Appeal No. 2002-1280
Application 08/995,996
The question remains whether the examiner is correct in assuming
that the combination of Drori and Karasawa teaches all the
features of the claimed invention. This requires us to address
appellant's arguments. In particular, in the last argument, we
find one claim limitation to be missing.
Appellant argues that it is not necessary for the user in
Drori to know the specific code that is transmitted from the
transmitter to the receiver, which is opposite to, and amounts to
a teaching away from, the present invention where the user
programs in the code (Br7-8; RBr4-5).
While Drori states that "the user is not required to encode
the [transmitter]" (col. 7, lines 54-55), this is for the user's
convenience because, as discussed in the background, most users
do not have the skill to set codes. One of ordinary skill in the
art would not interpret Drori to teach that the user cannot set
the code. Thus, Drori does not teach away from the user setting
the signature code. See In re Gurley, 27 F.3d 551, 553,
31 USPQ2d 1130, 1131 (Fed. Cir. 1994) ("A reference may be said
to teach away when a person of ordinary skill, upon [examining]
the reference, would be discouraged from following the path set
out in the reference, or would be led in a direction divergent
from the path that was taken by the applicant.").
At the oral hearing, it was argued that it would not make
sense to allow the user to set the signature code because this
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