Appeal No. 95-3158
Application 08/038,424
wherein the appellants assert their belief that Haskins belongs
to the category of non-analogous art. Haskins discloses a groove
and cord retaining means for a desk or wall mounted telephone.
The appellants argue that Haskins is outside the field of
applicable prior art for trackball pointing devices, and that
even if it is assumed to be analogous art, the teachings from
Aoki, Haskins and Kirchgessner [do] would not have reasonably
suggested the appellants' claimed invention. On both of these
points, we agree with the appellants.
Given two useful devices of whatever type, if one can
broaden or generalize the inventive field to whatever extent
subjectively desired, at some point the two devices will
inevitably be in the same field of endeavor no matter how
different they originally may be. If that happens, the inquiry
of whether two devices are within the same field of endeavor
becomes meaningless. Certainly, a rule of reason must apply.
The examiner defines the relevant field of endeavor as
anything concerning the "cable of an input device" (answer at 8).
In our view, that is unduly broad. The claimed invention
specifically concerns a hand-held trackball-type pointing device
having cursor controls for use with a computer. Defining the
field of the inventors' endeavor as any input device with a cable
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