DETAILED ACTION
This action is responsive to the Response to Restriction Requirement filed 1/26/2026.
Claims 1-8 have been elected, and are pending. Claims 9-20 are non-elected and have been withdrawn.
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.
Claim 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to the judicial exception of a mental process without significantly more.
With regard to Claim 1, the claim recites steps of receiving data extracted from files, determining based on the data that sections correspond to outputs of the same stage of an electronic design automation process, and extracting metrics from the logfiles. The steps of receiving data, making a determination, and extracting metrics therefrom are steps which can be performed in the human mind, and therefore constitute the judicial exception of a mental process.
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because the additional elements are not sufficient to do so. The additional elements recited in the claim are a processing device used in the determining step, and a step of generating a user interface to display extracted metrics adjacent to one another. These additional elements do not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application, because they merely recite generic computer elements.
The recited “processor” is merely a generic computing component, and does not constitute any elements of a practical application. The step of “generating a user interface to display the first metrics from the first section of the first logfile adjacent to the second metrics from the second section of the second logfile” does not constitute a practical application, as a user interface to display metrics adjacent to one another does not include any meaningful functions that integrate the mental process.
A generic interface capable of displaying each logfile is “a user interface to display the metrics of the first logfile adjacent to the second metrics.” The claim therefore does not capture a meaningful improvement to the technology of analyzing and extracting data from logfiles, and does not recite a particular machine or particular elements specifically tied to the steps of the mental process. Rather, the elements are merely generic elements of a computer, and do not integrate the mental process into a practical application sufficient to render the mental process patent eligible.
Claim 1 does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because, for reasons similar to those explained above. The additional elements do not amount to more than conventional, routine, well-understood elements of a generic computer system, because a graphical user interface capable of displaying two documents and a processor are basic elements of computing systems that have existed for many years. Therefore, the additional elements do not amount to significantly more than the judicial exception.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-8 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
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/KEITH D BLOOMQUIST/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2171
2/19/2026