Ex Parte Krishnamoorthy et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Oct 30, 2012

11045514 (P.T.A.B. Oct. 30, 2012)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte SUBAN KRISHNAMOORTHY, VIJAYENDER GARCHA, and
CHRISTOPHER STROBERGER
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Appeal 2010-003230
Application 11/045,514
Technology Center 2400
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Before ERIC S. FRAHM, KALYAN K. DESHPANDE, and
DAVID M. KOHUT, Administrative Patent Judges.

FRAHM, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Introduction
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a final rejection of
claims 1-28, all the claims pending in the application (App. Br. 5). We have
jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm-in-part.
Appellants’ Disclosed Invention
Appellants disclose a system and method of validating the
configuration of a storage system by comparing a snapshot of the storage
system with a desired storage system architecture (Spec. ¶ [0004]).
Exemplary Claims
An understanding of the invention can be derived from a reading of
exemplary claims 1 and 3, which are reproduced below with emphases
added:
1. A method of validating the configuration of a storage system
(SS) via comparison of a snapshot thereof (SSshot) against a desired
storage system architecture (SS-architecture), the storage system
including an interconnected plurality of devices, the method
comprising:
providing a database representing the desired SS-architecture,
the database including a listing of permissible types of device within
the storage system and a listing of permissible instances of the device
types within the storage system;
automatically determining, for each device in the SSshot,
whether a device type thereof is acceptable based upon the listing of
permissible types of device within the storage system; and
automatically determining, at least for each permissible type of
device in the SSshot, whether instance details thereof are permissible
based upon the listing of permissible instances of the device types
within the storage system.

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3. The method of claim 2, wherein:
there is at least one instance of a multi-link rather than a single-
link between two of the plurality of devices; and
the automatic determination as to link characteristics includes
the following,
decomposing multi-links of the SSshot into single-link-
based arrangements, respectively,
associating the single-link-based arrangements with the
multi- links, respectively, and
modeling the SSshot as a graph of singly-linked nodes
based upon the SSshot and the associated single-link-based
arrangements, where nodes of the graph correspond to the
plurality of devices.

The Examiner’s Rejections
(1) The Examiner rejected claims 1-4, 10-13, 18-21, 27, and 28 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Alon (US
2004/0205089 A1) and Beeston (US 6,854,052 B2). (Ans. 3-9).
(2) The Examiner rejected claims 5, 6, 14, 15, 22, and 23 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Alon,
Beeston, and Saleh (US 6,801,496 B1). (Ans. 9-12).
(3) The Examiner rejected claims 7, 16, and 24 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Alon, Beeston, and
Pecen (US 2002/0147926 A1). (Ans. 12-13).
(4) The Examiner rejected claims 8, 9, 17, 25, and 26 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Alon, Beeston, and
Treiber (US 7,043,539 B1). (Ans. 13-15).

Appellants’ Contentions
(1) Appellants contend (App. Br. 11-15; Reply Br. 1-3) that the
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Examiner erred in rejecting claims 1-4, 10-13, 18-21, 27, and 28 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over the combination of Alon and
Beeston for numerous reasons, including:1
(a) Alon’s “access path policy specifies end-points and path
attributes rather than a ‘desired storage system architecture’ as
required by claim 1” (App. Br. 11) and similarly recited in claims 10,
18, and 27 (App. Br. 13), because storage system architecture is
irrelevant to Alon (App. Br. 11-13; Reply Br. 1-3) and Alon’s
validation of logical access paths is not the same as validating storage
system configuration or architecture (Reply Br. 2);
(b) Alon’s collection of configuration information (see
¶ [0049]) is not a desired SS architecture or a listing of permissible
device types (Reply Br. 2);
(c) Alon is not concerned with permissibility of device types,
but with whether identified paths conform to a previously established
access path policy (Reply Br. 2-3);
(d) Alon fails to teach or suggest (i) a listing of device type
instances included in the database representing the desired SS

1 Appellants present arguments on the merits with regard to independent
claim 1 (see App. Br. 11-13; Reply Br. 1-3). Independent claims 10, 18, and
27 are argued as patentable because they include similar limitations to claim
1. Separate patentability is not argued for dependent claims 2, 4, 11, 13, 19,
21, and 28 (see App. Br. 11-15; Reply Br. 1-3). Separate patentability is
argued for dependent claims 3, 12, and 20 (App. Br. 13-14).
We select the following representative claims: (1) claim 1 as
representative of the group of claims 1, 2, 4, 10, 11, 13, 18, 19, 21, 27, and
28; and (2) claim 3 as representative of the group of claims 3, 12, and 20. 37
C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv).
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architecture, (ii) determining acceptability of device types, and (iii)
determining whether instance details are admissible, as recited in
claim 1 (App. Br. 11-13), and similarly recited in claims 10, 18, and
27 (App. Br. 13);
(e) Alon fails to teach or suggest a multi-link as recited in
claims 3, 12, and 20 and described in Appellants’ Specification (see
¶ [0037] stating that a “multi-link connects a pair of nodes with
multiple links”) and shown in Appellants’ Figure 4A (multi-link 402),
and merely teaches that a graph edge represents a physical link
between devices (App. Br. 13-14).
(2) Appellants contend (App. Br. 15) that the Examiner erred in
rejecting claims 5, 6, 14, 15, 22, and 23 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) over the
combination of Alon, Beeston, and Saleh for the same reasons as provided
with respect to independent claims 1, 10, and 18.
(3) Appellants contend (App. Br. 15) that the Examiner erred in
rejecting claims 7, 16, and 24 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over the combination of Alon, Beeston, and Pecen for the same
reasons as provided with respect to independent claims 1, 10, and 18.
(4) Appellants contend (App. Br. 15) that the Examiner erred in
rejecting claims 8, 9, 17, 25, and 26 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over the combination of Alon, Beeston, and Treiber for the
same reasons as provided with respect to independent claim 1, 10, and 18.
Issues on Appeal
Did the Examiner err in rejecting claims 1, 2, 4-11, 13-19, and 21-28
because the combination of Alon and Beeston fails to teach or suggest a
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listing of permissible device types, a desired storage system architecture, and
the “automatically determining” steps, as recited in representative claim 1?
Did the Examiner err in rejecting claims 3, 12, and 20 because Alon
fails to disclose a multi-link, as recited in representative claim 3?

ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner’s rejections in light of Appellants’
contention in the Appeal Brief (App. Br. 11-15) and the Reply Brief (Reply
Br. 1-3) that the Examiner has erred.
We agree with Appellants’ contentions as to representative claim 3
(App. Br. 13-14) because Alon’s Figure 1 shows only a single link between
server 108 and switch 122, and not a multi-link as asserted by the Examiner
(see Ans. 21). In addition, we do not agree with the Examiner’s
determination that Alon’s paragraphs [0052] and [0059] teach or suggest
multi-links (Ans. 6-7 and 20-22), because these paragraphs address logical
access path policy (¶ [0052]) and intranet links (¶ [0059]), but are silent with
regard to “multi-links.” Accordingly, we will not sustain the Examiner’s
obviousness rejection of claims 3, 12, and 20.
We disagree with the Appellants’ conclusions as to representative
claim 1. We adopt as our own (1) the findings and reasons set forth by the
Examiner in the action from which this appeal is taken and (2) the reasons
set forth by the Examiner in the Examiner’s Answer in response to the
Appellants’ Appeal Brief (Ans. 3-5 and 16-20). We highlight and amplify
certain teachings and suggestions of the references as follows.
We agree with the Examiner (Ans. 3-5 and 16-20) that the
combination of Alon and Beeston teaches or suggests a listing of permissible
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device types, a desired storage system architecture, and the “automatically
determining” steps, as recited in representative claim 1. Alon’s “access path
policy” (or permissibility of logical access type paths) broadly encompasses
the recitation in claim 1 of a listing of permissible device types. Also,
Beeston discloses a system configuration of a data storage system (col. 8, ll.
36-52; Ans. 5).
In view of the foregoing, we will sustain the Examiner’s obviousness
rejection of claims 1, 2, 4, 10, 11, 13, 18, 19, 21, 27, and 28. For the same
reasons as claims 1, 10, and 18 we will also sustain the Examiner’s
obviousness rejection of: (1) claims 5, 6, 14, 15, 22, and 23; (2) claims 7, 16,
and 24; and (3) claims 8, 9, 17, 25, and 26.

CONCLUSIONS
(1) The Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 1, 2, 4-11, 13-19, and
21-28 as being unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) because the
combination of Alon and Beeston teaches or suggests a listing of permissible
device types, a desired storage system architecture, and the “automatically
determining” steps, as recited in representative claim 1.
(2) Appellants have established that the Examiner erred in rejecting
claims 3, 12, and 20 as being unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) because
Alon fails to disclose a multi-link, as recited in representative claim 3.
(3) Claims 1, 2, 4-11, 13-19, and 21-28 are not patentable.

DECISION
The Examiner’s rejections of claims 1, 2, 4-11, 13-19, and 21-28
under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) are affirmed.
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The decision of the Examiner rejecting claims 3, 12, and 20 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) is reversed.

No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED-IN-PART

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