Ex Parte Post et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardMar 20, 201713152839 (P.T.A.B. Mar. 20, 2017) Copy Citation 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. 13/152,839 06/03/2011 Daniel J. Post PI 1427US1 7738 111349 7590 03/22/2017 Van Court & Aldridge LLP Apple Inc. 154 Grand St. New York, NY 10013 EXAMINER CHAPPELL, DANIEL C ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2135 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 03/22/2017 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): docket @ vcaiplaw. com j aldridge @ vcaiplaw. com avancourt @ vcaiplaw. com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte DANIEL J. POST, ERIC TAMURA, VADIM KHMELNITSKY, NIR J. WAKRAT, and MATTHEW BYOM Appeal 2015-005836 Application 13/152,839 Technology Center 2100 Before JOHN A. EVANS, KAMRAN JIVANI, and MATTHEW J. McNEILL, Administrative Patent Judges. EVANS, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellants1 seek our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the Examiner’s Final Rejection of Claims 1—22. App. Br. 1. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We AFFIRM.2 1 The Appeal Brief identifies Apple Inc. as the real party in interest. App. Br. 2. 2 Rather than reiterate the arguments of Appellants and the Examiner, we refer to the Appeal Brief (filed June 24, 2014, “App. Br.”), the Corrected Claims Appendix (filed July 28, 2014), the Reply Brief (filed May 18, 2015, Appeal 2015-005836 Application 13/152,839 STATEMENT OF THE CASE The claims relate to systems and methods for unmapping unused logical addresses at mount-time of a file system. See Abstract. INVENTION Claims 1, 8, 15, and 19 are independent. An understanding of the invention can be derived from a reading of representative claim 1 (see App. Br. 8), which is reproduced below with some formatting added: 1. A method of preparing a non-volatile memory (“NVM”) for use in an electronic device, wherein the electronic device implements a file system and a NVM manager, the method comprising: at mount-time of the file system, wherein the mount-time incorporates aspects of files stored in the NVM into a file and folder structure of the file system: preparing a list of unallocated logical addresses associated with the NVM, and providing the list from the file system to the NVM manager; and synchronizing, based on the list, allocation of logical block addresses (LBAs) between the file system and the NVM manager before the NVM is used. Reply Br.”), the Examiner’s Answer (mailed March 18, 2015, “Ans.”), the Final Action (mailed December 26, 2013, “Final Act.”), and the Specification (filed June 3, 2011, “Spec.”) for their respective details. 2 Appeal 2015-005836 Application 13/152,839 REFERENCES AND REJECTIONS The Examiner relies upon the prior art as follows: Camiel US 2008/0229428 A1 Sept. 18, 2008 1. Nathan Edwards, White Paper. The TRIM Command, Maximum PC, pp. 1^4 and abstract pp. 1—8 (“Edwards”). 2. openSUSE Support Database, “SDB:SSD discard (trim) support” pp. 1—3, (“openSUSE”). 1. Claims 1—14 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as obvious over Edwards, openSUSE, and Camiel. Final Act. 2—15. 2. Claims 15—22 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as obvious over Edwards and Camiel. Final Act. 15—29. 3. Claim 15 stands provisionally rejected under the judicial grounds of non-statutory type obviousness double patenting over claim 1 of co pending Application 13/323,347 and Edwards. Final Act. 30—33. ANALYSIS We have reviewed the rejections of Claims 1—22 in light of Appellants’ arguments that the Examiner erred. We have considered in this decision only those arguments Appellants actually raised in the Briefs. Any other arguments which Appellants could have made but chose not to make in the Briefs are deemed to be waived. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(l)(iv). We are not persuaded that Appellant identifies reversible error. Upon consideration of the arguments presented in the Appeal Brief and Reply Brief, we agree with the Examiner that all the pending claims are 3 Appeal 2015-005836 Application 13/152,839 unpatentable over the cited combination of references. We adopt as our own the findings and reasons set forth in the rejection from which this appeal is taken and in the Examiner’s Answer. We provide the following explanation to highlight and address specific arguments and findings primarily for emphasis. We consider Appellants’ arguments seriatim, as they are presented in the Appeal Brief, pages 9-23. Claims 1-14: Obviousness over Edwards, openSUSE, and Camiel At mount-time of the file system. The Examiner finds Edwards substantially teaches the claimed method of preparing a non-volatile memory (NVM) for use in an electronic device. Final Act. 2. The Examine finds Edwards teaches listing and re allocating logical addresses including the use of the “TRIM” command. Id. The Examiner finds openSUSE teaches the synchronization and allocation of logical block addresses before the NVM is used. Id. at 3. The Examiner finds the Edwards-openSUSE combination does not explicitly teach block allocation occurs “at mount time of the file system,” as claimed. Id. at 4. However, the Examiner finds Camiel teaches the file allocation taught by Edwards-openSUSE occurs at the mount time of the file. Id. Appellants contend “Camiel has absolutely no bearing on when to execute a Trim command.” App. Br. 11. The Examiner finds the invention of Claim 1 may be equivalently stated as running the well-known TRIM command at mount-time of a device. Ans. 3. The Examiner finds Appellants concede: “Edwards clearly explains what the ‘TRIM command is all about,”’ in that the TRIM 4 Appeal 2015-005836 Application 13/152,839 command erases physical blocks that correspond to files (i.e., logical blocks) that have been deleted. Ans. 3 (citing App. Br. 9,11. 20-21; p. 9,1. 32 — p. 10,1. 3). The Examiner further finds Appellants concede openSUSE states: “fstrim should be ‘run once a week’ or ‘call wiper.sh/fstrim once every lOgb worth of file deletions.’” Id. The Examiner finds “fstrim” is a command that invokes the well-known TRIM operation to delete (i.e., un map) Logical Block Addresses (LBAs) that are no longer in use by a file system. Id. at 2. In the openSUSE reference, the fstrim command is invoked by the wiper.sh script, which may be run at arbitrary times, such as once a week. Id. at 2. The Examiner finds the claimed “mount-time” is an arbitrary time. Id. at 4. The Examiner finds Camiel teaches performing an operation to prepare a file and directory structure (i.e., the claimed file and folder structure) for mounting, which, in combination with the teachings of Edwards and openSUSE, teaches the claimed limitations. Id. at 4. Appellants traverse the Examiner’s characterization that “the mount time claimed by the Appellants is an arbitrary time.” Reply Br. 9. Appellants argue the claims specifically relate to benefits achieved by providing the claimed information to the NVM manager before the NVM is used, i.e., at mount-time. Id. We find the Examiner properly cites Camiel as teaching preparing file structures at mount-time. We further find the Examiner’s synthetic case teaches the claims contrary to Appellants’ assertion. See App. Br. 12. Appellants argue claims 2—7 in view of the limitations of Claim 1. App. Br. 12. In view of the foregoing discussion, we are not persuaded the 5 Appeal 2015-005836 Application 13/152,839 Examiner erred. Appellants argue claims 8—14 in view of the limitations of Claim 1. App. Br. 13. In view of the foregoing discussion, we are not persuaded the Examiner erred. Claims 15-22: Obviousness over Edwards and Camiel Appellants traverse the rejection over the Edwards-Camiel combination essentially for the reasons discussed above. See App. Br. 14- lb. In view of the foregoing discussion, we are not persuaded the Examiner erred. Impermissible Hindsight. Appellants argue that the Examiner too liberally interprets the disclosures of Edwards and Camiel which, Appellants contend, do not disclose the wording of the claims. App. Br. 16. Appellants argue the person of ordinary skill must judge the prior art without the benefit of the Applicants’ invention-teaching. Id. Appellants argue that when doing so, it is apparent that steps 1105 et seq. in Camiel follow step 1104 in time with no suggestion that any of these steps occur at mount-time. Id. Appellants contend without the benefit of the Examiner’s hindsight, it would only be reasonable to assume that all of these things happen after mount-time. Id. We are not persuaded that Camiel’s disclosure of a plurality of steps to accomplish a mount implies they must occur subsequent to the claimed “mount-time.” Appellants define the claimed “mount-time” as that point in the operation of the system where the operating system “triggers] a mount.” Spec. 2, | 5. Appellants disclose various subsequent steps that are included in the claimed “mount-time.” See Spec, 6—8. 6 Appeal 2015-005836 Application 13/152,839 The Examiner finds interpretive phrases, such as “this means” or “which means,” merely indicate a restatement of the prior art teachings and do not indicate, per se, impermissible hindsight. Ans. 6. (quoting MPEP 2145(X)(A): [a]ny judgment on obviousness is in a sense necessarily a reconstruction based on hindsight reasoning, but so long as it takes into account only knowledge which was within the level of ordinary skill in the art at the time the claimed invention was made and does not include knowledge gleaned only from applicant’s disclosure, such a reconstruction is proper. We are not persuaded the Examiner has used impermissible hindsight. Appellants contend Claims 15—18 are allowable as dependent from Claim 15. App. Br. 15. In view of the foregoing discussion, we are not persuaded the Examiner erred. Appellants contend Claims 19-22 are allowable in view of the arguments applied to Claim 15. App. Br. 18—19. In view of the foregoing discussion, we are not persuaded the Examiner erred. Claim 15: Non-statutory type obviousness double patenting Appellants contend this rejection is not ripe because the accused co pending application, 13/323,347 has not issued as a patent. Id. at 19. We find that Application 13/323,347 issued as US 8,756,458 B2 on June 17, 2014. Because the co-pending application has issued, the rejection is ripe. Appellants present no substantive arguments as to the merits of the rejection, which we summarily affirm. DECISION 7 Appeal 2015-005836 Application 13/152,839 The rejection of Claims 1—22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 is AFFIRMED. The rejection of Claim 15 under the judicial doctrine of obviousness- type double patenting is AFFIRMED.3 AFFIRMED 3 A timely filed terminal disclaimer in compliance with 37 C.F.R. §§ 1.321(c) or 1.321(d) may be used to overcome an actual or provisional rejection based on a nonstatutory double patenting ground provided the conflicting application or patent either is shown to be commonly owned with this application, or claims an invention made as a result of activities undertaken within the scope of a joint research agreement. 8 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation