Appeal No. 95-2598
Application 08/021,230
individual constituent modules or units are disclosed or
suggested in either Warshaw or Ulrich.
Based on the foregoing, the decision of the examiner
rejecting claims 1 and 3 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 is reversed.
We have additionally reviewed the references to
Cavanagh and Twigg applied by the examiner against dependent
claims 4 through 8, however, we fail to find in these references
anything which would supply the deficiencies already noted above
with regard to the basic combination of Warshaw and Ulrich. In
reviewing the teachings of Cavanagh and Twigg, as well as those
of Ulrich, we are also of the opinion that the examiner has
inappropriately relied upon hindsight and improperly used
appellant's own disclosure and teachings as a guide through the
prior art and the individual diverse elements thereof in
selectively modifying the tape machine of Warshaw in the manner
posited by the examiner so as to arrive at the claimed subject
matter. As was made clear in Warner, supra, such a
retrospective, hindsight reconstruction is not permitted by the
examiner under 35 U.S.C. § 103. It follows that the examiner's
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