DETAILED 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 .
Status of the Claims
Claims 1-11 were previously pending. Claims 1 and 8 were amended and new claims 12-19 were added in the reply filed May 26, 2026. Claims 1-19 are currently pending.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments with respect to the rejections made under § 112(a) have been fully considered but are not persuasive for reasons already of record. Non-Final Rejection mailed 12/22/2025, ¶ 5. Specifically, while the disclosure supports using constraints to search for and achieve an outcome/result (see Remarks, 9-10 and ¶¶ 0090-91)), this does not support that the generated itinerary network itself is constrained. Instead, the only mentions of the itinerary network itself specifically state that it is unconstrained.
Applicant's arguments with respect to the rejections made under § 103 are persuasive and the rejections are withdrawn.
Specification
The specification is objected to as failing to provide proper antecedent basis for the claimed subject matter. See 37 CFR 1.75(d)(1) and MPEP § 608.01(o). Correction of the following is required: the detailed description lacks antecedent basis for the claim terms "spatial dependencies," "payload," "govern," "fulfillment sequencing," "constrained itinerary network," "constrained itinerary schedule," "supplemental content."
Claim Objections
Claim 7 is objected to because of the following informalities: claim 7 recites "wherein the exchange employs a listener configured to identify the selected nodes associated with the travel request." However, this limitation is already present in claim 1, from which claim 7 depends. Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of 35 U.S.C. 112(a):
(a) IN GENERAL.—The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor or joint inventor of carrying out the invention.
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112:
The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor of carrying out his invention.
Claims 2-3, 12-13, and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), first paragraph, as failing to comply with the written description requirement. The claim(s) contains subject matter which was not described in the specification in such a way as to reasonably convey to one skilled in the relevant art that the inventor or a joint inventor, or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the inventor(s), at the time the application was filed, had possession of the claimed invention.
Claim 2 recites "to generate a constrained itinerary network being constrained according to traveler preferences and availability of the selected nodes." The disclosure references an "unconstrained" schedule (¶¶ 0075, 83-84). It further mentions the process to follow if constraints cannot be met (¶¶ 0090-91), and allocating inventory based on constraints (¶ 0097) but these passages do not provide any detail on how generating a constrained itinerary network being constrained according to traveler preferences and availability of the selected nodes is intended to be performed. Claims 3 and 16 recite related limitations, and there is no description of returning this unspecified constrained itinerary network to the network of travel content supplier devices. Instead, the Specification only supports sending the itinerary components or nodes fulfilling to the request themselves (rather than an entire itinerary network).
"When examining computer-implemented functional claims, examiners should determine whether the specification discloses the computer and the algorithm (e.g., the necessary steps and/or flowcharts) that perform the claimed function in sufficient detail such that one of ordinary skill in the art can reasonably conclude that the inventor possessed the claimed subject matter at the time of filing.... It is not enough that one skilled in the art could write a program to achieve the claimed function because the specification must explain how the inventor intends to achieve the claimed function to satisfy the written description requirement. See, e.g., Vasudevan Software, Inc. v. MicroStrategy, Inc., 782 F.3d 671, 681-683, 114 USPQ2d 1349, 1356, 1357 (Fed. Cir. 2015)." MPEP 2161.01(I).
The subject matter of the claims (recited above) does not conform to the disclosure in such a manner that one of ordinary skill in the art would recognize the claimed system as being that which Applicant adequately described as the invention or what Applicant actually had possession of at the time of the invention. A review of the disclosure does not reveal the particular manner in which traveler preferences and availability of the selected nodes are used to generate a constrained itinerary network. The lack of a particular methodology supports a finding that Applicant did not fully possess of these features at the time of filing. The dependent claims inherit the rejections of their respective base claims and, as such, are rejected for the same reasons.
Claims 13 and 18 reference a "payload" being transmitted to the network of travel content supplier devices. The term "payload" does not appear in the Specification and it is not sufficiently clear what specific data from the disclosure is being referred to by the term. Additionally, while claim 13 recites that the payload includes "a request for inferential information and/or semantics of the request together with a framework for interpreting the itinerary network itinerary objects," this does not appear to be the same data sent to the travel content supplier devices in the disclosure. Instead, the Specification supports sending this data itself to the travel content supplier devices rather than a request for the information (¶ 0094).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1, 4-6, 8-11, 14-17, and 19 are allowed.
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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DANIEL VETTER whose telephone number is (571)270-1366. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9:00-6:00.
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/DANIEL VETTER/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3628
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