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 .
DETAILED ACTION
This action is issued in response to Application filed February 25, 2025.
Claims 1-20 are pending.
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.
Claim(s) 1-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Raux (U.S. Patent Application No. 2022/0157315) in view of Hall (U.S. Patent Application No. 2018/0374479).
Regarding Claim 1, Raux discloses a method, comprising:
metadata that defines a structure indicating at least one entity and at least one app intent call (par [0144], Raux - event recognizer includes metadata with configurable properties, flags, and/or lists that indicate how the event delivery system should perform sub-event delivery to actively involved event recognizers. In some embodiments, metadata includes configurable properties, flags, and/or lists that indicate how event recognizers interact, or are enabled to interact, with one another… par [0219-0221] – ontology structure that identifies nodes representing an intent and property)1; 51, 134-135, hall
determining, by the first process, that the metadata indicates that a property associated with the at least one entity is updateable (par [0263-0265], Raux – updating module is configured to update a state of a task flow, wherein a task flow is defined by a set of one or more parameters having a respective set of one or more values);
generating, by the first process, a mapping between the property and the at least one app intent call to indicate a relationship between an action taken by the at least one app intent call to enable modification of the property (par [0263-0265], Raux - updating module is configured to update a state of a task flow, wherein a task flow is defined by a set of one or more parameters having a respective set of one or more values… updating module is configured to update a state of a task flow based on the corresponding representation of user intent… par [0219-0220] - A linkage between an actionable intent node and a property node in ontology defines how a parameter represented by the property node pertains to the task represented by the actionable intent node… par [0256] - selection module selects each task flow using a mapping associating each user intent representation with the respective task flow);
generating, by the first process, a dictionary structure comprising an indication of the mapping between the property and the at least one app intent call (par [0219-0229], Raux - Ontology is a hierarchical structure containing many nodes, each node representing either an “actionable intent” or a “property” relevant to one or more of the “actionable intents” or other “properties”; wherein an “actionable intent” represents a task that the digital assistant is capable of performing, i.e., it is “actionable” or can be acted on. A “property” represents a parameter associated with an actionable intent or a sub-aspect of another property. A linkage between an actionable intent node and a property node in ontology defines how a parameter represented by the property node pertains to the task represented by the actionable intent node); and
providing, by the first process, the dictionary structure for access by an automated assistant (par [0219-0229], Raux - ontology includes all the domains (and hence actionable intents) that the digital assistant is capable of understanding and acting upon; wherein the digital assistant corresponds to the claimed automated assistant).
While Raux teaches all of the claimed subject matter as stated above; however, Raux is not as detailed with respect to extracting a schema associated with an application.
On the other hand, Hall discloses extracting a schema associated with an application (par [0051], [0134-0135], Hall – schema data for a second domain is received, the schema data may include properties having named fields with a type. The schema may be automatically imported and may automatically be mapped to schema for a first domain. A resolver may convert system query language into an application program interface (API) calls to find entities that match restraints in a query).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate Hall’s teachings into the Raux system. A skilled artisan would have been motivated to combine in order to provide an improved automated assistant that is more easily configured for new domains and applications.
Regarding Claim 2, the combination of Raux in view of Hall, disclose the method of claim 1, wherein the automated assistant causes modification of the property by accessing the indication of the mapping in the dictionary structure (par [0217-0219], [0224], Raux - ontology includes all the domains (and hence actionable intents) that the digital assistant is capable of understanding and acting upon. The ontology is modified, such as by adding or removing entire domains or nodes, or by modifying relationships between the nodes within the ontology).
Regarding Claim 3, the combination of Raux in view of Hall, disclose the method of claim 1, wherein generating the mapping comprises identifying a get operation associated with the property and a set operation associated with the action taken by the at least one app intent call, wherein the mapping comprises a link between the get operation and the set operation (par [0263-0265], Raux).
Regarding Claim 4, the combination of Raux in view of Hall, disclose the method of claim 1, wherein the dictionary structure is generated in conjunction with installation of the application on the electronic device (par [0115], [0226-0227], Raux).
Regarding Claim 5, the combination of Raux in view of Hall, disclose the method of claim 1, wherein determining that the metadata indicates that the property associated with the at least one entity is updateable comprises performing a search through the schema to identify the at least one app intent call that is configured to modify the entity (par [0144], [0231-0236], Raux - metadata includes configurable properties that indicate how entities should interact or perform… generate a query to represent the identified actionable intent in order to update a parameter… also see par [0251], [0264]… par [0051], [0134-0135], Hall).
Regarding Claim 6, the combination of Raux in view of Hall, disclose the method of claim 1, wherein causing modification of the property comprises retrieving the dictionary structure from storage and indexing the mapping in the dictionary structure (par [0224], [0226-0227], Raux - each node in ontology is associated with a set of words and/or phrases that are relevant to the property or actionable intent represented by the node. The respective set of words and/or phrases associated with each node are the so-called “vocabulary” associated with the node. The respective set of words and/or phrases associated with each node are stored in vocabulary index in association with the property or actionable intent represented by the node).
Regarding Claim 7, the combination of Raux in view of Hall, disclose the method of claim 1, wherein causing modification of the property comprises executing a second process associated with the automated assistant, wherein the property is modified by the second process (par [0264], Raux - updating module is configured to update a state of a task flow based on the corresponding representation of user intent. For example, for the user intent to translate “hello”, updating module updates state of the first perform translation task flow to {{input text=“hello”}, {target language=[null]}, {translation result=[null]}}, where [null] indicates that the value is not determined or specified. For the user intent to translate “hello” to Spanish, updating module updates the state of the second perform translation task flow to{{input text=“hello”}, {target language=Spanish}, {translation result=[null]}}. In some examples, for the user intent to translate “yellow”, updating module updates the state of the third perform translation task flow to {{input text=“yellow”}, {target language=[null]}, {translation result=[null]}}).
Regarding Claim 8, the combination of Raux in view of Hall, disclose the method of claim 1, wherein causing modification of the property comprises performing, by the first process, a relative property modification using a predefined property value (par [0263-0265], Raux… par [0303]).
Claims 9-15 contain similar subject matter as claims 1-7 above; and are rejected under the same rationale.
Claims 16-20 contain similar subject matter as claims 1-5 above; and are rejected under the same rationale.
Points of Contact
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to CHELCIE L DAYE whose telephone number is (571) 272-3891. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday-Friday 7:30-4:00pm. Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Apu Mofiz can be reached on 571-272-4080. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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Chelcie Daye
Patent Examiner
Technology Center 2100
May 2, 2026
/CHELCIE L DAYE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2161
1 Examiner Notes: Details about a processor on a device is found within Raux at par [0048-0049].
Prosecution Insights