Goss, Ryan James. et al.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Oct 14, 2020

12763003 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Oct. 14, 2020)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
12/763,003 04/19/2010 Ryan James Goss STL16191 4656
73462 7590 10/14/2020
Hall Estill - Seagate Technology LLC
100 North Broadway, Suite 2900
Oklahoma City, OK 73102-8820
EXAMINER
ALSIP, MICHAEL
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2136
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
10/14/2020 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):
USPTO@dockettrak.com
amelia.pharofrank@seagate.com
okcipdocketing@hallestill.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte RYAN JAMES GOSS, KEVIN GOMEZ,
MARK ALLEN GAERTNER, and BRUCE DOUGLAS BUCH

Appeal 2019-003976
Application 12/763,003
Technology Center 2100

Before ROBERT E. NAPPI, JEAN R. HOMERE, and
JAMES R. HUGHES, Administrative Patent Judges.
HOMERE, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
I. STATEMENT OF THE CASE1
Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant appeals from the
Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1–4, 7–16, 18, 19, and 21, all of the
claims pending.2 Claims App. Claims 5, 6, 17, and 20 have been canceled.
Id. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). An oral hearing was held

1 We refer to the Specification filed Apr. 19, 2010 (“Spec.”); the Final
Office Action, mailed June 4, 2018 (“Final Act.”); the Appeal Brief, filed
Dec. 6, 2018 (“Appeal Br.”); the Examiner’s Answer, mailed Feb. 26, 2019
(“Ans.”); and the Reply Brief, filed April 26, 2019 (“Reply Br.”).
2 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in
37 C.F.R. § 1.42(a). Appellant identifies Seagate Technology LLC as the
real party-in-interest. Appeal Br. 1.
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in this appeal on September 23, 2020. A transcript of the oral hearing will
be entered into the record in due course.
We affirm, and designate our affirmance as a new ground of rejection.
II. CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
According to Appellant, the claimed subject matter relates to a
method and system for updating stored user data in memory (118) in
response to receiving access commands from computer host (102). Spec.,
6:8–14.
Figures 1 and 6, reproduced and discussed below, are useful for
understanding the claimed subject matter:

Figure 1 above illustrates host (102) sending commands to storage device
(100) via interface (104) to update user data in memory (118). Id. at 3:21–
25.

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Figure 6 above illustrates memory (118) having a plurality of channels (ch.
0–15) for storing full stripes of user data (ch. 0–14) along with associated
parity data (ch. 15) accessible via buffer (116) having indices aligned with
the channels for temporarily storing updated data for users 1’ and 5’ in
channels 0 and 1 respectively. Id. at 2:15–17, 7:7–13.

In particular, responsive to the host access commands to update first
and second user data (e.g., users 1 and 5) stored in the full stripes of memory
(118), controller (106) executes memory control logic (140) that computes
new parity data (P (1’ +5’)) for a partial stripe stored in buffer (116)
including the updated first and second user data without using old user data
and old parity data stored in memory (118). Id. at 7:7–13.

Claims 1, 13, and 21 are independent. Claim 1, reproduced below
with disputed limitations emphasized, is illustrative:
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1. A data storage apparatus configured to store data and
in communication with a computer host to receive host access
commands to update stored data, the data storage apparatus
comprising:
a memory having a predetermined plurality of channels
storing full stripes of data, each full stripe of data storing user
data from the computer host in each of a predetermined subset
of the channels and storing parity data in each of the rest of the
channels that is computed for the user data stored in the
respective full stripe;
a buffer having indices aligned with the channels in the
memory and temporarily storing updated user data from the
computer; and
a processor-based controller executing memory control
logic that, responsive to the host access commands to update
first user data stored in one of the full stripes in the memory
and to update second user data stored in another one of the full
stripes in the memory, computes new parity data for a partial
stripe stored in the buffer that includes the updated first and
second user data without using any old user data and without
using any old parity data stored in the memory.

Appeal Br. 11 (Claims App.).
III. REFERENCES
The Examiner relies upon the following references.3
Name Reference Date
Neufeld US 5,333,305 July 26, 1994
Santeler US 2002/0194530 A1 Dec. 19, 2002

3 All reference citations are to the first named inventor only.
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IV. REJECTION
The Examiner rejects claims 1–4, 7–16, 18, 19, and 21 under 35
U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over the combined teachings of Santeler
and Neufeld. Final Act. 2–5.
V. ANALYSIS
We consider Appellant’s arguments in the order they are presented in
the Appeal Brief, pages 5–10 and the Reply Brief, pages 2–10.4
Appellant argues that the Examiner erred in finding that the
combination of Santeler and Neufeld teaches or suggests updating user data
stored in full stripes contained in memory by computing new parity data for
a partial stripe of the updated data stored in a buffer without using old data
from memory, as recited in independent claims 1, 13, and 21. Appeal Br. 5.
In particular, Appellant argues that Neufeld does not cure the admitted
deficiencies of Santeler because Neufeld updates data already stored in
memory by writing updated data back to the same stripe in which old data
was stored. Id. at 7 (citing Neufeld 2:50–51, 3:35–44). According to
Appellant, Neufeld expressly requires reading old data stored in memory
when writing a partial stripe of updated data, whereas the disputed limitation
requires using new data in a partial stripe as opposed to using old data in a
full stripe to compute new parity data. Id. Further, Appellant argues that
Neufeld teaches determining whether the stripe contains unused storage
space wherein old data resides, whereas the disputed limitation requires old

4 We have considered in this Decision only those arguments Appellant
actually raised in the Briefs. Arguments not made are waived. See
37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv) (2014).
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data residing in a stull stripe in the memory contains no unused space. Id. at
8 (citing Neufeld Fig. 5). In particular, Appellant argues that Neufeld
teaches reading old data from memory prior to computing the new parity
data, which is subsequently written in the partial stripe of new data. Id. at 8–
9. According to Appellant, Neufeld at best teaches writing dummy data to
fill unused space after new parity data has already been computed from old
data for the partial stripe of updated data. Id. at 9–10. Consequently,
Appellant argues that the combination of Santeler and Neufeld would not
have reasonably taught or suggested the disputed limitations of claims 1, 13,
and 21. Id. at 10.
Appellant’s arguments are not persuasive of reversible Examiner error
because they are tantamount to attacks against the references’ teachings
individually, and not as the combination proposed by the Examiner. One
cannot show non-obviousness by attacking the references individually where
the rejections are based on combined teachings of the 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).
As a preliminary matter, we note the disputed claim limitation
requires computing new parity data for a partial stripe using updated user
data in a buffer (as opposed to user old data from memory) to thereby update
old user data in full stripes contained in memory. The Examiner relies upon
Santeler for its teaching of a memory module having stored in full stripes
user data and parity data. Final Act. 2–3 (citing Santeler ¶¶ 29–31, 36, 37).
The Examiner further relies upon Santeler for its teaching of a buffer logic
computing new parity data in partial stripes, and writing new data in full
stripes without retrieving old data from memory. Id. at 3 (citing Santeler
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¶ 51). Additionally, the Examiner relies upon Neufeld for its teaching of
performing a partial write operation without reading old data during which
unused space will not be filled. Id. (citing Neufeld 3:45–52); Ans. 3 (citing
Neufeld 10:3–15).
Although the Examiner also finds that Santeler teaches calculating
partial strip parity using old data, we determine that this teaching to be
cumulative. Id.5 We find nonetheless that the combination of the cited
teachings of Santeler and Neufeld 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 what one would expect from such an
arrangement. See KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 416 (2007).
Therefore, the ordinarily skilled artisan, being “a person of ordinary
creativity, not an automaton,” would have been able to fit the teachings of
the cited references together like pieces of a puzzle to predictably achieve a
buffer logic performing a partial stripe operation and computing new parity
data using the updated data stored in a buffer without using old data from
full stripes contained in memory and thereby updating user data in memory.
Because Appellant has solely addressed Neufeld’s teachings without
addressing the merits of Santeler’s teachings, Appellant has not
demonstrated that the Examiner’s proffered combination would have been
“uniquely challenging or difficult for one of ordinary skill in the art.”
Therefore, we agree with the Examiner that the proposed modification
would have been within the capabilities of the ordinarily skilled artisan. See

5 Because we have modified the Examiner’s proposed combination of
Santeler and Neufeld, we designate our affirmance of the Examiner rejection
as a new ground of rejection.
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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 satisfied that, on
this record, that the combination of Santeler and Neufeld would have taught
or at least suggested updating user data stored in full stripes contained in
memory by computing new parity data for a partial stripe of the updated data
stored in a buffer without using old data from memory. Ans. 4–6.
Accordingly, we are not persuaded of error in the Examiner’s rejection of
claims 1, 13, and 21 over the combined teachings of Santeler and Neufeld.
Regarding the rejection of claims 2–4, 7–12, 14–16, 18, and 19,
Appellant has not presented separate patentability arguments or has
reiterated substantially the same arguments as those previously discussed for
the patentability of claims 1, 13, and 21. As such, claims 2–4, 7–12, 14–16,
18, and 19 fall therewith. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv).
VI. CONCLUSION
We affirm the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1–4, 7–16, 18, 19, and
21. 37 C.F.R. § 41.50(b) provides that, “[a] new ground of rejection
pursuant to this paragraph shall not be considered final for judicial review.”
37 C.F.R. § 41.50(b) also provides that the Appellants, WITHIN
TWO MONTHS FROM THE DATE OF THE DECISION, must exercise
one of the following two options with respect to the new grounds of
rejection to avoid termination of proceedings (37 C.F.R. § 1.197 (b)) as to
the rejected claims:
(1) Reopen prosecution. Submit an appropriate amendment of
the claims so rejected or new evidence relating to the claims so
rejected, or both, and have the matter reconsidered by the
examiner, in which event the prosecution will be remanded to
the examiner. . . .
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(2) Request rehearing. Request that the proceeding be reheard
under 37 C.F.R. § 41.52 by the Board upon the same record. . . .

VII. DECISION SUMMARY
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C.
§
Reference(s)/
Basis Affirmed Reversed
New
Ground
1–4, 7–16,
18, 19, 21 103
Santeler,
Neufeld
1–4, 7–16,
18, 19, 21
1–4, 7–16,
18, 19, 21
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). See 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.136(a)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED
37 C.F.R. § 41.50(b)