DETAILED ACTION
This Action is a response to the reply filed 17 September 2025. Claims 1, 8, 15, 17 and 20 are amended; no claims are canceled or newly added. Claims 1-20 remain pending for examination. In view of the amendments and remarks, and after further consideration of the issues, Examiner has withdrawn the rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
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 information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on 10 July 2025 and 15 September 2025 are being considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. § 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claims 1-3, 5, 7-10, 12, 14-17 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Cirone et al., U.S. 2022/0083454 A1 (“Cirone”) in view of Weiss, Benjamin, U.S. 10,776,252 B1 (“Weiss”) and Marolia et al., U.S. 9,747,191 B1 (“Marolia”).
Regarding claim 1, Cirone teaches: A method of curing defects in software applications (Cirone, e.g., ¶¶3-4, “solutions facilitate improved telemetry capabilities and analytics … a method of propagating tracing …”), the method comprising:
providing, to a client device, an instrumented web page application that comprises a tracer configured to log tracing data for the web page application executing on a web browser (Cirone, e.g., ¶46, “providing a web page application to a web browser on a client device … Web application 134 includes tracer application 136, which provides instrumentation …”);
receiving, from the tracer, a tracing log comprising a hierarchy of spans associated with execution by a user of the web page application in the web browser, wherein each span represents an execution of operations associated with an event associated with an operation on the web application … (Cirone, e.g., ¶49, “detecting an event initiated by interaction with the web page application …” See also, e.g., ¶51, “logging a start of a span based on the detection … logging of a span that corresponds to the event” (i.e., logging spans representing execution of operations associated with an event (initiated event) associated with an operation on the web application (interaction with the web page application resulting in initiation of the event). See also, e.g., ¶53, “automatically logging an end of the span based upon a completion of the operations corresponding to the event … Data collected can include processing cycles used, time taken to execute the span …” and ¶54, “execution of block 210 can result in additional spans … tracer application 136 can create a first child span corresponding to a first operation and a second child span corresponding to a second operation … child spans can be children of the span.”);
… wherein each of the one or more spans is associated with a respective interaction by the user with the web page application (Cirone, e.g., ¶51, “Tracer application 136 causes the logging of a span that corresponds to the event.” See also, e.g., ¶50, “Examples of events include user interface interactions, clicks, navigations, mouse-overs, refreshes … event can be a representational state transfer”).
Cirone does not more particularly teach that the spans have associated timestamps, identifying one or more spans, and deriving from the identified spans a sequence of events by extracting a respective event for each identified span and associated timestamp, and executing the sequence of events in an additional web application instance. However, Weiss does teach: [each span] has an associated timestamp … identifying, from the hierarchy of spans, one or more spans … deriving, from the identified spans, a sequence of events, by extracting, for each identified span and the associated timestamp, a respective event (Weiss, e.g., 8:66-9:23, “During execution of the instance of the enterprise mobile application 35 at mobile device 12A, session logger 38 records a corresponding log for each session … indicates … sequence of user actions that have been taken and/or user events that have occurred at user interface … respective time intervals elapsing between each user action/event … logging indications of respective identities of each user action/event and its respective timestamps …” See also, e.g., 9:40-10:4, “discovering or identifying a particular pattern or sequence of user actions … mine session log data 48 … each identified pattern is a respective ordered set of user actions … selecting a subset of session log data 48 … filtering session log data 48 … based on one or more criteria or characteristics related to the instance of enterprise mobile application 35, such as the version or release of the application 35 …”); and
executing the sequence of events within an additional instance of the web page application on a developer device (Weiss, e.g., 11:13-29, “method 100 may include automatically generating a new test case and/or automatically determining an update to an existing test case based on the particular pattern … automatically updating the suite of user interface test cases of the enterprise mobile application to include the new test case or updated test case …” See also, e.g., 12:1-14, “method 150 may include executing or performing a suite of user interface test cases on a version of an enterprise mobile application that is to be tested, e.g., on a ‘test version’ of the mobile application … executing on a physical mobile device or virtual machine …”) for the purpose of determining interesting sequences of user interactions with a plurality of instances of a web application and using those sequences to derive additional or modified test cases for executing against instances of the web application (Weiss, e.g., 4:5-5:33).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system and method for propagating tracing across a distributed web application as taught by Cirone to provide that the spans have associated timestamps, identifying one or more spans, and deriving from the identified spans a sequence of events by extracting a respective event for each identified span and associated timestamp, and executing the sequence of events in an additional web application instance because the disclosure of Weiss shows that it was known to those of ordinary skill in the pertinent art to improve a system and method for collecting and analyzing pluralities of web application trace logs to provide that the spans have associated timestamps, identifying one or more spans, and deriving from the identified spans a sequence of events by extracting a respective event for each identified span and associated timestamp, and executing the sequence of events in an additional web application instance for the purpose of determining interesting sequences of user interactions with a plurality of instances of a web application and using those sequences to derive additional or modified test cases for executing against instances of the web application (Weiss, Id.).
Cirone in view of Weiss does not more particularly teach that executing the sequence of events within an additional instance of the application includes an additional tracer application to capture additional telemetry data associated with execution of a script mimicking user action on a developer device. However, Marolia does teach: [executing the events within an additional instance of the application] including an additional tracer application to capture additional telemetry data associated with execution of a script mimicking user action [on a developer device] (Marolia, e.g., 5:8-15, “event capture component 206 may … capture and record user input events that occur on a mobile device …” See also, e.g., 5:60-6:13, “event replay component 208 may simulate or trigger user input events on an app under test …” See also, e.g., 8:41-48, “event player component 406 may … generate user input events directed to an app under test on a target device, based on the events in the replication event stream 402 … event player generates a screen tap event directed to the app under test …” See also, e.g., 9:25-35, “player component 406 may validate whether an event is replayed successfully on a target device. The performance metrics component 408 may capture performance data while replaying events on the target device … related to memory or CPU utilization … object traces, or log data, etc. …”) for the purpose of facilitating the efficient testing and identification of error root causes for an application that may be executed across a wide variety of hardware and platform environments (Marolia, e.g., 2:31-3:62).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system and method for propagating tracing across a distributed web application as taught by Cirone in view of Weiss to provide that executing the sequence of events within an additional instance of the application includes an additional tracer application to capture additional telemetry data associated with execution of a script mimicking user action on a developer device because the disclosure of Marolia shows that it was known to those of ordinary skill in the pertinent art to improve a system and method for recording and replaying web application user interaction event sequences to provide that executing the sequence of events within an additional instance of the application includes an additional tracer application to capture additional telemetry data associated with execution of a script mimicking user action on a developer device for the purpose of facilitating the efficient testing and identification of error root causes for an application that may be executed across a wide variety of hardware and platform environments (Marolia, Id.).
Claims 8 and 15 are rejected for the reasons given in the rejection of claim 1 above. Examiner notes that with respect to claim 8, Cirone further teaches: A system (Cirone, e.g., ¶225, “exemplary computer system …”) comprising: a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing computer-executable program instructions (Cirone, e.g., ¶225, “Storage subsystem 1618 includes tangible computer-readable storage media …”); and a processing device communicatively coupled to the non-transitory computer-readable medium for executing the computer-executable program instructions (Cirone, e.g., ¶228, “processing unit 1604 can execute a variety of programs in response to program code … resident in processing unit 1604 and/or in storage subsystem 1618 …”), wherein executing the computer-executable program instructions configures the processing device to perform operations comprising: [[[the method of claim 1]]]; and with respect to claim 15, Cirone further teaches: A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing computer-executable program instructions, wherein when executed by a processing device (Cirone, e.g., ¶225, “Storage subsystem 1618 includes tangible computer-readable storage media …” See also, e.g., ¶228, “processing unit 1604 can execute a variety of programs in response to program code … resident in processing unit 1604 and/or in storage subsystem 1618 …”), the computer-executable program instructions cause the processing device to perform operations comprising: [[[the method of claim 1]]].
Regarding claim 2, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated, and Cirone further teaches: wherein identifying the one or more spans comprises determining an association, for the one or more spans, with one or more of: (i) a reference to an element of a respective interaction by the user on the web page application, (ii) a navigation by the user on the web page application, or (iii) a priority designation (Cirone, e.g., ¶60, “user may click on a particular visual element of the web page displayed within the browser, causing a component event. The telemetry runtime 320 may determine that the web browser should navigate to a new web page …” See also, e.g., ¶¶100-101, “web application includes an event that is triggered by a user interaction … associating the event with a first span … log tracing information based on an execution of a first set of operations caused by (corresponding to execution of) the event … obtain a first measurement of performance of a first span …” See also, e.g., ¶104, “obtaining a priority for the first span …”).
Regarding claim 3, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated, but Cirone does not more particularly teach that an error is detected from the hierarchy of spans of the tracing log from one or more of a span associated with an operation execution error and a span with a time duration greater than a predetermined threshold. However, Weiss does teach: detecting, from the hierarchy of spans of the tracing log, an error associated with the instrumented web page application, wherein the error is detected from one or more of: (i) a span associated with an error in the execution of one or more operations; (ii) a span with a duration of time greater than a predetermined threshold; and (iii) an error report from the user (Weiss, e.g., 12:30-59, “determining, based on an execution of the test suite, an error and/or a sub-optimal performance issue that corresponds to user interface functionality of the enterprise mobile application … retrieval of data within the feature was too slow (e.g., the elapsed time from the user requesting the data to the data being displayed was greater than a maximum length of time), incorrect data was returned and displayed … automatically generating one or more new test cases corresponding to the detected error/sub-optimal performance issue … cases may be directed to a particular sequence of user actions and/or events … that occurred prior to the occurrence of the issue/sub-optimal performance issue …”) for the purpose of determining interesting sequences of user interactions with a plurality of instances of a web application and using those sequences to derive additional or modified test cases for executing against instances of the web application (Weiss, e.g., 4:5-5:33).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system and method for propagating tracing across a distributed web application as taught by Cirone to provide that an error is detected from the hierarchy of spans of the tracing log from one or more of a span associated with an operation execution error and a span with a time duration greater than a predetermined threshold because the disclosure of Weiss shows that it was known to those of ordinary skill in the pertinent art to improve a system and method for collecting and analyzing pluralities of web application trace logs to provide that an error is detected from the hierarchy of spans of the tracing log from one or more of a span associated with an operation execution error and a span with a time duration greater than a predetermined threshold for the purpose of determining interesting sequences of user interactions with a plurality of instances of a web application and using those sequences to derive additional or modified test cases for executing against instances of the web application (Weiss, Id.).
Claims 9-10 and 16-17 are rejected for the additional reasons given in the rejections of claims 2-3 above.
Regarding claim 5, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated, but Cirone does not more particularly teach that the additional instance of the web application comprises an additional tracer for logging additional tracing data for the additional web application instance. However, Weiss does teach: wherein the additional instance of the web page application on the developer device comprises an additional tracer configured to log additional tracing data for the additional instance of the web page application (Weiss, e.g., 12:30-59, “determining, based on an execution of the test suite, an error and/or a sub-optimal performance issue that corresponds to user interface functionality of the enterprise mobile application … automatically generating one or more new test cases corresponding to the detected error/sub-optimal performance issue … cases may be directed to a particular sequence of user actions and/or events … that occurred prior to the occurrence of the issue/sub-optimal performance issue …” See also, e.g., 9:24-39 et seq., as discussed above with respect to claim 1, wherein a session log (trace) is obtained and from which a sequence of actions is derived for use in generating the new test case) for the purpose of determining interesting sequences of user interactions with a plurality of instances of a web application and using those sequences to derive additional or modified test cases for executing against instances of the web application (Weiss, e.g., 4:5-5:33).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system and method for propagating tracing across a distributed web application as taught by Cirone to provide that the additional instance of the web application comprises an additional tracer for logging additional tracing data for the additional web application instance because the disclosure of Weiss shows that it was known to those of ordinary skill in the pertinent art to improve a system and method for collecting and analyzing pluralities of web application trace logs to provide that the additional instance of the web application comprises an additional tracer for logging additional tracing data for the additional web application instance for the purpose of determining interesting sequences of user interactions with a plurality of instances of a web application and using those sequences to derive additional or modified test cases for executing against instances of the web application (Weiss, Id.).
Claims 12 and 19 are rejected for the additional reasons given in the rejection of claim 5 above.
Regarding claim 7, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated, but Cirone does not more particularly teach that deriving the sequence of events includes generating a script by associating the spans with user interactions ordered based on the timestamp, the script comprising a list of instructions for execution within the additional web application instance. However, Weiss does teach: wherein deriving the sequence of events includes generating a script by associating the spans with user interactions ordered based on the timestamp, wherein the script comprises a list of instructions for execution within the additional instance of the web page application (Weiss, e.g., 12:1-42, “executing or performing a suite of user interface test cases on a version of an enterprise mobile application … executing on a physical mobile device … determining, based on execution of the test suite, an error and/or sub-optimal performance issue that corresponds to user interface functionality … test results may show that the retrieval of data within the feature was too slow (e.g., the elapsed time from the user requesting the data …” Examiner’s note: the test causes the automated performance of a series of user interface interactions consistent with a determined sequence of user actions; that is, it represents a list of instructions for execution of the version of the enterprise mobile application. As discussed above with respect to claim 1, the sequences are logged by identities of actions/events and corresponding timestamps to derive sequences) for the purpose of determining interesting sequences of user interactions with a plurality of instances of a web application and using those sequences to derive additional or modified test cases for executing against instances of the web application (Weiss, e.g., 4:5-5:33).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system and method for propagating tracing across a distributed web application as taught by Cirone to provide that deriving the sequence of events includes generating a script by associating the spans with user interactions ordered based on the timestamp, the script comprising a list of instructions for execution within the additional web application instance because the disclosure of Weiss shows that it was known to those of ordinary skill in the pertinent art to improve a system and method for collecting and analyzing pluralities of web application trace logs to provide that deriving the sequence of events includes generating a script by associating the spans with user interactions ordered based on the timestamp, the script comprising a list of instructions for execution within the additional web application instance for the purpose of determining interesting sequences of user interactions with a plurality of instances of a web application and using those sequences to derive additional or modified test cases for executing against instances of the web application (Weiss, Id.).
Claim 14 is rejected for the additional reasons given in the rejection of claim 7 above.
Claims 4, 11 and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Cirone in view of Weiss and Marolia, and in further view of Mihara, Makoto, U.S. 2004/0015736 A1 (“Mihara”).
Regarding claim 4, the rejection of claim 3 is incorporated, but Cirone in view of Weiss and Marolia does not more particularly teach that receiving the hierarchy of spans from the tracer is triggered by the detection of the error. However, Mihara does teach: wherein receiving the hierarchy of spans from the tracer is triggered by the detection of the error (Mihara, e.g., ¶166, “function of using a trigger only when a log acquisition starts and an error occurs …” See also, e.g., ¶¶167-169, “function/method is set as a log acquisition trigger … acquisition code temporarily stores the module name … temporarily stores the call time, a parameter … determines whether or not the log acquisition initiation trigger should be used only if an error occurs … determines whether or not the function/method has resulted in an error … if the function/method has resulted in an error, the code stores the log it has temporarily stored in memory into the HDD …” Examiner’s note: that the log comprises the hierarchy of spans is disclosed with respect to claim 1 above, incorporated herein) for the purpose of providing a configurable trace log system that reduces logging resource consumption by limiting the trace logs that are collected during application execution (Mihara, e.g., ¶¶162-174).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system and method for propagating tracing across a distributed web application as taught by Cirone in view of Weiss and Marolia to provide that receiving the hierarchy of spans from the tracer is triggered by the detection of the error because the disclosure of Mihara shows that it was known to those of ordinary skill in the pertinent art to improve a system and method for trace log acquisition to provide that receiving the hierarchy of spans from the tracer is triggered by the detection of the error for the purpose of providing a configurable trace log system that reduces logging resource consumption by limiting the trace logs that are collected during application execution (Mihara, Id.).
Claims 11 and 18 are rejected for the additional reasons given in the rejection of claim 4 above.
Claims 6, 13 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Cirone in view of Weiss and Marolia, and in further view of Ocariza, Jr. et al., U.S. 2019/0310931 A1 (“Ocariza”).
Regarding claim 6, the rejection of claim 5 is incorporated, but Cirone does not more particularly teach receiving an additional tracing log comprising an additional hierarchy of spans associated with execution of the additional web application instance, each span thereof representing event operation execution and associated with a timestamp, and identifying one or more differences comparing the tracing log and the additional tracing log. However, Weiss does teach: receiving an additional tracing log comprising an additional hierarchy of spans associated with execution of the additional instance of the web page application, wherein each span of the additional hierarchy represents an execution of operations associated with an event and has an associated timestamp (Weiss, e.g., 8:25-41, “download respective instances of the enterprise mobile application 35 to multiple mobile devices 12A-12N … instance … includes a session logger 38 …” See also, e.g., 8:66-9:15, “session logger 38 records a corresponding session log for each session … indicates … particular sequence of user actions that have been taken and/or user events … logging indications of respective identifies of each user action/event and its respective timestamps …” See also, e.g., 12:1-14, “method 150 may include executing or performing a suite of user interface test cases on a version of an enterprise mobile application that is to be tested, e.g., on a ‘test version’ of the mobile application … executing on a physical mobile device or virtual machine …”);
identifying one or more differences comparing the execution of operations of the tracing log with the execution of operations of the additional tracing log to identify differences between the operations (Weiss, e.g., 12:30-42, “running a particular test for a newly added feature, the test results may show that the retrieval of requested data within the feature was too slow (e.g., the elapsed time from the user requesting the data to the data being displayed was greater than a maximum length of time), incorrect data was returned …” Examiner’s note: the difference is based on a performance characteristic particular to the operations of the additional tracing log (session log of the test instance) based on a new feature and corresponding performance characteristics of the sequence of user actions pertaining thereto) for the purpose of determining interesting sequences of user interactions with a plurality of instances of a web application and using those sequences to derive additional or modified test cases for executing against instances of the web application (Weiss, e.g., 4:5-5:33).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system and method for propagating tracing across a distributed web application as taught by Cirone to provide for receiving an additional tracing log comprising an additional hierarchy of spans associated with execution of the additional web application instance, each span thereof representing event operation execution and associated with a timestamp, and identifying one or more differences comparing the tracing log and the additional tracing log because the disclosure of Weiss shows that it was known to those of ordinary skill in the pertinent art to improve a system and method for collecting and analyzing pluralities of web application trace logs to provide for receiving an additional tracing log comprising an additional hierarchy of spans associated with execution of the additional web application instance, each span thereof representing event operation execution and associated with a timestamp, and identifying one or more differences comparing the tracing log and the additional tracing log for the purpose of determining interesting sequences of user interactions with a plurality of instances of a web application and using those sequences to derive additional or modified test cases for executing against instances of the web application (Weiss, Id.).
Cirone in view of Weiss and Marolia does not teach that when the differences between the tracing log and additional log exceed a predetermined threshold, deriving an additional sequence of events. However, Ocariza does teach: when the differences between the tracing log and additional tracing log exceed a predetermined threshold, derive an additional sequence of events (Ocariza, e.g., ¶17, “automatically determine performance regression causes by comparing the execution timelines of different versions of an application …” See also, e.g., ¶22, “different execution timelines are generated using the different versions of the application when interacting with a web application …” See also, e.g., ¶29, “performance regression cause represents lowest-level functions that regressed by at least a real number u (e.g., a minimum response time difference u) based on a comparison of the old … and the new execution timeline …” and ¶32, “A critical graph represents a new timeline, but with nodes that are considered irrelevant to the performance regressions being filtered out …”) for the purpose of identifying a particular sequence of operational events leading to a particular regression (Ocariza, e.g., ¶¶17-18).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system and method for propagating tracing across a distributed web application as taught by Cirone in view of Weiss and Marolia to provide that when the differences between the tracing log and additional log exceed a predetermined threshold, deriving an additional sequence of events because the disclosure of Ocariza shows that it was known to those of ordinary skill in the pertinent art to improve a system and method for regression analysis using trace log execution timelines to provide that when the differences between the tracing log and additional log exceed a predetermined threshold, deriving an additional sequence of events for the purpose of identifying a particular sequence of operational events leading to a particular regression (Ocariza, Id.).
Claims 13 and 20 are rejected for the additional reasons given in the rejection of claim 6 above.
Response to Arguments
In the Remarks, Applicant Argues: Amendments to the independent claims, relying on subject matter from at least ¶¶4, 9, 37, 44, 46 and 92 of the Specification, recite limitations that incorporate any judicial exceptions into a practical application (Resp. at 9-12). In particular, the Specification (¶¶4, 28-29, 37, 44, 46 and 92) recite an improvement to computer or other technology, and the claims recite these details (id. at 10-12). Accordingly, the independent claims and their dependent claims should be found eligible (id. at 12).
Examiner’s Response: In view of the amendments and the remarks, and after further consideration, Examiner has withdrawn the rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
Applicant Further Argues: Claims 1, 8 and 15, as amended, recite subject matter not taught or suggested by Cirone and Weiss, and these claims, and all claims depending therefrom, should therefore be considered allowable (Resp. at 13-14).
Examiner’s Response: In view of the amendments, Examiner newly cites to Marolia, and maintains the rejections under the new grounds set forth in full above.
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 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.
Examiner has identified particular references contained in the prior art of record within the body of this action for the convenience of Applicant. Although the citations made are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the enumerated claims, the teaching of the cited art as a whole is not limited to the cited passages. Other passages and figures may apply. Applicant, in preparing the response, should consider fully the entire reference as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art and/or disclosed by Examiner.
Examiner respectfully requests that, in response to this Office Action, support be shown for language added to any original claims on amendment and any new claims. That is, indicate support for newly added claim language by specifically pointing to page(s) and line number(s) in the specification and/or drawing figure(s). This will assist Examiner in prosecuting the application.
When responding to this Office Action, Applicant is advised to clearly point out the patentable novelty which he or she thinks the claims present, in view of the state of the art disclosed by the references cited or the objections made. He or she must also show how the amendments avoid such references or objections. See 37 C.F.R. 1.111(c).
Examiner interviews are available via telephone and video conferencing using a USPTO-supplied web-based collaboration tool. Applicant is encouraged to submit an Automated Interview Request (AIR) which may be done via https://www.uspto.gov/patent/uspto-automated-interview-request-air-form, or may contact Examiner directly via the methods below.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communication from Examiner should be directed to Andrew M. Lyons, whose telephone number is (571) 270-3529, and whose fax number is (571) 270-4529. The examiner can normally be reached Monday to Friday from 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM ET. If attempts to reach Examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, Examiner’s supervisor, Wei Mui, can be reached at (571) 272-3708. Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Center system. For more information about the Patent Center system, see https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center. 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.
/Andrew M. Lyons/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2191