Appeal No. 96-3236
Application 08/295,493
clock running all operations, Danielsen states (column 7, lines 67-68) that the “two clocks would need
to be synchronized with each other.”
Thus, it is clear that while the claims require processors operating asynchronously, the primary
reference employed by the examiner to reject those claims discloses a system which operates only in a
synchronous manner. The examiner does not deny this.
Rather, the examiner states, that it would have been obvious “to modify Danielsen to
independently clock Danielsen’s processors because one would want to prevent catastrophic failure of
Danielsen’s Anti-Lock Brakes if said one clock fail [sic]” [answer-page 4]. The examiner further states
that it would have been obvious “to modify Danielsen to asynchronously (loosely-coupled) operate his
processors because this would add greater reliability to his system” [answer-page 5].
The examiner’s rationale, in our view, is based on impermissible hindsight gleaned from
appellants’ own disclosure. At page 2 of the specification, appellants disclose that a drawback to the
TMR (triple module redundancy) system is that because the modules share a common clock, “clock
failure is devastating to operation of the system.” They also disclose that while “loose synchronization”
between processors is known when using a software data collection and voting technique, the
4
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007