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 .
Response to Amendment
This Office action is in response to Applicant's amendment filed on 3/2/2026.
Claim 1-20 are pending. Claim 1-20 are rejected.
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.
Claim 1, 4-6, 8, 10-12, 15 and 18-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Raja, Harvey et al (PGPUB Document No. 20180314749), hereafter, referred to as “Raja”, in view of Word, Jonathan Brian (US Patent No. 10686905), hereafter, referred to as “Word”, in view of Goodman, Brian et al (PGPUB Document No. 20180107562), hereafter, referred to as “Goodman”, in further view of Lee, Robert et al (PGPUB Document No. 20150169718), hereafter, referred to as “Lee”.
Regarding Claim 1(Original), Raja teaches A method, comprising: receiving, by a data management and storage (DMS) cluster that stores data from a compute infrastructure comprising a plurality of machines(Raja, Fig. 1 & para 0018 disclose infrastructure in a distributed storage system for taking snapshot in a distributed node environment “As illustrated in FIG. 1, a distributed data grid provides data storage and management capabilities by distributing data over a number of servers (e.g., 120 a, 120 b, 120 c, and 120 d) working together…”), a request to take a snapshot of a fileset from a first machine of the plurality of machines, wherein partitions for the fileset are undefined prior to the request to take the snapshot being received(Raja, para 0050 discloses a request for making snapshot of different nodes and the partition is getting defined during the request (not prior to the request) “At step 210, the snapshot coordinator sends a snapshot request identifying particular partitions to the server node holding the particular partitions. The request includes a snapshot name and a set of partitions for which snapshots art to be made.”);
creating, by the DMS cluster, a plurality of jobs for taking data copies associated with the plurality of partitions, wherein a job of the plurality of jobs corresponds to a single partition of the plurality of partitions(Raja, para 0061 discloses creating tasks/jobs for snapshots from the queue, where each job associated to particular partition ”The association pile only allows one persistent task related to a particular partition to be polled at a time. Thus, the snapshot task runs on the only worker thread processing persistent tasks related to the partition at the time….When the worker thread finishes snapshot task, it is released and it can move on to other tasks queued in the association pile”);
executing in parallel the plurality of jobs to obtain a plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions, wherein a respective job obtains a respective data copy of the plurality of data copies for a respective partition of the plurality of partitions(Raja, para 0050 discloses creating snapshots simultaneously/parallel on different nodes “Multiple snapshot requests can be in process on different servers/nodes simultaneously”; para 0051 further discloses a snapshot is related to multiple partitions “At step 210, the snapshot coordinator sends a snapshot request identifying particular partitions to the server node holding the particular partitions. The request includes a snapshot name and a set of partitions for which snapshots art to be made.”);
But Raja does not explicitly teach obtaining, by the DMS cluster, fileset metadata associated with the fileset; determining, by the DMS cluster, whether to divide the fileset into a plurality of partitions based on the fileset metadata;
defining, by the DMS cluster, the plurality of partitions for the fileset based on the fileset metadata; storing respective data copies of the plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions in respective DMS nodes; and restoring in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Word teaches obtaining, by the DMS cluster, fileset metadata associated with the fileset; determining, by the DMS cluster, whether to divide the fileset into a plurality of partitions based on the fileset metadata(Word, col 28:20-26 discloses the file division or chunking is determined by obtained metadata “the file system subscription management service may maintain chunk-cutting techniques for common data types. The data type of a file to be divided into chunks may be determined using any suitable file metadata and/or by inspection of the contents of the file; a matching chunk-cutting technique may then be selected based on the determined data type of the file”); defining, by the DMS cluster, the plurality of partitions for the fileset based on the fileset metadata(Word, col 28:23-26 further teaches partitioning or chunking is dictated by metadata “The data type of a file to be divided into chunks may be determined using any suitable file metadata” );
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention made to incorporate the feature of dividing files in partition based on metadata of Word into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja to produce an expected result of snapshotting plurality of partition as backup data. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to divide file/s into partitions so that file backup jobs can be divided in smaller tasks for improved overall performance(Word, col 28:20-26).
But Raja and Word don’t explicitly teach storing respective data copies of the plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions in respective DMS nodes; and restoring in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes.
However, in the same field of endeavor of snapshot creation for storage system Goodman teaches storing respective data copies of the plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions in respective DMS nodes(Goodman, para 0034 discloses storing snapshots to its respective node “each node in the distributed control system may save its own snapshot (e.g., a snapshot of each individual node) and the saved snapshot on each individual node stays with the node until an export request is received or processed (that involves the snapshot on the particular node)”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of storing snapshot of partitions of Goodman into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja and Word to produce an expected result of storing partition snapshots as backup data. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to use less processing resources by only selecting log snapshots which are related to error events (Goodman, para 0020-0022).
But Raja, Word and Goodman don’t explicitly teach and restoring in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes.
However, in the same field of endeavor of data restoration in a distributed environment Lee teaches and restoring in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes (Lee, Fig. 6 and para 0052 discloses concurrently restoring data from a distributed storage system “the coordinator 610 can instruct the member 620 (and all other members in the distributed data grid 600 concurrently) to prepare for restoring persisted partitions”; further in para 0056 discloses the restoration of partitions from stored distributed data stores “at step 609, the different members in the distributed data grid 600 (including the member 620) can carry out the recovery of the persisted partitions based on the received partition recovery assignment”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of recovering data partition from a distributed data grid of Lee into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Work and Goodman to produce an expected result of restoring plurality of partition data concurrently. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to restore data concurrently without having to wait on one coping process to end to start another (Lee, para 0052).
Regarding claim 4(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 1 and Raja further teaches wherein the first machine is a virtual machine, and the fileset comprises a virtual disk file(Raja, para 0021 discloses node/machine can be a virtual machine “In a distributed data grid the nodes may be for example, software applications, virtual machines”).
Regarding claim 5(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 1 and Raja further teaches wherein the DMS cluster maintains information identifying a correspondence between the plurality of partitions and the fileset(Raja, para 0030 discloses in order to identify data/file in partition a map is being used for maintaining the information “In order to find a particular datum, each node has a map, for example a hash map, which maps keys to partitions. The map is known to all nodes in the cluster and is synchronized and updated across all nodes of the cluster” ).
Regarding claim 6(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 5 and Raja further teaches wherein the DMS cluster has N available nodes, N being a variable representing an integer quantity of available DMS nodes (Raja, para 0050 discloses a request for making snapshot of different nodes as the process continues “At step 210, the snapshot coordinator sends a snapshot request identifying particular partitions to the server node holding the particular partitions. The request includes a snapshot name and a set of partitions for which snapshots art to be made”).
Regarding Claim 8(Original), Raja teaches A data management and storage (DMS) system, wherein the DMS system comprises: one or more processors; and one or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media, operatively coupled with at least one of the one or more processors, comprising instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the DMS system to(Raja, Fig. 1 & para 0018 disclose infrastructure in a distributed storage system for taking snapshot in a distributed node environment by storing executable instructions in storage media “As illustrated in FIG. 1, a distributed data grid provides data storage and management capabilities by distributing data over a number of servers (e.g., 120 a, 120 b, 120 c, and 120 d) working together…”):
receive a request to take a snapshot of a fileset from a first machine of a plurality of machines, wherein the DMS system comprises a DMS cluster that stores data from a compute infrastructure, wherein the compute infrastructure comprises the plurality of machines, and wherein partitions for the fileset are undefined prior to the request to take the snapshot being received(Raja, para 0050 discloses a request for making snapshot of different nodes and the partition is getting defined during the request (not prior to the request) “At step 210, the snapshot coordinator sends a snapshot request identifying particular partitions to the server node holding the particular partitions. The request includes a snapshot name and a set of partitions for which snapshots art to be made.”);
create a plurality of jobs for taking data copies associated with the plurality of partitions, wherein a job of the plurality of jobs corresponds to a single partition of the plurality of partitions(Raja, para 0061 discloses creating tasks/jobs for snapshots from the queue, where each job associated to particular partition ”The association pile only allows one persistent task related to a particular partition to be polled at a time. Thus, the snapshot task runs on the only worker thread processing persistent tasks related to the partition at the time….When the worker thread finishes snapshot task, it is released and it can move on to other tasks queued in the association pile”); execute in parallel the plurality of jobs to obtain a plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions, wherein a respective job obtains a respective data copy of the plurality of data copies for a respective partition of the plurality of partitions(Raja, para 0050 discloses creating snapshots simultaneously/parallel on different nodes “Multiple snapshot requests can be in process on different servers/nodes simultaneously”; para 0051 further discloses a snapshot is related to multiple partitions “At step 210, the snapshot coordinator sends a snapshot request identifying particular partitions to the server node holding the particular partitions. The request includes a snapshot name and a set of partitions for which snapshots art to be made.”);
But Raja does not explicitly teach obtain fileset metadata associated with the fileset; determine whether to divide the fileset into a plurality of partitions based on the fileset metadata; define the plurality of partitions for the fileset based on the fileset metadata;
store respective data copies of the plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions in respective DMS nodes; and restore in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Word teaches obtain fileset metadata associated with the fileset; determine whether to divide the fileset into a plurality of partitions based on the fileset metadata (Word, col 28:20-26 discloses the file division or chunking is determined by obtained metadata “the file system subscription management service may maintain chunk-cutting techniques for common data types. The data type of a file to be divided into chunks may be determined using any suitable file metadata and/or by inspection of the contents of the file; a matching chunk-cutting technique may then be selected based on the determined data type of the file”); define the plurality of partitions for the fileset based on the fileset metadata (Word, col 28:23-26 further teaches partitioning or chunking is dictated by metadata “The data type of a file to be divided into chunks may be determined using any suitable file metadata” );
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention made to incorporate the feature of dividing files in partition based on metadata of Word into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja to produce an expected result of snapshotting plurality of partition as backup data. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to divide file/s into partitions so that file backup jobs can be divided in smaller tasks for improved overall performance (Word, col 28:20-26).
But Raja and Word don’t explicitly teach store respective data copies of the plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions in respective DMS nodes; and restore in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes.
However, in the same field of endeavor of snapshot creation for storage system Goodman teaches store respective data copies of the plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions in respective DMS nodes(Goodman, para 0034 discloses storing snapshots to its respective node “each node in the distributed control system may save its own snapshot (e.g., a snapshot of each individual node) and the saved snapshot on each individual node stays with the node until an export request is received or processed (that involves the snapshot on the particular node)”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of storing snapshot of partitions of Goodman into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja and Word to produce an expected result of storing partition snapshots as backup data. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to use less processing resources by only selecting log snapshots which are related to error events (Goodman, para 0020-0022).
But Raja, Word and Goodman don’t explicitly teach and restore in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes.
However, in the same field of endeavor of data restoration in a distributed environment Lee teaches and restore in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes(Lee, Fig. 6 and para 0052 discloses concurrently restoring data from a distributed storage system “the coordinator 610 can instruct the member 620 (and all other members in the distributed data grid 600 concurrently) to prepare for restoring persisted partitions”; further in para 0056 discloses the restoration of partitions from stored distributed data stores “at step 609, the different members in the distributed data grid 600 (including the member 620) can carry out the recovery of the persisted partitions based on the received partition recovery assignment”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of recovering data partition from a distributed data grid of Lee into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Work and Goodman to produce an expected result of restoring plurality of partition data concurrently. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to restore data concurrently without having to wait on one coping process to end to start another (Lee, para 0052).
Regarding claim 11(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 8 and Raja further teaches wherein the first machine is a virtual machine, and the fileset comprises a virtual disk file(Raja, para 0021 discloses node/machine can be a virtual machine “In a distributed data grid the nodes may be for example, software applications, virtual machines”).
Regarding claim 12(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 8 and Raja further teaches wherein the DMS cluster maintains information identifying a correspondence between the plurality of partitions and the fileset (Raja, para 0030 discloses in order to identify data/file in partition a map is being used for maintaining the information “In order to find a particular datum, each node has a map, for example a hash map, which maps keys to partitions. The map is known to all nodes in the cluster and is synchronized and updated across all nodes of the cluster” ).
Regarding claim 13(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 12 and Raja further teaches wherein the DMS cluster has N available nodes, N being a variable representing an integer quantity of available DMS nodes(Raja, para 0050 discloses a request for making snapshot of different nodes as the process continues “At step 210, the snapshot coordinator sends a snapshot request identifying particular partitions to the server node holding the particular partitions. The request includes a snapshot name and a set of partitions for which snapshots art to be made”).
Regarding Claim 15(Original), Raja teaches One or more non-transitory computer-readable storage media comprising instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause a data management and storage (DMS) system to(Raja, Fig. 1 & para 0018 disclose infrastructure in a distributed storage system for taking snapshot in a distributed node environment by storing executable instructions in storage media “As illustrated in FIG. 1, a distributed data grid provides data storage and management capabilities by distributing data over a number of servers (e.g., 120 a, 120 b, 120 c, and 120 d) working together…”):
receive a request to take a snapshot of a fileset from a first machine of a plurality of machines, wherein the DMS system comprises a DMS cluster that stores data from a compute infrastructure, wherein the compute infrastructure comprises the plurality of machines, and wherein partitions for the fileset are undefined prior to the request to take the snapshot being received (Raja, para 0050 discloses a request for making snapshot of different nodes and the partition is getting defined during the request (not prior to the request) “At step 210, the snapshot coordinator sends a snapshot request identifying particular partitions to the server node holding the particular partitions. The request includes a snapshot name and a set of partitions for which snapshots art to be made.”);
create a plurality of jobs for taking data copies associated with the plurality of partitions, wherein a job of the plurality of jobs corresponds to a single partition of the plurality of partitions (Raja, para 0061 discloses creating tasks/jobs for snapshots from the queue, where each job associated to particular partition ”The association pile only allows one persistent task related to a particular partition to be polled at a time. Thus, the snapshot task runs on the only worker thread processing persistent tasks related to the partition at the time….When the worker thread finishes snapshot task, it is released and it can move on to other tasks queued in the association pile”); execute in parallel the plurality of jobs to obtain a plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions, wherein a respective job obtains a respective data copy of the plurality of data copies for a respective partition of the plurality of partitions (Raja, para 0050 discloses creating snapshots simultaneously/parallel on different nodes “Multiple snapshot requests can be in process on different servers/nodes simultaneously”; para 0051 further discloses a snapshot is related to multiple partitions “At step 210, the snapshot coordinator sends a snapshot request identifying particular partitions to the server node holding the particular partitions. The request includes a snapshot name and a set of partitions for which snapshots art to be made.”);
But Raja does not explicitly teach obtain fileset metadata associated with the fileset; determine whether to divide the fileset into a plurality of partitions based on the fileset metadata; define the plurality of partitions for the fileset based on the fileset metadata; store respective data copies of the plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions in respective DMS nodes; and restore in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Word teaches obtain fileset metadata associated with the fileset; determine whether to divide the fileset into a plurality of partitions based on the fileset metadata; define the plurality of partitions for the fileset based on the fileset metadata (Word, col 28:20-26 discloses the file division or chunking is determined by obtained metadata “the file system subscription management service may maintain chunk-cutting techniques for common data types. The data type of a file to be divided into chunks may be determined using any suitable file metadata and/or by inspection of the contents of the file; a matching chunk-cutting technique may then be selected based on the determined data type of the file”); defining, by the DMS cluster, the plurality of partitions for the fileset based on the fileset metadata(Word, col 28:23-26 further teaches partitioning or chunking is dictated by metadata “The data type of a file to be divided into chunks may be determined using any suitable file metadata” );
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention made to incorporate the feature of dividing files in partition based on metadata of Word into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja to produce an expected result of snapshotting plurality of partition as backup data. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to divide file/s into partitions so that file backup jobs can be divided in smaller tasks for improved overall performance(Word, col 28:20-26).
But Raja and Word don’t explicitly teach store respective data copies of the plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions in respective DMS nodes; and restore in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes.
However, in the same field of endeavor of snapshot creation for storage system Goodman teaches store respective data copies of the plurality of data copies associated with the plurality of partitions in respective DMS nodes(Goodman, para 0034 discloses storing snapshots to its respective node “each node in the distributed control system may save its own snapshot (e.g., a snapshot of each individual node) and the saved snapshot on each individual node stays with the node until an export request is received or processed (that involves the snapshot on the particular node)”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of storing snapshot of partitions of Goodman into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja and Word to produce an expected result of storing partition snapshots as backup data. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to use less processing resources by only selecting log snapshots which are related to error events (Goodman, para 0020-0022).
But Raja, Word and Goodman don’t explicitly teach and restore in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes.
However, in the same field of endeavor of data restoration in a distributed environment Lee teaches and restore in parallel, two or more partitions of the plurality of partitions of the fileset using the respective data copies of the two or more partitions stored in the respective DMS nodes (Lee, Fig. 6 and para 0052 discloses concurrently restoring data from a distributed storage system “the coordinator 610 can instruct the member 620 (and all other members in the distributed data grid 600 concurrently) to prepare for restoring persisted partitions”; further in para 0056 discloses the restoration of partitions from stored distributed data stores “at step 609, the different members in the distributed data grid 600 (including the member 620) can carry out the recovery of the persisted partitions based on the received partition recovery assignment”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of recovering data partition from a distributed data grid of Lee into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Work and Goodman to produce an expected result of restoring plurality of partition data concurrently. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to restore data concurrently without having to wait on one coping process to end to start another (Lee, para 0052).
Regarding claim 18(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 15 and Raja further teaches wherein the first machine is a virtual machine, and the fileset comprises a virtual disk file(Raja, para 0021 discloses node/machine can be a virtual machine “In a distributed data grid the nodes may be for example, software applications, virtual machines”).
Regarding claim 19(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 15 and Raja further teaches wherein the DMS cluster maintains information identifying a correspondence between the plurality of partitions and the fileset (Raja, para 0030 discloses in order to identify data/file in partition a map is being used for maintaining the information “In order to find a particular datum, each node has a map, for example a hash map, which maps keys to partitions. The map is known to all nodes in the cluster and is synchronized and updated across all nodes of the cluster” ).
Claim 2, 9 and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Raja, Harvey et al (PGPUB Document No. 20180314749), hereafter, referred to as “Raja”, in view of Word, Jonathan Brian (US Patent No. 10686905), hereafter, referred to as “Word”, in view of Goodman, Brian et al (PGPUB Document No. 20180107562), hereafter, referred to as “Goodman”, in view of Lee, Robert et al (PGPUB Document No. 20150169718), hereafter, referred to as “Lee”, in further view of Chang, Yuan-Chi et al (US Patent No. 9460147), hereafter, referred to as “Chang”.
Regarding claim 2(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 1 don’t explicitly teach wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a size of the fileset.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Chopra teaches wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a size of the fileset (Chopra, col 6:8-11 discloses partition or splitting fileset (disk image file) is being performed during cloning/snapshotting operation where scanning operation before cloning the disk image finds total amount of data (metadata) to be partitioned “the scanner is responsible for scanning a disk image file that includes the primary backup copy to split, divide, or partition an amount or total amount of data to be cloned among hosts 217” ).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention made to incorporate the feature of dividing files in partition based on metadata of Chopra into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee to produce an expected result of snapshotting plurality of partition as backup data. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to divide file/s into partitions so that file backup jobs can be divided in smaller tasks for improved overall cloning operation speed(Chopra, col7:54-56).
Regarding claim 9(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 8 don’t explicitly teach wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a size of a file of the fileset indicated by the fileset metadata.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Chopra teaches wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a size of a file of the fileset indicated by the fileset metadata (Chopra, col 6:8-11 discloses partition or splitting fileset (disk image file) is being performed during cloning/snapshotting operation where scanning operation before cloning the disk image finds total amount of data (metadata) to be partitioned “the scanner is responsible for scanning a disk image file that includes the primary backup copy to split, divide, or partition an amount or total amount of data to be cloned among hosts 217” ).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention made to incorporate the feature of dividing files in partition based on metadata of Chopra into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee to produce an expected result of snapshotting plurality of partition as backup data. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to divide file/s into partitions so that file backup jobs can be divided in smaller tasks for improved overall cloning operation speed(Chopra, col7:54-56).
Regarding claim 16(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitation of claim 15 don’t explicitly teach wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a size of the fileset.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Chopra teaches wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a size of the fileset(Chopra, col 6:8-11 discloses partition or splitting fileset (disk image file) is being performed during cloning/snapshotting operation where scanning operation before cloning the disk image finds total amount of data (metadata) to be partitioned “the scanner is responsible for scanning a disk image file that includes the primary backup copy to split, divide, or partition an amount or total amount of data to be cloned among hosts 217” ).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention made to incorporate the feature of dividing files in partition based on metadata of Chopra into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee to produce an expected result of snapshotting plurality of partition as backup data. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to divide file/s into partitions so that file backup jobs can be divided in smaller tasks for improved overall cloning operation speed(Chopra, col7:54-56).
Claim 3, 10 and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Raja, Harvey et al (PGPUB Document No. 20180314749), hereafter, referred to as “Raja”, in view of Word, Jonathan Brian (US Patent No. 10686905), hereafter, referred to as “Word”, in view of Goodman, Brian et al (PGPUB Document No. 20180107562), hereafter, referred to as “Goodman”, in view of Lee, Robert et al (PGPUB Document No. 20150169718), hereafter, referred to as “Lee”, in further view of Chang, Yuan-Chi et al (US Patent No. 9460147), hereafter, referred to as “Chang”.
Regarding claim 3(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitations of claim 1 but don’t explicitly teach wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a predetermined partition size.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Chang teaches wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a predetermined partition size(Chang, col 10: 23-30 discloses partition size is mentioned (predetermined) in metadata “320 allocating portions of the dataset 305D to the one or more base-delta files according to the base table partition sizes, formats, and other partitioning criteria specified in the base table metadata”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of dividing fileset into partitions based on pre-determined size of Chang into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee to produce an expected result of partitioning fileset into fixed size. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to improve the efficiency of distributed storage systems by using fast sequential disk writes against slow random writes(Chang, col 2:54-57).
Regarding claim 10(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitations of claim 8 but don’t explicitly teach wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a predetermined partition size.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Chang teaches wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a predetermined partition size(Chang, col 10: 23-30 discloses partition size is mentioned (predetermined) in metadata “320 allocating portions of the dataset 305D to the one or more base-delta files according to the base table partition sizes, formats, and other partitioning criteria specified in the base table metadata”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of dividing fileset into partitions based on pre-determined size of Chang into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee to produce an expected result of partitioning fileset into fixed size. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to improve the efficiency of distributed storage systems by using fast sequential disk writes against slow random writes(Chang, col 2:54-57).
Regarding claim 17 (Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitations of claim 15 but don’t explicitly teach wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a predetermined partition size.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Chang teaches wherein determining whether to divide the fileset into the plurality of partitions is based on a predetermined partition size(Chang, col 10: 23-30 discloses partition size is mentioned (predetermined) in metadata “320 allocating portions of the dataset 305D to the one or more base-delta files according to the base table partition sizes, formats, and other partitioning criteria specified in the base table metadata”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of dividing fileset into partitions based on pre-determined size of Chang into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee to produce an expected result of partitioning fileset into fixed size. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to improve the efficiency of distributed storage systems by using fast sequential disk writes against slow random writes(Chang, col 2:54-57).
Claim 7, 14 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Raja, Harvey et al (PGPUB Document No. 20180314749), hereafter, referred to as “Raja”, in view of Word, Jonathan Brian (US Patent No. 10686905), hereafter, referred to as “Word”, in view of Goodman, Brian et al (PGPUB Document No. 20180107562), hereafter, referred to as “Goodman”, in view of Lee, Robert et al (PGPUB Document No. 20150169718), hereafter, referred to as “Lee”, in further view of Wu, Qi et al (PGPUB Document No. 20180349095), hereafter, referred to as “Wu”.
Regarding claim 7(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitations of claim 2 but don’t explicitly teach wherein the fileset includes multiple files.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Wu teaches wherein the fileset includes multiple files (Wu, para 0008 discloses a fileset which is to be portioned can have multiple or group of files “wherein a merged group of files is immediately partitioned and stored in a next intermediate level”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of dividing group of file of Wu into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee to produce an expected result of having multiple files in the same partition for snapshot creation. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to improve large scale data storing operations by reducing computational overhead using key-value pair written internally multiple times to storage device (Wu, para 0004-0005).
Regarding claim 14(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitations of claim 8 but don’t explicitly teach wherein the fileset includes multiple files.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Wu teaches wherein the fileset includes multiple files (Wu, para 0008 discloses a fileset which is to be portioned can have multiple or group of files “wherein a merged group of files is immediately partitioned and stored in a next intermediate level”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of dividing group of file of Wu into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee to produce an expected result of having multiple files in the same partition for snapshot creation. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to improve large scale data storing operations by reducing computational overhead using key-value pair written internally multiple times to storage device (Wu, para 0004-0005).
Regarding claim 20(Original), Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee teach all the limitations of claim 15 but don’t explicitly teach wherein the fileset includes multiple files.
However, in the same field of endeavor of file partition creation Wu teaches wherein the fileset includes multiple files (Wu, para 0008 discloses a fileset which is to be portioned can have multiple or group of files “wherein a merged group of files is immediately partitioned and stored in a next intermediate level”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate the feature of dividing group of file of Wu into the snapshot creation in a distributed storage system of Raja, Wood, Goodman and Lee to produce an expected result of having multiple files in the same partition for snapshot creation. The modification would be obvious because one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to improve large scale data storing operations by reducing computational overhead using key-value pair written internally multiple times to storage device (Wu, para 0004-0005).
Response to Arguments
I. Non-statutory double patenting rejection
Non-statutory double patenting rejection to claim 1-20 has been withdrawn in response to submission of terminal disclaimer filed on 3/2/2026.
II. 35 U.S.C §103
The crux of the applicant’s argument regarding prior art Raja presented on page 9 paragraph 4 through page 11 paragraph 4 for independent claim 1, 8 and 15 is “Raja does describe taking snapshots of partitions, but the partitions in Raja already exist-for separate reasons related to the overall storage architecture as described above-prior to the receipt of any corresponding snapshot requests”.
Applicant’s above mentioned argument has been fully considered but the examiner respectfully disagrees as the purpose of using prior art Raja is to teach making request for initiating snapshot/data copying operation related data partition; where partitions details are being identified during the request, not before that. Further, claimed ‘undefined partition’ does not indicate if a partition has already been created or not.
The applicant further on page 12 paragraph 3 stated that “Word determines how to partition the data based on file metadata- i.e,, which "chunk-cutting technique" to use-but not whether to do SO. That is, once a decision has already been made to divide a file into chunks, Word then uses file metadata to select which technique to use for the dividing, but that is distinct from a decision of whether to divide at all”.
The examiner respectfully disagrees for following reason;
Word in col 28:23-26 teaches partitioning or file division is getting determined from metadata as following “The data type of a file to be divided into chunks may be determined using any suitable file metadata”.
The applicant also on page 14 paragraph 1 argued “Thus, the cited aspects of Goodman relate to log snapshots, which are snapshots of event logs that may be generated by controller nodes of the automated data storage library. But these log snapshots are snapshots of event logs associated with the operation of the
controllers, and not copies of the data itself”.
Applicant’s above mentioned argument has been fully considered but the examiner respectfully disagrees as Goodman in para 0034 discloses storing snapshots to its respective node, where any snapshot basically refers to copy of data for a point-in-time.
No other arguments were presented for claims dependent of independent claim 1, 8 and 15 other than discussed above.
Therefore, the examiner maintains the rejection to claim 1-20 mailed on 11/28/2025.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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.
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/ABDULLAH A DAUD/Examiner, Art Unit 2164
/AMY NG/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2164
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