Appeal 96-0460
Application 08/150,303
In many respects the state of affairs with respect to
this appeal is probably symptomatic of one of the reasons why
the board has such an unacceptable backlog of ex parte appeals
pending before it at the present time.
The examiner does not appear to have determined the
precise scope of claim 1. Likewise, it appears to us, that
the examiner has simply declined to address the limitation set
out in bold in claim 1, supra--a limitation which appears in
all claims on appeal. We find the examiner's action in
declining to determine the scope of claim 1 and/or address the
limitation set out in bold, supra, to be curious given that
applicants discuss, and rely on, the limitation on page 4 of
their appeal brief. We decline to search the prior art relied
upon by the examiner to see if somehow that prior art might
meet the limitation relied upon by the examiner. Because the
examiner fails to make out a prima facie case due to a failure
to address a limitation relied upon by the applicants, we
reverse.
3. Other observations about the record
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Last modified: November 3, 2007