Appeal No. 2000-0766
Application No. 08/825,259
line segment in determining the intersection of the line segment with a major coordinate
line, Foley has, indeed, based the determination, not only upon the major axis
coordinates, as claimed, but also on the slope of the line segment.
While Foley takes one x-value at a time and computes a corresponding y-value,
based on slope, prior to moving on to the next x-value, the instant claimed invention
identifies all of the major axis values between the endpoints of the line segment before
determining any of the minor axis values. As soon as Foley makes a preliminary
calculation of slope, the minor axis coordinates are invoked because the slope gives a
minor axis value for each and every major axis value. In contrast, the instant claims
require using only the major axis coordinates of the endpoints and this must be done
prior to identification of the major axes crossing the line segment.
We find that, as disclosed and argued by appellant, the claim language, “based
only upon the major axis coordinates of the endpoints of the line segment” means that
the identification of the major coordinate lines, if any, crossing the line segment to be
displayed may not be based, in any part, or in any way, on a previous calculation of the
slope. The identification must be based solely on the major axis coordinates of the
endpoints of the line segments. Thus, if the major axis is the x-axis and the line
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