Appeal No. 2003-1509
Application 09/853,575
device in either Crossland's display device or Appeldorn '643's
illumination device (Br9).
The examiner states that the limitation "an optical switch"
in the preamble has not been given patentable weight because the
portion of the claim following the preamble is self-contained and
does not depend for completeness on the preamble (EA10-11). The
examiner finds that optical pickups are commonly used to receive
optical signals in optical systems and "[o]ne of ordinary skill
in the [art] would have recognized that the light emitted by the
display device disclosed by Crossland et al. could be received by
any of numerous well known optical pick-ups for a variety of
reasons, including analyzing and/or testing the light output from
the display device of Crossland et al." (EA11).
We agree with appellants that there is no suggestion in
either Crossland or Appeldorn '643 to provide an optical pickup.
The examiner states in the final rejection that one of ordinary
skill in the art would have recognized the advantages of
incorporating an optical pickup in Crossland, but does not
identify these advantages or produce any evidence that these
advantages were known. Thus, this reasoning is not persuasive.
As to the examiner's new reasoning in the examiner's answer, that
an optical pickup could be provided for many reasons, "including
analyzing and/or testing the light output from the display in
Crossland" (EA11), no factual support has been provided for such
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