Appeal No. 1997-0897
Application No. 08/227,992 Page 12
We turn next to the rejection of claims 12-15, 23, and 25-27
under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Koch and the admitted
prior art. We begin with independent claims 12 and 23. The
examiner’s position (answer, pages 5 and 6) with respect to
independent claims 12 and 23, is that the admitted prior art of
figure 5 does not show focal length changing means. To overcome
this deficiency of the admitted prior art, the examiner turns to
Koch for a teaching of this feature, relying upon col. 1, lines
1-7 of Koch. The examiner states (answer, page 6) that:
These claims, as best understood, are directed
to a method of selecting from a plurality of variations
the item or position which gives the best result, in
this case, a correct focal length.
It is well-known in assembling devices of any
kind that when parts available vary in dimension,
best results can be obtained by trial and error, ie,
by trying different specimens of a given part or trying
a single part in different attitudes, until a best
result is obtained. This approach is not just
well-known, but intuitive. It can be observed on an
assembly line or in a sandwich shop.
It is common to chamfer the edges of transparent
coverings on imaging devices in order to reduce the
risk of injury to a user. Further, it is inherent in
the manufacture of chamfered transparent coverings
that variations in thickness or chamfer depth may occur,
and also that dimensions of inner sidewalls of a device
frame may vary. Thus it would have been obvious to one
of ordinary skill in the art to select an appropriate
covering through trial and error, ie, trying different
coverings, or trying a single covering in different
orientations or angles, until a best result was obtained.
Page: Previous 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007