Appeal No. 1997-3133 Page 4
Application No. 08/370,076
determination of a post-test scan path configuration and the
comparison thereof with a pre-test scan path configuration,
that Hassan suggests these claim limitations in the disclosure
of loading test vectors, shifting responses for detection of
faults and comparing with an expected response.
Hassan is clearly directed to the type of system referred
to by appellants in the background of the specification wherein
interconnects are tested and diagnosed using boundary scan
architecture. However, appellants’ improvement thereover, as
explained in the specification and set forth in the instant
claims, is to confirm the integrity of a mission test performed
on a circuit by executing the mission test on a circuit wherein
the scan path has a pre-test configuration and then
determining, after performance of the mission test, a post-test
configuration of the scan path. The result of a comparison of
the pre- and post-test configurations of the scan path
determines whether the mission test was valid. Hassan neither
discloses nor suggests such a scheme for determining the
integrity of a mission test. Conventional testing techniques,
of which Hassan is representative, assume that the post-test
configuration of the scan path is the same as the pre-test
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