DETAILED ACTION
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 .
Drawings
2. The drawings are objected to under 37 CFR 1.83(a). The drawings must show every feature of the invention specified in the claims. Therefore, the claimed constructor, vectorization unit, comparison unit, similarity determination unit, and adjustment unit must be shown or the feature(s) canceled from the claim(s). No new matter should be entered.
Corrected drawing sheets in compliance with 37 CFR 1.121(d) are required in reply to the Office action to avoid abandonment of the application. Any amended replacement drawing sheet should include all of the figures appearing on the immediate prior version of the sheet, even if only one figure is being amended. The figure or figure number of an amended drawing should not be labeled as “amended.” If a drawing figure is to be canceled, the appropriate figure must be removed from the replacement sheet, and where necessary, the remaining figures must be renumbered and appropriate changes made to the brief description of the several views of the drawings for consistency. Additional replacement sheets may be necessary to show the renumbering of the remaining figures. Each drawing sheet submitted after the filing date of an application must be labeled in the top margin as either “Replacement Sheet” or “New Sheet” pursuant to 37 CFR 1.121(d). If the changes are not accepted by the examiner, the applicant will be notified and informed of any required corrective action in the next Office action. The objection to the drawings will not be held in abeyance.
Claim Objections
3. Claim 1 is objected to because of the following informalities: the claim recites duplicate, out-of-order sections (A, B, C, B, C, D, E).
Furthermore, step (D-3) in claim 1 ends with a period, although it is not the end of the claim, and it appears the word “and” should appear between “element,” and “tagging”. The structure of this section of the claim does not conform with MPEP 608.01(m).
Appropriate corrections are required.
Claim Rejections – 35 USC § 101
4. 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 1-12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. Independent claims 1 and 7 recite a method comprising:
(A) receiving a user input;
(B) analyzing at least one aspect of the received user input to formulate a set of prompts;
(C) identifying at least one content element from a content database based on the analysis of at least one aspect of the user input, wherein the relevance of the at least one content element is determined in relation to at least one aspect of the user input;
(B) generating a first set of attribute values for a first assessment content element, wherein the set comprises at least one attribute characterizes the identified content element or a derivative representation thereof;
(C) constructing the assessment content element by:
(C-1) transmitting a creation request for at least a portion of the assessment content element;
(C-2) receiving a response comprising at least a portion of the assessment content element;
(C-3) processing the received response to extract a specified portion of the assessment content element; and
(C-4) repeating C-1 through C-4 iteratively until the entire assessment content element is generated;
(D) processing the generated assessment content element, wherein the processing comprises at least one of the following operations:
(D-1) aggregating the generated portions to form a unified assessment content element;
(D-2) assigning metadata tags reflective of one or more attributes from the first set of attribute values to facilitate subsequent retrieval, categorization, or analysis; or
(D-3) performing any other processing operation that enhances, modifies, or utilized the assessment content element for its intended purpose. which may include concatenating portions of the assessment content element, tagging the assessment content element with one or more attributes from the set of attributes; and
(E) storing the assessment content element in a content database and/or transmitting the assessment content element to a content delivery system for presentation to a reviewer or assessment taker.
The limitations of receiving and analyzing a user input, identifying a content element, generating attributes, constructing an assessment content element, and processing and storing the content element, as drafted, constitutes a process that, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components. That is, other than reciting the method is “computer-implemented” via interaction with an “AI model”, nothing in the claim elements precludes the steps from practically being performed in the mind. For example, but for the “computer-implemented” and “AI” language, “receiving”, “analyzing”, “identifying”, generating”, “constructing”, “processing” and “storing” in the context of these claims encompasses a user manually receiving input from another user, analyzing it and generating attributes as a purely mental process, constructing the assessment content element by transmitting requests and receiving responses for example to another person or to a database, and processing and storing the content element. If a claim limitation, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components, then it falls within the “Mental Processes” grouping of abstract ideas. Accordingly, the claims recite an abstract idea.
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. In particular, the claims recite that the method is “computer-implemented” which amounts no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component. See MPEP 2106.05(f). The claims further recite the method is performed via interaction with a computational or generative AI model, including transmitting the request to the AI model and receiving a response from the AI model. This AI model is recited at a high level of generality and amounts to no more than utilizing a computer as a tool to perform the abstract idea. Alternatively, this use of a generic AI model amounts to no more than generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use. See MPEP 2106.05(h) Accordingly, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. The claims are directed to an abstract idea.
The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. As discussed above with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, the additional elements of implementing the method using a computer interacting with a generic AI model amounts to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using generic computer components. Mere instructions to apply an exception using a generic computer component cannot provide an inventive concept. The claims are not patent eligible.
Dependent claims 2-6 and 8-12 recite the same abstract idea as in their respective parent claims and only recite additional aspects of the abstract idea being performed via interaction with the generic AI model (determining relevance of content elements based on vectorized representations, using one of a set of generic machine learning techniques, specifying the type of content elements, etc.), Therefore these claims do not recite additional limitations sufficient to direct the claimed invention to significantly more.
CLAIM INTERPRETATION
5. The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(f):
(f) Element in Claim for a Combination. – An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
6. Use of the word “means” (or “step for”) in a claim with functional language creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim element is to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. § 112(f) (pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph). The presumption that § 112(f) (pre-AIA § 112, sixth paragraph) is invoked is rebutted when the function is recited with sufficient structure, material, or acts within the claim itself to entirely perform the recited function.
Absence of the word “means” (or “step for”) in a claim creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim element is not to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. § 112(f) (pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph). The presumption that § 112(f) (pre-AIA § 112, sixth paragraph) is not invoked is rebutted when the claim element recites function but fails to recite sufficiently definite structure, material or acts to perform that function.
Claim elements in this application that use the word “means” (or “step for”) are presumed to invoke § 112(f) except as otherwise indicated in an Office action. Similarly, claim elements that do not use the word “means” (or “step for”) are presumed not to invoke § 112(f) except as otherwise indicated in an Office action.
7. Claim limitations “processing unit”, “generator”, “constructor”, and “storage unit” in claim 7, “vectorization unit”, “comparison unit” and “similarity determination unit” in claim 8, and “adjustment unit” in claim 9, have been interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, because they use a generic placeholder “unit”, “generator”, or “constructor” coupled with functional language “configured to” without reciting sufficient structure to achieve the function. Furthermore, the generic placeholder is not preceded by a structural modifier.
Since the claim limitation(s) invokes 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, claim 1 has been interpreted to cover the corresponding structure described in the specification that achieves the claimed function, and equivalents thereof.
A review of the specification reveals the following to correspond to the claimed processing unit and storage unit, respectively: one or more processors (Par. 166), and databases and other temporary or permanent computer storage (Par. 149).
However, a review of the specification does NOT appear to reveal structure corresponding to the remaining 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph limitations. The “generator” is interpreted as being the attributes generator 124, however this is only described as a block in a diagram and the specification does not appear to disclose structure corresponding to the generator. Furthermore, the specification makes no mention of the constructor, vectorization unit, comparison unit, similarity determination unit, and adjustment unit outside of the claims themselves. Therefore, the specification does not reveal structure corresponding to these limitations.
8. If applicant wishes to provide further explanation or dispute the examiner’s interpretation of the corresponding structure, applicant must identify the corresponding structure with reference to the specification by page and line number, and to the drawing, if any, by reference characters in response to this Office action.
If applicant does not intend to have the claim limitation(s) treated under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, applicant may amend the claim(s) so that it/they will clearly not invoke 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, or present a sufficient showing that the claim recites/recite sufficient structure, material, or acts for performing the claimed function to preclude application of 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph.
For more information, see MPEP § 2173 et seq. and Supplementary Examination Guidelines for Determining Compliance With 35 U.S.C. 112 and for Treatment of Related Issues in Patent Applications, 76 FR 7162, 7167 (Feb. 9, 2011).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
9. 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.
10. Claims 7-12 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. As detailed above claims 7-9 recite limitations that invoke 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, and have been interpreted to cover the corresponding structure described in the specification that achieves the claimed function, and equivalents thereof. However, the specification does not appear to describe structure corresponding to the claimed generator, constructor, vectorization unit, comparison unit, similarity determination unit, and adjustment unit. Accordingly, the claims contain subject matter (the claimed engines) which are not described in such a way as to convey that the inventor had possession of the claimed invention, and thus fail to comply with the written description requirement. Dependent claims 10-12 inherit the deficiencies of their parent claims through their dependencies, and are thus rejected for the same reasons.
11. 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.
12. Claims 7-12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention. As detailed above claim 7 recites limitations that invoke 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, and have been interpreted to cover the corresponding structure described in the specification that achieves the claimed function, and equivalents thereof. However, the specification does not appear to describe structure disclosed as corresponding to these claimed objects. Accordingly, the scope of the claimed invention is unclear since the claims and specification do not apprise the person of ordinary skill in the art what falls within, and outside of, the bounds of the invention. Dependent claims 10-12 inherit the deficiencies of their parent claims through their dependencies, and are thus rejected for the same reasons.
13. Claims 1-12 are further rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention, for the following reasons:
Regarding claim 1, the limitations of performing “any other” processing operation, and which “may include” in step (D-3) are open-ended and indefinite.
Similarly, the limitation “or other” inferred metric in claims 3 and 9 is open-ended and indefinite.
Regarding claims 5 and 6, it appears there is wording or punctuation missing between the words “elements” and “the repositioning” in each claim, which renders the claims indefinite.
The limitation in claim 7 of “any other” in section (E) is indefinite for the reasons
described above.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
14. The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
15. Claims 1 and 7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Ahmad et al. (US 2019/0034060 A1).
Regarding claims 1 and 7, Ahmad discloses a computer-implemented method generating assessment content via interaction with at least one of a computational artificial intelligence (AI) model or a generative AI model, the method comprising:
(A) receiving, via a user interface, user input (see e.g. Fig. 8, step 702 – receive content receipt request);
(B) analyzing at least one aspect of the received user input to formulate a set of prompts for querying the AI model (analyze identify of requesting user, and for example detect hardware configuration of user device – steps 704-706, Par. 151-152; in order to send to AI model – Par. 92);
(C) identifying at least one content element (presentation data and/or evaluation data) from a content database based on the analysis of at least one aspect of the user input, wherein the relevance of the at least one content element is determined in relation to at least one aspect of the user input (Par. 155);
(B) generating a first set of attribute values for a first assessment content element (content attributes), wherein the set comprises at least one attribute characterizes the identified content element or a derivative representation thereof (Par. 82);
(C) constructing the assessment content element by:
(C-1) transmitting a creation request for at least a portion of the assessment content element to the AI model over an interface; (C-2) receiving a response from the AI model comprising at least a portion of the assessment content element; and (C-3) processing the received response to extract a specified portion of the assessment content element; and (C-4) repeating C-1 through C-4 iteratively until the entire assessment content element is generated (Par’s. 92-93 – AI models receive several inputs relating to the user and/or several content items can be inserted, which are used to predictively select the content items in the assessment);
(D) processing the generated assessment content element, wherein the processing comprises at least one of the following operations:
(D-1) aggregating the generated portions to form a unified assessment content element (Par. 84); and
(D-2) assigning metadata tags reflective of one or more attributes from the first set of attribute values to facilitate subsequent retrieval, categorization, or analysis (Par. 82); and
(E) storing the assessment content element in a content database and/or transmitting the assessment content element to a content delivery system for presentation to a reviewer or assessment taker (provide presentation data to user at step 716, Fig. 8).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
16. 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.
17. 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.
18. Claims 2-6 and 8-12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ahmad et al. (US 2019/0034060 A1) in view of Sitton et al. (US 2018/0233057 A1).
Regarding claims 2-4 and 8-10, Ahmad does not appear to disclose, but Sitton does discloses in a similar content recommendation system, determining the relevance of the at least one content element from the content database by: (A) Generating vectorized representations for both the at least one user input and content elements within the content database that represent their semantic content; (B) Comparing the vectorized representation of the at least one user input with the vectorized representations of the content elements; and (C) Employing a similarity determination algorithm to identify the at least one content element whose vectorized representation demonstrates the highest semantic congruence with the vectorized representation of the user input (see Sitton, Par. 38) (as per claims 2 and 8),
adjusting the vector representations of at least one subset of the content elements in a content database based upon aggregated performance data (Par’s. 40, 67), wherein said adjusting repositions the embeddings within the vector space based on an inferred difficulty level (Par. 55) (as per claims 3 and 9), and
the adjustment of the vector representations involves using one or more machine learning techniques selected from the group consisting of supervised learning, unsupervised learning, semi-supervised learning, reinforcement learning, and transfer learning, for dynamically repositioning the embeddings within the vector space (offline machine learning - Par. 64) (as per claims 4 and 10).
It would have been obvious to one skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the teachings of Ahmad by utilizing these vectorized representations to compare user input and content elements and make content determinations, as taught by Sitton. Such a modification would involve applying a known technique to known devices ready for improvement to yield predictable results.
Regarding claims 5, 6, 11 and 12, Ahmad further discloses the at least one subset of the content elements is a set of curriculum content elements the repositioning of the embeddings is based on an inferred difficulty level (Par. 80) (as per claims 5 and 11), and
the at least one subset of the content elements is a set of assessment content elements the repositioning of the embeddings is based on an inferred test format adequacy metric (Par. 122) (as per claims 6 and 12).
Conclusion
19. The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. See attached PTO-892.
20. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to PETER EGLOFF whose telephone number is (571)270-3548. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday - Friday 9:00 am - 5:00 pm.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Xuan Thai can be reached at (571) 272-7147. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Peter R Egloff/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3715