface card memory, as taught by Ji’s active/shadow redundancy appliances because the modification would provide fault tolerance for the interface card and enable continuation or recovery of the interface card function if the primary interface card fails [Ji; col. 1, lines 55-67].
As per claim 8: Although claim 8 is directed towards a device claim, it is rejected under the same rationale as the method claim 2 above.
As per claim 14: Although claim 14 is directed towards a system claim, it is rejected under the same rationale as the method claim 2 above.
Claims 3-5, 9-11, and 15-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gupta in view of Cheng and further in view of Crawford et al. (US 2012/0151135 A1).
As per claim 3: The method according to claim 1, wherein the primary storage device further comprises a primary storage array, and storing the target data in the cache in the target primary disk.
Gupta discloses [col. 1, lines 41-67] a storage controller controls a plurality of storage devices for writing target data, including a write cache in a primary storage array.
and the write request further comprises an identifier of a target primary disk; and after writing, by the primary storage device, the target data into the cache, the method further comprises: determining, by the primary storage device, the target primary disk from the primary storage array based on the identifier of the target primary disk,
Gupta and Cheng disclose writing data to the primary storage device and into the cache, but fail to explicitly disclose the write request comprises an identifier of a target primary disk. Crawford discloses a similar method, which further teaches [0006-0010] a host write command directed to a source volume of a primary controller, metadata comprising a SCSI LUN ID that uniquely identifies the source volume, and using that LUN ID to map the write to a corresponding target volume of a secondary controller.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the teachings of Gupta and Cheng with that of Crawford. One would have been motivated to carry an identifier with a write request because it allows the controller to store data to the correct source volume [Crawford; 0007].
As per claim 4: The method according to claim 1, further comprising: determining, by the primary storage device, an identifier of a target remote disk based on an identifier of a target primary disk and a preset mapping relationship between the target primary disk and the target remote disk, wherein the target remote disk is a disk in a remote storage array comprised in the remote storage device; writing, by the primary storage device, the identifier of the target remote disk into the primary interface card; and sending, by the primary storage device, the identifier of the target remote disk to the remote storage device.
Gupta and Cheng disclose writing data to the primary storage device and into the cache and transmission of write data to the remote storage device, but fail to explicitly disclose the preset mapping relationship. Crawford discloses a similar method, which further teaches [0006-0010] a predetermined mapping between a source volume at a primary storage controller and a target volume at a secondary storage controller, where an SCSI LUN ID uniquely identifies the source volume and is used to map a host write command to the corresponding target volume.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the teachings of Gupta and Cheng with that of Crawford. One would have been motivated to have a preset mapping relationship because it allows the controller to store data to the correct source and target volumes [Crawford; 0007].
As per claim 5: The method according to claim 1, further comprising: updating, by the primary storage device, of writing the target data into the primary interface card.
Gupta and Cheng disclose updating the primary storage device and writing the target data into the primary interface card,
a health state of a mapping relationship that is between a target primary disk and a target remote disk and that is recorded in the primary storage device to abnormal in response to a failure
but fail to explicitly disclose updating a health state of a mapping relationship between primary and secondary disk. Crawford discloses a similar method, which further teaches [Fig. 3; 0031-0034] determining if the primary storage controller has failed and if the primary storage controller has failed, a use of the mapping to maintain write availability is still achieved by writing through the secondary target volume and notifying the primary host.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the teachings of Gupta and Cheng with that of Crawford. One would have been motivated to update the health state of a mapping relationship because it allows the primary host to maintain write availability [Crawford; 0031-0034].
As per claim 9-11: Although claims 9-11 are directed towards a device claim, they are rejected under the same rationale as the method claims 3-5 above.
As per claim 15-17: Although claims 15-17 are directed towards a system claim, they are rejected under the same rationale as the method claims 3-5 above.
Claims 6, 12, and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gupta in view of Cheng and further in view of Cochran (US 7,340,572 B2).
As per claim 6: The method according to claim 1, further comprising: when detecting that a network between the primary storage device and the remote storage device is disconnected, recording, by the primary storage device, start time at which the network is disconnected; and obtaining, by the primary storage device, a log request, and in response to the log request, outputting a log after the start time, wherein the log after the start time is used to query data from a primary storage array of the primary storage device.
Gupta and Chen disclose the method of claim 1, but fail to explicitly disclose starting a log request after disconnection and outputting a log from the primary storage device. Cochran discloses a similar method, which further teaches [col. 9, lines 1-36] a communication failure between a dominant storage device and a remote-mirror device is maintained by a time-ordered write-request buffer (maintaining buffer log from the start time of communication failure) for writes during the failure time, and replaying (outputting) the buffered log writes to resynchronize the remote mirror after communication is restored.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the teachings of Gupta and Chen with that of Cochran. One would have been motivated to maintain buffer log during disconnect because it allows to resynchronize after communication is restored [Cochran; col. 9, lines 1-36].
As per claim 12: Although claim 12 is directed towards a device claim, it is rejected under the same rationale as the method claim 6 above.
As per claim 18: Although claim 18 is directed towards a system claim, it is rejected under the same rationale as the method claim 6 above.
Conclusion
The following prior art made of record and not relied upon is cited to establish the level of skill in the applicant’s art and those arts considered reasonably pertinent to applicant’s disclosure. See MPEP 707.05(c).
· US 11,544,012 B2 – Hsu discloses a distributed storage system and a data synchronization method with a network and providing failover when the first network host is out of service.
· US 2013/0080723 A1 – Sawa discloses a first and second primary storage apparatuses that comprise a built-in remote-copy function and provide data migration enabling a storage apparatus to be replaced while retaining data consistently and without halting access.
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/JIGAR P PATEL/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2114
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