Appeal No. 1998-2498
Application No. 08/603,696
Claims 1-12 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Alsborg in
view of Fornoff.
Reference is made to the briefs and answer for the respective positions of
appellants and the examiner.
OPINION
We reverse.
It is the examiner’s position that Alsborg discloses the claimed invention but for the
claimed memory for storing a numerical value indicative of the position of the object at a
reference position relative to a sensor. The examiner relies on Fornoff for the teaching of
storing a numerical value indicative of the position of the object at a reference position
relative to a sensor for the purpose of accurately determining the distance from the sensor
when switching occurs. The examiner then concludes that it would have been obvious to
use a memory to store a numerical value indicative of the position of the object at a
reference position relative to a sensor as taught by Fornoff on the system of Alsborg in
order to accurately determine the distance from the sensor when switching occurs.
Fornoff does, indeed, determine the reference position of an object and it does so
by sensing switching points as a magnetic element is passed back and forth over a
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