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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1-6 have been considered but are moot in view of the new ground of rejections.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
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 1-6 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.
For example claim 6 recites: “a word group analyzing step of analyzing which of a plurality of keywords matches the voice word wherein the word group analyzing step further includes extracting a keyword candidate from the voice word and updating a keyword dictionary based on the extracted keyword candidate; a question answer creating step of creating a question and an answer to the question, using the voice word, wherein the question answer creating step includes generating a plurality of questions and a plurality of answers based on a plurality of utterances included in the conversation, each of the questions including the keyword or a related word of the keyword”. The claim introduces “a plurality of keywords”, “a keyword candidate”, and “a keyword dictionary” in the word group analyzing step. But then it recites “each of the questions including the keyword or a related word of the keyword”. There is no singular “a keyword” introduced in the claims before this – only the plurality and the candidate. Therefore, “the keyword” has no clear antecedent basis and not sure which keyword it refers to. Claim 6 is rejected for similar reasons. Claims 2-5 are rejected for being dependent on claim 1.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
Claims 1-4 and 6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Beranek et al. (US Pub 2005/0283475) in view of Zhou, Xin. (US Pub 2013/0304730).
Regarding claim 1, Beranek discloses method, the method comprising, by the computer:
a voice analyzing step of analyzing a voice about a conversation to obtain a voice word, the voice word being a word included in the conversation (see para 0039-0041);
a word group analyzing step of analyzing which of a plurality of keywords matches the voice word (see abstract; para 0009-0012, 0041), wherein the word group analyzing step further includes extracting a keyword candidate from the voice word and updating a keyword dictionary based on the extracted keyword candidate (para 0043-0049 – “additional keywords to be activated for detection”);
Beranek does not disclose a question answer creating step of creating a question and an answer to the question, using the voice word, wherein the question answer creating step includes generating a plurality of questions and a plurality of answers based on a plurality of utterances included in the conversation. each of the questions including the keyword or a related word of the keyword; and
a question-and-answer set obtaining step of obtaining, using a keyword that is determined to match the question being classified and an answer to the question, a question and an answer about the keyword, the question and the answer being to be recorded in a question-and-answer collection, wherein the question-and-answer set obtaining step includes associating a plurality of questions and a plurality of answers with each keyword and storing the plurality of questions and the plurality of answers in relation to the keyword in the question-and-answer collection. and classifying the questions and the answers into categories.
Zhou discloses a question answer creating step of creating a question and an answer to the question, using the voice word (see abstract; para 0021, 0031), wherein the question answer creating step includes generating a plurality of questions and a plurality of answers based on a plurality of utterances included in the conversation, each of the questions including the keyword or a related word of the keyword (para 0015, 0033, 0035, 0037-0040); and; and
a question-and-answer set obtaining step of obtaining, using a keyword that is determined to match the question being classified and an answer to the question, a question and an answer about the keyword (para 0015, 0033, 0035, 0037-0040), the question and the answer being to be recorded in a question-and-answer collection (para 0015, 0033, 0035, 0037-0040), wherein the question-and-answer set obtaining step includes associating a plurality of questions and a plurality of answers with each keyword and storing the plurality of questions and the plurality of answers in relation to the keyword in the question-and-answer collection. and classifying the questions and the answers into categories (para 0015, 0033, 0035, 0037-0040, 0042; see figs. 3A, 3B);
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Beranek with the teachings of Zhou in order to quickly get an answer based on creation and maintenance of data repositories for storing question answer pairs and keyword-set answer pairs (Zhou, para 0019).
Regarding claim 2, Beranek discloses further comprising:
a keyword candidate extracting step of obtaining a candidate for a keyword from the voice word (see para 0041, 0043); and
a keyword updating step of updating, using the candidate for the keyword extracted in the keyword candidate extracting step, a keyword registered in a keyword dictionary, to update a plurality of registered keywords (para 0021,0043, 0049), wherein
the plurality of keywords in the word group analyzing step are the plurality of registered keywords that are obtained by the keyword updating step (para 0021 – “rules may be invoked which associates newly monitored keywords with the context of the new topic area. A rule may be triggered by an utterance of one or more keywords and may cause new keywords or phrases to be activated for monitoring”,0043, 0049).
Regarding claim 3, Zhou discloses further comprising
a category analyzing step of analyzing a category of the question and the answer (para 0033 – such as different language Chinese), wherein
the question-and-answer collection stores the question and the answer in the category analyzed in the category analyzing step, the question and the answer being to be recorded in the question-and-answer collection (para 0033).
Regarding claim 4, Zhou discloses further comprising:
a content related word reading step of reading, by the computer, a content related word that is related to content included in a presentation material about the conversation (para 0041, 0044);
a content related word determining step of determining whether the keyword is the content related word (para 0041, 0044); and
a content obtaining step of, when the keyword is the content related word, storing the content in the question-and-answer collection in association with the question and the answer to be recorded in the question-and-answer collection (para 0041, 0044).
Regarding claim 6, see rejection of claim 1.
Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Beranek et al. (US Pub 2005/0283475) in view of Zhou, Xin. (US Pub 2013/0304730) and in further view of Lavery et al. (US Pub 2023/0106058).
Regarding claim 5, Beranek in view of Zhou discloses the method of claim 1.
Beranek in view of Zhou does not disclose wherein the question-and-answer collection stores a page of a presentation material related to the content in association with the content.
Lavery discloses wherein the question-and-answer collection stores a page of a presentation material related to the content in association with the content (see para 0027).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Beranek in view of Zhou with the teachings of Lavery in order to have a single document for presentation for easier readability.
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 NAFIZ E HOQUE whose telephone number is (571)270-1811. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8-5.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Ahmad Matar can be reached at (571)272-7488. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/NAFIZ E HOQUE/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2693
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