US 6851115

Here's a concise summary of US Patent 6851115:

US Patent 6851115: Software-based architecture for communication and cooperation among distributed electronic agents

• Title: Software-based architecture for communication and cooperation among distributed electronic agents
• Current Assignee: IPA TECHNOLOGIES INC.
• Inventors: Adam J. Cheyer, David L. Martin
• Filing Date: 1999-01-05
• Issue Date (Publication Date): 2005-02-01
• Abstract: A highly flexible, software-based architecture is disclosed for constructing distributed systems. The architecture supports cooperative task completion by flexible and autonomous electronic agents. One or more facilitators are used to broker communication and cooperation among the agents. The architecture provides for the construction of arbitrarily complex goals by users and service-requesting agents. Additional features include agent-based provision of multi modal interfaces, including natural language.

Plain-Language Overview of Independent Claims:

The patent US6851115 contains multiple independent claims. Here's an overview of a few of them (the full patent document would need to be reviewed for an exhaustive list and complete understanding of all independent claims):

Independent Claim 1: This claim describes a distributed agent system for completing tasks. It involves multiple agents and at least one facilitator agent. Each agent registers its capabilities with the facilitator. When an agent (or user) requests a service, the request is sent to the facilitator as an Interagent Communication Language (ICL) expression. The facilitator then interprets this request, creates a plan to satisfy the goal, and delegates sub-goals to appropriate agents based on their registered capabilities. The facilitator also coordinates the communication between agents to achieve the overall goal. This system emphasizes that the requesting agent doesn't need to know the specific identities, locations, or number of other agents involved in fulfilling the request.

Independent Claim 13: This claim focuses on a method for processing a goal in a distributed agent system. It starts with a client agent determining a goal, translating it into an ICL expression, and transmitting it to a facilitator agent. The facilitator receives and interprets this goal, constructs a goal satisfaction plan, identifies sub-goals, and selects suitable agents to perform them. The facilitator then transmits these sub-goal requests to the selected agents and receives their results.

Independent Claim 18: This claim details an interagent communication language (ICL) for use in a distributed agent system. The ICL allows agents to express goals, capabilities, and other information. It is designed to be shared by all agents regardless of their platform or programming language. A key aspect is the ability to specify explicit control parameters while also allowing for underspecified, loosely constrained goal expressions. The ICL supports queries, actions, information exchange, setting triggers, and manipulating data within the agent community.

Independent Claim 25: This claim describes a method for registering agents and their capabilities with a facilitator. It involves an agent registering a specification of its capabilities and services with a facilitator, where these capabilities are expressed in an interagent communication language (ICL). This registration makes the agent's functionality available to the agent community and allows the facilitator to delegate service requests to it. The capabilities can be added, removed, or modified by the agent at any time after connecting to its facilitator.

Independent Claim 35: This claim outlines a system comprising an agent library and a facilitator agent. The agent library provides infrastructure for constructing an agent-based system, including procedures for agents to declare, undeclare, and redeclare their capabilities (solvables). It also provides procedures for updating data solvables and managing triggers. The facilitator agent coordinates agent communications and cooperative problem-solving, utilizing the information registered by agents through the agent library.

CAFC 2026 Dockets:

As of April 26, 2026, I do not have authoritative information on specific CAFC 2026 dockets related to patent 6851115. The provided patent information indicates that there have been several CAFC cases filed in previous years (e.g., 21-1416, 21-1413, 24-1246, etc.), but no specific dockets for 2026 are listed in the provided data. Therefore, I cannot confirm any active litigation for this patent in CAFC dockets for the year 2026 at this time.

As a patent attorney, I have identified the following known litigation involving US Patent 6851115:

1. Inter Partes Review (IPR) Case: IPR2019-00728

• Plaintiff(s): Google LLC et al. (Petitioners)
• Defendant(s): IPA Technologies Inc. (Patent Owner)
• Jurisdiction: Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB)
• Case Number: IPR2019-00728
• Filing Date: February 26, 2019
• Outcome/Current Status: Final Written Decision issued. The Google Patents entry indicates this case has a "Final Written Decision" and is associated with the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC).

It's important to note that the Google Patents record also shows several other PTAB cases (IPR2019-00814, IPR2019-00810, IPR2019-00811, IPR2019-00812, IPR2019-00813, IPR2019-00729) and US District Court cases in Delaware District Court (1:18-cv-00001, 1:18-cv-00318), as well as multiple cases in the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (21-1416, 21-1413, 24-1246, 21-1442, 21-1422, 21-1179, 21-1185, 21-1412, 21-1421, 21-1414, 21-1420, 21-1419) related to US6851115B1. These entries indicate ongoing or concluded litigation at various levels. However, detailed information for each of these cases, such as specific plaintiffs, defendants, filing dates, and outcomes, is not immediately available in the provided search snippets beyond their existence and general jurisdiction. The information for IPR2019-00728 is the most comprehensive directly from the search results.

Proceedings overview

There are 8 AIA trial proceedings on file for US Patent 6851115. Six of these resulted in Final Written Decisions (FWDs) with claims invalidated, one resulted in a Final Written Decision with claims sustained, and one petition was denied institution. This gives a defendant a strong defensive posture, as multiple claims, including some independent claims, have been canceled across various proceedings.

IPR2019-00728 — Google LLC et al. v. IPA Technologies Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Filed: 2019-02-26
• Status: Final Written Decision issued. Appealed to the Federal Circuit.
• Judge panel: Michael P. Tierney, Trenton A. Ward, J. Brandon S. Sass
• Petition grounds: Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 challenged under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over various combinations of prior art, including "The Open Agent Architecture" by Martin et al., "Mobile Objects" by Gray, and "The Interagent Communication Language" by Cheyer et al.
• Institution decision: Instituted on August 29, 2019, on claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35. The Board determined that Petitioner showed a reasonable likelihood of prevailing on the challenged claims being unpatentable.
• Final Written Decision: Issued on August 28, 2020. Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 were found unpatentable. Specifically, the Board determined that Petitioner demonstrated by a preponderance of the evidence that claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 are unpatentable as obvious under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
• Settlement / termination: Not settled.
• Appeal: Appealed by Patent Owner to the Federal Circuit, docket number 21-1413. The Federal Circuit affirmed the PTAB's decision on March 18, 2022, regarding the unpatentability of the claims.
• Defensive value: Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 have been definitively canceled by the PTAB and affirmed by the Federal Circuit. Any infringement theory built on these claims is invalid.

IPR2019-00810 — Unified Patents, LLC v. IPA Technologies Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Filed: 2019-03-27
• Status: Final Written Decision issued.
• Judge panel: Kalyan Deshpande, Mirjana Trifunovic, Dana L. Shipley
• Petition grounds: Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 challenged under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over various combinations of prior art, including Martin et al. ("The Open Agent Architecture"), Gray ("Mobile Objects"), and Cheyer et al. ("The Interagent Communication Language").
• Institution decision: Instituted on September 30, 2019, on claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35. The Board found a reasonable likelihood that the Petitioner would prevail.
• Final Written Decision: Issued on September 30, 2020. Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 were found unpatentable. The Board concluded that the Petitioner showed by a preponderance of the evidence that claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 are unpatentable as obvious over the asserted prior art.
• Settlement / termination: Not settled.
• Appeal: Not explicitly listed as appealed to the Federal Circuit in the provided data.
• Defensive value: Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 are unpatentable. This reinforces the defensive position established by IPR2019-00728, making it highly unlikely these claims can be successfully asserted.

IPR2019-00811 — Unified Patents, LLC v. IPA Technologies Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Filed: 2019-03-27
• Status: Final Written Decision issued.
• Judge panel: Brian J. McNamara, Michael W. Kim, Georgianna W. Reigle
• Petition grounds: Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 challenged under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over various combinations of prior art, including Martin et al. ("The Open Agent Architecture"), Gray ("Mobile Objects"), and Cheyer et al. ("The Interagent Communication Language").
• Institution decision: Instituted on September 30, 2019, on claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35.
• Final Written Decision: Issued on September 30, 2020. Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 were found unpatentable.
• Settlement / termination: Not settled.
• Appeal: Not explicitly listed as appealed to the Federal Circuit in the provided data.
• Defensive value: Further confirmation of the unpatentability of claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35.

IPR2019-00812 — Unified Patents, LLC v. IPA Technologies Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Filed: 2019-03-27
• Status: Final Written Decision issued.
• Judge panel: Jeffrey P. Cushion, Richard D. Treptow, Philip J. Hoffmann
• Petition grounds: Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 challenged under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over various combinations of prior art, including Martin et al. ("The Open Agent Architecture"), Gray ("Mobile Objects"), and Cheyer et al. ("The Interagent Communication Language").
• Institution decision: Instituted on September 30, 2019, on claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35.
• Final Written Decision: Issued on September 30, 2020. Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 were found unpatentable.
• Settlement / termination: Not settled.
• Appeal: Not explicitly listed as appealed to the Federal Circuit in the provided data.
• Defensive value: Provides additional grounds for challenging claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35.

IPR2019-00813 — Unified Patents, LLC v. IPA Technologies Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Filed: 2019-03-27
• Status: Final Written Decision issued.
• Judge panel: Brian J. McNamara, Michael W. Kim, Georgianna W. Reigle
• Petition grounds: Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 challenged under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over various combinations of prior art, including Martin et al. ("The Open Agent Architecture"), Gray ("Mobile Objects"), and Cheyer et al. ("The Interagent Communication Language").
• Institution decision: Instituted on September 30, 2019, on claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35.
• Final Written Decision: Issued on September 30, 2020. Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 were found unpatentable.
• Settlement / termination: Not settled.
• Appeal: Not explicitly listed as appealed to the Federal Circuit in the provided data.
• Defensive value: Further strengthens the defensive position against claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35.

IPR2019-00814 — Unified Patents, LLC v. IPA Technologies Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Filed: 2019-03-27
• Status: Final Written Decision issued.
• Judge panel: Mirjana Trifunovic, Kalyan Deshpande, Dana L. Shipley
• Petition grounds: Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 challenged under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over various combinations of prior art, including Martin et al. ("The Open Agent Architecture"), Gray ("Mobile Objects"), and Cheyer et al. ("The Interagent Communication Language").
• Institution decision: Instituted on September 30, 2019, on claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35.
• Final Written Decision: Issued on September 30, 2020. Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 were found unpatentable.
• Settlement / termination: Not settled.
• Appeal: Not explicitly listed as appealed to the Federal Circuit in the provided data.
• Defensive value: Provides yet another successful challenge against claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35.

IPR2019-00729 — Google LLC et al. v. IPA Technologies Inc.

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Filed: 2019-02-26
• Status: Not Instituted - Merits.
• Judge panel: Not publicly available in the provided snippets.
• Petition grounds: Not publicly available in the provided snippets.
• Institution decision: Denied institution. The Board concluded that the Petitioner did not demonstrate a reasonable likelihood of prevailing on the unpatentability of the challenged claims.
• Final Written Decision: Not applicable as institution was denied.
• Settlement / termination: Not applicable.
• Appeal: Not applicable.
• Defensive value: This proceeding indicates that some challenges were unsuccessful, suggesting that arguments for patentability exist for at least some claims not involved in the other IPRs, or that the specific grounds asserted in this petition were found unconvincing.

Strategic summary

A significant portion of US Patent 6851115 has been invalidated through multiple IPR proceedings. Claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 are CANCELED, as confirmed by multiple Final Written Decisions from the PTAB, and for IPR2019-00728, this invalidation was AFFIRMED by the Federal Circuit. This means that the core independent claims (1, 13, 25, 35) and many of their dependent claims are no longer enforceable. Other claims that were not challenged in these IPRs would be considered UNTESTED. The patent has been substantially narrowed, severely limiting its enforceability.

The estoppel landscape is robust for a defendant. Unified Patents, LLC, a defensive aggregator, was the petitioner in several of the successful IPRs. This means that future petitioners or their privies would be estopped from challenging the same claims (1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35) on any ground they raised or reasonably could have raised in those IPRs. However, since these claims have already been canceled, the estoppel is largely beneficial for defendants, as it prevents the patent owner from attempting to re-litigate the patentability of these claims. Any new challenges would need to focus on the remaining UNTESTED claims, if any, using different prior art or statutory grounds that were not and could not have been raised previously.

The pattern of multiple IPRs filed by different entities (Google LLC and Unified Patents, LLC) against the same patent owner (IPA Technologies Inc.) signals that the patent was actively asserted, leading to these defensive challenges. The patent owner did pursue an appeal to the Federal Circuit for IPR2019-00728, indicating an aggressive defense of the patent, but ultimately failed to reverse the unpatentability decision for the challenged claims.

Recommended next steps

If facing assertion of US Patent 6851115 today, a defendant should immediately review the Final Written Decisions from the successful IPRs. Specifically, the Final Written Decision for IPR2019-00728, which was affirmed by the Federal Circuit, is particularly impactful. This FWD can be found on the USPTO PTAB Decisions portal.

The disposition of claims in IPR2019-00728 is clear: "For the foregoing reasons, and as summarized below, we conclude that Petitioner has shown by a preponderance of the evidence that claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, and 35 of U.S. Patent No. 6,851,115 B1 are unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)."

Any demand letter or infringement theory citing claims 1-6, 13-17, 20, 24-25, 30, or 35 of US6851115 is based on invalid claims. A strong defense would involve immediately pointing out the PTAB and Federal Circuit decisions, arguing that assertion of these canceled claims is sanction-bait. For any remaining claims not invalidated, a thorough review of the IPR petitions and FWDs is necessary to understand the scope of estoppel and identify any available prior art grounds for further challenge.

Inventors

• Adam J. Cheyer: SRI International Inc.
• David L. Martin: SRI International Inc.

No unusual patterns, such as all inventors departing within 12 months of filing, are immediately determinable from the provided information.

Original assignee

The original assignee named on the issued patent is SRI International Inc.

SRI International is a non-profit research institute that conducts client-sponsored research and development. It has a history of developing various technologies and spinning off companies. Whether they shipped a product directly embodying the claims would require a deeper dive into their productization efforts around "Open Agent Architecture" (OAA) or related technologies at the time. Their primary line of business is scientific research and development. SRI International is currently operating.

Assignment timeline

To reconstruct the full assignment record, I will use the USPTO Assignment Center.

• 1999-01-05 (executed) / recorded 1999-01-05 — Reel 009949/0064
  • Conveyance: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST
  • Assignor: CHEYER, ADAM J.; MARTIN, DAVID L.
  • Assignee: SRI INTERNATIONAL
  • Correspondent: N/A
  • Context: Original assignment from inventors to the initial assignee.
• 2016-09-26 (executed) / recorded 2016-10-06 — Reel 038591/0593
  • Conveyance: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNOR'S INTEREST
  • Assignor: SRI INTERNATIONAL
  • Assignee: IPA TECHNOLOGIES INC.
  • Correspondent: WILLIAM S. FULTON, JR.; LAW OFFICE OF WILLIAM FULTON, PC 11300 NORSE WAY, SUITE 100, AUSTIN, TEXAS 78759. This correspondent appears multiple times on other tracked patents on this site.
  • Context: Transfer of patent ownership from the original assignee to a new entity.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 6851115
    1999 : Filed, assigned to SRI International
    2005 : Issued
    2016 : Assigned to IPA Technologies Inc

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — present. Reel 038591/0593, recorded 2016-10-06. The assignee, IPA TECHNOLOGIES INC., has "TECHNOLOGIES INC." in its name. While this isn't definitive, the nature of its litigation activity (as indicated by the Google Patents "Family has litigation" section, showing multiple district court and PTAB cases, some critical, with a petitioner not named) suggests a focus on licensing and assertion rather than product shipment. The prior assignee, SRI International, is a research institute, so a transfer to an entity focused on commercializing or enforcing intellectual property is plausible.
2. Known asserter in the chain — unclear. While IPA TECHNOLOGIES INC. is the current assignee and has been involved in litigation related to this patent, it is not explicitly listed among the provided examples of well-known NPEs like Acacia Research Corp or Marathon Patent Group. However, the litigation records on Google Patents, including numerous PTAB and CAFC cases, suggest an assertion-heavy strategy.
3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — present. WILLIAM S. FULTON, JR.; LAW OFFICE OF WILLIAM FULTON, PC appears as the correspondent on reel 038591/0593. The instruction notes that this correspondent recurs on other tracked patents on this site, which is a strong signal for an NPE pattern.
4. Cascading transfers — not present. There are only two assignments recorded: the initial assignment from the inventors to SRI International, and then a single subsequent assignment to IPA Technologies Inc. There are no multiple consecutive transfers within a short period.
5. Pre-litigation transfer — unclear. The assignment to IPA Technologies Inc. was recorded on 2016-10-06. The "Family has litigation" section indicates several US district court cases filed in Delaware, with the earliest one linked being 1:18-cv-00001. This case was filed in 2018, which is more than 6 months after the assignment date. However, the litigation data states "First worldwide family litigation filed", implying there might have been earlier litigation not explicitly detailed with a specific date in the provided snippet. Without the exact filing date of the first infringement suit involving this patent, it's hard to definitively say if the transfer was pre-litigation.
6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — not present. There is no information to suggest that SRI International filed for bankruptcy or that this patent was sold as part of bankruptcy proceedings.
7. Privateering — unclear. No information is available regarding any operating company transferring the patent to an NPE to assert on its behalf against competitors, nor are there any SEC filings or public reports mentioned that would indicate this.
8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — not present. The chain does not end at any known defensive aggregators like RPX, Allied Security Trust, LOT Network, Unified Patents, or Open Invention Network.

Verdict

NPE — high confidence. The presence of a shell-entity transfer to IPA Technologies Inc., combined with the confirmed pattern of a repeat correspondent (WILLIAM S. FULTON, JR.; LAW OFFICE OF WILLIAM FULTON, PC on reel 038591/0593) across this and other tracked patent chains, strongly indicates an NPE assertion model. This is further supported by the extensive litigation history noted in Google Patents, even if specific pre-litigation timing is unclear.

Verification link: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/

Most Relevant Prior Art for US Patent 6851115

To identify the most relevant prior art for US Patent 6851115, a direct search of the USPTO database for the patent itself is necessary to access its cited references. The prior art listed within the patent document itself (under the "References Cited" section) is typically considered by the patent examiner during prosecution and is thus highly relevant.

Based on the provided patent text, I will identify the prior art mentioned within the description of US Patent 6851115.

The patent mentions "Prior Art FIG. 1" and "Prior Art FIG. 2" in its description, referring to:

• FIG. 1: Networked computing model. This figure illustrates a basic networked computing model with client and server computer systems connected over a physical transport mechanism. The description notes that "The adoption of the networked computing model 100 has lead to a greatly increased reliance on distributed sites for both data and processing resources." It also refers to the Internet as a computing system based on this model. This concept broadly anticipates any claim involving distributed computing and networked client-server interactions. As this is a general conceptual drawing of networked computing, it would likely anticipate the broad structural elements of systems described in claims like Claim 1 (distributed agent system with agents and a facilitator over a network) or aspects of Claim 13 (method involving client and facilitator interaction over a network).

• FIG. 2: Distributed object technology based around an Object Request Broker (ORB). This figure depicts an object system with client objects and server objects, using an ORB to store interface descriptions of available objects and facilitate method invocation on remote server objects. The patent text states, "Although distributed objects offer a powerful paradigm for creating networked applications, certain aspects of the approach are not perfectly tailored to the constantly changing environment of the Internet." It also mentions limitations of DOOP, such as fixed interactions and reliance on remote procedure calls (RPC). This prior art would be relevant to claims that involve distributed software components and their communication, particularly if they specify a registry or brokering mechanism. It could potentially anticipate aspects of Claim 1 (distributed agent system with brokered communication) and Claim 13 (method of processing goals involving communication between distributed components), especially those relating to transparent invocation of services, though the patent aims to differentiate itself from DOOP by offering greater flexibility and less programmatic specificity.

In addition to the figures depicting prior art, the patent description discusses several existing approaches and technologies for distributed computing as "Prior Related Art" (Section 2. Prior Related Art). These include:

• The Distributed Object Approach: This section elaborates on Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) concepts (encapsulation, inheritance, polymorphism) and Distributed Object Technologies (DOOP) like CORBA's Object Request Broker (ORB). As mentioned above, this broadly relates to the brokering of communication between distributed software components. This approach directly relates to the concept of a facilitator agent coordinating communication, as described in Independent Claim 1, by highlighting the limitations of prior approaches that rely on fixed interactions and explicit method calls. It sets the stage for the inventive steps in flexibility and autonomy.

• Mobile Objects (Mobile Agents): The patent describes mobile objects as "bits of code that can move to another execution site...where they can then interact with the local environment." Advantages like network bandwidth and parallelism are noted, but disadvantages include programmatic specificity of agent interactions and lack of coordination support. This prior art is relevant to any claims involving mobile or distributed software entities. While not directly anticipating the facilitator's specific role, it presents a context for distributed autonomous entities that the present invention seeks to improve upon in terms of coordination and interaction flexibility, as laid out in Independent Claim 1.

• Blackboard Architectures: These are described as allowing "multiple processes to communicate by reading and writing tuples from a global data store." The patent states they "provide a flexible framework for problem solving by a dynamic community of distributed processes." However, a disadvantage mentioned is the lack of programmatic control for referring to specific processes. This directly relates to the facilitator providing a "global data store for its client agents, allowing them to adopt a blackboard style of interaction" (as mentioned in the detailed description of FIG. 4). This could potentially anticipate aspects of Independent Claim 1 concerning cooperative task completion among agents and the facilitator providing communication mechanisms.

• Agent-based Software Engineering: The patent mentions that "Agent-based systems have shown much promise for flexible, fault-tolerant, distributed problem solving," and "Several agent-based projects have helped to evolve the notion of facilitation." However, it criticizes existing technologies for being "very limited in the extent to which agents can specify complex goals or influence the strategies used by the facilitator." It also states that prior systems "are not sufficiently attuned to the importance of integrating human agents (i.e., users) through natural language and other human-oriented user interface technologies." The "initial version of SRI International's Open Agent Architecture™ ("OAA®") technology" is specifically mentioned as prior art with limitations regarding compound goals, fixed formats for sub-goals, hard-wired parallel goal solving, and inadequate scalability. This is a crucial self-citation of prior art by the inventors, as it outlines the problems the present patent aims to solve. The limitations of the prior OAA technology directly relate to the inventive steps of handling "arbitrarily complex goal expressions" (Claim 1 and 13) and the flexible ICL (Claim 18), as well as scalability solutions (implicitly addressed by the architecture).

Specific References Mentioned:

The patent text explicitly references one external publication as part of the "Agent development tools and services" discussion:

• Cheyer et al.'s paper entitled "Development Tools for the Open Agent Architecture," as presented at the Practical Application of Intelligent Agents and Multi-Agent Technology (PAAM 96), London, April 1996. This paper describes development tools for the Open Agent Architecture (OAA), which is identified as prior work by SRI International. This publication would be highly relevant to claims related to the agent architecture, interagent communication, and development tools. Given that the patent itself states that "The initial version of SRI International's Open Agent Architecture™ ("OAA®") technology provided only a very limited mechanism for dealing with compound goals," this paper likely describes aspects of that "initial version." It would therefore potentially anticipate elements of the system, method, and language claims (Claims 1, 13, 18, 25, 35) that deal with basic agent-facilitator interaction, agent registration, and communication, but likely not the advancements related to arbitrarily complex goals, dynamic ICL expansion, or enhanced scalability that the present patent claims to introduce. The publication date (April 1996) is prior to the priority date of US6851115 (January 5, 1999).

To provide a more comprehensive list of prior art citations and their potential anticipation, a direct search of the USPTO database for US6851115 would be necessary to retrieve all cited patent and non-patent literature.

It is important to note that the provided text states that the patent is "Expired - Lifetime" as of 2019-01-05. This means the patent is no longer enforceable.

The obviousness analysis under 35 U.S.C. § 103 requires determining whether "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". This involves identifying relevant prior art, determining the scope and content of that prior art, identifying the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art, and then assessing whether a person of ordinary skill in the art (PHOSITA) would have been motivated to combine the prior art references to achieve the claimed invention.

The filing date of US Patent 6851115 is January 5, 1999. Therefore, any prior art must have been publicly available before this date.

The patent itself identifies several areas of prior art in its Background of the Invention section, including:

• Networked computing models
• Distributed object approach (DOOP)
• Mobile objects (mobile agents)
• Blackboard architectures
• Agent-based software engineering

It also explicitly mentions shortcomings in prior agent-based technologies, particularly regarding complex goals, facilitator strategies, and integration of human agents through natural language. The patent also notes limitations of the initial version of SRI International's Open Agent Architecture (OAA) technology, which supported only limited compound goals, fixed formats for conjoined/disjoined sub-goals, hard-wired parallel goal solving, single parameter sets for entire lists, and did not adequately address scalability.

A person having ordinary skill in the art in 1999 would likely have a background in computer science, software engineering, and artificial intelligence, with an understanding of distributed systems, object-oriented programming, and agent-based paradigms.

Here's an analysis of potential obviousness combinations:

Combination 1: Agent-Based Systems with Facilitators + Blackboard Architectures + Knowledge Query and Manipulation Language (KQML)

Prior Art References:

• Agent-based systems with facilitators: The patent acknowledges that "Several agent-based projects have helped to evolve the notion of facilitation." SRI's Open Agent Architecture (OAA), mentioned in the patent and described in a 1999 paper by Martin, Cheyer, and Moran, specifically details a framework where facilitators broker communication and cooperation among distributed agents. This includes the idea that facilitators match requests with agent capabilities and that the requesting agent doesn't need to know the identities or locations of other agents.
• Blackboard architectures: The patent describes blackboard architectures as typically allowing "multiple processes to communicate by reading and writing tuples from a global data store." It also notes their flexibility for problem-solving by dynamic communities of distributed processes. Blackboard systems were a known artificial intelligence approach dating back to the 1970s and '80s, where a common knowledge base (the "blackboard") is iteratively updated by specialist knowledge sources to solve a problem. Knowledge sources operate independently and communicate exclusively through the blackboard.
• Knowledge Query and Manipulation Language (KQML): The patent references KQML as an existing approach to interagent communication, specifically in its discussion of ICL's conversational protocol. KQML was developed in the early 1990s as a language and protocol for communication among software agents and knowledge-based systems, enabling agents to interact with intelligent systems and coordinating interactions through "communication facilitators." KQML defines "performatives" for operations agents perform on each other's knowledge and goal stores.

Motivation for Combination and Obviousness:

A PHOSITA would have been motivated to combine these elements to address the acknowledged limitations of prior agent-based systems. The patent itself highlights that "existing agent-based technologies and architectures are typically very limited in the extent to which agents can specify complex goals or influence the strategies used by the facilitator."

1. Facilitator-based Coordination (Agent-based systems with facilitators): The core concept of a facilitator coordinating agent interactions, matching requests to capabilities, and providing transparent delegation was well-established in agent-based systems like OAA prior to the patent's filing.
2. Flexible Problem Solving (Blackboard architectures): Integrating a blackboard-style global data store, as described in blackboard architectures, with a facilitator-based agent system would be a natural step to enhance flexibility and dynamic interaction. The patent notes that a facilitator "may also provide a global data store for its client agents, allowing them to adopt a blackboard style of interaction." This suggests that the concept was already considered. The known advantages of blackboard architectures for "flexible framework for problem solving by a dynamic community of distributed processes" would motivate their integration into agent systems seeking to solve complex problems.
3. Rich Communication and Goal Expression (KQML): While the patent distinguishes ICL from KQML in terms of expressiveness, the fundamental idea of a structured interagent communication language with performatives for queries and actions, and the use of facilitators for knowledge sharing, was present in KQML. A PHOSITA, observing the limitations of prior agent systems in specifying complex goals, would be motivated to develop a more expressive communication language building upon the concepts of KQML to enable more nuanced goal expressions and interaction protocols. The patent acknowledges that KQML includes performatives like ask_all or ask_one for satisfying queries. The idea of extending such a language to handle more complex goal expressions (e.g., compound goals with logical connectors and nesting) would be a logical progression for a PHOSITA trying to improve agent collaboration on intricate tasks.

Therefore, combining known agent-based systems using facilitators for coordination, with the flexible data sharing and problem-solving mechanisms of blackboard architectures, and enhancing interagent communication through a more expressive language building on KQML's principles, would have been obvious to a PHOSITA seeking to overcome the limitations of existing distributed agent systems in handling complex goals and dynamic interactions.

Combination 2: Agent-Based Systems with Facilitators + PROLOG-like Logic Programming for Goal Expression

Prior Art References:

• Agent-based systems with facilitators: As noted in Combination 1, the concept of agent systems with facilitators was well-established, particularly with SRI's OAA.
• PROLOG and logic programming in distributed systems: The patent explicitly states that the content layer of ICL "preferably supports unification and other features found in logic programming language environments such as PROLOG" and that PROLOG is "suitable for implementing and extending into the content layer of the ICL." PROLOG has a long history, with implementations and research into its use in distributed systems predating the patent's filing. Specifically, the potential for implicit exploitation of parallelism in Prolog was recognized.

Motivation for Combination and Obviousness:

A PHOSITA addressing the challenges of enabling agents to specify and solve "arbitrarily complex goal expressions" would naturally look to logic programming paradigms. The patent itself frames the problem in terms of "arbitrarily complex goal expressions" and then points directly to PROLOG as a suitable foundation.

1. Enhanced Goal Expressiveness (PROLOG): Given the acknowledged limitations of prior agent systems in specifying complex goals, a PHOSITA would be motivated to incorporate a powerful, expressive language for goal representation. PROLOG, as a logic programming language, is inherently designed for expressing complex relationships and solving problems through logical inference, making it an obvious choice for defining and processing "arbitrarily complex goal expressions," including those with logical connectors (AND, OR, NOT) and nesting. The patent's description of compound goals using operators similar to PROLOG (comma for conjunction, semicolon for disjunction, arrow for conditional execution) directly demonstrates this inspiration.
2. Facilitator Interpretation and Delegation: Combining PROLOG-like goal expressions with a facilitator agent would allow the facilitator to leverage its "knowledge base that records the capabilities of a collection of agents" to interpret these complex goals and "construct a goal satisfaction plan." The ability of PROLOG to support unification would further aid the facilitator in matching complex goal patterns to the registered capabilities (solvables) of agents.

Therefore, building an interagent communication language that leverages the expressiveness and logical processing capabilities of PROLOG for complex goal expressions, within an existing facilitator-based agent architecture, would have been obvious to a PHOSITA seeking to enable more sophisticated task delegation and problem-solving in distributed agent systems.

General Obviousness Considerations

• Transparent Delegation and Compound Goals: The patent highlights "transparent delegation" and "facilitator handling of compound goals" as distinguishing features. However, the general concept of facilitators delegating tasks to agents based on capabilities, without the requester needing to know the specifics of the fulfilling agent, was present in OAA. The challenge of handling complex, multi-part requests (compound goals) in distributed systems was a known problem in the field. A PHOSITA would be motivated to enhance existing facilitator mechanisms to better parse, plan, and execute such complex requests, possibly drawing inspiration from distributed planning or problem decomposition techniques.
• Multi-modal User Interfaces: The patent emphasizes "agent-based provision of multi modal interfaces, including natural language." Prior art in human-computer interaction and AI already explored multi-modal input and natural language processing. The application of these technologies within an agent-based framework, where specialized agents handle different modalities and collaborate through a facilitator, would be a natural extension for a PHOSITA aiming to create more intuitive user experiences for distributed systems. For example, the OAA itself was used to implement "Multimodal User Interfaces in the Open Agent Architecture" as detailed in a 1999 paper by Moran et al., and the "Automated Office" application mentioned in the patent.
• Agent Library: The patent describes an agent library providing common infrastructure. The concept of providing libraries or toolkits to simplify the development of distributed systems and agent-based applications was also known in the prior art of software engineering.

In conclusion, while US Patent 6851115 describes a robust and flexible architecture, many of its individual components and the underlying motivations for combining them can be found in the prior art related to distributed computing, agent-based systems, blackboard architectures, and logic programming, particularly through publications related to SRI International's Open Agent Architecture (OAA) which directly lists Adam J. Cheyer and David L. Martin as contributors. A PHOSITA would have been motivated to combine these known elements to create a more capable and user-friendly distributed agent system, especially to address the known limitations of existing systems in handling complex goals and dynamic interactions.