Ex Parte Clark et al

Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences

May 17, 2011

11008316 (B.P.A.I. May. 17, 2011)

STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________________

BEFORE THE BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS
AND INTERFERENCES
____________________

Ex parte THOMAS KEITH CLARK, RAMAKRISHNA DWIVEDULA,
ROGER C. RAPHAEL, and ROBERT MICHAEL REES
____________________

Appeal 2009-0086991
Application 11/008,316
Technology Center 2100
____________________

Before JEAN R. HOMERE, CAROLYN D. THOMAS and JAMES R.
HUGHES, Administrative Patent Judges.

HOMERE, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

1 The real party in interest is International Business Machines, Corp. (App.
Br. 2.)
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I. STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the final rejection of
claims 1, 2, 4, 6-8, 10, 12-15, 17, and 19-21. Claims 3, 5, 9, 11, 16, 18, 22-
26 have been canceled. (App. Br. 2.) We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C.
§ 6(b).
We reverse.
Appellants’ Invention
Appellants invented a method and system for allowing a client to
manage storage space allocation in a storage area network (SAN) without
submitting a request to a metadata server thereby reducing the number of
transactions between the client and the server while maintaining an accurate
record of the status of the managed space. (Spec., ¶¶ [0006, 0031].)

Illustrative Claim
Independent claim 1 further illustrates the invention. It reads as
follows:
1. An apparatus to manage storage space allocation, the
apparatus comprising:

a reclaiming module configured to reclaim a logical unit
of space in a storage area network (SAN) data storage system to
a local pool managed by a client in response to a deletion of
data without a request to a metadata server configured to
allocate space and maintain a record of a status of each logical
unit of space, wherein the reclaimed logical unit of space may
be requested by another client;

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a requesting module configured to request a logical unit
of space from another client without a request to the metadata
server;

a recognizing module configured to recognize a trigger
event at the client, wherein the trigger event comprises passing
either a predetermined upper or lower threshold for a pool of
logical units;

a reserving module configured to reserve space to store
data using a logical unit of the space of the plurality of logical
units of space in the local pool in response to the trigger event
without a request to the metadata server; and

a managing module configured to manage the plurality of
logical units of space at the client, wherein the managing
module controls allocation of the logical units of space
independently of the metadata server.

Prior Art Relied Upon
Henson 5,226,159 Jul. 6, 1993
Jiang 2003/0191745 A1 Oct. 9, 2003
Mandler 6,820,122 B1 Nov. 16, 2004

Rejection on Appeal
Claims 1, 2, 4, 6-8, 10, 12-15, 17, and 19-21 stand rejected under 35
U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Jiang,
Henson, and Mandler.

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Appellants’ Contentions
Appellants contend that the combination of Jiang, Henson and
Mandler does not teach or fairly suggest a reserve module for reserving
space in response to a trigger event without a request to a metadata server, as
recited in independent claim 1. (App. Br. 14-15.) According to Appellants,
while Jiang discloses a client that maintains a list of free blocks, the client
first acquires the list only after having made an initial request for memory to
the server. Similarly, Appellants argue that in both Mandler and Henson, the
client has to first make a request for memory space to the server before the
client can write to the memory space granted by the server. (Id. at 14-15.)

Examiner’s Findings
In response, the Examiner finds upon being delegated metadata
management after the client’s initial request to the server, the client can
make subsequent write and append transactions without making further
requests to the server. Therefore, since the claim recitation does not have a
time requirement, the Examiner finds that Jiang’s disclosure of subsequently
reserving space without consulting with the server teaches the disputed
limitations. (Ans. 14.)
Therefore, the pivotal issue before us is as follows:

II. ISSUE
Have Appellants shown that the Examiner erred in finding that the
combination of Jiang, Henson, and Mandler teaches or fairly suggests a
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reserve module for reserving space in response to a trigger event without a
request to a metadata server, as recited in independent claim 1?

III. FINDINGS OF FACT
The following Findings of Fact (FF) are shown by a preponderance of
the evidence.
Jiang
Jiang discloses a data network having a file manager that delegates
metadata management tasks to a client, which is then able to directly read or
write data to or from a file system in a cache disk array. (Jiang, ¶ [0042]).
In particular, upon detecting that a maintained list of pointers to leased free
blocks and nodes is nearly empty, a secondary data mover issues a
read/write request to a primary data mover. Upon receiving authorization
from the primary data mover, the secondary data mover performs the
intended operation without further assistance from the primary data mover.
(Jiang, ¶¶ [0051, 0052, 0054, 0057].)

IV. ANALYSIS
Independent claim 1 recites, inter alia, a reserve module configured
for reserving space to store data using a logical unit of the space in response
to a trigger event without a request to a metadata server. As noted above, the
Examiner and Appellants mainly disagree on whether Jiang’s client unit is
configured to reserve space without submitting a request to a server. We find
that Jiang’s disclosure of a client that makes a read/write request to the
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server, upon realizing that the client’s list of free blocks is nearly empty
(FF), teaches or suggests that the client submitted a request for additional
space to the server when the client is nearly running out of free space
(trigger event). Further, we find that the cited disclosure teaches that the
client can reserve the additional space, if granted by the server, to perform
the read/write operations. We note, however, that the disclosed request for
space runs afoul of the disputed claim language, which specifically
precludes the client from issuing “a request” to the server. While Jiang also
teaches that the client can directly perform the specified operations without
any further assistance from the server (FF), we note that such operations are
not concerned with reserving space. Rather, they pertain to directly reading
or writing data in the additional space that the client previously requested
from the server. (FF.) Consequently, we do not agree with the Examiner
that Jiang’s disclosure teaches that after the initial space request to the
server, the client can subsequently reserve space without any help from the
server. Instead, Jiang teaches that, after the initial space request, the client
can perform the read/write operation without further assistance from the
server. Since Appellants have shown at least one error in the Examiner’s
rejection of claim 1, we need not address Appellants’ other arguments. We
note that the portions Henson and Mandel upon which the Examiner relies
do not cure the noted deficiencies. It therefore follows that Appellants have
shown error in the Examiner’s obviousness rejection of claim 1.
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Since claims 2, 4, 6-8, 10, 12-15, 17, and 19-21 recite the same
limitations of claim 1 discussed above, Appellants have also shown error in
the Examiner’s rejection of those claims.

V. CONCLUSION OF LAW
Appellants have established that the Examiner erred in rejecting
claims 1, 2, 4, 6-8, 10, 12-15, 17, and 19-21 as being unpatentable under 35
U.S.C. § 103(a) .

VI. DECISION
We reverse the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1, 2, 4, 6-8, 10, 12-15,
17, and 19-21.

REVERSED

msc