Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
1. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
DETAILED ACTION
2. This Office Action is sent in response to Applicant’s Communication received on 06/23/2026 for application number 18/371,587.
Response to Amendments
3. The Amendment filed 06/23/2026 has been entered. Claims 1-3, 6-9, and 11-14 have been amended. Claims 1-17 remain pending in the application.
4. Applicant’s amendments to claims 2, 3, 7, 8, 12-14 have been fully considered and are not persuasive. The amendment provided to overcome the §112(b) rejection set forth in the previous office action is not sufficient. Accordingly, the 35 U.S.C § 112(b) rejection of claims 2-5, 7-10, and 12-17 is maintained.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s response provides definitions for terms appearing in the recited equations. The Examiner acknowledges Applicant’s attempt to clarify the mathematical notation. However, the response does not fully overcome the rejection because one or more of the definitions and/or mathematical symbols provided by the Applicant are not legible in the record. As a result, the Examiner cannot reliably determine what the affected variables or symbols represent. Accordingly, the rejection of claims 2-5, 7-10, and 12-17 under 112(b) is maintained.
Applicant argues that cited combination does not teach or suggest the amended claim requirement in independent claims 1, 6, and 11. Upon consideration of the amendments and Applicant’s remarks, the prior art rejections previously applied to the independent claims 1, 6, and 11 are withdrawn. In particular, the Examiner has considered the presently claimed combinations as a whole and finds that the prior art presently of record does not teach or render obvious the limitations added by Applicant’s amendments to independent claims.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
5. The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 2-5, 7-10, and 12-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b) as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
Applicant’s response provides definitions for terms appearing in the recited equations. The Examiner acknowledges Applicant’s attempt to clarify the mathematical notation. However, the response does not fully overcome the rejection because one or more of the definitions and/ mathematical symbols provided by the Applicant are not legible in the record. As a result, the Examiner cannot reliably determine what the affected variables or symbols represent.
Specifically, the following definitions and/or variables provided are illegible.
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264
912
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246
910
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564
894
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191
716
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191
716
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Claims 4, 5, 9, 10, 15-17 incorporate the deficiencies of claims 3, 8, 14, through dependency, and are also rejected.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1, 6, and 11 are allowed.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure.
Zhu et al. (Pub. No. US 20220114475 A1), Methods and systems for decentralized federated learning are described. Each client participating the training of a local machine learning model identifies one or more neighbor clients in direct communication with itself. Each client transmits to its neighbor clients a weighting coefficient and a set of local model parameters for the local model. Each client also receives from its neighbor clients respective sets of local model parameters and respective weighting coefficients. Each client updates its own set of local model parameters using a weighted aggregation of the received sets of local model parameters, each received set of local model parameters being weighted with the respective received weighting coefficient.
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 extension fee 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 date of this final action.
It is noted that any citation to specific pages, columns, lines, or figures in the prior art references and any interpretation of the references should not be considered to be limiting in any way. A reference is relevant for all it contains and may be relied upon for all that it would have reasonably suggested to one having ordinary skill in the art. In re Heck, 699 F.2d 1331, 1332-33, 216 U.S.P.Q. 1038, 1039 (Fed. Cir. 1983) (quoting In re Lemelson, 397 F.2d 1006, 1009, 158 U.S.P.Q. 275, 277 (C.C.P.A. 1968)).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to TAN TRAN whose telephone number is (303)297-4266. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday - Thursday - 8:00 am - 5:00 pm MT.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Matt Ell can be reached on 571-270-3264. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/TAN H TRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2141
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