Appeal No. 2004-1026 Page 8
Application No. 09/028,480
B. PROHIBITING GESTURE-BASED EDITING
The examiner asserts that in Forcier "[i]f pen-down coordinates is [sic] within
effective text editing area 32, a prompt is displayed, a gesture is drawn starting from the
prompt (col. 13, lines 17-21; lines 39-41, figs 4-4H), the text editing function associated
with the input gesture will be executed since editing area 32 is contextually sensitive to
text editing operations." (Supp. Examiner's Answer at 11-12.) The appellants argue,
"gestures in Tannenbaum are utilized regardless of whether or not the hot spot of the
gesture is located in a particular window (i.e., the pendown coordinates in Tannenbaum
cannot cause editing to not occur as required by claim 9)." (Supp. Reply Br. at 6.)
1. Claim Construction
Claim 19 further recites in pertinent part the following limitations: "editing based
upon pen stroke is not carried out when pen down coordinates for a pen stroke are in
the second area, even when further inputs of the pen stroke are in the first area. . . ."
Claim 9 recites similar limitations. Giving claims 9 and 19 their broadest, reasonable
construction, the limitations further require that if the pen is put down in one area of the
display, gesture-based editing is prevented even if the pen is moved into another area
of the display during a stroke of the pen.
2. Obviousness Determination
"Non-obviousness cannot be established by attacking references individually
where the rejection is based upon the teachings of a combination of references." In re
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