Appeal No. 95-2320
Application No. 08/074,517
perhaps the examiner meant to reject the claims over Fischer in
view of Billig and further in view of either one of Takayama or
Yabu.
In any event, we will not sustain the rejection of claims 7
through 11 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 because independent claim 7
requires a concave portion to be formed in the insulator layer,
the concave portion having a final bottom wall which is “located
immediately above said connection conductive layer” [emphasis
ours]. The meaning of this is clear from a reference to the
instant disclosure wherein Figs. 2A-C show the final bottom of
the concave portion immediately, or directly, above connection
conductive layer element 3.
It is the examiner’s apparent position that this limitation
is taught by either Fischer or Billig. With regard to Fischer,
the examiner contends that the concave portion 16 of dielectric
layer 13 in Fig. 1 has a bottom wall and that bottom wall is
immediately above the connection conductive layer 12. While we
understand the examiner’s position in contending that portion 16
of Fischer is, indeed, above element 12, and such an
interpretation would appear to meet the claim language if the
language only called for the bottom wall to be above the
connection conductive layer, the instant claim language calls for
4
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