DETAILED ACTION
This action is in response to the reply filed 17 July 2025.
Claims 1–23 are pending. Claims 1, 8, and 15 are independent.
Claims 1–23 are rejected.
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after 16 March 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. §§ 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. §§ 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments, see remarks, filed 17 July 2025, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1–23 under § 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. However, upon further search and consideration, a new ground of rejection is made in view of Chandra et al.
Claim Rejections—35 U.S.C. § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. § 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 C.F.R. § 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. § 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. § 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1–3, 5, 8–10, 12, 15–17, 19, and 21–23 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Ji et al. (US 2020/0293874 A1) [hereinafter Ji] in view of Kozareva et al. (US 2017/0097966 A1) [hereinafter Kozareva] and Chandra et al. (US 2022/0208177 A1) [hereinafter Chandra].
Regarding independent claim 1, Ji discloses [a] method, comprising: conducting, by at least one processor, a first tier of machine learning analysis to compare a received input string with a first subset of training phrases associated with a plurality of dynamic intents to extract one or more parameters of the received input string, wherein the received input string is based on a desired action, specified by a user of a virtual agent on a computing platform, to be performed by the computer platform, […]; An entity detection process is used to extract entities from an input user request [string based on a desired action] (Ji, ¶ 70). The entity detection process using a learning model trained with question tokens [training phrases] (Ji, ¶¶ 71–78). conducting, by the at least one processor, a second tier of machine learning analysis to compare an output of the first tier of machine learning analysis with a second subset of training phrases associated with the plurality of dynamic intents, […], and wherein the comparison is used to generate respective similarity scores indicating whether the received input string matches one or more of the second subset of training phrases; The encoded input question is compared to candidate predicates [second subset of training phrases] to produce a matching score [similarity] indicating how well each candidate matches the input (Ji, ¶ 64). selecting, by the at least one processor, an intent from among the plurality of intents based on the respective similarity scores; and An intent is selected based on the matching scores (Ji, ¶ 64). executing, by the at least one processor, an action associated with the selected intent. The intent(s) are used to identify one or more actions to accomplish the user intent (Ji, ¶ 39).
Ji teaches determining intents, but does not expressly teach intents based on background information of a user. However, Kozareva teaches: and wherein the plurality of dynamic intents and respective actions associated with the plurality of dynamic intents are defined at the time a session is created responsive to receipt of the input string based on background information of the user and a stored library of intents that defines the respective actions associated with the plurality of dynamic intents An intent space is updated dynamically in response to events, including receiving a query from a user (Kozareva, ¶¶ 53–55). An intent and response to a query may be generated based on a user corpus and data sources related to the user, e.g., email and social media [background information of the user] (Kozareva, ¶¶ 65–67). The intent spaces are stored in an intent database, including pairs of actions and domains (Kozareva, ¶¶ 73–74). A task generation engine generates tasks in response to triggers, e.g., task requests from the user, and may access a task template and update the template (Kozareva, ¶¶ 78–79).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Ji with those of Kozareva. One would have been motivated to do so in order to improve the accuracy of intent estimation by continuously updating the intent space (Kozareva, ¶ 106).
Ji/Kozareva teaches first and second tiers of machine learning analysis, but does not expressly teach a larger set of training data having more refined intent types. However, Chandra teaches: wherein the second subset of training phrases is larger and comprises more refined intent types than the first subset of training phrases A hierarchical intent classification model, having a first layer with a first classification model, and a second layer with a plurality of further classification models (Chandra, ¶ 42). A user utterance is input to the first layer, which determines a classifier in the second layer, and the second layer classifier determines an intent from the utterance (Chandra, ¶ 43). The second layer models may be trained using utterances [phrases] used to train the first layer model, and additional utterances [second subset of training phrases] specific to each cluster of intents that each second layer model is trained to recognize [more refined intent types] (Chandra, ¶¶ 56–58).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Ji/Kozareva with those of Chandra. One would have been motivated to do so in order to improve the performance of the machine learning models (Chandra, ¶¶ 4–7, 45).
Regarding dependent claim 2, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated and Ji/Kozareva/Chandra further teaches: wherein the first tier of machine learning analysis comprises a named-entity recognition (NER) analysis. An entity detection process [named entity recognition analysis] (Ji, ¶ 70).
Regarding dependent claim 3, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated and Ji/Kozareva/Chandra further teaches: wherein the second tier of machine learning analysis comprises a natural language expression analysis, a fuzzy logic analysis, a natural language inference analysis, or any combination thereof. The matching layer is part of a natural language understanding model (Ji, ¶ 104).
Regarding dependent claim 5, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated and Ji/Kozareva/Chandra further teaches: wherein conducting the second tier of machine learning analysis comprises: replacing a portion of the received input string with the one or more parameters; and The input request is encoded with word embeddings and knowledge embeddings [parameters] (Ji, ¶ 98). comparing the received input string with the one or more parameters to the second subset of training phrases. The encoded request is compared with the encoded predicates [training phrases] (Ji, ¶ 101).
Regarding independent claim 8, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 1, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding independent claim 9, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 2, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding independent claim 10, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 3, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding independent claim 12, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 5, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding independent claim 15, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 1, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding independent claim 16, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 2, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding independent claim 17, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 3, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding independent claim 19, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 5, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding dependent claim 21, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated and Ji/Kozareva/Chandra further teaches: wherein the background information of the user is determined based at least on one of information from an application operating on a user device or metadata associated with the user. The user data may be from local or remote applications (Kozareva, ¶¶ 60, 66).
Regarding independent claim 22, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 8, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding independent claim 23, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 15, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Claims 4, 7, 11, 14, and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Ji et al. (US 2020/0293874 A1) [hereinafter Ji] in view of Kozareva et al. (US 2017/0097966 A1) [hereinafter Kozareva], Chandra et al. (US 2022/0208177 A1) [hereinafter Chandra], and Choque et al. (US 10,929,781 B1) [hereinafter Choque].
Regarding dependent claim 4, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated. Ji/Kozareva/Chandra teaches ranking candidate predicates [intents] but does not expressly teach that they are previous intents/actions from/for the user. However, Choque teaches: further comprising ranking previous actions requested by the user, and wherein the similarity scores are based on the ranking. A system uses past intents, responses, and actions in human-human or human-chatbot conversations as training for a chatbot (Choque, col. 9 ll. 40–60, col. 13 ll. 15–40).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Ji/Kozareva/Chandra with those of Choque. One would have been motivated to do so in order to improve future human-chatbot interactions [future actions based on the input intents] (Choque, col. 13 ll. 15–20).
Regarding dependent claim 7, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated. Ji/Kozareva/Chandra teaches storing candidate predicates [intents], and applying existing intents to new domains (Ji, ¶ 120) but does not expressly teach storing an action performed as a new intent. However, Choque teaches: further comprising storing the action performed as a new intent. A system stores inputs, responses, intents, and actions for use in training a machine learning chatbot (Choque, col. 13 ll. 15–40).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Ji/Kozareva/Chandra with those of Choque. One would have been motivated to do so in order to improve future human-chatbot interactions [future actions based on the input intents] (Choque, col. 13 ll. 15–20).
Regarding dependent claim 11, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 4, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding dependent claim 14, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 7, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding dependent claim 18, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 4, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Claims 6, 13, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Ji et al. (US 2020/0293874 A1) [hereinafter Ji] in view of Kozareva et al. (US 2017/0097966 A1) [hereinafter Kozareva], Chandra et al. (US 2022/0208177 A1) [hereinafter Chandra], and Nomula et al. (US 2017/0148073 A1) [hereinafter Nomula].
Regarding dependent claim 6, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated. Ji/Kozareva/Chandra teaches determining a user intent and performing an action in response, but does not expressly teach prompting the user for further information. However, Nomula teaches: further comprising prompting the user to provide further information associated with the action. A virtual agent may ask the user one or more clarification questions as part of a natural dialog, prompting the user to share more information (Nomula, ¶ 49).
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to combine the teachings of Ji/Kozareva/Chandra with those of Nomula. One would have been motivated to do so in order to better determine the needs of the user (Nomula, ¶ 49).
Regarding dependent claim 13, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 6, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding dependent claim 20, this claim recites limitations similar to those of claim 6, and is rejected for the same reasons.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 C.F.R. § 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to Applicant's disclosure.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Tyler Schallhorn whose telephone number is 571-270-3178. The examiner can normally be reached Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. (ET).
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/Tyler Schallhorn/Examiner, Art Unit 2144
/TAMARA T KYLE/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2144
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