3DETAILED ACTION
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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed on January 02, 2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
With respect to claim 1-22, applicant argued that these claims should not be rejected with 35 U.S.C. 101, Examiner disagree with applicant’s arguments. As pointed out by applicant’s, the paragraphs 7 and 8 of filed specification disclose that “the existing optical string recognition system fails to read the string altogether in the preceding circumstance and do not return any characters” and the paragraph 9 of the filed specification disclose that “These approaches provide apparatus and systems that provide feedback to a user when a partial match is identified. This allows the user to adjust parameters of the optical string recognition system until a full match is identified.”, however, the claims 1-22 does not include the limitation “these approaches provide apparatus and systems that provide feedback to a user when a partial match is identified. This allows the user to adjust parameters of the optical string recognition system until a full match is identified” which applicant believes that it is the improvement of the existing optical string recognition system. Therefore, the 35 USC 101 rejection is maintained.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-22 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to a Judicial Exception in the form of an Abstract Idea, without significantly more:
Beginning with independent claim 1, a process claim, which recites:
A method of identifying a match for a model string in an image, the method comprising: performing optical character recognition on the image to identify a candidate string, the candidate string including a plurality of candidate characters; determining a minimum edit cost between the candidate string and the model string, the model string including a plurality of model characters, the minimum edit cost representative of a cost of edit operations performed on the candidate string to satisfy characteristics of the model string, wherein the determining the minimum edit cost includes: responsive to determining that there is a missing or invalid candidate character at a character position in the candidate string with respect to a character position in the model string, determining the minimum edit cost using a special cost of an edit operation for identifying the missing or invalid candidate character in the candidate string; determining, based on the minimum edit cost, whether the candidate string is a match for the model string; and responsive to determining that the candidate string is a match for the model string, returning an output string corresponding to the minimum edit cost, wherein the returning the output string includes: returning, as the output string, a partial string corresponding to the candidate string that includes a label representing the missing or invalid character at the character position in the candidate string.
The claim recites abstract ideas:
A process that encompass a human performing the steps mentally with or without a physical aid in the form of the “returning” steps, with the “performing” step and “determining” steps being pre-solution acts of processing information which could be performed visually and/or mentally; and
A method of organizing human behavior in the form of a social activity of following rules or instructions informing a person to perform the “performing” step and “determining” steps and the “returning” steps.
These two abstract ideas will be considered together for analysis as a single abstract idea per MPEP 2106:
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This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because there are no recited additional elements that amount to a practical application, such as but no limited to the following as noted in MPEP 2106:
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The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception for the same reason: There are not additional elements other than the abstract idea.
Independent claim 1 is merely a generic computer implementation of the abstract ideas and likewise do not amount to significantly more. See MPEP 2106:
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Independent claim 8, a process claim, which recites:
A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising computer program instructions executable by at least one computer processor that when executed by the at least one computer processor perform a method of identifying a match for a model string in an image, the method comprising: performing optical character recognition on the image to identify a candidate string, the candidate string including a plurality of candidate characters; determining a minimum edit cost between the candidate string and the model string, the model string including a plurality of model characters, the minimum edit cost representative of a cost of edit operations performed on the candidate string to satisfy characteristics of the model string, wherein the determining the minimum edit cost includes: responsive to determining that there is a missing or invalid candidate character at a character position in the candidate string with respect to a character position in the model string, determining the minimum edit cost using a special cost of an edit operation for identifying the missing or invalid candidate character in the candidate string; determining, based on the minimum edit cost, whether the candidate string is a match for the model string; and responsive to determining that the candidate string is a match for the model string, returning an output string corresponding to the minimum edit cost, wherein the returning the output string includes: returning, as the output string, a partial string corresponding to the candidate string that includes a label representing the missing or invalid character at the character position in the candidate string
The claim recites abstract ideas:
A process that encompass a human performing the steps mentally with or without a physical aid in the form of the “returning” steps, with the “performing” step and “determining” steps being pre-solution acts of processing information which could be performed visually and/or mentally; and
A method of organizing human behavior in the form of a social activity of following rules or instructions informing a person to perform the “performing” step and “determining” steps and the “returning” steps.
These two abstract ideas will be considered together for analysis as a single abstract idea per MPEP 2106:
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This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because there are no recited additional elements that amount to a practical application, such as but no limited to the following as noted in MPEP 2106:
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The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception for the same reason: There are not additional elements other than the abstract idea.
Independent claim 8 is merely a generic computer implementation of the abstract ideas and likewise do not amount to significantly more. See MPEP 2106:
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Independent claim 15, a process claim, which recites:
A method of identifying a match for a model string in an image, the method comprising: performing optical character recognition on the image to identify a candidate string, the candidate string including a plurality of candidate characters; determining a minimum edit cost between the candidate string and the model string, the model string including a plurality of model characters, the minimum edit cost representative of a cost of edit operations performed on the candidate string to satisfy characteristics of the model string, wherein the determining the minimum edit cost includes: responsive to determining that a character position in the model string is identified as optional, determining the minimum edit cost using a special insertion cost of an insert operation for inserting, at a character position in the candidate string, a skip character marker indicating that an optional character position of the model string was skipped; determining, based on the minimum edit cost, whether the candidate string is a match for the model string; and responsive to determining that the candidate string is a match for the model string, returning an output string corresponding to the minimum edit cost, wherein the returning the output string includes: returning, as the output string, a basic string corresponding to the candidate string.
The claim recites abstract ideas:
A process that encompass a human performing the steps mentally with or without a physical aid in the form of the “returning” steps, with the “performing” step and “determining” steps being pre-solution acts of processing information which could be performed visually and/or mentally; and
A method of organizing human behavior in the form of a social activity of following rules or instructions informing a person to perform the “performing” step and “determining” steps and the “returning” steps.
These two abstract ideas will be considered together for analysis as a single abstract idea per MPEP 2106:
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This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because there are no recited additional elements that amount to a practical application, such as but no limited to the following as noted in MPEP 2106:
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The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception for the same reason: There are not additional elements other than the abstract idea.
Independent claim 15 is merely a generic computer implementation of the abstract ideas and likewise do not amount to significantly more. See MPEP 2106:
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Independent claim 19, a process claim, which recites:
A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising computer program instructions executable by at least one computer processor that when executed by the at least one computer processor perform a method of identifying a match for a model string in an image, the method comprising: performing optical character recognition on the image to identify a candidate string, the candidate string including a plurality of candidate characters; determining a minimum edit cost between the candidate string and the model string, the model string including a plurality of model characters, the minimum edit cost representative of a cost of edit operations performed on the candidate string to satisfy characteristics of the model string, wherein the determining the minimum edit cost includes: responsive to determining that a character position in the model string is identified as optional, determining the minimum edit cost using a special insertion cost of an insert operation for inserting, at a character position in the candidate string, a skip character marker indicating that an optional character position of the model string was skipped; determining, based on the minimum edit cost, whether the candidate string is a match for the model string; and responsive to determining that the candidate string is a match for the model string, returning an output string corresponding to the minimum edit cost, wherein the returning the output string includes: returning, as the output string, a basic string corresponding to the candidate string.
The claim recites abstract ideas:
A process that encompass a human performing the steps mentally with or without a physical aid in the form of the “returning” steps, with the “performing” step and “determining” steps being pre-solution acts of processing information which could be performed visually and/or mentally; and
A method of organizing human behavior in the form of a social activity of following rules or instructions informing a person to perform the “performing” step and “determining” steps and the “returning” steps.
These two abstract ideas will be considered together for analysis as a single abstract idea per MPEP 2106:
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This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because there are no recited additional elements that amount to a practical application, such as but no limited to the following as noted in MPEP 2106:
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The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception for the same reason: There are not additional elements other than the abstract idea.
Independent claim 19 is merely a generic computer implementation of the abstract ideas and likewise do not amount to significantly more. See MPEP 2106:
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Likewise, the following dependent claims have been analyzed and do not recite elements that recite a practical application or significantly more and remain rejected under 35 USC 101: Claims 2-7, 9-14, 16-18 and 20-21.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 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 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 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.
Contact
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to HUO LONG CHEN whose telephone number is (571)270-3759. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F 9am - 5pm. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Tieu, Benny can be reached on (571) 272-7490. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is (571) 273-8300. Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from either Private PAIR or Public PAIR. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only. For more information about the PAIR system, see http://pair-direct.uspto.gov. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative or access to the automated information system, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/HUO LONG CHEN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2682