Appeal No. 1999-2294
Application No. 08/807,430
Claims 1-5, 8-20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable
over Journal. Claims 6, 7 and 21-24 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Journal in view of Scott.
Rather than reiterate the conflicting viewpoints advanced by the examiner and
appellants regarding the above-noted rejections, we make reference to the examiner's
answer (Paper No. 17, mailed Jun. 14, 1999) for the examiner's reasoning in support of
the rejections, and to appellants’ brief (Paper No. 16, filed May 10, 1999) and reply brief
(Paper No. 19, filed Aug. 13, 1999) for appellants’ arguments thereagainst.
OPINION
In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given careful consideration to
appellants’ specification and claims, to the applied prior art references, and to the
respective positions articulated by appellants and the examiner. As a consequence of our
review, we make the determinations which follow.
As pointed out by our reviewing court, we must first determine the scope of the
claim. "[T]he name of the game is the claim." In re Hiniker Co., 150 F.3d 1362, 1369, 47
USPQ2d 1523, 1529 (Fed. Cir. 1998). We find that the examiner has not provided a
teaching or convincing line of reasoning why one skilled in the art would have desired to
modify the teachings of Journal to achieve the invention as recited in claim 19. Similarly,
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