Appeal No. 95-3042
Application No. 08/098,501
Therefore, one of the disclosed, and claimed, improvements
of the instant claimed invention over Balzer is the ability to
simulate a past program state by employing "pre-existing" values of
registers and memory locations. This is crucial to the instant
claimed invention, yet neither of the applied references discloses or
suggests these "pre-existing" values. Even the examiner eventually
admitted as such when, on the bottom of page 9 of the answer, in
responding to appellants' arguments, the examiner states, "[t]he fact
that applicants [sic] system stores pre-existing values rather than
new values of Balzer (see page 577, fifth line from last) does not
constitute a patentable difference." The examiner's contention is
that this is merely "an engineering choice since either method has
the effect of recording the changing of values, so that the system
state at a particular point in time can be reconstructed [pages 9-10
of the answer].
We agree with appellants, at page 9 of the brief, wherein
they argue that the distinction between the claimed "pre-existing
values" and Balzer's "new" values is more than a mere "engineering
choice." Appellants have the ability to simulate a past program
state by employing these "pre-existing" values of registers and
memory locations." The examiner has failed to show any support in
the prior art for the allegation of "engineering choice." Further,
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