Appeal 2007-1361
Application 09/681,573
A. CLAIM CONSTRUCTION
"The Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) must consider all claim
limitations when determining patentability of an invention over the prior
art." In re Lowry, 32 F.3d 1579, 1582, 32 USPQ2d 1031, 1034 (Fed. Cir.
1994) (citing In re Gulack, 703 F.2d 1381, 1385, 217 USPQ 401, 403-04
(Fed. Cir. 1983)).
Here, claim 12 recites in pertinent part the following limitations: "the
computer is further caused to receive more than one media control
instruction and simultaneously transform the content of the electronic media
into more than one format." Contrary to the Examiner's characterization, the
limitations do not permit the transform to be substantially simultaneous.
Instead, the claim requires simultaneously transforming the content of the
electronic media into more than one format.
B. OBVIOUSNESS ANALYSIS
Figure 6 of Alam, on which the Examiner relies, "illustrat[es]
conversion of data representing a document to portable document format, to
an intermediate format, and finally to a different output format. . . ." (Col. 3,
ll. 16-18.) Although the reference transforms a "text and/or image
document 518" (col. 6, l. 34) into "a PDF document 626" (id. l. 37),
"an intermediate format document 530" (id. l. 42), and "an output format
document 534" (id. 44-45), the transformations are not simultaneous.
Instead, the Figure shows that the three transformations are serial.
16
Page: Previous 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 Next
Last modified: September 9, 2013