Appeal No. 2005-2668
Application No. 09/765,823
complies with a remote policy (e.g., the occupant is determined to be authorized by
entry of the correct security code), the central monitoring system sends a signal to
disarm the security system. The signal may be considered an “enablement” signal, as
the signal enables moving to a state different from the present state (i.e., from an alarm
to an unarmed state). Moreover, Johnson also discloses (col. 5) that a signal may
indicate enabling, for example, the horn or headlights.
During prosecution before the USPTO, claims are to be given their broadest
reasonable interpretation, 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 USPQ2d
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). Appellants, particularly in the Reply Brief, base arguments on embodiments of
the invention to which instant claim 1 is not limited. We decline to, indeed cannot,
narrow the scope of the claim by interpreting it to be limited to any particular disclosed
embodiment that is not required by the language that appellants have chosen in setting
out the metes and bounds of the claimed invention. We further note that appellants’
specification (at 7, l. 30 - 8, l. 15) is contrary to appellants’ ad hoc position.
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