Appeal No. 94-4400
Application 07/771,063
they suggest having the alternate node upgrade its status to that
of a primary node upon failing to determine the existence of such
a primary node” [brief, pages 10-11]. The examiner does not
respond to this argument directly, but instead, argues that the
invention of claims 10-12 is suggested by the applied prior art
because the primary master node in Literati checks with other
nodes through the transfer of timing priority numbers (TPNs), and
the checking and incrementation of the TPNs clearly teaches the
checking of the status of each node [answer, page 6]. Although
it is not clear if any of the examiner’s statements regarding the
teachings of the applied prior art are incorrect, it is clear
that the examiner’s rejection fails to address the specific
recitations of claim 10 and whether the differences asserted by
appellants would have been obvious to the artisan in view of this
prior art.
As pointed out by appellants, the method of claim 10
specifically recites an alternate control point node which
interrogates other control point nodes and updates its own status
to a primary control point node when it does not find a primary
control point node among the other control point nodes. The
examiner apparently views the “client” nodes of Near and Literati
as interrogating each of the control point nodes, and the
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