Appeal No. 2001-1795
Application 08/825,196
angle” was given no patentable weight. It was error for the
examiner to fail to consider this limitation of the claimed
invention. All limitations of a claimed invention must be
considered when making prior art rejections. Not only does the
rejection fail to consider the claimed invention as a whole, but
the rejection also fails to evaluate the claimed means as
required by the sixth paragraph of 35 U.S.C. § 112. The examiner
has not identified the disclosed structure which corresponds to
the claimed means nor explained how or why this structure would
have been obvious over the teachings of the applied prior art.
We agree with appellant that there has been no showing that the
applied prior art teaches a pair of oculars which are initially
adjustable but are then permanently fixed in place as a function
of a desired working distance and convergence angle. With
respect to dependent claims 2-9, we note that the additionally
applied references do not overcome the deficiencies discussed
above. Therefore, we do not sustain the rejection of claims 1-9.
With respect to representative, independent claim 10, the
examiner’s rejection is set forth on pages 9-11 of the answer.
Appellant argues that the claimed limitation of ocular support
arms and other structural elements defining a preset convergence
angle as a function of working distance does not appear in any of
-9-
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