Ex Parte Kolovson

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Dec 30, 2015

13278541 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 30, 2015)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
13/278,541 10/21/2011 Curt Kolovson
56436 7590 01/04/2016
Hewlett Packard Enterprise
3404 E. Harmony Road
Mail Stop 79
Fort Collins, CO 80528
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.
82858886 1080
EXAMINER
CY GIEL, GARY W
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2137
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
01/04/2016 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):
hpe.ip.mail@hpe.com
mkraft@hpe.com
chris.mania@hpe.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
U-NITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte CURT KOLOVSON
Appeal2014-001530
Application 13/278,541
Technology Center 2100
Before JOHN P. PINKERTON, JEFFREY A. STEPHENS, and
NORMAN H. BEAMER, Administrative Patent Judges.
STEPHENS, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant1 seeks our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the
Examiner's final rejection of claims 29-32, 34--36, and 49---61, which are all
the claims pending in the application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C.
§ 6(b ).
We affirm.
1 The real party in interest is identified as Hewlett-Packard Development
Company, LP. (App. Br. 2.)
Appeal2014-001530
Application 13/278,541
Claimed Subject Matter
The invention generally relates to intelligent cache management.
(Spec. i-f 1.) Claim 29, reproduced below with disputed limitations
emphasized, is illustrative:
29. A storage device, comprising:
at least one disk drive;
a controller to manage data input/output operations
between the disk drive and a remote processor; and
a cache memory communicatively connected to the
controller, wherein the controller is to:
receive a data operation request generated by an
application executing on a remote computing device, the
data operation request comprising data to be stored to
the storage device and a header;
parse the header to identifY a Pin cache hint
generated by the application; and
in response to the Pin cache hint hold the data in
the cache memory of the storage device rather than
storing the data to the disk drive.
Rejection
Claims 29-32, 34--36, and 49---61 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as unpatentable over Misinai (US 5,848,241, issued Dec. 8, 1998),
Liedtke (US 6,347,364 Bl, issued Feb. 12, 2002), and Okamura (US
2002/0138699 Al, published Sept. 26, 2002). (Final Act. 2---6.)
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner's rejections in light of Appellant's
arguments the Examiner erred (App. Br. 4--12; Reply Br. 1-5). We are not
2
Appeal2014-001530
Application 13/278,541
persuaded by Appellant's contentions. We adopt as our own the findings
and reasons set forth by the Examiner in the action from which this appeal is
taken and in the Answer (see Ans. 3-7). We highlight and address specific
arguments and findings for emphasis as follows.
Appellant argues all claims on appeal as a group. (See App. Br. 5---6,
11.) We select claim 29 as representative. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(l)(iv).
Appellant contends the commands in Misinai are not cache hints used
to determine how to manage cache by, for example, specifying how long to
maintain memory in cache. (App. Br. 8.) Appellant also contends Misinai's
commands are not a data operation request, where the data operation request
includes the data to be stored to the storage device and a header. (Id.)
Appellant's arguments regarding Misinai do not persuade us of error
in the rejection. The Examiner relies on Misinai for teaching the disk drive,
controller, and cache memory claimed in claim 29, and also finds Misinai
teaches the controller is configured to receive a data operation request
generated by an application executing on a remote computing device. (Final
Act. 2-3 (citing Misinai 15:1-15 & Figs. 2, 12).) We agree with these
findings, which Appellant does not specifically challenge. We further agree
with the Examiner's finding that Misinai relates to the broad concept of a
cache hint, in that Misinai' s resource sharing facility (RSF), which has a
medium-level cache, receives commands to manage it. (See Ans. 3--4.) For
example, Misinai teaches a special formulation of a lock request that affects
the way the RSF manages the cache:
This special formulation enables the program to tell the RSF
that the current lock request will be followed by a read for a
given data item. When RSF encounters such a request it tries to
3
Appeal2014-001530
Application 13/278,541
improve the chances that the read request will find the record in
the medium-level cache.
(Misinai 14:22-26; see Ans. 3 (citing Misinai 14:9-33).) In addition, the
Examiner relies on Liedtke and Okamura for the specific contents of the data
operation request. (See Final Act. 3--4.)
Appellant argues the Examiner relies on Liedtke to teach a Pin cache
hint, as recited in claim 29, and argues Liedtke does not describe caching
techniques at all, much less caching techniques employed by a secondary
storage device. (App. Br. 9.) The Examiner finds one of skill in the art
would have modified Misinai to include the pinning methods taught by
Liedtke because it improves system performance by enabling the retention in
the cache of high usage data. (Final Act. 3.) Liedtke teaches "providing a
dynamic scheduling of memory pinning where the applications may request
for and be allowed to pin pages in memory based on predetermined criteria
and according to given constraints." (Liedtke 2:36--40; see Final Act. 3
(citing Liedtke 2:35--41).) Liedtke refers to pinning in main memory (see
Liedtke 1: 10-1 7), but we agree with the Examiner that Liedtke' s use of
pinning requests to keep pages in a memory staging area to avoid disc
accesses (see Liedtke 1: 10-17, 8:50-57; Final Act. 3) lends itself to use in
Misinai' s system involving the RSF' s management of its cache. (See Ans.
4--5.) Therefore, Appellant's argument that Liedtke does not mention cache
is not persuasive of error in the rejection based on the combined teachings of
the references.
Appellant also contends "Okamura does not disclose that the packet
includes 'data that is to be stored to the storage device and a header"'
because "Okamura merely states that the data is transmitted, and does not
4
Appeal2014-001530
Application 13/278,541
indicate the data is stored to the storage device." (App. Br. 10.) We agree
with the Examiner (Ans. 5---6) that Okamura expressly describes storing data
(see Okamura i-f 11 ("A cache memory device with a cache section ... has a
capability of storing input data in the cache section when attribute
information affixed to the input data indicates a predetermined attribute.")).
We, therefore, are not persuaded that Okamura's description of transmitting
data refers only to data not intended to be stored.
Appellant further asserts Okamura does not teach parsing the header
of the data packet. Appellant asserts reading a header is not equivalent to
parsing it, which requires forming a structural representation of the input.
(App. Br. 11 (citing Wikipedia.org).) The Examiner responds that "[i]n the
context of a computing system where data is represented in binary form, all
data must necessarily be comprehended to form 'a structural representation
of the input' and is therefore parsed as defined by the appellant." (Ans. 6.)
Appellant argues input data does not have to be parsed when read, and states
that data may be read as a stream of data and streaming data is not
necessarily parsed. (Reply Br. 4--5.)
We agree with the Examiner that identifying the header attribute in
Okamura at least suggests it is parsed according to Appellant's definition.
Figure lB of Okamura, relied on by the Examiner (Final Act. 4), shows the
data structure of the packet includes a header, communication data, trailer,
and attributes associated with each of these. Okamura's control apparatus
uses this structured form to identify the different parts of the packet,
including the header attribute. (See Okamura i-f 22; Final Act. 4; Ans. 6.)
Appellant's Specification similarly provides:
5
Appeal2014-001530
Application 13/278,541
At operation 620 the storage controller parses the data operation
request to obtain the cache management hint associated with the
data operation request. In one embodiment cache management
hints may be transmitted in a header associated with the data
management request, and the storage controller may be
configured to retrieve the cache management hint from the
header associated with the request.
(Spec. i-f 43.) Appellant has not persuaded us that anything more than
retrieving the header attribute transmitted with the packet is required in
Okamura to teach parsing the header.
Appellant next contends the combination of Misinai, Liedtke, and
Okamura is improper because the references teach away from each other.
(App. Br. 11.) In particular, Appellant argues "the resource sharing facility
of Misinai would be rendered meaningless, as the paging techniques of
Liedtke could not be implemented." (Id.) According to Appellant,
combining the teachings of the references "effectively changes the principle
of operation of Misinai." (Id.)
We are not persuaded the references teach away from each other or
that combining their teachings changes the principle of operation of Misinai.
We agree with the Examiner that Appellant has not given any reason to
support the position that the paging techniques of Liedtke could not be
implemented in Misinai. (Ans. 7.) Appellant does not explain why the pin
request of Liedtke cannot be added to the available commands in Misinai,
and Appellant also does not rebut the Examiner's reasoning for combining
the specific teachings of Liedtke and Okamura with Misinai (see Final Act.
3--4.) In addition, we agree with the Examiner (Ans. 7) that "[t]he test for
obviousness is not whether the features of a secondary reference may be
bodily incorporated into the structure of the primary reference; nor is it that
6
Appeal2014-001530
Application 13/278,541
the claimed invention must be expressly suggested in any one or all of the
references." In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425 (CCPA 1981). "Rather, the test
is what the combined teachings of the references would have suggested to
those of ordinary skill in the art." Id. Here, we agree with the Examiner's
reasoning and conclusion of obviousness of claim 29 based on the teachings
of Misinai, Liedtke, and Okamura.
In light of the foregoing, we sustain the rejection of representative
claim 29, as well as claims 30-32, 34--36, and 49---61 not separately argued,
under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Misinai, Liedtke, and
Okamura.
DECISION
We affirm the Examiner's decision to reject claims 29-32, 34--36, and
49-61.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l )(iv).
AFFIRMED
msc
7