DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
The instant application having application No. 18/770,230 filed on July 11, 2024, presents claims 1-20 for examination. The instant application claim priority to the U.S. Provisional application having application No. 63/597,201, filed on November 8, 2023.
Examiner Notes
Examiner cites particular columns, paragraphs, figures and line numbers in the references as applied to the claims below for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested that, in preparing responses, the applicant fully consider the references in their entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the examiner.
Claim Objections
Claims 1-7 and 14-20 objected to because of the following informalities:
With respect to claim 1, the inclusion of “and” at the end of line 12 appears to be a typographical error. Additionally, line 18 appears to have been mistakenly indented to line up with the “respective data structures” on lines 9-17.
Claim 2-7 inherit these deficiencies.
With respect to claim 2, lines 1-2 recite “wherein the program or the portion of the program is a probabilistic programming language” appears to be a typographical error that should recite “wherein the program or the portion of the program is specified in a probabilistic programming language”.
With respect to claims 7 and 14, the inclusion of “or” at the end of line 4 appears to be a typographical error.
With respect to claim 15, “the portion of the program” appears to be a typographical error that should recite “a portion of the program”. Additionally, the inclusion of “and” at the end of line 11 appears to be a typographical error.
Claim 16-20 inherit this deficiency.
With respect to claims 17-20, each recites “the programming instructions”, which appears to be a typographical error that should recite “the program instructions”.
Appropriate correction is required.
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.
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention recites a judicial exception, is directed to that judicial exception, specifically an abstract idea, as it has not been integrated into a practical application and the claims further do not recite significantly more than the judicial exception. Examiner has evaluated the claims under the framework provided in the 2019 Patent Eligibility Guidance published in the Federal Register 01/07/2019 and has provided such analysis below.
Step 1: Claims 1-7 are directed to systems and fall within the statutory category of machines; Claims 8-14 are directed to computer implemented methods and fall within the statutory category of processes; Claims 15-20 are directed to non-transitory computer-readable storage media and fall within the statutory category of articles of manufacture. Therefore, “Are the claims to a process, machine, manufacture or composition of matter?” Yes.
In order to evaluate the Step 2A inquiry “Is the claim directed to a law of nature, a natural phenomenon or an abstract idea?” we must determine, at Step 2A Prong 1, whether the claim recites a law of nature, a natural phenomenon, or an abstract idea (see MPEP § 2106.04).
Step 2A Prong 1:
With respect to claims 1, 8, and 15, The limitations of “traverse the tree to generate a map data structure in a single pass, wherein the map data structure maps the tree, and different subtrees of the tree, to respective data structures that comprise: a first set of variables declared prior to the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree and in scope for the tree; a second set of variables read by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree; and a third set of variables modified by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree; and a set of array references that respectively reference an array possibly modified by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree; and wherein to traverse the tree, … construct a chain of dependencies between results observed at each node visited as part of traversing the tree”, as recited in claim 1, “for a tree representing a program or a portion of the program: traversing the tree to generate a map data structure in a single pass, wherein the map data structure maps the tree, and different subtrees of the tree, to respective data structures that comprise: a first set of variables declared prior to the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree and in scope for the tree; a second set of variables read by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree; a third set of variables modified by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree; and a set of array references that respectively reference an array possibly modified by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree; and wherein traversing the tree comprises constructing a chain of dependencies between results observed at each node visited as part of traversing the tree”, as recited in claim 8, and “for a tree representing a program or the portion of the program: traversing the tree to generate a map data structure in a single pass, wherein the map data structure maps the tree, and different subtrees of the tree, to respective data structures that comprise: a first set of variables declared prior to the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree and in scope for the tree; a second set of variables read by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree; and a third set of variables modified by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree; and a set of array references that respectively reference an array possibly modified by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree; and wherein in traversing the tree … constructing a chain of dependencies between results observed at each node visited as part of traversing the tree”, as recited in claim 15, are each a process that, but for the recitation of generic computing components and under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind with no more than pen and paper. For example, a human software developer, using no more than pen and paper, could perform the following: (1) manually go through, i.e. traverse, each node of a linearized human-readable tree representation of small portion of source code in a single pass, (2) based on the traversal, draft human readable source code for a data structure that maps the tree and its subtrees to source code data structures including (i) a first set of variables declared prior to the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree and in scope for the tree, (ii) a second set of variables read by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree, (iii) a third set of variables modified by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree, and (iv) a set of array references that respectively reference an array possibly modified by the program or the portion of the program represented by the tree; and (3) while traversing the linearized tree representation, draft a sequence of dependencies between node results as each node is visited.
Therefore, Yes, claims 1, 8, and 15 recite limitations that fall within the “Mental Processes” grouping of abstract ideas.
As the claims have been identified as reciting a judicial exception, Step 2A Prong 2 will evaluate whether the claim as a whole integrates the recited judicial exception into a practical application (see MPEP § 2106.04(d)).
Step 2A Prong 2:
With respect to claims 1, 8, and 15, The judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. In particular, the claims recite the following additional elements: “A system, comprising: at least one processor; a memory, comprising program instructions that when executed by the at least one processor cause the at least one processor to: … the program instructions cause the at least one processor to,”1 “performing, by one or more computing devices:,”2 “One or more, non-transitory, computer-readable storage media, storing program instructions that when executed on or across one or more computing devices, cause the one or more computing devices to implement: … the program instructions cause the one or more computing devices to implement,”3 which merely recite instructions to implement an abstract idea on a generic computer, or merely uses a generic computer or computer components to perform the abstract idea, which does not integrate a judicial exception into a practical application (see MPEP § 2106.05(f)).
Claim 1 further recites the following additional element: “obtain a tree representing a program or a portion of a program,” which is merely insignificant extra-solution activity such as gathering data, which does not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application (see MPEP § 2106.05(g), which cites relevant case law, e.g., OIP Technologies, 788 F.3d at 1363, 115 USPQ2d at 1092-93 and CyberSource v. Retail Decisions, Inc., 654 F.3d 1366, 1375, 99 USPQ2d 1690, 1694 (Fed. Cir. 2011)), and will be analyzed further below in Step 2B as being well-understood, routine, and conventional.
Therefore, “Do the claims recite additional elements that integrate the judicial exception into a practical application? No, even when viewed in combination, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application and they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
After having evaluated the inquires set forth in Steps 2A Prong 1 and 2, it has been concluded that claims 1, 8, and 15 not only recite a judicial exception but are directed to the judicial exception as the judicial exception has not been integrated into a practical application. Accordingly, Step 2B will evaluate whether the claim as a whole amounts to significantly more than the recited exception, i.e., whether any additional element, or combination of additional elements, adds an inventive concept to the claim. See MPEP § 2106.05.
Step 2B:
With respect to claims 1, 8, and 15, The claims do not include additional elements, alone or in combination, that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. As discussed above with respect to the integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, the additional elements amount to no more than generic computing components applying the abstract idea and insignificant extra-solution activity such as gathering, displaying, updating, transmitting, and storing data, which is well-understood, routine, and conventional (see MPEP § 2106.05(d)(II) for court decisions recognizing that this activity is well-understood, routine, and conventional.).
Therefore, “Do the claims recite additional elements that amount to significantly more than the judicial exception?” No, these additional elements, alone or in combination, do not amount to significantly more than the judicial exception.
Having concluded the analysis within the provided framework, claims 1, 8, and 15 do not recite patent eligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
With respect to claims 2, 9, and 16, the limitations recite “wherein the program or the portion of the program is a probabilistic programming language,” which merely provides details of the program represented by the tree identified above as being part of a mental process, and these details do not alter a human developer’s ability to perform the mental process identified above with respect to claims 1, 8, and 15. These limitations therefore also fall within the same Mental Processes grouping of abstract ideas identified above. Thus, the claims are directed to the judicial exception and do not have elements amounting to significantly more than the abstract idea itself. Therefore, the claims do not recite patent eligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
With respect to claims 3, 10, and 17, the limitations recite “wherein to traverse the tree … determine whether a variable name is overloaded,”4 which could also be performed mentally using no more than pen and paper. For example, a human developer could manually walk through the linearized tree representation and keep track of variable names to determine if a variable name is overloaded. These limitations therefore also fall within the Mental Processes grouping of abstract ideas identified above. Furthermore, “the program instructions cause the at least one processor to” and “the programming instructions cause the one or more computing devices to implement” merely recite instructions to implement the abstract idea on a generic computer, or merely uses a generic computer or computer components to perform the abstract idea, which does not integrate a judicial exception into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea itself (see MPEP § 2106.05(f)). Thus, the claims are directed to the judicial exception and do not have elements amounting to significantly more than the abstract idea itself. Therefore, the claims do not recite patent eligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
With respect to claims 4, 11, and 18, the limitations recite “wherein to traverse the tree, … determine whether more than one global reference points to a same array,”5 which could also be performed mentally using no more than pen and paper. For example, a human developer could manually walk through the linearized tree representation and count the number of global references to each array. These limitations therefore also fall within the Mental Processes grouping of abstract ideas identified above. Furthermore, “the program instructions cause the at least one processor to” and “the programming instructions cause the one or more computing devices to implement” merely recite instructions to implement the abstract idea on a generic computer, or merely uses a generic computer or computer components to perform the abstract idea, which does not integrate a judicial exception into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea itself (see MPEP § 2106.05(f)). Thus, the claims are directed to the judicial exception and do not have elements amounting to significantly more than the abstract idea itself. Therefore, the claims do not recite patent eligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
With respect to claims 5 and 12, the limitations recite “wherein to traverse the tree, … determine whether at least one reference is maintained to an outer most array,”6 which could also be performed mentally using no more than pen and paper. For example, a human developer could manually walk through the linearized tree representation and use their programming understanding to see if there is a reference to an outermost array. These limitations therefore also fall within the Mental Processes grouping of abstract ideas identified above. Furthermore, “the program instructions cause the at least one processor to” and “the programming instructions cause the one or more computing devices to implement” merely recite instructions to implement the abstract idea on a generic computer, or merely uses a generic computer or computer components to perform the abstract idea, which does not integrate a judicial exception into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea itself (see MPEP § 2106.05(f)). Thus, the claims are directed to the judicial exception and do not have elements amounting to significantly more than the abstract idea itself. Therefore, the claims do not recite patent eligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
With respect to claims 6, 13, and 19, the limitations recite “wherein to traverse the tree, … determine whether one of the set of array references to the array is placed in two or more other arrays,”7 which could also be performed mentally using no more than pen and paper. For example, a human developer could manually walk through the linearized tree representation and use their programming understanding to see if one of the array references is placed in two or more other arrays. These limitations therefore also fall within the Mental Processes grouping of abstract ideas identified above. Furthermore, “the program instructions cause the at least one processor to” and “the programming instructions cause the one or more computing devices to implement” merely recite instructions to implement the abstract idea on a generic computer, or merely uses a generic computer or computer components to perform the abstract idea, which does not integrate a judicial exception into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea itself (see MPEP § 2106.05(f)). Thus, the claims are directed to the judicial exception and do not have elements amounting to significantly more than the abstract idea itself. Therefore, the claims do not recite patent eligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
With respect to claims 7, 14, and 20, the limitations recite “wherein to traverse the tree, … determine whether the first set of variables is within scope of at least: a for statement; or an if-else statement; or the for statement and the if-else statement,”8 which could also be performed mentally using no more than pen and paper. For example, a human developer could manually walk through the linearized tree representation that captures variable scope information and use their programming understanding to see if the first set variables are within the scope of a for statement. These limitations therefore also fall within the Mental Processes grouping of abstract ideas identified above. Furthermore, “the program instructions cause the at least one processor to” and “the programming instructions cause the one or more computing devices to implement” merely recite instructions to implement the abstract idea on a generic computer, or merely uses a generic computer or computer components to perform the abstract idea, which does not integrate a judicial exception into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea itself (see MPEP § 2106.05(f)). Thus, the claims are directed to the judicial exception and do not have elements amounting to significantly more than the abstract idea itself. Therefore, the claims do not recite patent eligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Specifically, (1) Yermakov et al. US 20110307956 A1 discloses walking a tree and creating symbol and context tables with information describing observed variables; (2) Xu et al. US 20210318858 A1 discloses generating and traversing and abstract syntax trees to obtain dependency relationships; (3) Sevitsky et al. US 6557011 B1 discloses traversing a call tree in a single pass; (4) Misek et al. “Mapping of Dynamic Language Constructs into Static Abstract Syntax Trees” discloses mapping constructs into an abstract syntax tree; and (5) Kuipers et al. “Object-oriented tree traversal with JJForester” discloses construction and traversal of parse trees represented by object structures.
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/STEPHEN D BERMAN/ Examiner, Art Unit 2192
1 See claim 1.
2 See claim 8
3 See claim 15.
4 Examiner notes that while the limitations differ slightly between the claims, the same reasoning applies.
5 Examiner notes that while the limitations differ slightly between the claims, the same reasoning applies.
6 Examiner notes that while the limitations differ slightly between the claims, the same reasoning applies.
7 Examiner notes that while the limitations differ slightly between the claims, the same reasoning applies.
8 Examiner notes that while the limitations differ slightly between the claims, the same reasoning applies.
Prosecution Insights