Prosecution Insights
Last updated: April 19, 2026
Application No. 18/806,400

BUILDING LINGUISTIC OPERATIONAL EXPERT SYSTEMS FOR DNS, DHCP, AND IPAM (DDI)

Non-Final OA §102§112
Filed
Aug 15, 2024
Examiner
OPSASNICK, MICHAEL N
Art Unit
2658
Tech Center
2600 — Communications
Assignee
Infoblox Inc.
OA Round
1 (Non-Final)
82%
Grant Probability
Favorable
1-2
OA Rounds
3y 3m
To Grant
92%
With Interview

Examiner Intelligence

Grants 82% — above average
82%
Career Allow Rate
737 granted / 900 resolved
+19.9% vs TC avg
Moderate +10% lift
Without
With
+10.5%
Interview Lift
resolved cases with interview
Typical timeline
3y 3m
Avg Prosecution
46 currently pending
Career history
946
Total Applications
across all art units

Statute-Specific Performance

§101
17.7%
-22.3% vs TC avg
§103
33.0%
-7.0% vs TC avg
§102
29.9%
-10.1% vs TC avg
§112
6.3%
-33.7% vs TC avg
Black line = Tech Center average estimate • Based on career data from 900 resolved cases

Office Action

§102 §112
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 . 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 18-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being incomplete for omitting essential elements, such omission amounting to a gap between the elements. See MPEP § 2172.01. The omitted elements are: a processor executing the computer instructions that are embodied in a non-transitory computer readable medium. The receiving/processing/generating steps, cannot be performed unless a processor is executing the computer instructions that are stored on the non-transitory computer readable medium. Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102 In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status. 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. Claim(s) 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by O’Connor (20160352772). As per claim 1, O’Connor (20160352772) teaches a system, comprising: a processor configured to: receive a user request for DNS, DHCP, and IPAM (DDI) related information (as, user request as a DNS query – see para 0022, 0023); process the user request using a Large-Language Model (LLM) (as using natural language processing to generate a relevant result to the user -- para 0074; the natural language processing includes the use of machine learned models – para 0116); and generate a user interface (UI) output using the LLM and a vector embedding space (as, using natural language processing and the machine learned models, above, to generate vectors for an input target domain name and comparing to a database of vectorized dns’ – see para 0064), wherein the output includes generative UI content that was generated using the LLM and one or more relevant technical documentation for DDI related information that was selected based on a proximity to the user request in the vector embedding space (as, based on a similarity score between a vector of the target and the vector in a corpus – para 0064; displaying the content to the user in a ranking of corresponding sites – end of para 0064); and a memory coupled to the processor and configured to provide the processor with instructions (as, memory/storage interfacing with a processor to execute the above steps – (para 0123). As per claim 2, O’Connor (20160352772 ) teaches the system recited in claim 1, wherein the user request includes a user query for DDI related information associated with the user's enterprise network (as, part of the user query DNS request, access log data which includes differing clients/domains, as part of the enterprise network – para 0023; see also paragraphs 0050, 0051). As per claim 3, O’Connor (20160352772 ) teaches the system recited in claim 1, wherein the DDI related information includes customer information including network configuration information, network event data, and/or telemetry and log data (as DDI related info includes recursive DNS clusters and nameservers – para 0037). As per claim 4, O’Connor (20160352772 ) teaches the system recited in claim 1, wherein a conversation history is stored for a plurality of user requests (as using/accessing previous DNS requests – para 0040; and using historical subscriber preferences for previous DNS – para 0045). As per claim 5, O’Connor (20160352772) teaches the system recited in claim 1, wherein an embedding model is used for determining relevant DDI documentation based on the user request (as using an embedded vector corpus -- para 0020, and using the vectors to perform semantic analysis via NLP and machine learning to determine proper content – para 0021, 0022; to include logged information – para 0023). As per claim 6, O’Connor (20160352772 ) teaches the system recited in claim 1, wherein the UI output includes one or more of the following interactive elements: clickable responses, clickable follow-up questions, tables, graphs, and widgets (noting that the claim scope is in alternative format “one or more”, O’Connor (20160352772 ) teaches displaying a landing page in the format of a web browser – which could include graphs/table/widgets, etc – see end of para 0049). As per claim 7, O’Connor (20160352772 ) teaches the system recited in claim 1, wherein the UI output includes a UI widget for user input, and wherein the processor is further configured to: perform an action based on the user input in the UI widget (as, displaying to the user, the end result which could be in the form of a landing page, as part of a web browser, email app, or stand alone app – end of para 0049; see also para 125 showing display capabilities to the user). As per claim 8, O’Connor (20160352772 ) teaches the system recited in claim 1, wherein the processor is further configured to: process a conversation history (as using/accessing previous DNS requests – para 0040; and using historical subscriber preferences for previous DNS – para 0045) and generate a query or a message that incorporates a relevant context using the LLM (as using natural language processing to generate a relevant result to the user -- para 0074; the natural language processing includes the use of machine learned models – para 0116). As per claim 9, O’Connor (20160352772 ) teaches the system recited in claim 1, wherein the processor is further configured to: classify an intent associated with the user request using the LLM (as using natural language processing – end of para 0018, and language models derived from machine learning – para 0116). As per claim 10, O’Connor (20160352772 ) teaches the system recited in claim 1, wherein the processor is further configured to: perform retrieval augmented generation for using a vector database (as accessing a corpus of content vectors – para 0020) for DDI related technical documentation (the aforementioned corpus contains domain content information – para 0020, which is used to compare the input to stored DNS/target domains/URL’s – para 0018). Claims 11-17 are method claims whose steps are performed by system claims 1-10 above and as such, claims 11-17 are similar in scope and content to claims 1-10 above; therefore, claims 11-17 are rejected under similar rationale as presented against claims 1-10 above. Claims 18-20 are non-transitory computer readable medium claims embodying a computer program product, whose executable steps are performed by system claims 1-10 above and as such, claims 18-20 are similar in scope and content to claim elements found in claims 1-10 above; therefore, claims 18-20 are rejected under similar rationale as presented against claims 1-10 above. Conclusion The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure Please see related art listed on the PTO-892 form. Furthermore, the following references were found that map/match certain features found in applicants specification/claims: Yadav et al (20160359887) teaches DNS servers (para 0061) using machine learning techniques to analyze DNS exchanges (para 0072), using an interface for user input as well as presentation modules to the user (para 0068). Arora (20210176181) teaches converting domain names to a vector space embeddings, generating an organized training dataset to process DNS queries, using a deep neural network. (para 0005, 0023, 0037-0038). Lilingood (20220239693) teaches the use of machine learning models to process DNS queries compared to DNS entries (abstract, para 0003, 0025). Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Michael Opsasnick, telephone number (571)272-7623, who is available Monday-Friday, 9am-5pm. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner's supervisor, Mr. Richemond Dorvil, can be reached at (571)272-7602. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from either Private PAIR or Public PAIR. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only. For more information about the PAIR system, see http://pair-direct.uspto.gov. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). /Michael N Opsasnick/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2658 02/18/226
Read full office action

Prosecution Timeline

Aug 15, 2024
Application Filed
Feb 18, 2026
Non-Final Rejection — §102, §112 (current)

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Study what changed to get past this examiner. Based on 5 most recent grants.

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Prosecution Projections

1-2
Expected OA Rounds
82%
Grant Probability
92%
With Interview (+10.5%)
3y 3m
Median Time to Grant
Low
PTA Risk
Based on 900 resolved cases by this examiner. Grant probability derived from career allow rate.

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