Appeal No. 2004-1156
Application No. 09/071,594
Claims 1-39 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over
Brandt in view of Grrimm.
Rather than reiterate the conflicting viewpoints advanced by the examiner and
appellants regarding the above-noted rejections, we make reference to the examiner's
answer (Paper No. 28, mailed Jul. 10, 2003) for the examiner's reasoning in support of
the rejections, and to appellants’ brief (Paper No. 27, filed Apr. 28, 2003) and reply brief
(Paper No. 29, filed Sep. 12, 2003) for appellants’ arguments thereagainst.
OPINION
In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given careful consideration to
appellants’ specification and claims, to the applied prior art references, and to the
respective positions articulated by appellants and the examiner. As a consequence of
our review, we make the determinations which follow.
At the outset, we note that appellants have elected to group the claims as
standing or falling together in five separate groupings. (See brief at page 4.) We will
address appellants’ arguments thereto, but will separate independent claim 37
separately from independent claim 1 since we do not find corresponding limitations to
independent claims 1 and 23.
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