Ex Parte BRAAM et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardNov 30, 201813283169 (P.T.A.B. Nov. 30, 2018) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 13/283, 169 98068 7590 Hollingsworth Davis 8000 West 78th Street Suite 450 10/27/2011 Minneapolis, MN 55439 12/04/2018 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Peter BRAAM UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE United States Patent and Trademark Office Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS P.O. Box 1450 Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450 www .uspto.gov ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. STX.143.Al 2835 EXAMINER RAAB, CHRISTOPHER J ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2156 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 12/04/2018 ELECTRONIC Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding. The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication. Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the following e-mail address(es): tdotter@hdpatlaw.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte PETER BRAAM, and NIKITA Y. DANILOV Appeal 2017-011846 1 Application 13/283,169 Technology Center 2100 Before JEAN R. HOMERE, CARL W. WHITEHEAD JR., and IRVINE. BRANCH, Administrative Patent Judges. HOMERE, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a Final Rejection of claims 1-5, 8, 9, 11-21, 24, 29-31, 33, 34, and 36. 2 Claims App'x. Claims 6, 7, 10, 22, 23, 25-28, 32, and 35 have been canceled. 3 We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b ). We affirm. 1 Appellants identify the real party in interest as Seagate Technology LLC. App. Br. 1. 2 Summary of claims in PTOL-326, and list of rejected claims in Final Action mailed November 4, 2016 (reproduced in App. Br. 6) are incorrect. 3 See amendment and response filed July 11, 2016. Appeal 2017-011846 Application 13/283,169 Introduction According to Appellants, the claimed subject matter is directed to a method and system for "recovering data on a storage system with minimal downtime subsequent to a system failure or error." Spec. 1 :5- 6. In particular, upon receiving at a server (104) a request from a host computer ( 102) to modify a file ( e.g. assign new volumes, read/write commands) in a file system (120) within the operating system (116), a RAID controller hardware ( 118) executes a corresponding software application in the software application layer ( 116), and records the ensuing update in a file operations log (FOL-156). Id. 12: 11-25, 14:4-- 6, 14:21-26, and Figs. 1 & 2. More particularly, the file system (120) enables the storage device (110) to be externally visible to the client devices (102) as a set of numbered blocks of fixed size, and persistent structures (124) on the server comprising tables related to device space management, each block number identifying where file data is stored and a list of free blocks, which may be used to extend files. Id. 14:13- 19. Upon detecting that a record (156a) has been persistently added to the FOL (156) on the server (104) in response to an update request made by the client (102), an auxiliary file monitor (158) adds a similar record to its file system structure (160) so as to rebuild the file system (120) should a catastrophic error occur. Id. 16:1---6, 18:12-19, and Fig. 3. Representative Claim Independent claim 1 is representative, and reads as follows: A method comprising: receiving, on a computing device, a storage request operable to perform a modification operation on a file system; 2 Appeal 2017-011846 Application 13/283,169 processing, on the computing device, the storage request and updating a file system structure based on the storage request; generating, on the computing device, a data record for the modification operation, the data record comprising metadata relating to the modification operation made to the file system structure, the metadata including device block numbers identifying blocks where file data is stored and a list of free blocks which do not hold file data, the data record being stored in a file operations log that is continuously updated in response to each request to modify the file system structure; using the data record, updating an auxiliary file system structure operable to enable recovery of the file system, the auxiliary file system structure representative of a current state of the file system structure and having a different format than the file system to reduce a likelihood that an error in the file system structure is repeated in the auxiliary file system structure, the auxiliary file system structure including the device block numbers of the metadata and the list of free blocks. Karamcheti Prahlad Prasad Palagummi ("Prasad") Prior Art Relied upon US 2009/0157989 Al June 18, 2009 US 2010/0332456 Al Dec. 30, 2010 US 2011/0145199 Al June 16, 2011 Rejection on Appeal Claims 1-5, 8, 9, 11-21, 24, 29-31, 33, 34, and 36 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Prahlad, Karamcheti, and Prasad. Final Act. 4--20. 4 4 See supra note 2. 3 Appeal 2017-011846 Application 13/283,169 ANALYSIS We consider Appellants' arguments as they are presented in the Appeal Brief5, pages 6-11, and the Reply Brief, pages 6-10. We have reviewed the Examiner's rejection in light of Appellants' arguments. We are unpersuaded by Appellants' contentions. We adopt as our own the findings and reasons set forth in the Final Action and the Examiner's Answer in response to Appellants' Appeal Brief. See Final Act. 2-20; Ans. 2-5. However, we highlight and address specific arguments and findings for emphasis as follows. Appellants argue the proposed combination of Prahlad, Karamcheti, and Prasad does not teach or suggest "updating an auxiliary file system structure with data records that include device block numbers identifying blocks where file data is stored on a source file system structure", as recited in independent claim 1. App. Br. 6. In particular, Appellants argue Prahlad and Prasad are directed to a conventional technique of backing up only some file metadata (e.g., filename, directory structures) preserving file data and hierarchies so as to reconstruct equivalent data and hierarchy on a different storage device. Id. at 6-7 (citing Prahlad ,r,r 2-10, 50, 76-80, and 85; Prasad ,r,r 21, 24). However, Appellants argue the disclosed metadata backup does not include device block numbers or lists of free blocks of a data storage file system. Id. Further, Appellants argue that although Karamcheti discloses rediscovering relationships between logical block numbers and physical 5Rather than reiterate all the arguments of Appellants and all the Examiner's findings/ conclusions, we refer to the Appeal Brief ( filed March 31, 2017) ("App. Br."), the Final Action from which the appeal is taken (mailed November 4, 2016) ("Final Act."), the Reply Brief ( filed September 26, 2017)("Reply Br"), and the Answer (mailed July 26, 2017) ("Ans.") for the respective details. 4 Appeal 2017-011846 Application 13/283,169 block numbers on a storage device so as to recover a physical-to-logical metadata mapping on the storage device, the disclosed recovery is not taught as correcting errors in the file structures between a primary storage device and an auxiliary storage device. Id. at 7-8 (Karamcheti ,r,r 8, 43, 44, 77, 79, and 88). According to Appellants, because Karamcheti's physical-to-logical mapping metadata including block numbers identifying where the data is stored in a file system on a storage device, as well as the location of free blocks thereon, it does not provide a suggestion of an auxiliary file system storing the same metadata information. Id. at 8-9. Accordingly, Appellants submit that the proposed combination is based on improper hindsight reasoning using knowledge gleaned from Appellants' disclosure. Id. These arguments are not persuasive because they are tantamount to an individual attack against the references. One cannot show non-obviousness by attacking the references individually where the rejections are based on combinations of references. In re Merck & Co., 800 F.2d 1091, 1097 (Fed. Cir. 1986); see also In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413,425 (CCPA 1981). In this case, the Examiner relies upon Prahlad for its teaching of a disaster recovery method and system for copying file data/metadata from a primary storage into a cloud-based auxiliary storage so as to restore the files to the primary storage device in the aftermath of a disaster. Final Act. 4--5 ( citing Prahlad ,r,r 65, 80, 85, and 103). Further, the Examiner relies upon Prasad's disclosure of an auxiliary file system for backing up in a second format data/metadata copied in a first format from a primary file system. Id. at 6-7 (Prasad ,r,r 5, 9, and 35). Additionally, the Examiner relies upon Karamcheti' s disclosure of copying data/metadata from the physical blocks/volumes to corresponding logical block numbers within a file system of a computer so as to restore the data/metadata in the physical volumes in 5 Appeal 2017-011846 Application 13/283,169 the aftermath of a system failure. Id. 5-6 ( citing Karamcheti ,r,r 43--45, and 79). The Examiner also relies upon Karamcheti' s disclosure of maintaining in main memory a free block information table that keeps track of physical volumes currently not assigned to any file, and that are available to store applications. Id. ( citing Karamcheti ,r 77). We agree with the Examiner that the proposed combination of the cited references would predictably result in an auxiliary file system storing in a second format data/metadata identified by block numbers copied in a first format from a primary storage device so as to restore the data/metadata in the primary storage in the aftermath of a system crash. Id., Ans. 3-5. We find the Examiner's proposed combination of the cited teachings of Prahlad, Karamcheti, and Prasad is no more than a simple arrangement of old elements with each performing the same function it had been known to perform, yielding no more than one would expect from such an arrangement. KSR Int'! Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398,416 (2007). The ordinarily skilled artisan, being "a person of ordinary creativity, not an automaton," would be able to fit the teachings of the cited references together like pieces of a puzzle to predictably result in a system for result in an auxiliary file system storing in a second format data/metadata identified by block numbers copied in a first format from a primary storage device so as to restore the data/metadata in the primary storage in the aftermath of a system crash. Id. at 420--421. Because Appellants have not demonstrated that the Examiner's proffered combination would have been "uniquely challenging or difficult for one of ordinary skill in the art," we agree with the Examiner that the proposed modification would have been within the purview of the ordinarily skilled artisan. Leapfrog Enters., Inc. v. Fisher-Price, Inc., 485 F.3d 1157, 1162 (Fed. Cir. 2007) (citing KSR, 550 U.S. at 418). Consequently, we are 6 Appeal 2017-011846 Application 13/283,169 satisfied that, on the record before us, the Examiner has established by a preponderance of the evidence that the combination of Prahlad, Karamcheti, and Prasad renders claim 1 unpatentable. Accordingly, we are not persuaded of error in the Examiner's obviousness rejection of claim 1. Regarding the rejection of claims 2-5, 8, 9, 13, 18-21, 29, 31, 33, and 3 6, because Appellants have either not presented separate patentability arguments or have reiterated substantially the same arguments as those previously discussed for patentability of claim 1 above, those claims fall therewith. See 37 C.F.R. § 4I.37(c)(l)(iv). Regarding the rejection of claims 11, 12, 14--17, 24, 30, and 34, Appellants argue that the proposed combination of references is deficient for the same reasons discussed for claim 1. App. Br. 9. As noted above, this argument is not persuasive because we do not find any such deficiencies in the proposed combination of references. Further, Appellants argue that Prahlad's disclosure of using disaster recovery/secondary copies when primary copies are unavailable does not teach or suggest "determining, from the updating of the auxiliary file system structure, whether errors are present in a file system structure component affected by the modification operation and, if an error is detected, correct the error in the file system structure component". Id. (citing Prahlad ,r,r 64, 65). Furthermore, Appellants argue although the Examiner does not cite to Karamcheti as teaching the determination of error, Karamcheti teaches using a checksum to verify that a log entry is valid when the log data is accessed to rebuild metadata stored in memory, and using a duplicate copy of the log if an error is found in the original entry. Id. at 10. According to Appellants, because the disclosed checksum error is not discovered based on updating an auxiliary structure that uses a different format than the original, the disclosed duplicate copy 7 Appeal 2017-011846 Application 13/283,169 accessed after the error is found does not teach a different format. Id. ( citing Karamcheti ,r 94). This argument is not persuasive. As noted above, the combination of Prahlad, Prasad, and Karamcheti teaches using an auxiliary copy of a primary storage data/metadata when the primary copy is unavailable, wherein the auxiliary copy is stored in a different first format from the primary copy. We agree with the Examiner that, because the disputed claim limitation does not specify a particular type of error, the disclosed use of the auxiliary copy to recover data at a primary location teaches or suggests the disputed limitation. Ans. 4--5. Further, as noted by Appellants, Karamcheti discloses using a checksum to verify that a log entry is valid when the log data is accessed to rebuild metadata stored in memory, and using a duplicate copy of the log if an error is found in the original entry. We are satisfied that the proposed combination of references teaches using the auxiliary copy in a second format upon detecting an error in the primary copy in a first format. DECISION For the above reasons, we affirm the Examiner's rejection of claims 1-5, 8, 9, 11-21, 24, 29-31, 33, 34, and 36 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a). No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a) (1) (iv). AFFIRMED 8 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation