Can someone with patent law domain expertise please describe the "novel" patent criteria to laypeople here for software patents? To my simple lay mind, I apply

Can someone with patent law domain expertise please describe the "novel" patent criteria to laypeople here for software patents? To my simple lay mind, I apply a "not-novel" test criteria to patents. If I can describe a software patent in non-software terms, and apply a "...then a light-speed fast homunculus does this all...", then I'm already skeptical of the novelty of the software patent. In this specific instance, change "interactive service" to "newspaper, fetched from a vast library...by a very, very fast homunculus", and "advertisement" to "advertisement cut out and replaced by another advertisement fetched from a vast library...by a very, very fast homunculus". So obviously my lay understanding is way off, and I'm seeking to rectify that flawed understanding.