Appeal No. 2001-2270
Application 09/235,529
rejection to be addressed, see In re McDaniel, 293 F.3d 1379,
1384-85, 63 USPQ2d 1462, 1465-66 (Fed. Cir. 2002), the rule only
applies to grounds of rejection which an applicant contests.
Appellants did not contest the rejection of claim 6 in the
principal brief either in the grouping of claims, as required by
§ 1.192(c)(7), or in the arguments, as required by
§ 1.192(c)(8)(iv). Since claim 6 is a dependent claim, it can be
assumed that appellants considered the patentability to stand or
fall with claim 1. Examiners are not permitted to file a
supplemental answer as of right, § 1.193(b)(1); thus, it would be
unfair to let in new arguments in the reply brief. Accordingly,
this opinion addresses only the three groups in the main brief.
Group I: Claims 1, 3-6, 9, and 11
Claim 1 is representative of Group I. The sole difference
between Steven and the subject matter of claim 1 is that Stevens
does not disclose attenuating the dialing signals by "at least
30 dB." Stevens discloses an attenuator device, AC shunt 13 in
Fig. 2, connected in parallel (in shunt) across the tip and ring
conductors of a telephone link where "[t]he attenuator attenuates
the signals on the telephone line so that the amplitude of the
signals on the telephone line is below a threshold of the central
office, so that the central office does not recognize the signals
as representing a telephone number entered by the user" (col. 2,
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