Appeal No. 96-1259
Application 08/201,185
lines 29 to 51). Sindhu discloses that bus 26 is
"independently arbitrated by arbiters 35a, 35b, 35i, and 36"
(column 6, lines 16 to 17), and that "[t]he arbiters 35a-35i
and 36 . . . ensur[e] that each client has fair, bounded time
access to its host bus" (column 7, lines 44 to 48). Because
at least one of Sindhu’s arbiters, arbiter 36, is "separate
from" the client modules 14a-i, we find that Sindhu reads on
appellants’ broad claim 1 on appeal, to the extent that
representative claim 1 does not require that overflow
detection not also be performed by the client modules (i.e.,
decentralization).
We agree generally with the examiner (Answer, page 2)
that the ordinarily skilled artisan looking at the teachings
and suggestions of Sindhu would have found it obvious to
monitor the transaction queues of the individual client
modules from a central location (36 and/or 25) separate from
the modules (14a-i). While we note that there is no per se
rule as to the obviousness of shifting location of parts such
as suggested by the examiner’s reliance upon In re Japikse, 86
USPQ 70, 73 (CCPA 1950), we do find that it would have been
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