Satyam B. Vaghani et al.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Jan 29, 2020

11707724 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Jan. 29, 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.
11/707,724 02/16/2007 Satyam B. Vaghani A147.CIP 8856
152569 7590 01/29/2020
Patterson + Sheridan, LLP - VMware
24 Greenway Plaza
Suite 1600
Houston, TX 77046
EXAMINER
ROSTAMI, MOHAMMAD S
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2154
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
01/29/2020 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):
ipadmin@vmware.com
psdocketing@pattersonsheridan.com
vmware_admin@pattersonsheridan.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte SATYAM B. VAGHANI, YUEN-LIN TAN, and ABHISHEK RAI
____________

Appeal 2018-008484
Application 11/707,724
Technology Center 2100
____________

Before ST. JOHN COURTENAY III, DAVID M. KOHUT, and
MONICA S. ULLAGADDI, Administrative Patent Judges.

COURTENAY, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant1 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a final rejection of
claims 3–19, which are all the claims pending in this application. Claims 1,
2, and 20–36 are canceled. We have jurisdiction over the pending claims
under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.

1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to Applicant as defined in 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.42(a). The real party in interest is VMware, Inc. Appeal Br. 3.
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STATEMENT OF THE CASE 2
Introduction
Appellant’s claimed invention “relates to a distributed transaction
system within a computer system, or, more specifically, to providing
multiple computers or other computing entities with concurrent access to a
file system or other structured data system while maintaining a crash
recovery journal.” Spec. ¶ 3.
Exemplary Independent Claim 3
3. A distributed transaction system comprising:

a first computing entity;

a second computing entity; and

a data storage unit, coupled with said first computing
entity and said second computing entity, said data storage unit
storing a file system, a first transaction journal for said first
computing entity, and within the file system a second
transaction journal for said second computing entity, a plurality
of data entities including file descriptors, files, and a block
bitmap, and a lock for each of the data entities comprising an
owner field and a version field,
wherein the first transaction journal is updated with
entries that describe transactions executed by the first
computing entity on the data entities during periods in which
the first computing entity gained exclusive access to the data
entities by having acquired the locks associated with the data
entities, and the second transaction journal is updated with
entries that describe transactions executed by the second

2 We herein refer to the Final Office Action, mailed May 4, 2017 (“Final
Act.”); Appeal Brief, filed March 5, 2018 (“App. Br.”); the Examiner’s
Answer, mailed June 28, 2018 (“Ans.”), and the Reply Brief, filed Aug. 28,
2018 (“Reply Br.”).
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computing entity on the data entities during periods in which
the second computing entity gained exclusive access to the data
entities by having acquired the locks associated with the data
entities, and
at least one of the entries include a log action that
indicates updates made to a data entity during the transaction
described by the entry, and a lock action that indicates an
address of a lock that was exclusively acquired during the
transaction described by the entry and a version number
written into the version field of the lock during the transaction
described by the entry.

Appeal Br. 15, “CLAIMS APPENDIX.” (Emphasis added regarding the
contested dispositive limitations under 35 U.S.C. § 103).
Rejection
Claims 3–19 are rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
obvious over the combined teachings and suggestions of Kingsbury et al.
(US 2003/0065672 A1; pub. Apr. 3, 2003) (“Kingsbury”), Georgiev (US
7,552,122 B1; iss. Jun. 23, 2009), and Sandri et al. (US 2003/0105796 A1;
pub. Jun. 5, 2003) (“Sandri”).

Prior PTAB Decision
Appeal No. 2014-007868, corresponding to instant Application No.
11/707,724, decided May 26, 2016 (Examiner Affirmed-In-Part, New
Ground of Rejection by Board under 37 C.F.R. § 41.50(b)).

ANALYSIS
We have considered all of Appellant’s arguments and any evidence
presented. Based upon our review, and for the reasons discussed below,
Appellant provides sufficient argument and evidence to persuade us the
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Examiner erred with respect to the single rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
over the cited combination of Kingsbury, Georgiev, and Sandri.

Rejection of Independent Claim 3 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
Issue: Under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a), did the Examiner err by finding
Kingsbury, Georgiev, and Sandri collectively teach or suggest the contested
dispositive limitations: “a data storage unit storing a file system . . . . and
within the file system . . . a lock for each of the data entities,” within the
meaning of independent claim 3?3 (Emphases added).
We note the disputed limitations of independent claim 3 are recited in
similar form having commensurate scope in remaining independent claim
10. We note a locking mechanism (such as a semaphore) is essentially, for
example, a counter variable that keeps track of when a shared resource is
claimed (e.g., by a process). When the lock is released, the shared resource
becomes available to another waiting process, as is known in the art. 4

3 We give the contested claim limitations the broadest reasonable
interpretation (“BRI”) consistent with the Specification. See In re Morris,
127 F.3d 1048, 1054 (Fed. Cir. 1997).

4 See Spec. ¶ 46: “The acquisition of a lock may be achieved in a number of
ways, including as described in U.S. Patent Application No. 10/773,613,
which is incorporated by reference herein.” See corresponding US Pat.
7,849,098 B1 (filed Feb. 6, 2004; issued Dec. 7, 2010): “If multiple
computers are given concurrent, unrestricted access to a typical file system
the data in the file system will likely become corrupted.” Col. 1, ll. 18–20.
See also Col. 1, ll. 37–42: “Thus, to provide multiple computers with
concurrent access to a common file system on a shared data store, without
corrupting the data and the file system, one or more locking and/or
coherence mechanisms must generally be implemented.”
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The dispositive issue presented here is not whether a lock is taught by
the cited references, but rather whether the cited combination of Kingsbury,
Georgiev, and Sandri teaches or suggests a lock for each of the data entities
that is actually stored within the file system, as claimed, and as depicted
below in Appellant’s Figure 5. Lock 36 is stored within file system 64,
which is further stored within the data storage unit, as illustrated below:

Appellant’s Figure 5 is shown above depicting file system 64.
Associated with data entity 34 is lock 36, stored within file
system 64, within the data storage unit. To gain access to a
particular data entity 34, server 12 must gain control of the
respective lock 36.

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Claim Construction
We begin our analysis with claim construction regarding the broadest
reasonable interpretation of the claim term “file system.” 5 We turn to the
Specification for context regarding the claimed “file system.” Appellant
provides non-limiting, exemplary descriptions of the claim term “file
system,” as being consistent with conventional file systems, as follows:
In various embodiments of the present invention, physical file
systems, including the New Technology File System (NTFS), the
Unix File System (UFS), the VMware Virtual Machine File
System (VMFS), and the Linux third extended file system
(ext3FS), may be used as the file system layer 64.
Spec. ¶ 41.
See also:
FIG. 5 illustrates a data storage unit (DSU) 30, in accordance
with various embodiments of the present invention. As shown,
the DSU 30 includes a file system 64. It should be appreciated
that any other structured data system, such as a database, may be
substituted for file system 64. The file system 64 may comprise
a conventional file system, including a plurality of files of

5 Claim construction is an important step in a patentability determination. A
legal conclusion that a claim is obvious involves two analytical steps,
assuming the references have been properly combined under § 103. See
Medichem, S.A. v. Rolabo, S.L., 353 F.3d 928, 933 (Fed. Cir. 2003) (“Both
anticipation under § 102 and obviousness under § 103 are two-step inquiries.
The first step in both analyses is a proper construction of the claims. . . . The
second step in the analyses requires a comparison of the properly construed
claim to the prior art.” (Internal citations omitted)). Under the second step,
the Board must compare the construed claim to one or more prior art
references and make factual findings regarding the limitations contested by
Appellant. See In re Crish, 393 F.3d 1253, 1256 (Fed. Cir. 2004).
Because the PTO is entitled to give claims their broadest reasonable
interpretation, a court’s review of the Board’s claim construction is limited
to determining whether it was reasonable. See Morris, 127 F.3d at 1055.

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various types, typically organized into one or more directories.
The file system 64 may include metadata that specifies
information about the file system 64, such as some data structure
that indicates which data blocks in the file system remain
available for use, along with other metadata indicating the
directories and files in the file system, along with their location.
. . . Many existing file systems are amply documented so that
they can be used and modified as described herein by a person of
skill in the art, and any such file system may be used in
implementing the invention.
Spec. ¶ 45.

Regarding the claim term “data storage unit” that stores the “file
system” (claim 1), we again turn to the Specification for context:

The different potential locations of logical storage managers are
generally not significant to the operation of the SAN 14 [(Storage
Area Network 14)] and, in particular, the underlying data storage
systems 16. While the SAN 14 provides routeable multipath
access, the data storage systems 16 present a relatively large
collection of externally visible LUNs, also referred to in the
context of the present invention as data storage units (DSUs),
accessible by the computing entities 12, subject to conventional
access controls. Individually, the data storage systems 16 are
relatively conventional computer platforms 20, though
specialized to support typically high-bandwidth fibre channel
network interfaces and to host large parallel arrays of typically
SCSI-based disk drive storage units 221-22N. Aggregate network
bandwidth at the SAN 14 interface typically in excess of 200
Megabytes per second and online storage capacity in excess of
10 terabytes on a single system 16 is presently not uncommon.
Collectively, the data storage systems 16 are often
geographically distributed to reduce access latency, distribute
load, and ensure that power and network disruptions do not
compromise the entire function of the system 10.
Spec. ¶ 39 (emphases added).
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Therefore, consistent with the Specification, we broadly but
reasonably interpret the claimed “file system” as being persistently stored in
“data storage units” that encompass secondary storage, such as hard disk
drives, which may be geographically distributed. See Id. See supra Fig. 5.

Appellant’s Contentions
Appellant contends the cited combination of Kingsbury, Georgiev,
and Sandri fails to teach or suggest the limitations: “a data storage unit
storing a file system . . . . and within the file system . . . a lock for each of
the data entities,” as recited in independent claim 3. Appeal Br. 8
(emphasis added).
The Examiner’s Findings
We agree with the Examiner that Kingsbury teaches a file system in
paragraph 27. We also agree with the Examiner that Kingsbury teaches “a
method for lock and journal management” in paragraph 41. See Final Act.
7. However, in reviewing the Examiner’s rejection of independent claim 3,
the Examiner makes no specific findings that map the bolded terms of the
claim 3 limitation (“a data storage unit storing a file system . . . . and within
the file system . . . a lock for each of the data entities”) to a particular
section of Kingsbury, Georgiev, or Sandri. See Final Act. 6–13. Even if the
two cited features or embodiments were used in combination in Kingsbury,
we still do not see a specific teaching or suggestion of “a data storage unit
storing a file system . . . . and within the file system . . . a lock for each of
the data entities,” as required by the express language of independent claim
3. (Emphasis added).

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Therefore, for the reasons discussed infra, we find the evidence and
record supports Appellant’s statement in the Appeal Brief:
In the Final Office Action, the [E]xaminer’s rejection against
claim 3 was silent with respect to the above limitation, which
requires a lock for a data entity to be stored within a file
system. Instead, the examiner applied Kingsbury against a
different limitation, i.e., “said file system comprising: a
plurality of data entities ... , each of the data entities . . . having
an associated lock.” See page 7, lines 8-12 of Final Office
Action. The claim language being considered in that passage
corresponds to the claim language of claim 3 which was deleted
by amendment, and not the amended limitation of “a data
storage unit storing a file system ... and within the file system
... a lock for each of the data entities.”
Appeal Br. 8 (emphasis added).

We have also reviewed the Examiner’s responses in the Answer and
the additional and/or cumulative citations to “Kingsbury: paragraphs [0041]-
[0042]; also, Fig. 4: #400: exclusive lock. Fig. 4 #400: wherein the ‘mode’
refers to the lock state; also, paragraph [0041]: lock states are exclusive,
shared, and/or not held; also, Fig. 3: the ‘field’ being located in the
‘Transactional data structure.’” Ans. 3.
Even if a field pertaining to the state of a lock is located in
Kingsbury’s transactional data structure (Fig. 3A), we find this is
insufficient to establish by a preponderance of the evidence that Kingsbury
teaches “a data storage unit storing a file system . . . . and within the file
system . . . a lock for each of the data entities,” as required by the disputed
language of independent claim 3. Moreover, we find that to affirm the
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Examiner on this point would require some degree of speculation on our
part. We decline to engage in speculation. 6
Therefore, on this record, we find a preponderance of the evidence
supports Appellant’s rebuttal in the Reply Brief: “in Kingsbury, the locking
mechanism relates only to writing blocks to the journal to make the writes to
the journal atomic. The locking mechanism governing writes to the journal
still does not teach a data storage unit storing a lock within the file
system.” Reply Br. 2 (emphasis added).
Further regarding claim 3, the Examiner contradicts any finding that
Kingsbury and/or Georgiev teach the contested limitations by making a new
finding in support of the rejection of independent claim 10 that relies upon
the tertiary Sandri reference to teach what is found missing in Kingsbury and
Georgiev:
However neither Kingsbury nor Georgiev explicitly
facilitate from a data storage unit that stores within the file
system a plurality of data entities including file descriptors,
files, and a block bitmap, and a lock for each of the data
entities comprising an owner field and a version field; by
writing an owner ID thereof into the owner field of the lock.
Final Act. 19.
Regarding independent claim 10, the Examiner now finds:

Sandri discloses, from a data storage unit that stores
within the file system a plurality of data entities including file
descriptors, files, and a block bitmap, and a lock for each of

6 “A rejection . . . must rest on a factual basis . . . .” In re Warner, 379 F.2d
1011, 1017 (CCPA 1967). “The Patent Office has the initial duty of
supplying the factual basis for its rejection. It may not . . . resort to
speculation, unfounded assumptions or hindsight reconstruction to supply
deficiencies in its factual basis.” Id.

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the data entities comprising an owner field and a version field;
by writing an owner ID thereof into the owner field of the lock.
Id.
Thus, to support the rejection of independent claim 10, the Examiner
turns to the tertiary Sandri reference and now finds Sandri’s resource
descriptor 106 (Fig. 1) teaches or suggests a lock within the file system. In
particular, the Examiner reproduces and relies upon paragraph 48 of Sandri:
Resource descriptor 106 could be a register formatted
into a plurality of fields each associating a resource
with a logical processor identifier (LPID) and a status
identifier such as a lock bit. Each field associating a resource
with a LPID and a status identifier could identify the
corresponding resource based on the field’s position, i.e.,
order, within the register. Each field could be N+l bits long,
with the low-order bit acting as the lock bit and the higher-
order bits holding the LPID. Each resource’s LPID field
would identify which, if any, logical processor had reserved
the resource, and the status identifier would indicate whether
the reservation was currently active.

Final Act. 20 (quoting Sandri ¶ 48).
Thus, the Examiner finds: “If logical processor 101 successfully
obtains a lock, it has exclusive access to resource descriptor 106 (i.e., logical
processor 102 is not permitted to change the contents of resource descriptor
106 while logical processor 101 has the lock).” Final Act. 20.
In rebuttal, Appellant argues:
This semaphore lock [in Sandri] does not meet the limitations
of the claimed “lock for each of the data entities” because it is
stored in hardware (i.e., a register) and not in any file system.
Claim 10 expressly requires a data storage unit “storing ...
within the file system ... a lock for each of the data entities.”
(Emphasis added.) Therefore, the [E]xaminer clearly erred in
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concluding that the combination of Kingsbury, Georgiev, and
Sandri teaches “a data storage unit storing a file system ... and
within the file system ... a lock for each of the data entities.”
Appeal Br. 11 (emphasis added).
We find a preponderance of the evidence supports the Appellant’s
contentions, because we do not see how a register internal to Sandri’s logic
device 100 (either resource descriptor 106 or semaphore 105 — Fig. 1)
teaches or suggests a lock within the file system, because any such file
system (in persistent secondary storage) would be external to logic device
100, and processors 101 and 102. See Sandri Fig. 1, logical device 100,
including logical processors 101 and 102. See also Sandri ¶ 31:
“Semaphore 105 and resource descriptor 106 may both be registers.”
We note Sandri describes locks as follows: “a particular logical
processor of a plurality of logical processors has exclusive use of a shared
resource. A logical processor with exclusive use of a resource may be said
to have a ‘lock’ on the resource.” Sandri ¶ 9. Sandri depicts the shared
resources as element 103, shown within logic device 100. See Fig. 1.
Thus, Sandri is not concerned with any file system as a shared
resource, but rather with “a control mechanism for controlling access by
multiple logical processors to shared resources on a common microchip.”
Abstract (emphasis added). Sandri describes the shared resources: “A
plurality of processor cores as shown in FIG. 7 typically share certain chip
resources. For example, cores 0-N share cache 706, front side bus 707, and
control logic 708 via multiplexer 705.” Sandri ¶ 3.
Accordingly, even if arguendo Sandri’s resource descriptor 106 were
to store an address pointer to a file system, Sandri’s semaphore 105 (i.e., a
“lock” contained within logical device 100 — Fig. 1) would exist outside
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the file system, and not within it, as required by the express language of
independent claims 3 and 10.
In the Reply Brief (and Appeal Brief 12–13), Appellant additionally
argues the references have not been properly combined:
In the Final Office Action, the Examiner [found] that the reason
to combine Sandri with Kingsbury and Gorgiev [(sic)] is the
“need to manage locks to make sure logical processors can
function properly”. Final Office Action, page 13, 1st full
paragraph, page 21, 1st full paragraph. In the Examiner's
Answer, the Examiner now [finds] that the reason to make the
combination is the “need to manage shared resources; need for
efficient logical process for controlling access to shared
resources in an environment with multiple logical processors”.
Examiner's Answer, page 8.
Reply Br. 3.
We find a preponderance of the evidence supports Appellant’s
responsive rebuttal in the Reply Brief:
However, neither reason offered by the Examiner in the
Examiner's Answer articulates sufficient grounds for combining
Sandri with Kingsbury and Gorgiev [(sic)]. The journal lock in
Kingsbury already controls access by multiple servers to the
blocks in the journal and Kingsbury provides no reason to seek
out other locks to control access to any other shared resources.
The access trees in Gorgiev already control access by multiple
computers to shared resources and Gorgiev provides no reason
to seek out another locking mechanism to control access to
shared resources.
Moreover, no person of skill in the art cognizant of
Kingsbury and Gorgiev would turn to Sandri because neither
Kingsbury nor Gorgiev has any need to reserve resources prior
to their use, as taught in Sandri.
Id. Note: “Gorgiev” should be “Georgiev.”
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Further, based upon our review of the record, we find the Examiner’s
mapping of the disputed limitations is generally unclear (particularly
regarding claim 3), because the Examiner does not provide a clear mapping
of the individual disputed claim terms to the corresponding specific
feature(s) found in Kingsbury, Georgiev, or Sandri, considered alone or in
combination. See Final Act. 6–21. We emphasize that a list of many
possible citations is not specific.
Although Georgiev also teaches an “object-based opportunistic
locking file system application” (col. 4, ll. 38–39), the Examiner did not rely
on this portion of Georgiev in support of the rejection. Upon closer review,
we find that there is insufficient evidence to determine whether Georgiev
(col. 4, ll. 38–39) teaches “a lock that is stored within the file system for
each of the data entities,” as required by the disputed language of
independent claims 3 and 10.
We note the Board is a reviewing body that does not perform initial
examination. To show obviousness (or anticipation), the Examiner must
provide a clear mapping of each claim limitation to the corresponding
specific feature found in the reference, which the Examiner must identify
with particularity.7
The prima facie burden has not been met, and the rejection does not
adhere to the minimal requirements of 35 U.S.C. § 132(a), “when a rejection
is so uninformative that it prevents the applicant from recognizing and

7 See 37 C.F.R. § 1.104(c)(2) (“When a reference is complex or shows or
describes inventions other than that claimed by the applicant, the particular
part relied on must be designated as nearly as practicable. The pertinence
of each reference, if not apparent, must be clearly explained and each
rejected claim specified.” (Emphasis added)).
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seeking to counter the grounds for rejection.” Chester v. Miller, 906 F.2d
1574, 1578 (Fed. Cir. 1990).
On this record, and based upon a preponderance of the evidence, we
are persuaded of error regarding the Examiner’s underlying factual findings
and ultimate legal conclusion of obviousness for independent claims 3 and
10.
Therefore, given the absence of clear mappings and explanations by
the Examiner, and for essentially the same reasons argued by Appellant in
the Briefs, as further discussed above, we are constrained on this record to
reverse the Examiner’s § 103(a) rejection of independent claims 3 and 10.
Because we have reversed the rejection of each independent claim on
appeal, we also reverse the Examiner’s obviousness rejection for each
dependent claim on appeal.
Accordingly, we reverse the Examiner’s obviousness rejection of all
claims 3–19 on appeal.

CONCLUSION
The Examiner erred in rejecting claims 3–19, as being obvious under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a), over the cited combination of Kingsbury, Georgiev, and
Sandri.

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DECISION SUMMARY
Claims
Rejected
Pre-AIA
35 U.S.C.
§
Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
3–19 103(a) Kingsbury,
Georgiev, Sandri
3–19
Overall
Outcome
3–19

REVERSED