Appeal No. 2003-1062
Application No. 09/004,265
within the view) (See pages 2-3 of the principal brief). Since
IBM is concerned with “triples,”1 and it is clear that triples,
or tuples, are merely data of interest in a “view,” there is
clearly an implied generation of “views” of the database within
IBM, and these “views” contain view tuples, or view triples.
Having said that, we find it unnecessary to address
appellants’ argument that the references are not combinable since
Colby, albeit cumulative to IBM, is not even necessary for the
rejection, in our view.
Appellants argue that the references do not disclose the
claimed locking of a “superset of tuples” since IBM explicitly
states that “a superset of the necessary triples is held by the
accessing application, while only a subset of the necessary
triples is explicitly locked.” Accordingly, appellants conclude
that a “superset of tuples” is not locked in IBM.
We disagree. A “superset” is merely “a set which contains
the tuple, but additional data, or tuples” (principal brief-page
3). IBM goes on to explain that a triple, or tuple, is defined
in general by the form (x, y, z), where x, y, and z are
identifiers of database elements which name entities in the real
1It is clear that IBM’s “triples” are identical to
appellants’ “tuples” Appellants do not dispute this.
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