Appeal No. 96-1492
Application 07/666,162
664 (Fed. Cir. 1985), cert. denied, 475 U.S. 1017 (1986); ACS
Hosp. Sys., Inc. v. Montefiore Hosp., 732 F.2d 1572, 1577, 221
USPQ 929, 933 (Fed. Cir. 1984). These showings by the
examiner are an essential part of complying with the burden of
presenting a prima facie case of obviousness. Note In re
Oetiker, 977 F.2d 1443, 1445, 24 USPQ2d 1443, 1444 (Fed. Cir.
1992).
With respect to representative, independent claim 1,
the examiner basically asserts that Liu teaches the invention
of claim 1 except for the recitation that each processor
processes the portion of the task distributed to it in the
same amount of time as the other processors process their
distributed portions, and the recitation that the subtasks are
allocated in inverse order such that the processor having the
lowest processing rate receives the first task portion and the
processor having the highest processing rate receives the last
task portion [answer, pages 3-6]. Natarajan is cited by the
examiner as teaching an allocation system in which tasks are
allocated among a plurality of processors such that all
processors finish at substantially the same time. The
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