Appeal No. 2004-2250
Application No. 09/542,154
the user’s monitor (answer, pages 3 & 4). The Examiner further
relies on Brown for the user interface, on Kikinis for wireless
communications between the user’s terminal and a network (answer,
page 4), on Namma for teaching an icon linked to a feed from a
video camera and on Humpleman for showing the link to an in-home
appliance (answer, page 5). Additionally, the Examiner points to
column 2, lines 9-14 of Brown for a teaching of how toolbars may
be modified by adding or deleting buttons or by changing the
functions associated with a button (answer, page 15). Thus, the
Examiner relies on Brown for providing the motivation for
combining the references and changing the commands associated
with each terminal button according to the features disclosed by
Kikinis, Namma and Humpleman.
As a general proposition, in rejecting claims under 35
U.S.C. § 103, the examiner bears the initial burden of presenting
a prima facie case of obviousness. See In re Rijckaert, 9 F.3d
1531, 1532, 28 USPQ2d 1955, 1956 (Fed. Cir. 1993) and In re Fine,
837 F.2d 1071, 1074, 5 USPQ2d 1596, 1598 (Fed. Cir. 1988). Here,
we find the Examiner’s reliance on the teachings of Brown,
Kikinis, Namma and Humpleman to be reasonable and sufficient to
support a prima facie case of obviousness which shifts the burden
to Appellants. However, in response to the prima facie case
7
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007