Appeal No. 2006-0479
Application No. 10/309,274
the supplemental answer1) as documentary evidence to support the
officially noticed methods. Suffice to say, however, that the
three items fall far short in this regard. Arguably, the items
do not even substantiate the existence in the prior art of the
individual features for which they are respectively cited, and
they certainly do not demonstrate the existence of the purported
methods which actually were officially noticed by the examiner.
Thus, the evidence advanced by the examiner does not justify
a conclusion that the differences between the subject matter
recited in claims 6 and 12 and the prior art are such that the
subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the
invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art.
Accordingly, we shall not sustain the standing 35 U.S.C. §
103(a) rejection of independent claims 6 and 12, and dependent
claims 7-9, 13, 15, 16, 18, 19 and 21, as being unpatentable over
Pulkkinen in view of Crane and Official Notice.
1 The supplemental answer identifies the three items as (1) “Floor B1, pages 1-2, of: Finding Your
Way Inside St. Luke's. St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital website. 18 October 2002” (Appendix A), (2) “Figure
1 of: Bligh, U.S. Patent Application Number 2002/0057204” (Appendix B), and (3) “pages 1-2 of: No More
Mazes, Research about Design for Wayfinding in hospitals. DIAGLOG(R) File 148: Gale Group Trade &
Industry DB. 02336780. SUPPLIER NUMBER: 03585116. Progressive Architecture, v66, pl56(2). Jan,
1985” (Appendix C).
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