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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicants’ arguments and amendments, filed 5/12/2026, concerning the rejection of the claims under 35 USC §101 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Regarding the rejections of the claims under 35 USC §101, Applicants first argue on pages 7-11 that the claims are not directed to an abstract idea because the specification details a solution to a problem that is rooted in technology. Applicants’ second argument is that the specification provides evidence that of a particular solution to a technical problem. Third, Applicants further argue the specification and that art was not applied to the claims.
The Office respectfully disagrees. First, it is noted Applicants assertion is actually that the specification does not represent an abstract idea. However, these specification details are not reflected in the claim language. The claim language reflects high-level / abstract concepts and the conventional use of generic computing components.
Second, Applicants assert that the specification provides evidence that of a particular solution to a technical problem. But it is also noted, these specification details are not reflected in the claim language. The claim language reflects high-level / abstract concepts and the conventional use of generic computing components.
Third, it is additionally noted, these specification details are not reflected in the claim language. The claim language reflects high-level / abstract concepts and the conventional use of generic computing components. And, the arguments further conflate anticipation/obviousness with abstractness.
As indicated in the rejections, the current claims, at a high level, are directed to manipulating data using generic hardware elements. There is no claimed integration to a practical application, only the manipulation of data using generic computing components. Therefore, it is deemed that the rejection of the claims under 35 USC §101 was reasonable.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-20 are allowable over the prior art. However, the claims remain rejected under 35 USC §101.
Reasons For Allowance
The cited references do not disclose determining if the parsed data of the element to be parsed is different from an expected data of the element to be parsed in the document, when the parsed data is different from the expected data, modifying each element of the plurality of elements in the first document by adding an index value as an attribute to the tag for each element of the plurality of elements, submitting, to a large language model, a query comprising the modified document, a description of the element to be parsed, and a request asking the large language model to identify the element to be parsed based on the description, obtaining, from the large language model, the index value assigned to the element to be parsed, generating a second expression defining a second path to the element to be parsed in the first document that was assigned to the index value returned by the large language model.
Claim Rejections – 35 U.S.C. § 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 is directed to non-statutory subject matter.
These claims are rejected under 35 USC §101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. The claim recites at a very level, reading a document, and making a decision as to whether or not to modify the contents of that document. Thus, the claims encompass the performance of the limitations in the mind that are not tied to a practical application.
Regarding the independent claims:
Step 1: Yes, claim 1 is directed to a method (therefore a process), and claim 11 is directed to a system (therefore a product/machine), claim 20 recites a storage medium for a series of steps executed (therefore a process embodied in a product/machine. Thus, each of these claims is directed to a statutory category.
Step 2A, Prong 1 (Judicial Exception Recited?): Yes. Claims 1, 11 and 20 recite limitations directed to an abstract idea: “(b) parsing, from the first document, data of an element to be parsed using a first expression, wherein the first expression defines a first path to the element to be parsed in the first document;(c) determining if the parsed data of the element to be parsed is different from an expected data of the element to be parsed in the document;(d) when the parsed data is different from the expected data, modifying each element of the plurality of elements in the first document by adding an index value as an attribute to the tag for each element of the plurality of elements; … (g) generating a second expression defining a second path to the element to be parsed in the first document that was assigned to the index value returned by the large language model; … and (i) parsing, from the second document, second data of the element to be parsed using the second expression”. As drafted, each of these limitations recites a mentally performable process as one can decide whether to modify a document and do so via a mental process or using paper and pencil.
Step 2A, Prong 2 (Integrated into a Practical Application?): No. Claim 1 recites the following additional elements, "computer” and “large language model”. Claim 11 recites “a memory; and at least one processor” and “large language model”. Claim 20 recites “a computer-readable device”, “a computing device”, and “large language model”. Each of these are merely high-level recitations of generic computer components and represent mere instructions to apply on a computer as in MPEP 2106.05(f), which does not provide integration into a practical application.
Additionally, claims 1, 11 and 20 each recite “downloading …”, “submitting …”, “obtaining … ‘, and “downloading … ”. These limitations represent insignificant extra-solution activity as retrieval/transmitting of data (i.e., mere data gathering) as identified in MPEP 2106.05(g), and does not provide integration into a practical application. See also, Ameranth, 842 F.3d at 1241-42, 120 USPQ2d at 1854-55, referenced in MPEP 2106.05(g) and indicating that the printing or downloading generated menus (i.e., downloading data) represents an insignificant application.
Accordingly, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. Viewing the additional limitations together and the claims as a whole, nothing provides integration into a practical application. Therefore, each claim is directed to an abstract idea.
Step 2B (Inventive Concept Provided?): No. As discussed with respect to Step 2A and (claims 1, 11 and 20, above), the elements (i.e., the steps of downloading, submitting, obtaining, and downloading) in each claim amount to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception. Mere instructions to apply an exception using generic computer components (e.g., storage, processors, software) cannot integrate a judicial exception into a practical application at Step 2A or provide an inventive concept in Step 2B.
With respect to the downloading/submitting/obtaining/downloading limitations discussed above, and when re-evaluated, each element is well-understood, routine, and conventional as evidenced by the court cases in MPEP 2106.05(d)(II), "i. Receiving or transmitting data over a network, e.g., using the Internet to gather data, Symantec, 838 F.3d at 1321, 120 USPQ2d at 1362 (utilizing an intermediary computer to forward information); … OIP Techs., Inc., v. Amazon.com, Inc., 788 F.3d 1359, 1363, 115 USPQ2d 1090, 1093 (Fed. Cir. 2015) (sending messages over a network); buySAFE, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 765 F.3d 1350, 1355, 112 USPQ2d 1093, 1096 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (computer receives and sends information over a network);" and thus remains insignificant extra-solution activity that does not provide significantly more. See also, Ameranth, 842 F.3d at 1241-42, 120 USPQ2d at 1854-55, referenced in MPEP 2106.05(g) and indicating that the printing or downloading generated menus (i.e., downloading data) represents an insignificant application.
Therefore, each of the claims, taken as a whole, does not change this conclusion and the claim is ineligible.
Claims 2-10 depend upon claim 1, and do not correct the issues set forth above. These claims essentially further describe the data , or add further insignificant extra-solution activity elements, such as further transmitting and downloading. Therefore, these claims are likewise rejected.
Claims 12-19 depend upon claim 11, and do not correct the issues set forth above. These claims essentially further describe the data, or add further insignificant extra-solution activity elements, such as further transmitting and downloading. Therefore, these claims are likewise rejected.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Relevance is provided in at least the Abstract of each cited document.
Non-Patent Literature
Fu, Yan, et al., “Using XPath to Discover Informative Content Blocks of Web Pages”, SKG 2007, Xi’an, China, October 29-31, 2007, IEEE Computer Society, pp. 450-453.
Web pages usually contain various contents, which are relevant or irrelevant with the main topic. We define relevant contents as informative content blocks, whereas irrelevant contents as clutters. Clutters intend to mislead search engines, or trigger an artificially high link-based ranking for specific target pages. So cleaning Web pages before mining becomes critical for improving performance of traditional information retrieval. Here, we propose a method to discover informative content block without supervision. Initially, using a set of sample pages, we adopt a series of rules to distinguish informative content blocks from clutters. Then we generalize public XPath for informative content blocks or clutters, and apply it to similar pages. We have implemented our method in five different Web sites, and output more simpler and centralized HTML file. Experimental result shows that our method can obtain informative content blocks of Web page accurately. (page 450, Abstract). Firstly, we define informative content block and clutter of a Webpage. In a page, informative content block denotes main body shown on this page, and clutter denotes contents except informative content block. It means clutters may be presented as various forms, such as advertisements, navigation, decoration, interaction or contact information. For traditional search engines, text and links are both traced and indexed. So here, we also take main text and relevant links as informative contents. Since there are more and more information needed to be published on Internet, Web site designers could not write all HTML pages totally by hand. So nowadays, they usually use a release program according to specific static HTML style to publish pages. In other words, pages in one site are usually generated by a public template or layout. Therefore, in similar DOM trees, informative content blocks or clutters of different pages may appear in similar positions. (page 451, 1st-2nd paragraphs of section “3. Architecture and Approach”). At the end, for each content block, we scan all labeled links and compute ratio of “false” label. Given a threshold, when “false” ratio of a content block is higher, we mark this block as clutter. Under real situation, this threshold is always bigger than 0.5. (page 452, last paragraph of section “3.2 Content Estimation”). For XPath set, we aim to output the minimal public path aggregation by finding public paths, ignoring attributes and axes information, or using wildcards. We make use of this methods in sample pages, and get public XPath for informative content blocks and clutters respectively. Then we apply derived XPath to all pages with the similar layout, to eliminate clutters and keep informative content blocks indicated by public Xpath. The output for the page in Fig. 2 is a HTML page only composed of block 6 and 10, whereas in some research, relevant links are ignored and only block 10 is left [9]. (page 452, 2nd paragraph of section “3.3 XPath Generalization”).
US Patents
Kim 7,146,564
Techniques for extensible stylesheet designs using meta-tag and/or associated meta-tag Information are described. To generate a proper stylesheet (e.g., an XSL or XSLT file) from a source file (e.g., an XML file), all meta-tag and/or associated meta-tag Information are differentiated by attaching respectively unique identifiers to those that are otherwise identical. To facilitate user required operations on certain data in the source file, a document source path for the data is identified and inserted with one or more operators thus to form document source path information. The differentiated meta-tag and/or associated meta-tag Information and source path information are relied upon to generate one or more stylesheets. (Abstract).
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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.
Contact Information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to examiner ROBERT STEVENS whose telephone number is (571) 272-4102. The examiner can normally be reached Mon - Fri 6:00 - 2:30.
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/ROBERT STEVENS/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2164
July 29, 2026
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