DETAILED ACTION
This communication is in response to the Amendments and Arguments filed on 12/10/2025. Claims 1-9 and 11-20 are pending and have been examined.
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 12/10/2025 has been entered.
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Information Disclosure Statement
The IDS dated 09/10/2025 has been considered and placed in the application file.
Response to Arguments
The reply filed on 12/10/2025 has been entered. Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1-9 and 11-20 have been considered but are moot in view of new ground(s) of rejection caused by the amendments.
With respect to the applicant’s arguments to claim rejections under 35 U.S.C § 112, the applicant’s arguments and amendments with respect to claims 3 and 10 have been considered and accepted.
With respect to the applicant’s arguments to claim rejections under 35 U.S.C § 103, the applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1-9 and 11-20 have been considered but are moot in view of new ground(s) of rejection caused by the amendments.
Claim Interpretation
The claims in this application are given their broadest reasonable interpretation using the plain meaning of the claim language in light of the specification as it would be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art. The broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim element (also commonly referred to as a claim limitation) is limited by the description in the specification.
The following terms in the claims have been given the following interpretations in light of the specification:
Chatbot extension: paragraphs [0025] and [0026], “Chatbot 140 contains configurations 142- one or more configurations 152 that have been registered by extensions 150. Extensions 150 extend the capabilities of chatbot 140. As discussed below in more detail, extensions 150 are composable in that the output of one extension may be used as input to another extension. Chatbot extensions are also composable in that they read and write metadata as a request is passed through a pipeline of extensions. In some configurations, chatbot extensions 150 interact with chatbot 140 without registering configurations 152. In this scenario, one or more chatbot extensions 150 may provide prompts to chatbot 140, similar to how a user would provide chatbot 140 with prompts. The responses provided by chatbot 140 may be further processed by extensions 150 according to configurations 152. These responses may then be provided to other chatbot extensions 150, which may or may not invoke chatbot 140, enabling multiple chatbot extensions 150 to form a chain of extensions. Each extension in the chain of extensions may invoke chatbot 140 before returning a response to a subsequent chatbot extension 150 or the user.”
Thus, a chatbot extension is any composable software that extends or interacts with a chatbot. Chatbot extensions can solely comprise the functionality of a chatbot. This definition is used for purposes of searching for prior art, but cannot be incorporated into the claims.
Filter condition: paragraphs [0038], “Filters 216 are conditions that determine whether the corresponding chatbot extension 150 will process a particular request. If no filter 216 is listed, then the corresponding extension 150 will always be invoked.”
Thus, a filter condition is any conditional that evaluates whether to invoke a chatbot extension. This definition is used for purposes of searching for prior art, but cannot be incorporated into the claims.
PNG
media_image1.png
528
858
media_image1.png
Greyscale
Extension pipeline: paragraphs [0041], “FIG. 3 illustrates a pipeline 300 of chatbot extensions 150 processing a prompt 312 of a request 310A. As illustrated, pipeline 300 includes extension 150A, extension 150B, and extension 150C. These extensions may be ordered based on their relative priority values 208. As each extension is executed, responses 320 are received and incorporated into subsequent requests 310.”
Thus, an extension pipeline is any system that includes an order of chatbot extensions that incorporate previous responses to generate an overall response. This definition is used for purposes of searching for prior art, but cannot be incorporated into the claims.
Should applicant wish different definitions, Applicant should point to the portions of the specification that clearly show a different definition.
Claim Objections
Claims 8 and 13 are objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 8, line 15, should be "and [[the]] a second configuration of the second chatbot accepts"
Claim 13, line 3, should be "wherein the first chatbot extension[[s]] is placed"
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 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.
Claims 1-4, 8, 9, 11-14, and 17-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over US Patent Publication 20220141160 A1, (Ham et al.) in view of US Patent Publication 20190267001 A1 (Byun et al.) in view of US Patent Publication 20200372055 A1, (Joko et al.).
Claim 1
Regarding claim 1, Ham et al. disclose a method (Ham et al. ¶ [0048], "An electronic apparatus and a control method according to the disclosure can effectively combine and provide responses and functions of chat-bots that are independently developed.") comprising:
receiving a plurality of configurations of a plurality of chatbot extensions (Ham et al. ¶ [0062], "The plurality of chat-bots included in the memory 110 may be divided in various ways according to the types of services provided by the electronic apparatus 100" Dividing chatbots by various types of services is considered analogous to a receiving a plurality of configurations);
receiving a prompt (Ham et al. ¶ [0103], "Alternatively, a case wherein the electronic apparatus 100 is implemented as a smartphone or an AI speaker is assumed. In this case, if a user uttered a question, the user voice is input through a microphone of the electronic apparatus 100, and the processor 120 may acquire a text converted from the input user voice") [and a metadata associated with the prompt wherein the metadata includes a property];
[according to the ordering,] providing the first chatbot extension with the prompt (Ham et al. ¶ [0112], "the chat-bot management module 122 may input a user's question into the chat-bot 1 selected by the question classification module 121") [and the metadata, wherein the first chatbot extension modifies the metadata by modifying the property of the metadata];
receiving a first response [and the modified metadata] from the first chatbot extension (Ham et al. ¶ [0119]-[0130], "the function information extraction module 123 may receive the first response of the chat-bot 1 from the chat-bot management module 122 in operation S13 ... the question generation module 124 may generate a question (ex. Turn on the mobile data) requesting to perform the function (ex. mobile data>turn on) extracted from the function information extraction module 123, and transmit the generated question to the question classification module 121 in operation S15" The generated question and/or the first response from chat-bot 1 is considered analogous to a first response from a first chatbot extension);
according to the ordering, providing [the prompt,] the first response [and the modified metadata] to the second chatbot extension (Ham et al. ¶ [0131]-[0136], "the processor 120 may select the chat-bot 2 that can perform the function included in the first response by using the question classification module 121. … Then, the question classification module 121 may transmit information on the selected chat-bot 2 to the chat-bot management module 122 in operation S16 ... the chat-bot management module 122 may acquire a second response (ex. Shall I turn on the mobile data?) of the chat-bot 2 regarding the generated question (ex. Turn on the mobile data)" Selecting a chat-bot based on its ability to perform a function included in a first response received from a first chatbot is considered analogous to providing a first response to a second chatbot extension according to an ordering);
receiving a second response from the second chatbot extension, wherein the second response is generated based on [the prompt,] the first response (Ham et al. ¶ [0136], " the chat-bot management module 122 may acquire a second response (ex. Shall I turn on the mobile data?) of the chat-bot 2 regarding the generated question (ex. Turn on the mobile data)" The generated question is considered analogous to a first response (see above)) [and the modified property of the modified metadata]; and
providing a message that comprises the second response for display (Ham et al. ¶ [0276], "Then, based on the first response and the second response, a response for the user's question may be provided in operation S1060.").
Ham et al. do not explicitly disclose all of modifying metadata or generating a second response based on the modified metadata.
However, Byun et al. disclose a method, comprising:
receiving a plurality of configurations of a plurality of chatbot extensions (Byun et al. ¶ [0137], "each of the plurality of chatbots 730 may provide the user (or the user terminal) with a response that provides a specified service. ... the plurality of chatbots 730 may correspond to apps (or application programs) that provide the specified services" Providing chatbots that are associated with specified services is considered analogous to receiving configurations of chatbot extensions);
receiving a prompt (Byun et al. ¶ [0066], "According to an embodiment, the intelligence agent 145 may include an utterance recognition module for performing the user input. The processor 150 may recognize the user input for executing an action in an app through the utterance recognition module.") and a metadata associated with the prompt (Byun et al. ¶ [0087], "According to an embodiment, the processor 150 may receive context information indicating a current state of the user terminal 100 from a device platform") wherein the metadata includes a property (Byun et al. ¶ [0087], "The context information may include general context information, user context information, or device context information.");
[according to the ordering,] providing the first chatbot extension with the prompt and the metadata (Byun et al. ¶ [0144], " the first chatbot 731 may include the first NLU module 731a and the first local context module 731b … the first NLU module 731a may generate a first intent (e.g., hotel reservation) from a first user input ... The first NLU module 731a may further generate first context information ... associated with the first intent" Context information is considered analogous to metadata), wherein the first chatbot extension modifies the metadata by modifying the property of the metadata (Byun et al. ¶ [0150], "the context data converter 741a may convert the context information received from the first chatbot 731 to the specified format. For example, the context data converter 741a may set at least one field (e.g., a user's name field or a user's address field) and may convert the received context depending using the field." Modifying context data by setting/converting a field is considered analogous to modifying metadata by modifying a property of the metadata);
receiving a first response (Byun et al. ¶ [0144], "The first NLU module 731a ... may provide the user with a first response (e.g., information about a hotel capable of being booked) based on the first intent and the first context information") and the modified metadata from the first chatbot extension (Byun et al. ¶ [0150], " the context data converter 741a may store the converted context information in the context DB 741b. For example, the context share module 740 may store context information, which is converted by the context data converter 741a, in the context DB 741b.");
[according to the ordering,] providing [the prompt, the first response and] the modified metadata to the second chatbot extension (Byun et al. ¶ [0151], "According to an embodiment, the context data converter 741a may reconvert the context information, which is stored in the specified format, to a format necessary for the second chatbot 732. … the context data converter 741a may transmit the reconverted or extracted context information the second chatbot 732.");
receiving a second response from the second chatbot extension, wherein the second response is generated based on [the prompt, the first response and] the modified property of the modified metadata (Byun et al. ¶ [0178], "According to an embodiment, in operation 1190, the intelligent server 700 may provide a second response based on the second intent and the one or more pieces of context information transmitted from the other chatbot 731."); and
providing a message that comprises the second response for display (Byun et al. ¶ [0178], "the intelligent server 700 may provide the second response via the communication interface.").
Prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Ham et al.'s chatbot system to include Byun et al.'s metadata sharing because such a modification is the result of combining prior art elements according to known methods to yield predictable results. More specifically, Ham et al.'s chatbot system as modified by Byun et al.'s metadata sharing can yield a predictable result of improving user experience since sharing context information between chatbots would enable a greater level of cohesion between chatbots in understanding the user’s intent. Thus, a person of ordinary skill would have appreciated including in Ham et al.'s chatbot system the ability to do Byun et al.'s metadata sharing since the claimed invention is merely a combination of old elements, and in the combination each element merely would have performed the same function as it did separately, and one of ordinary skill in the art would have recognized that the results of the combination were predictable.
Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. do not explicitly disclose all of ordering chatbots based on configurations or providing the original prompt to secondary chatbots.
However, Joko et al. disclose receiving a plurality of configurations of a plurality of chatbot extensions (Joko et al. ¶ [0040], "the chatbot 110 includes chatbot data 130, which includes a request table 132 that indicates which other chatbots the chatbot 110 is allowed to communicate with, a reply table 134 that the chatbot 110 would use to determine which other chatbots it would reply to if given a request by one or more of the other chatbots, and a respondent classifier 136 that indicates which chatbot is responding to the query. In some embodiments, each of the chatbots 110, 112, 114, 116, 118, and 120 includes its own respective variant of the chatbot data 130." Chatbot data is considered analogous to a configuration);
determining an ordering of an extension pipeline comprising the plurality of chatbot extensions, wherein a first chatbot extension of the extension pipeline and a second chatbot extension of the extension pipeline are ordered based on a plurality of preferred pipeline location values stored in the plurality of configurations (Joko et al. ¶ [0060], "In some embodiments, the primary chatbot 210 is in direct communication with the secondary chatbots 220, 222, and 224 and not in direct communication with the tertiary chatbots 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, and 242 (e.g., the primary chatbot 210 has to indirectly communicate with the tertiary chatbots 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, and 242 via the secondary chatbots 220, 222, and 224, which are each able to communicate with their respective tertiary chatbots based on their own respective request tables)" Determining communication order based on the chatbots' request tables is considered analogous to determining an ordering of an extension pipeline based on a plurality of configurations);
according to the ordering, providing the first chatbot extension with the prompt (Joko et al. ¶ [0059], "Referring now to FIG. 2, illustrated is an example system 200 of a primary chatbot 210 communicating with secondary chatbots 220, 222, and 224 and their related tertiary chatbots 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, and 242, in accordance with embodiments of the present disclosure. In some embodiments, the primary chatbot 210 receives a query (not shown) and using natural language processing techniques identifies key features of the query.") [and the metadata, wherein the first chatbot extension modifies the metadata by modifying the property of the metadata];
according to the ordering, providing the prompt [, the first response and the modified metadata] to the second chatbot extension (Joko et al. ¶ [0060], "The primary chatbot 210 pushes/forwards/distributes the key features of the query to the first secondary chatbot 220, the second secondary chatbot 222, and the third chatbot 224 based on the primary chatbot's request table (which was described above in regard to FIG. 1)."); and
receiving a second response from the second chatbot extension, wherein the second response is generated based on the prompt (Joko et al. ¶ [0065], "the primary chatbot 210 sends the query and receives the response to the query via the secondary chatbot").
Prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Ham et al.'s information provided to the second chatbot to include Joko et al.'s full query because such a modification is the result of combining prior art elements according to known methods to yield predictable results. More specifically, Ham et al.'s information provided to the second chatbot as modified by Joko et al.'s full query can yield a predictable result of increasing accuracy since providing the original query to a second chatbot would enable the second chatbot to respond with a greater degree of understanding of the query/user intent. Thus, a person of ordinary skill would have appreciated including in Ham et al.'s information provided to the second chatbot the ability to provide full queries since the claimed invention is merely a combination of old elements, and in the combination each element merely would have performed the same function as it did separately, and one of ordinary skill in the art would have recognized that the results of the combination were predictable.
Claim 2
Regarding claim 2, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Joko et al. further teach wherein a first configuration of the plurality of configurations is associated with the first chatbot extension and a second configuration of the plurality of configurations is associated with the second chatbot extension (Joko et al. ¶ [0040], "the chatbot 110 includes chatbot data 130…. In some embodiments, each of the chatbots 110, 112, 114, 116, 118, and 120 includes its own respective variant of the chatbot data 130." Chatbot data 130 is considered analogous to a configuration); and
determining whether to invoke the second chatbot extension of the extension pipeline based on an evaluation of a filter condition included in the second configuration (Joko et al. ¶ [0030], "when identifying which one of the primary chatbot and the one or more secondary chatbots is to respond to the query, the primary chatbot may poll each of the primary chatbot and the one or more secondary chatbots. The polling may indicate each of the primary chatbot's and the one or more secondary chatbots' confidence in the other chatbots responding to the query. The primary chatbot may rank, based on the polled confidence, the primary chatbot and the one or more secondary chatbots. The primary chatbot may select, of the primary chatbot and the one or more secondary chatbots, a chatbot with the highest confidence." Selecting chatbots based on comparing confidence values is considered analogous to invoking a chatbot extension based on a filter condition evaluating to true. See claim interpretation section) based in part on the [modified] property of the [modified] metadata (Joko ¶ [0034], "when polling for each of the primary chatbot's and the one or more secondary chatbots' confidence in the other chatbots responding to the query, the primary chatbot may compare the one or more key features to metadata associated with each of the primary chatbot and the one or more secondary chatbots."). Byun et al. disclose modifying properties of metadata; see claim 1.
Claim 3
Regarding claim 3, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Byun et al. further disclose wherein the second configuration declares that the second chatbot extension consumes the modified property of the metadata (Byun et al. ¶ [0184]-[0185], "The intelligent server 700 may process the user utterances 1211 and 1213 into a first intent (e.g., hotel reservation) and context information ... the intelligent server 700 may determine that the context information is information capable of being used by one other chatbot (e.g., the second chatbot 732) and may store the context information in a database ... so as to share the context information between the plurality of chatbots 730."; ¶ [0190], "the intelligent server 700 may transmit the context information stored in a database to the second chatbot. ... the intelligent server 700 may obtain information about available car rentals by using the second intent and the context information and may transmit the obtained information to the user terminal 100." The second chatbot using modified context information to obtain relevant car rental information is considered analogous to consuming a modified metadata property. Transmitting the response is considered analogous to declaring the use of the modified metadata).
Joko et al. disclose wherein a first configuration of the plurality of configurations is associated with the first chatbot extension and a second configuration of the plurality of configurations is associated with the second chatbot extension (Joko et al. ¶ [0040], "the chatbot 110 includes chatbot data 130…. In some embodiments, each of the chatbots 110, 112, 114, 116, 118, and 120 includes its own respective variant of the chatbot data 130." Chatbot data 130 is considered analogous to a configuration).
Claim 4
Regarding claim 4, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Byun et al. further disclose wherein the first configuration declares that the first chatbot extension modifies the property of the metadata (Byun et al. ¶ [0184]-[0185], "The intelligent server 700 may process the user utterances 1211 and 1213 into a first intent (e.g., hotel reservation) and context information ... the intelligent server 700 may determine that the context information is information capable of being used by one other chatbot (e.g., the second chatbot 732) and may store the context information in a database ... so as to share the context information between the plurality of chatbots 730." Storing generated context in a database for use by other chatbots is considered analogous to declaring a modification of metadata).
Joko et al. further disclose wherein a first configuration of the plurality of configurations is associated with the first chatbot extension (Joko et al. ¶ [0040], "the chatbot 110 includes chatbot data 130").
Claim 8
Regarding claim 8, Ham et al. disclose a computer-readable storage medium having computer-executable instructions stored thereupon (Ham et al. ¶ [0300], "Computer instructions for performing processing operations at the electronic apparatus 100 according to the aforementioned various embodiments of the disclosure may be stored in a non-transitory computer-readable medium.") that, when executed by a processing system (Ham et al. ¶ [0300], "Computer instructions stored in such a non-transitory computer-readable medium make the processing operations at the electronic apparatus 100 according to the aforementioned various embodiments performed by the aforementioned machine, when the instructions are executed by the processor of the machine."), cause the processing system to:
receive, at a first chatbot extension, a prompt [and a metadata associated with the prompt] from an extension pipeline (Ham et al. ¶ [0258], "a user's question may be input into a question classification model trained to determine a chat-bot for responding to a question among a plurality of chat-bots, and a first chat-bot for responding to the user's question may be selected among a plurality of chat-bots in operation S1010.");
modify the prompt (Ham et al. ¶ [0102], "a user's question may be input into a smartphone or an AI speaker in the form of a voice. Here, the smartphone or the AI speaker may convert the input user voice into a text, and transmit it to the electronic apparatus 100. In this case, the processor 120 may receive the converted text through a communication interface of the electronic apparatus 100." Converting a prompt from voice to text is considered analogous to modifying a prompt);
provide a chatbot with the modified prompt (Ham et al. ¶ [0112], "the chat-bot management module 122 may input a user's question into the chat-bot 1 selected by the question classification module 121"); and
receive a response from the chatbot (Ham et al. ¶ [0113], "a first response … of the selected chat-bot 1 regarding the user's question may be acquired in operation S13."; ¶ [0120], “the function information extraction module 123 may extract information on at least one function … that can be performed at the electronic apparatus 100 from the first response of the chat-bot 1 in operation S14.”; ¶ [0127], “The question generation module 124 may generate a question by using information on a function acquired through the function information extraction module 123.” The generated question is considered analogous to a first response from a first chatbot extension).
Ham et al. do not explicitly disclose all of modifying/sharing metadata with an extension pipeline.
However, Byun et al. disclose receiving, at a first chatbot extension, a prompt (Byun et al. ¶ [0184]-[0185], "the ASR module 710 may process the voice data to generate first text data based on the user utterance.") and a metadata associated with the prompt (Byun et al. ¶ [0087], "According to an embodiment, the processor 150 may receive context information indicating a current state of the user terminal 100 from a device platform") [from an extension pipeline];
providing a chatbot with the [modified] prompt (Byun et al. ¶ [0144], "the first chatbot 731 may include the first NLU module 731a and the first local context module 731b ... the first NLU module 731a may generate a first intent (e.g., hotel reservation) from a first user input");
receiving a response from the chatbot (Byun et al. ¶ [0144], "The first NLU module 731a may further generate first context information ... associated with the first intent and may provide the user with a first response ... based on the first intent and the first context information." The generated context information is considered analogous to a response from the chatbot);
modifying the metadata by setting a property of the metadata based on the response from the chatbot (Byun et al. ¶ [0150], "the context data converter 741a may convert the context information received from the first chatbot 731 to the specified format. For example, the context data converter 741a may set at least one field (e.g., a user's name field or a user's address field) and may convert the received context depending using the field." Modifying context data by setting/converting a field is considered analogous to modifying metadata by modifying a property of the metadata); and
providing the modified metadata to the extension pipeline (Byun et al. ¶ [0150], " the context data converter 741a may store the converted context information in the context DB 741b. For example, the context share module 740 may store context information, which is converted by the context data converter 741a, in the context DB 741b." Context information modified to use a specific format is considered analogous to modified metadata), wherein the extension pipeline provides the modified metadata to a second chatbot extension (Byun et al. ¶ [0151], "According to an embodiment, the context data converter 741a may reconvert the context information, which is stored in the specified format, to a format necessary for the second chatbot 732. … the context data converter 741a may transmit the reconverted or extracted context information the second chatbot 732."), wherein an ordering of the first chatbot extension and the second chatbot extension in the extension pipeline is determined by determining that [a first configuration of] the first chatbot sets the property of the metadata (Byun et al. ¶ [0150], "the context data converter 741a may convert the context information received from the first chatbot 731 to the specified format. For example, the context data converter 741a may set at least one field (e.g., a user's name field or a user's address field) and may convert the received context depending using the field.") and [a second configuration of] the second chatbot accepts, as an input or filter condition, the property of the metadata (Byun et al. ¶ [0151], "the context data converter 741a may reconvert the context information, which is stored in the specified format, to a format necessary for the second chatbot 732. For example, the context data converter 741a may extract data/parameter from a field it set (e.g., an address field), which includes information necessary for the second chatbot 732, from among at least one field of the context information stored in the specified format."), and wherein the second chatbot extension uses the property of the metadata to generate a message for display (Byun et al. ¶ [0178], "According to an embodiment, in operation 1190, the intelligent server 700 may provide a second response based on the second intent and the one or more pieces of context information transmitted from the other chatbot 731.").
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the time of the effective filing date of the claimed invention of the instant application to modify Ham et al.’s chatbot system to incorporate Byun et al.’s metadata sharing. The suggestion/motivation for doing so is similar to the suggestion/motivation described above with respect to claim 1.
Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. do not explicitly disclose all of ordering chatbots based on individual chatbot configurations.
However, Joko et al. disclose wherein an ordering of the first chatbot extension and the second chatbot extension in the extension pipeline is determined by [determining that] a first configuration of the first chatbot [sets the property of the metadata] and a second configuration of the second chatbot [accepts, as an input or filter condition, the property of the metadata] (Joko et al. ¶ [0040], "the chatbot 110 includes chatbot data 130, which includes a request table 132 that indicates which other chatbots the chatbot 110 is allowed to communicate with, a reply table 134 that the chatbot 110 would use to determine which other chatbots it would reply to if given a request by one or more of the other chatbots, and a respondent classifier 136 that indicates which chatbot is responding to the query. In some embodiments, each of the chatbots 110, 112, 114, 116, 118, and 120 includes its own respective variant of the chatbot data 130." ¶ [0060], "In some embodiments, the primary chatbot 210 is in direct communication with the secondary chatbots 220, 222, and 224 and not in direct communication with the tertiary chatbots 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, and 242 (e.g., the primary chatbot 210 has to indirectly communicate with the tertiary chatbots 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, and 242 via the secondary chatbots 220, 222, and 224, which are each able to communicate with their respective tertiary chatbots based on their own respective request tables)").
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the time of the effective filing date of the claimed invention of the instant application to modify Ham et al.’s chatbot system to incorporate Joko et al.’s configuration-based ordering because such a modification is the result of combining prior art elements according to known methods to yield predictable results. More specifically, Ham et al.’s chatbot system as modified by Joko et al.’s specified ordering can yield a predictable result of improving system efficiency since manually configuring the order of chatbots can help optimize the flow of chatbots such that the number chatbots needed to answer a given user query is minimized. Thus, a person of ordinary skill would have appreciated including in Ham et al.’s chatbot system the ability to do Joko et al.’s specified ordering since the claimed invention is merely a combination of old elements, and in the combination each element merely would have performed the same function as it did separately, and one of ordinary skill in the art would have recognized that the results of the combination were predictable.
Claim 9
Regarding claim 9, the rejection of claim 8 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Joko et al. further disclose wherein the first chatbot extension emits a log entry based on the response (Joko et al. ¶ [0056], "In some embodiments, the chatbot 110 updates the respondent classifier 136 and/or the request table 132 after choosing chatbot 116 to respond to the query so as to make a priority of the other chatbots; for example, chatbot 116 is prioritized to respond to subsequent queries that may be related to the query submitted by user 102. This allows the chatbot 110 to acquire the appropriate chatbot to respond to the query based on its knowledge (e.g., learning from previous selections of appropriate chatbots to respond to queries)." Updating a respondent classifier is considered analogous to emitting a log entry).
Claim 11
Regarding claim 11, Ham et al. disclose a processing system, comprising:
a processor (Ham et al. ¶ [0298], "According to implementation by hardware, the embodiments described in the disclosure may be implemented by using any one or any combination of application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), digital signal processors (DSPs), digital signal processing devices (DSPDs), programmable logic devices (PLDs), field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), processors, controllers, micro-controllers, microprocessors, or an electronic unit for performing various functions."); and
a computer-readable storage medium having computer-executable instructions stored thereupon (Ham et al. ¶ [0300], "Computer instructions for performing processing operations at the electronic apparatus 100 according to the aforementioned various embodiments of the disclosure may be stored in a non-transitory computer-readable medium.").
Byun et al. disclose wherein the metadata includes the property, and wherein the first chatbot extension modifies the metadata by adding to, modifying, or deleting the property of the metadata (Byun et al. ¶ [0150], "the context data converter 741a may convert the context information received from the first chatbot 731 to the specified format. For example, the context data converter 741a may set at least one field (e.g., a user's name field or a user's address field) and may convert the received context depending using the field." A field is considered analogous to a property. Thus, converting a field of context data is considered analogous to modifying a property of metadata).
The remaining limitations of claim 11 are similar in scope to that of claim 1 and therefore are rejected for similar reasons as described above.
Claim 12
Regarding claim 12, the rejection of claim 11 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Joko et al. further disclose wherein the prompt received from the client device is provided to the extension pipeline (Joko et al. ¶ [0017], "In some embodiments, a primary chatbot may receive a query from a user. ... The primary chatbot may identify, from the analyzing, one or more key features of the query. The primary chatbot may push the one or more key features to one or more secondary (e.g., tertiary, quaternary, etc.) chatbots.") and wherein the second response is received from the extension pipeline (Joko et al. ¶ [0022], "In some embodiments, the primary chatbot may push, in response to identifying that a first secondary chatbot is to respond to the query, the query to the first secondary chatbot. The primary chatbot may receive the response from the first secondary chatbot.").
Claim 13
Regarding claim 13, the rejection of claim 11 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Joko et al. further disclose wherein a first configuration associated with the first chatbot extension declares a preferred location of the first chatbot extension in the pipeline (Joko et al. ¶ [0040], "the chatbot 110 includes chatbot data 130, which includes a request table 132 that indicates which other chatbots the chatbot 110 is allowed to communicate with, a reply table 134 that the chatbot 110 would use to determine which other chatbots it would reply to if given a request by one or more of the other chatbots, and a respondent classifier 136 that indicates which chatbot is responding to the query." Chatbot data that specifies communication order with other chatbots is considered analogous to a configuration that declares a preferred location in a pipeline), and wherein the first chatbot extension is placed in the extension pipeline in an order derived in part from the preferred location of the first chatbot extension relative to preferred locations of other chatbot extensions of the extension pipeline (Joko et al. ¶ [0060], "In some embodiments, the primary chatbot 210 is in direct communication with the secondary chatbots 220, 222, and 224 and not in direct communication with the tertiary chatbots 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, and 242 (e.g., the primary chatbot 210 has to indirectly communicate with the tertiary chatbots 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, and 242 via the secondary chatbots 220, 222, and 224, which are each able to communicate with their respective tertiary chatbots based on their own respective request tables)").
Claim 14
Regarding claim 14, the rejection of claim 11 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Byun et al. further disclose wherein the metadata comprises a plurality of properties (Byun et al. ¶ [0087]-[0088], "The context information may include general context information, user context information, or device context information. ... the general context information may include information about current time and space. For example, the information about the current time and space may include information about current time or a current location of the user terminal 100."), and wherein the second chatbot extension adds or modifies or deletes an individual property of the plurality of properties (Byun et al. ¶ [0150], "the context data converter 741a may convert the context information received from the first chatbot 731 to the specified format. For example, the context data converter 741a may set at least one field (e.g., a user's name field or a user's address field) and may convert the received context depending using the field.").
Claim 17
Regarding claim 17, the rejection of claim 11 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Joko et al. further disclose wherein a first configuration associated with the first chatbot extension registers the first chatbot extension to be invoked by a chatbot when the chatbot is unable to respond to the prompt (Joko ¶ [0060], "In some embodiments, the primary chatbot 210 pushes the key features of the query to the secondary chatbots 220, 222, and 224 if the primary chatbot 210 determines that it is unable to properly/accurately respond to the query (e.g., within a degree of certainty).").
Claim 18
Regarding claim 18 the rejection of claim 11 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Ham et al. further disclose wherein the first chatbot extension adds the first response to a conversation (Ham et al. ¶ [0113], " In this case, a first response (ex. Did you check the mobile data or Wi-Fi connection state? Setting>connection>data use>mobile data>turn on) of the selected chat-bot 1 regarding the user's question may be acquired in operation S13"), wherein the second chatbot extension adds the second response to the conversation (Ham et al. ¶ [0136], "the chat-bot management module 122 may acquire a second response (ex. Shall I turn on the mobile data?) of the chat-bot 2 regarding the generated question (ex. Turn on the mobile data), and provide a response to the user's question (question 1) based on the aforementioned first response and second response in operation S17."), and wherein providing the message of the second response for display comprises providing the conversation for display (Ham et al. ¶ [0137]-[0141], "The processor 120 may generate a combined response for the input user's question (question 1) based on the first response and the second response. Here, the combined response may simply include the first response and the second response, or it may be a new response wherein the first response and the second response are fused. ... Then, the chat-bot management module 122 may provide the generated combined response.").
Claim 19
Regarding claim 19 the rejection of claim 11 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Joko et al. further disclose wherein a first configuration of the plurality of configurations is associated with the first chatbot extension and a second configuration of the plurality of configurations is associated with the second chatbot extension (Joko et al. ¶ [0040], "the chatbot 110 includes chatbot data 130.... each of the chatbots 110, 112, 114, 116, 118, and 120 includes its own respective variant of the chatbot data 130." Chatbot data is considered analogous to a configuration), wherein the second chatbot extension appears in the extension pipeline after the first chatbot extension (Joko et al. ¶ [0060], "In some embodiments, the primary chatbot 210 is in direct communication with the secondary chatbots 220, 222, and 224 and not in direct communication with the tertiary chatbots 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, and 242 (e.g., the primary chatbot 210 has to indirectly communicate with the tertiary chatbots 230, 232, 234, 236, 238, 240, and 242 via the secondary chatbots 220, 222, and 224, which are each able to communicate with their respective tertiary chatbots based on their own respective request tables)") in response to the second configuration declaring that the second chatbot extension is to be invoked after the first chatbot extension has been invoked (Joko et al. ¶ [0023], "a first (e.g., primary) chatbot that is a part of a cooking website may receive a question from a user asking: “How may quarts in a gallon?” and the first chatbot may determine that it does not have the answer to the query. ... The first chatbot may identify that a particular chatbot (e.g., first secondary chatbot) that it is in direct communication with is sending an indication that it can likely respond to the full query. The particular chatbot may be in communication with the first chatbot because the particular chatbot was coded to interact with the first chatbot when metric-related cooking questions arose from users." A particular chatbot being coded to interact with a primary chatbot when certain questions arise is considered analogous to a second configuration declaring that a second chatbot is to be invoked after a first chatbot.).
Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of US Patent Publication 20220417194 A1 (Prabhu et al.).
Claim 5
Regarding claim 5, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. do not explicitly disclose wherein the metadata property indicates whether the prompt contains offensive language.
However, Prabhu et al. teach wherein the metadata property indicates whether the prompt contains offensive language (Prabhu ¶ [0093], "The machine learning model 134 can include any type of machine learning model that can be trained to generate output data capable of being used to classify an input data into one of multiple different classifications. Such classifications can include a first class indicating that a responsive message indicates that an initial message likely includes offensive content or a second class indicating that a responsive message indicates that an initial message likely does not include offensive content"; the use of classifications is considered analogous to the claimed metadata property, and the initial message is considered analogous to the prompt).
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the time of the effective filing date of the claimed invention of the instant application to modify the metadata property of Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. to incorporate Prabhu et al.’s classification of offensive language.
The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been to, “reduce [the] spread of messages, gestures, or both, that are likely to be offensive to others” as noted by the Prabhu et al. disclosure in paragraph [0063].
Claims 6 and 7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of US Patent Publication 20230074406 A1 (Baeuml et al.).
Claim 6
Regarding claim 6, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. do not explicitly disclose all of providing chatbots with a conversation of messages.
However, Baeuml et al. disclose wherein a second chatbot extension is provided with a conversation of messages generated by one or more previous chatbot extensions that preceded the second chatbot extension in an extension pipeline (Baeuml et al. ¶ [0042]-[0043], "the automated assistant 115 can transmit one or more structured request to one or more first-party (1P) systems 191... and/or one or more third-party (3P) systems 192 over one or more of the networks, and receive fulfillment data from one or more of the 1P systems 191 and/or 3P systems 192 to generate the stream of fulfillment data. ... The stream of fulfillment data can correspond to, for example, a set of assistant outputs ... the LLM engine 150A1 and/or 150A2 can process the set of assistant outputs that are predicted to be responsive to the assistant query" LLM engine 150 is considered analogous to a second chatbot extension. A stream of fulfillment data consisting of a set of assistant outputs is considered analogous to a conversation of messages generated by previous chatbot extensions).
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the time of the effective filing date of the claimed invention of the instant application to modify the metadata property of Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. to incorporate Baeuml et al.’s provision of conversation history.
The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been to, “a quantity of user inputs received at the client device can be reduced since a quantity of occurrences of the user having to request information that is contextually relevant to a dialog session can be reduced,” as noted by the Baeuml et al. disclosure in paragraph [0019].
Claim 7
Regarding claim 7, the rejection of claim 6 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. in view of Baeuml et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Baeuml et al. further disclose wherein the second chatbot extension modifies an existing message of the conversation of messages (Baeuml et al. ¶ [0043], "in some implementations, the LLM engine 150A1 and/or 150A2 can cause the set of assistant outputs to be modified, using one or more LLM outputs, to generate a set of modified assistant outputs.").
Claims 15 and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. as applied to claim 11 above, and further in view of US Patent Publication 20220284174 A1 (Galitsky).
Claim 15
Regarding claim 15, the rejection of claim 11 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. do not explicitly disclose determining that the first response is accurate based on an analysis of an outside source.
However, Galitsky teaches wherein the second chatbot extension determines that the first response is accurate (Galitsky ¶ [0050], "FIG. 1 depicts an example of a computing environment for correcting raw text generated using deep learning techniques, in accordance with at least one embodiment. In the example depicted in FIG. 1, computing environment 100 includes one or more of computing device 102 and user device 104. Computing device 102 can implement an application (e.g., application 106). In some embodiments, the application 106 may be an autonomous agent (e.g., a chatbot) that engages in a conversation with user device 104 and uses one or more of the techniques disclosed herein to dialog in response to input provided by user device 104") based on an analysis of an outside source (Galitsky ¶ [0037], "The techniques discussed herein apply fact-checking to raw text to identify entities and phrases which are untrue. One or more queries are formed from these untrue phrases and search available knowledge bases (e.g., the Internet, a corpus of documents, etc.) for sentences that may be used to replace/correct and/or augment portions of the raw text while retaining the syntactic and logical structure of the original text.").
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the time of the effective filing date of the claimed invention of the instant application to modify Ham et al.’s chatbot system with the Galitsky’s accuracy check.
The suggestion/motivation for doing so would have been to, “improve the end-to-end content generation process with fact-checking and correct fact substitution, to make the resulting content sound and trusted,” as noted by the Galitsky disclosure in paragraph [0037].
Claim 16
Regarding claim 16, the rejection of claim 15 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. in view of Galitsky disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Galitsky further discloses wherein the metadata property indicates that the first response is accurate (Galitsky ¶ [0137], "Each candidate true sentence obtained from the search results may be generalized with the raw text sentence such that each candidate true statement has an associated semantic alignment score and syntactic alignment score associated with it. These scores may collectively indicate a degree of by which a candidate true statement is appropriate to provide fragments with which the raw text sentence may be corrected"; alignment score is considered analogous to the claimed metadata property).
Claim 20 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. as applied to claim 11 above, and further in view of US Patent Publication 20220261817 A1 (Ferrucci et al.).
Claim 20
Regarding claim 20, the rejection of claim 11 is incorporated. Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. disclose all the elements of the claimed invention as stated above.
Joko et al. further disclose wherein a first configuration of the plurality of configurations is associated with the first chatbot extension and a second configuration of the plurality of configurations is associated with the second chatbot extension (Joko et al. ¶ [0040], "the chatbot 110 includes chatbot data 130.... each of the chatbots 110, 112, 114, 116, 118, and 120 includes its own respective variant of the chatbot data 130." Chatbot data is considered analogous to a configuration).
Ham et al. in view of Byun et al. in view of Joko et al. do not explicitly disclose a stream of subsections.
However, Ferrucci et al. teach wherein the [second] chatbot extension receives a stream of subsections (Ferrucci et al. ¶ [0167], "The user input may include a continuous stream of words describing an input scenario that may be typed or spoken by the user 104”; a continuous stream of words is considered analogous to the claimed stream of subsections, see Claim Interpretation section) [of the first response] as [the first response is] generated (Ferrucci et al. ¶ [0167], "In some examples, the multimodal dialog engine 216 may use the semantic parser 214 to identify components and connections between the components as the user 104 continues to describe the input scenario").
Prior to the effective filing date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Ham et al.’s transmission of responses between chatbots to include Ferrucci et al.’s continuous stream of subsections because such a modification is the result of simple substitution of one known element for another producing a predictable result. More specifically, Ham et al.’s first response and Ferrucci et al.’s user input perform the same general and predictable function, the predictable function being providing the computing system with the user’s intent and/or context for solving the user’s problem. Since each individual element and its function are shown in the prior art, albeit shown in separate references, the difference between the claimed subject matter and the prior art rests not on any individual element or function but in the very combination itself - that is in the substitution of Ham’s transmission of responses by replacing it with Ferrucci’s ability to understand a continuous stream of subsections. Thus, the simple substitution of one known element for another producing a predictable result renders the claim obvious.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JACOB B VOGT whose telephone number is (571)272-7028. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday 9:30am - 7pm EST.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Paras D Shah can be reached at (571)270-1650. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/JACOB B VOGT/ Examiner, Art Unit 2653
/Paras D Shah/ Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2653
02/05/2026