DETAILED ACTION
Response to Amendment
The amendment filed on 11/08/25 has been entered. Claims 1-6 are pending in the application.
Claim Interpretation
As an initial matter, the body of claim 1 describes a structurally complete invention. That is, “a preamble generally is not limiting when the claim body describes a structurally complete invention such that deletion of the preamble phrase does not affect the structure or steps of the claimed invention.” (MPEP 2111.02). Further, the limitations containing the phrases “for automatically expanding”, “being capable of computation over parameters”, “can be performed”, “can occur” and “should be” are considered statements of intended use and fail to impart further structural elements to the claim. That is, language that suggests or makes a feature or step optional but does not require that feature or step does not limit the scope of a claim under the broadest reasonable claim interpretation (MPEP 2103).
Further, MPEP 2106(II), states that "It is essential that the broadest reasonable interpretation (BRI) of the claim be established prior to examining a claim for eligibility" and the BRI of the claim under MPEP 2111.04 and the contingent limitations "requires only those steps that must be performed and does not include steps that are not required to be performed because the condition(s) precedent are not met." Here the condition might not be met, i.e. any expansion other than those listed. This limitation also mentions the term “should be” in addition to “whether” which raise questions as to their limiting effect. This limitation does not further limit the claim as they are not required, and thus do not confer eligibility under BRI.
Claim Objections
Claims 1-6 are objected to because of the following informalities:
“upon the receipt” and "upon receipt" should be “upon receipt” and "upon the receipt", respectively [Claim 1, lines 14/16];
"the predefined expansion rule" should be "a predefined expansion rule of the predefined rules for all possible expansions" [Claim 1, line 22];
"the information already represented" should be "information already represented" [Claim 1, line 19];
"the information received" should be "the new information" [Claim 1, line 23];
"the dimensions of a matrix or tensor" should be "a dimension of a matrix or tensor " [Claim 2, line 3];
"each dimension" should be "each dimension of the dimensions" [Claim 3, line 1];
"wherein the expanding of the graph" should be "wherein the expanding of the factor graph database" [Claims 4-6, all line 1].
Appropriate correction is required. Further, in an effort to practice compact prosecution, each of these limitations has been interpreted similarly as in the provided recommendation for each limitation, above.
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.
Claims 1-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
Claim 1 recites "the attributes" in line 7. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claims. Claims 2-6 are also rejected for the same reason due to their dependency on claim 1;
Claim 1 recites the limitation "all possible expansions that is appropriate" in line 26. Prior to this limitation, the claim recites a contingent limitation that determines whether the expansion is a variable extension, graph extension, or new graph creation. It is not clear if “all possible expansions that is appropriate” refers to and/or encompasses this listing of different types of expansions, or, refers to something else. Further, this limitation refers to “possible expansions” which is a difficult term to ascertain the meaning of because it is not clear as to what would constitute a “possible expansion”, or more specifically, “all possible expansions”. For this reason, these claims fail to particularly point out and distinctly define the metes and bounds of the subject matter to be protected by the patent grant (MPEP 2171). Claims 2-6 are also rejected for the same reason due to their dependency on claim 1.
Pertinent Prior Art
The following prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
Smith (US 2022/0291939) discloses executing a process using a lightweight java workflow orchestration library and a graph data structure;
Mishra (US 2025/0166092) discloses generating a database for controlling a workflow of a production process.
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 extension fee 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 date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to WILLIAM P BARTLETT whose telephone number is (469)295-9085. The examiner can normally be reached on M-Th 11:30-8:30, F 11-3.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Sherief Badawi can be reached on 571-272-9782. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/WILLIAM P BARTLETT/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2169