Ex Parte 5694604 et al - Page 29


                Appeal 2007-2127                                                                                  
                Reexamination Control No. 90/006,621                                                              
                object code.  The disclosed invention relates to an incremental compiler                          
                where each line of source code is compiled into object code as it is entered.                     

                                    c. Process                                                                    
                       A process is defined as a program in execution.  A program by itself                       
                is not a process; a program is a passive entity, such as the contents of a file                   
                stored on disk, whereas a process is an active entity, having the executable                      
                code and a set of resources allocated by the operating system, such as                            
                memory, file handles (a handle is an integer referring to an object), device                      
                handles, etc.  See Lafore, Peter Norton's Inside OS/2, page 12 ("A program                        
                . . . is nothing more than the executable code, which may reside in memory,                       
                on a hard disk, or even on a floppy locked away in a drawer.  A process, on                       
                the other hand, in an instance of a program actually being executed.  The                         
                process is the executable code, plus the resources the process is using, such                     
                as memory, files, and I/O devices.").                                                             

                                    d. Thread                                                                     
                       "Within each process it is also possible to define entities known as                       
                threads.  A thread is like a subroutine within a program which executes                           
                concurrently, or asynchronously, with other subroutines."  Nguyen,                                
                Advanced Programmer's Guide to OS/2, page 6.  The attributes of threads in                        
                a preemptive multithreading environment will be discussed infra.                                  

                                    e. Operating System/2 (OS/2)                                                  
                       Operating System/2 (OS/2) was jointly developed by the Microsoft                           
                and IBM Corporations as a successor to MS-DOS and was released in the                             
                1987-1988 time frame.  See Charles Petzold, Programming the OS/2                                  

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