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 .
Claims 1 – 14 are pending.
Oath/Declaration
See Informational Notice to Applicant mailed on 12 March 2025.
Information Disclosure Statement
The Informational Disclosure Statement (IDS) filed on 13 February 2025 indicated an English translation of the foreign reference was included. However, the included copy of the reference was missing an English translation other than a summary paragraph. Therefore, the foreign reference cannot be considered until an English translation is provided. Being the only reference on the IDS, it is not being considered at this time. Filing of a new IDS including the English translation of any foreign references provided will be considered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to the 35 USC 101 rejection of claims 1 – 13 have been fully considered and are persuasive in view of the amended claim language. The 35 USC 101 rejection of claims 1 – 13 has been withdrawn.
Applicant’s arguments with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1-7 and 10-13 under 35 USC 102 have been fully considered and are persuasive in view of the amended claim language. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Pandey in view of Chan, see rejection below. See rejection in view of Pandey modified by Chan and Bathwal below for new claim 14.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claim(s) 1 – 7 and 10 – 13 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. Patent No. 12,518,226 issued to Pandey et al (hereinafter Pandey) in view of U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2025/0086895 issued to Chan et al (hereinafter Chan).
As to claim 1, Pandey discloses an information processing apparatus comprising:
a memory storing a plurality of search queries collected within a predetermined period (main memory and static memory and mass storage device, see Pandey: Col. 17 lines 21 – 56, and previous questions that have been asked before are checked and compared to newly asked questions for determining priority, see Pandey: Col. 11 lines 22 – 34);
a processor configured to perform operations (processor, see Pandey: Col. 17 lines 21 – 43) comprising:
generating a question based on the selected search query (receiving user prompt including user intent and profile information as input into the generative AI (GAI) model to generate a question for the group, see Pandey: Col. 5 line 40 – Col. 6 line 15, see also Col. 4 line 34 – 41);
receiving an answer to the generated question (receive answers from users/experts of the group, see Pandey: Col. 6 lines 16 – 28 and , see also Col. 4 line 34 – 41); and
providing information including the generated question and the received answer (answer monitor tracks which questions have been answered, answers provided to the questions, and how much interactions the questions and answers have in the group, see Pandey: Col. 13 line 41 – Col. 14 line 7).
However, while Pandey does disclose the use of tracking term frequency in documents for returning of results (see Pandey: Col. 7 line 47 – Col. 8 line 7); Pandey does not explicitly disclose identifying, based on a rate of increase in a number of appearances per unit time exceeding a first threshold and a latest number of appearances exceeding a second threshold, a trend word included in the plurality of search queries; selecting a search query including the trend word and including a combination of terms not included in questions previously posted in a question-and-answer service or having a posting frequency below a threshold.
Chan teaches identifying, based on a rate of increase in a number of appearances per unit time exceeding a first threshold and a latest number of appearances exceeding a second threshold, a trend word included in the plurality of search queries (identifying questions being asked a threshold number of times within a threshold period of time, selection of frequently asked questions, extracting keywords from the frequently asked questions to for a list of frequently used keywords and/or phrases, see Chan: Para. 0030 – 0032);
selecting a search query including the trend word and including a combination of terms not included in questions previously posted in a question-and-answer service or having a posting frequency below a threshold (identify a list of keywords from a second canvas/virtual space that are frequent to the second (different) virtual space but not the first virtual space to produce a list of different keywords and phrases, selecting frequently asked question based on the different second list (different being a posting frequency below the threshold of the first virtual space), see Chan: Para. 0032 – 0034, and virtual spaces canvases and content are sharable between other virtual spaces, see Chan: Para. 0093).
Chan further discloses generating [a link to] a question based on the selected search query (using keywords/phrases from the user input deemed to be frequently used keywords in a threshold time period to determing a frequently ask question considered relevant to the user’s input query, generating a link to the question and answer pair and return the answer to the user, see Chan: 0030 – 0035 and 0158 – 0165);
receiving an answer to the generated question (link to the question and answer pair and return the answer to the user, see Chan: 0030 – 0035 and 0158 – 0165); and
providing information including the generated question and the received answer (providing the question-answer pair to the user, see Chan: 0030 – 0035 and 0158 – 0165).
Pandey and Chan are analogous due to their disclosure of generative AI for improving results based on user input queries by use of results from past queries related to the input query.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to modify Pandey’s use of generative AI to generate questions based on a user’s prompt including their intent/goals and profile information to be answered by another user with Chan’s use of term lists meeting a frequency threshold and recent time threshold to identify frequently asked question and answer pairs that are relevant to the user’s input question in order to determine, modify, update and/or synthesize various types of data within a virtual space to improve data accuracy, reduce delays in updating such data and reduce inefficient use of time (see Chan: Para. 0002 and 0017).
As to claim 2, Pandey modified by Chan discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the question is generated based on the selected search query and an attribute of a user of a terminal apparatus that has transmitted the search query (the questions are generated based on user goals/intent and user information determined from their profile, see Pandey: Col. 2 lines 37 – 50 and Col. 5 line 40 – Col. 6 line 15).
As to claim 3, Pandey modified by Chan discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the processor is configured to perform a further operation comprising:
estimating the attribute of the user of the terminal apparatus (user profile skills are tracked and used with the user entered intent/goals for generation of the question, see Pandey: Col. 5 line 40 – Col. 6 line 15), and
wherein the question is generated based on the selected search query and the estimated attribute (the questions are generated based on user goals/intent and user information determined from their profile, see Pandey: Col. 2 lines 37 – 50 and Col. 5 line 40 – Col. 6 line 15).
As to claim 4, Pandey modified by Chan discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the selected search query includes information indicating a place and information indicating a purpose at the place (user prompt including user goal/intent and profile information includes user’s groups, and skills associated with the groups that questions may be generated for, see Pandey: Col. 3 line 64 – Col. 4 line 25, Col. 5 line 22 – Col. 6 line 12), and
wherein the generated question, a question includes the information indicating the place and the information indicating the purpose at the place (the questions for a selected group are generated based on user goals/intent and user information determined from their profile, see Pandey: Col. 2 lines 37 – 50 and Col. 5 line 40 – Col. 6 line 15).
As to claim 5, Pandey modified by Chan discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the selected search query includes information indicating a place (user prompt including user goal/intent and profile information includes user’s groups, and skills associated with the groups that questions may be generated for, see Pandey: Col. 3 line 64 – Col. 4 line 25, Col. 5 line 22 – Col. 6 line 12), and generating the question includes:
estimating a purpose at the place (skills associated with the groups are determined and used in the generation of questions for the group, see Pandey: Col. 3 line 64 – Col. 4 line 25, Col. 5 line 22 – Col. 6 line 12); and
wherein the generated question includes the information indicating the place and information indicating the estimated purpose (the questions for a selected group are generated based on user goals/intent and user information determined from their profile, see Pandey: Col. 2 lines 37 – 50 and Col. 5 line 40 – Col. 6 line 15).
As to claim 6, Pandey modified by Chan discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the processor is configured to perform a further operation comprising:
generating a question to which an answer of a candidate for an answerer can be received, based on behavior history of the candidate for the answerer (identifying experts as candidates to answer the question based on the profile history and feedback on past answers, see Pandey: Col. 6 lines 16 – 28, and Col. 9 lines 26 – 34, and Col. 11 line 64 – Col. 12 line 8, and Col. 13 line 66 – Col. 14 line 7).
As to claim 7, Pandey modified by Chan discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the processor is configured to perform a further operation comprising:
providing an answer to the generated question via a service for receiving an answer to a question (answer monitor tracks which questions have been answered, answers provided to the questions, and how much interactions the questions and answers have in the group, see Pandey: Col. 13 line 41 – Col. 14 line 7 and questions determined to be answered in a group indicate the prompt template used to create the question is relevant to the group, see Pandey: Col. 14 lines 8 – 32).
As to claim 10, Pandey modified by Chan discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the question is generated by generative AI (receiving user prompt including user intent and profile information as input into the generative AI (GAI) model to generate a question for the group, see Pandey: Col. 5 line 40 – Col. 6 line 15, see also Col. 4 line 34 – 41).
As to claim 11, Pandey modified by Chan discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 10, wherein the processor is configured to perform a further operation comprising:
providing information indicating that the question is generated using the generative AI together with the question (receiving user prompt including user intent and profile information as input into the generative AI (GAI) model to generate a question for the group, see Pandey: Col. 5 line 40 – Col. 6 line 15, see also Col. 4 line 34 – 41, and questions determined to be answered in a group indicate the prompt template used to create the question is relevant to the group, see Pandey: Col. 14 lines 8 – 32).
Claims 12 and 13 are rejected using similar rationale to the rejection of claim 1.
Claim(s) 8 and 9 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Pandey in view of Chan, and in further view of U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2025/0272091 issued to Baker (hereinafter Baker).
As to claim 8, Pandey discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 1; however, Pandey does not explicitly disclose wherein the processor is configured to perform a further operation comprising: receiving a subsequent search query in a search service of the web content; performing search processing according to the received subsequent search query based on the received answer; and providing a search result.
Baker teaches wherein the processor is configured to perform a further operation comprising:
receiving a subsequent search query in a search service of the web content (after the first request is answered and returned by the generative AI system, a second follow-up request is generated, see Baker: Para. 0057 and 0061);
performing search processing according to the received subsequent search query based on the received answer (the second subsequent query is generated using the API to be processed by the generative AI system, see Baker: Para. 0057 and 0061); and
providing a search result (a subsequent queries after the first are answered by the generative AI system, see Baker: Para. 0057 and 0061).
Baker, Chan and Pandey are analogous due to their disclosure of using generative AI to generate queries to receive answers to a user’s prompt.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to modify Pandey and Chan’s use of generative AI to generate questions based on a user’s prompt including their intent/goals and profile information to be answered by another user with Baker’s use of generating subsequent queries by the generative AI for users to ask in order to automatically generate desired information for users with less software development experience and/or skill (Baker: Para. 0001).
As to claim 9, Pandey modified by Chan and Baker discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 8, wherein the search processing is performed based on the received answer in a case where the received subsequent search query is a same as the selected search query (subsequent queries are generated based on the first query and answers, see Baker: Para. 0057 and 0061).
Claim(s) 14 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Pandey modified by Chan as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2024/0281487 issued to Bathwal et al (hereinafter referred to as Bathwal).
As to claim 14, Pandey modified by Chan discloses the information processing apparatus according to claim 1, however, Pandey modified by Chan does not explicitly disclose wherein the processor is configured to perform further operation comprising: modifying a ranking model used for web content search by increasing a weight parameter corresponding to a feature amount associated with a keyword included in the received answer; computing ranking scores for web content using the modified ranking model; and outputting a search result ordered according to the computed ranking scores.
Bathwal teaches wherein the processor is configured to perform further operation comprising:
modifying a ranking model used for web content search by increasing a weight parameter corresponding to a feature amount associated with a keyword included in the received answer (LLM ranking and retrieval models, see Bathwal: Para. 0055, 0081 and 0102, and reinforcement learning including training models in a dynamic environment by updating models using user feedback, see Bathwal: Para. 0141 – 0149, and user feedback is used to adjust weights during the training phase for the models, see Bathwal: Para. 0155);
computing ranking scores for web content using the modified ranking model (scoring documents based on relevance to queries using the model to produce ranked result sets, see Bathwal: Para. 0021); and
outputting a search result ordered according to the computed ranking scores (outputting the ranked result sets to the user, see Bathwal: Para. 0021).
Bathwal further discloses generating follow-up queries from a user input query for determining answers based on possible multiple intents (see Bathwal: Para. 0066).
Bathwal, Baker, Chan and Pandey are analogous due to their disclosure of using generative AI to generate queries to receive answers to a user’s prompt.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to modify Pandey and Chan’s use of generative AI to generate questions based on a user’s prompt including their intent/goals and profile information to be answered by another user with Bathwal’s use of updating ranking models based on user feedback for dynamic real-time reinforcement training in order to generate enhanced search results by LLMs and generative AI using multi-document summarization techniques.
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 MARK E HERSHLEY whose telephone number is (571)270-7774. The examiner can normally be reached M-F: 9am-6pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Amy Ng can be reached at (571) 270-1698. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MARK E HERSHLEY/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2164
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