Ex Parte Vauthier et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jun 27, 2016

12422066 (P.T.A.B. Jun. 27, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
12/422,066 04/10/2009 Christophe Vauthier
56436 7590 06/29/2016
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.
82251188 5856
EXAMINER
HASSAN, AURANGZEB
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2184
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
06/29/2016 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)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte CHRISTOPHE V AUTHIER and CHRIS I. DAL TON
Appeal2015-002186
Application 12/422,066
Technology Center 2100
Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, JOHNNY A. KUMAR, and
JON M. JURGOV AN, Administrative Patent Judges.
JURGOVAN, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants 1 seek review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Final
Rejection of claims 1-22, which are all the claims pending in this
application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.2
1 Appellants identify Hewlett-Packard Development Co., L.P. as the real
party in interest. (App. Br. 1.)
2 Our Decision refers to the Specification filed Apr. 10, 2009 ("Spec."), the
Final Office Action mailed Oct. 10, 2013 ("Final Act."), the Appeal Brief
filed Mar. 10, 2014 ("App. Br."), the Examiner's Answer mailed Sept. 29,
2014 ("Ans."), and the Reply Brief filed Nov. 21, 2014 ("Reply Br.").
Appeal2015-002186
Application 12/422,066
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
The claims are directed to dynamically assigning a graphics
processing unit to a virtual machine. (Spec. Title.)
Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the claimed subject
matter:
1. A method of dynamically assigning a hardware graphics
processing unit, GPU, to a selected virtual machine of a
virtualized computer system, the method comprising:
providing a plurality of virtual machines on a computer
platform including the hardware GPU, each virtual machine
comprising a guest operating system, a virtual bus with a hot-
pluggable slot, and a virtual first configuration-management
component responsive to events relevant to the hot-pluggable
slot to interact with a second configuration-management
component provided as part of the guest operating system of the
virtual machine; and
assigning the GPU to a first selected one of the virtual
machines by generating an emulated slot insertion event in
respect of the hot-pluggable slot of the first virtual machine to
cause the first configuration-management component of that
machine to trigger the guest operating system of the first virtual
machine to operatively engage with the GPU through a provided
mapping between the virtual address space of the virtual machine
and the real address space of the computer platform.
REJECTIONS
RI. Claims 1, 2, 5-8, 11-15, and 18-22 stand rejected under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) based on Fultheim et al. (US 2005/0039180 Al; Feb. 17,
2005), Knauerhase et al. (US 2008/0276235 Al; Nov. 6, 2008), and Ports
(US 2009/0113425 Al; Apr. 30, 2009). (Final Act. 2-6.)
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Application 12/422,066
R2. Claims 3, 4, 9, 10, 16, and 17 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) based on Fultheim, Knauerhase, Ports, and Cromer (US 7,185,229
B2; Feb. 27, 2007). (Final Act. 6.)
ANALYSIS
Independent Claims 1 and 14
Appellants contend the combination of Fultheim, Knauerhase, and
Ports does not teach "assigning the GPU to a first selected one of the virtual
machines by generating an emulated slot insertion event in respect of the
hot-pluggable slot of the first virtual machine," as recited in claims 1 and 14.
(App. Br. 5, 10; Reply Br. 2-3.) Appellants argue that, although Fultheim
teaches forwarding hardware hot-pluggable PCI events to an operating
system of a virtual machine, Fultheim does not teach the use of emulated
events for assigning hardware to a selected virtual machine. (App. Br. 6
(emphasis ours).) Appellants further contend Fultheim teaches shared
hardware may be assigned to one of several virtual machines that share a
hardware device, but Fultheim fails to teach emulating slot insert events in
such an assignment process. (App. Br. 6-7.)
We are not persuaded of Examiner error in the rejection. The
Examiner finds, and we agree, that Fultheim teaches a virtual PCI controller
that tracks any changes made by the guest operating system to the PCI
devices' I/O ports and forwards the changes to the physical PCI hardware,
thereby emulating hot-pluggable PCI events for the guest operating system
for dynamic node addition and removal. (Final Act. 2-3; Ans. 2 (citing
Fultheim i-fi-166, 68; see also Fultheim i167).) Although Fultheim teaches
hardware changes may also generate hot-pluggable PCI events (see Fultheim
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Application 12/422,066
i-f 68), we agree that Fultheim's emulation of hot-pluggable PCI events due
to changes made by the guest operating system teaches generating an
emulated slot insertion event to assign hardware to a selected virtual
machine. Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner's rejection of claims 1 and
14.
Claims 2 and 8
Appellants contend the combination of Fultheim, Knauerhase, and
Ports does not teach "de-assigning the GPU from the first virtual machine by
generating an emulated slot removal event ... and assigning the GPU to the
second selected virtual machine," as recited in claims 2 and 8. (App. Br. 7-
9; Reply Br. 4.) Appellants contend Fultheim does not teach generating both
a slot removal event and a slot insertion event for the same device because
there is no reason to physically remove and reinsert the device in a slot. (Id.)
Appellants further argue that, assuming a PCI device is physically removed
and reinserted, Fultheim does not teach such events would re-assign the PCI
device to different virtual machines, because the disclosed system has
separate hardware segments that support respective virtual machines, and
there is no suggestion that slot insertion and removal events would change
the hardware segment containing the PCI device. (Id.)
Appellants' contentions are not persuasive of error. As discussed
above regarding claim 1, we agree with the Examiner's finding that
Fultheim teaches emulating a hot-pluggable PCI event in the virtual
machine, therefore physical removing and reinserting of PCI hardware is not
necessary. The Examiner further finds that Fultheim discloses the virtual
PCI controller provides for dynamic addition and removal of PCI devices for
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Application 12/422,066
the guest operation system, which we agree teaches de-assigning and re-
assigning of PCI hardware to the virtual machines. (Ans. 2-3 (citing
Fultheim i-f 68).) Appellants' contention that Fultheim teaches a single
hardware segment only supports a respective virtual machine is not
persuasive, because Fultheim teaches the I/O devices of all physical nodes
are accessible by each of the different virtual machines (see Fultheim i-f 88).
Therefore, we agree with the Examiner's finding that Fultheim teaches de-
assigning hardware from one virtual machine by emulating a slot removal
event (i.e., virtual PCI controller's dynamic removal of PCI device), and re-
assigning the hardware to another virtual machine by emulating a slot
insertion event (i.e., virtual PCI controller's dynamic addition of PCI
device). (Ans. 2-3.)
Claims 5, 11, and 18
Appellants contend the combination of Fultheim, Knauerhase, and
Ports does not teach "the generation of said slot insertion event is effected in
response to user input received by an administration program running in the
management domain," as recited in claims 5, 11 and 18. (App. Br. 8-10;
Reply Br. 4.) Appellants argue Fultheim refers to user-level privilege for an
emulator, and teaches emulating hot-pluggable PCI events in response to
real hot-pluggable PCI events, but the reference does not teach an emulation
event in response to user input through an administration program or
management domain. (Id.)
We are not persuaded of Examiner error in the rejection. The
Examiner finds Fultheim' s virtual computing system includes user
applications that are executed through the guest operating system of the
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virtual machines. (Final Act. 2--4 (citing Fultheim Fig. 4 and i-f 87; see also
Fultheim i-fi-156, 85).) The broadest reasonable interpretation consistent with
Appellants' disclosure of an "event effected in response to user input
received by an administration program" does not preclude indirect user input
received by the administration program. (See In re Morris, 127 F.3d 1048,
1054 (Fed. Cir. 1997).) Thus, we agree with the Examiner's finding that
Fultheim teaches generating an emulation event in response to user input
received by a user application, which is then received by the virtual machine
operating system (i.e., the administration program) (Final Act. 2--4), and we
sustain the rejection of claims 5, 11, and 18.
Remaining Claims
No separate arguments are presented for claims 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 12,
13, 15-17, and 19-22 (see App. Br. 10-11). Accordingly, we sustain their
rejections for the reasons stated with respect to independent claims 1, 8, and
14.
DECISION
The Examiner's rejections of claims 1-22 are affirmed.
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
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