Appeal 2007-1066
Application 10/170,510
attribute score that is used to order attributes, but Appellants “do not find”
where the reference teaches or suggests that the confidence score is adjusted.
(Reply Br. 3.)
Potamianos teaches context tracking in which confidence scores may
be assigned to ambiguous branches. Potamianos § 3.3. Specifically, an e-
form score is attached to each attribute in an application tree that is
dynamically updated at each dialogue turn. The e-form score includes the
confidence that an attribute has been given an unambiguous value; more
specifically, it includes a confidence score for each attribute-value pair. The
e-form score is used by the dialogue manager to rank order the attributes of
the e-form and decide which attribute, if any, should be in focus for the next
dialogue turn. The dialogue manager selects the appropriate dialogue act
based on the value(s) and on the confidence(s) associated with those values.
The dialogue act may include prompting, re-prompting, or “implicit
confirmation” for an AV with mid to high confidence. Potamianos § 4.1
Even assuming instant claim 1 might distinguish over adjusting
parameters for determining a confidence (as Appellants acknowledge to be
taught by Su and Reed), we are not persuaded that Potamianos fails to teach
adjusting a confidence based on system intent. Potamianos, in fact, teaches
a candidate scorer, associated with a context tracker, that adjusts a
confidence associated with each candidate AV pair. The confidence is
dynamically updated at each dialogue turn. The confidence is adjusted
“based on system intent” because the adjustment is based on implicit
confirmation. The confidence is also adjusted “based on system intent”
because the adjustment is based on user input. (See Specification, ¶ 8.)
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