Appeal No. 2005-1384
Application 09/886,200
We have carefully reviewed our original opinion in light of
appellant’s request, but we find no point of law or fact which we
overlooked or misapprehended in arriving at our original
decision. Even in light of appellant’s current arguments set
forth in the Request for Rehearing, we find no error in the
analysis or logic set forth in our original opinion.
With respect to appellant’s first position under topic A at
page 2 of the request, we reemphasize again our remarks at page 5
of our original opinion which affirmed the examiner’s remarks at
page 11 of the answer that appellant effectively was inviting us
to limit the scope of meaning of the term “character set” by
essentially urging us to read disclosed limitations thereof into
the claims on appeal which are not specifically claimed.
Contrary to the belief apparently set forth at the bottom of page
2 of the request, we did not misunderstand the disclosed meaning
of the term “character set”. Nor do we deny appellant’s right to
be his own lexicographer. Claims are to be given their broadest
reasonable interpretation during prosecution, and the scope of a
claim cannot be narrowed by reading disclosed limitations into
the claim. See In re Morris, 127 F.3d 1048, 1054, 44 USPQ 1023,
1027 (Fed. Cir. 1997); In re Zletz, 893 F.2d 319, 321, 13 USPQ2d
1320, 1322 (Fed. Cir. 1989); In re Prater, 415 F.2d 1393, 1404-
05, 162 USPQ 541, 550 (CCPA 1969). “[D]uring patent prosecution
2
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