Microsoft Technology Licensing Assigned Ten Patents

Scalable chunk store for data deduplication
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA, has been assigned a patent (10,394,757) developed by Cheung, Chun Ho, Ian, Bellevue, WA, Oltean, Paul Adrian, Redmond, WA, Kalach, Ran, Bellevue, WA, Gupta, Abhishek, Benton, James Robert, Seattle, WA, and Desai, Ronakkumar, Redmond, WA, for a “scalable chunk store for data deduplication.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Data streams may be stored in a chunk store in the form of stream maps and data chunks. Data chunks corresponding to a data stream may be stored in a chunk container, and a stream map corresponding to the data stream may point to the data chunks in the chunk container. Multiple stream maps may be stored in a stream container, and may point to the data chunks in the chunk container in a manner that duplicate data chunks are not present. Techniques are provided herein for localizing the storage of related data chunks in such chunk containers, for locating data chunks stored in chunk containers, for storing data streams in chunk stores in localized manners that enhance locality and decrease defragmentation, and for reorganizing stored data streams in chunks stores.”

The patent application was filed on November 18, 2010 (12/949,391).

Automatic uploading of attachments to group cloud storage at send time
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA, has been assigned a patent (10,389,663) developed by Uraizee, Misbah, Bellevue, WA, Herbert, III, George Arthur, Kirkland, WA, Walker, Christopher, and Stolarz, Aaron, Redmond, WA, for an “automatic uploading of attachments to group cloud storage at send time.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Technologies are presented directed to uploading of attachments to a relevant group cloud storage at send time. A communication application and/or service may suggest to a user to upload an attachment of an outgoing communication to a group cloud storage upon generation of the communication. Suggestion of group may be based on last use, document type, content, user(s), which account the user is in, and comparable factors. The user, (or sender) may also be provided with options to set permissions for the attachment based on the upload destination selection. In some examples, upload of work documents to personal cloud storage may be prevented and suitable groups may be selected for user that are part of multiple groups.”

The patent application was filed on September 4, 2015 (14/846,195).

Fully managed account level blob data encryption in distributed storage
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA, has been assigned a patent (10,387,673) developed by Surla, Rushi Srinivas, Kenmore, WA, Mainali, Shane Kumar, Duvall, WA, Edwards, Andrew, Bellevue, WA, Sah, Maneesh, Sammamish, WA, and Zhang, Weiping, Redmond, WA, for a “fully managed account level blob data encryption in a distributed storage environment.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A system receives a request to store data at a first layer of servers in a cluster, configured to authenticate and authorize the request. The system compresses the data upon authenticating and authorizing the request and encrypts the compressed data at the first layer of servers when encryption is enabled. The system sends the request and the encrypted data to a second layer of servers in the cluster, configured to store data structures used to manage data storage in a third layer of servers in the cluster, and to distribute the request and the encrypted data to the third layer of servers using the data structures. The system stores the encrypted data in the third layer of servers. Encrypting the data at the first layer of servers reduces latency associated with transferring the data between the first, second, and third layers of servers.”

The patent application was filed on June 30, 2017 (15/638,434).

Ensuring reliability of cache data and metadata subsequent to reboot
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA, has been assigned a patent (10,387,313) developed by Iyigun, Mehmet, Bellevue, WA, Bak, Yevgeniy, Fortin, Michael, Fields, David, Redmond, WA, Ergan, Cenk, Bellevue, WA, and Kirshenbaum, Alex, Redmond, WA, for “method and system for ensuring reliability of cache data and metadata subsequent to a reboot.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”To ensure that the contents of a non-volatile memory device cache may be relied upon as accurately reflecting data stored on disk storage, it may be determined whether the cache contents and/or disk contents are modified during a power transition, causing cache contents to no longer accurately reflect data stored in disk storage. The cache device may be removable from the computer, and unexpected removal of the cache device may cause cache contents to no longer accurately reflect data stored in disk storage. Cache metadata may be managed during normal operations and across power transitions, ensuring that cache metadata may be efficiently accessed and reliably saved and restored across power transitions. A state of a log used by a file system may be determined prior to and subsequent to reboot of an operating system in order to determine whether data stored on a cache device may be reliably used.”

The patent application was filed on May 11, 2015 (14/708,525).

Low latency RDMA-based distributed storage
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA, has been assigned a patent (10,375,167) developed by Shamis, Alexander, Seattle, WA, Suzue, Yutaka, Redmond, WA, and Risvik, Knut Magne, Mo i Rana, Norway, for a “low latency RDMA-based distributed storage.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A ‘Distributed Storage Controller’ applies an RDMA-based memory allocator to implement a distributed thread-safe and lock-free storage system in shared memory distributed across multiple networked computers. The Distributed Storage Controller enables any number of client applications, processes, subroutines, etc., on any number of networked computers to concurrently perform self-directed lock-free allocations, de-allocations, reads, writes, etc., on the shared memory via sequences of one-way RDMA messages, e.g., RDMA reads, RDMA writes, and RDMA atomic compare and swap, (CAS) operations) without requiring CPU locks. As such, the CPUs of computing devices hosting the shared memory do not need to be notified of RDMA-based reads, writes or CAS operations on that memory. Consequently, CPU utilization for computing devices hosting any portion of the shared memory is minimal, thereby enabling the Distributed Storage Controller to scale to very large numbers of concurrent accesses by very large numbers of networked computing devices.”

The patent application was filed on November 20, 2015 (14/947,473).

Authorization for transient storage devices with multiple authentication silos
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA, has been assigned a patent (10,366,254) developed by Bovee, James, Redmond, WA, for an “authorization for transient storage devices with multiple authentication silos.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”In a transient storage device, (TSD) with multiple authentication silos, a host computing device connected to the TSD is configured by the TSD to discover and act upon various types of authentication information in the silos. One or more logical combinations of authentication silos are switched to the authenticated state to grant access to an associated storage area. A particular ordering of authentication silos may be required to achieve a valid combination of authenticated silos. Ordering may be suggested by configuration information in the TSD. Ordering may also be based upon whether or not user input is required for authenticating a given authentication silo, the environment of use of the TSD, or a hierarchy from most trusted to least trusted authentication silo. With this information, the host proceeds with the most efficient authentication sequence leading to a grant of access to the storage area.”

The patent application was filed on July 28, 2015 (14/810,815).

Partitioning and rebalancing data storage
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA, has been assigned a patent (10,360,199) developed by Korycki, Jacek A., San Jose, CA, and Van Brink, David A., Santa Cruz, CA, for “partitioning and rebalancing data storage.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Techniques are described for partitioning and rebalancing data storage, such as through management of database partitions. In one or more implementations, a database that includes existing partitions is repartitioned to include new partitions. A balancing function that uses a skew factor is implemented that skews new data allocation to the new partitions. In at least some implementations, the skew factor can be removed from new data allocation, such as in response to an indication that data allocation between the new partitions and the existing partitions is unbalanced.”

The patent application was filed on January 22, 2018 (15/877,287).

Use of volatile memory as non-volatile memory
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA, has been assigned a patent (10,359,826) developed by Kelly, Bryan D., Carnation, WA, Santaniello, Mark A., Govindan, Sriram, and Badam, Anirudh, Redmond, WA, for “use of volatile memory as non-volatile memory.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A computing device may comprise a processor, a volatile memory and a non-volatile storage device. An operating system or firmware of the device may cause one or more pages of the volatile memory to be treated, by applications executing on the computing device, as non-volatile memory pages. A maximum number of pages that may be treated as non-volatile may be determined based on an amount of energy available in a battery and an amount of energy needed to transfer a page of memory to the non-volatile storage device.”

The patent application was filed on July 28, 2017 (15/663,571).

Cloud key escrow system
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA, has been assigned a patent (10,348,696) developed by D’Souza, Roy Peter, Bellevue, WA, and Pandey, Omkant, Seattle, WA, for a “cloud key escrow system.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”Embodiments are directed to storing encrypted data in a data store and to securely providing access to the encrypted data according to a predefined policy. A data storage system receives encrypted data. The data is encrypted using a private key. The data storage system stores the received encrypted data according to a predefined policy. The encryption and the policy prevents the storage system from unencrypting the encrypted data, while the policy allows the encrypted data to be released upon receiving a threshold number of requests from verified third parties. The data storage system implements a verifiable secret sharing scheme to verify that the encrypted data can be reconstituted without the data storage system decrypting the encrypted data. The data storage system can acknowledge that the received encrypted data has been verified and successfully stored.”

The patent application was filed on May 30, 2017 (15/608,704).

Document storage for reuse of content within documents
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA, has been assigned a patent (10,339,183) developed by Kohlmeier, Bernhard S. J., Chilakamarri, Pradeep, Seattle, WA, and Olstad, Bjorn, Oslo, Norway, for a “document storage for reuse of content within documents.“

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: ”A system for reuse of content within documents can include storage media on which a document graph is stored, and labeler software that, when executed by a processing system, directs the processing system to at least: aggregate, for a window of time, a plurality of actions carried out by a user on content associated with a document within a productivity application, normalize the plurality of actions into at least one predefined action class, determine a label of the user in relation to the document or a portion of the content associated with the document based on the at least one predefined action class, and store the label associated with the user and the document or the portion of the content in a document graph. A search of the document graph for reusable content can then be directed to related content associated with a user having a particular label.”

The patent application was filed on September 18, 2015 (14/858,894).