Appeal No. 2006-1030
Application No. 09/895,233
We reach a similar conclusion with respect to the identified claims rejected under
35 U.S.C. § 103 in light of Shah and Bakke. Beginning at page 5 of the Answer in the
examiner’s statement of the rejection, the examiner has set forth a separate motivation and
combinability analysis within 35 U.S.C. § 103 for each of plural separate subgroupings of the
respective dependent claims rejected there. Appellants’ remarks beginning at page 12 of the
Reply Brief do not address this approach. Moreover, when all is said and done, appellants argue
the patentability of independent claim 1 at pages 14 and 15 of the principal Brief on appeal,
which is not at issue with respect to the combinability of Shah and Bakke. Bakke alone has not
been used to reject independent claim 1 on appeal within 35 U.S.C. § 102.
With respect to the examiner’s reasoning of combinability and the examiner’s detailed
correlated teachings among both references, appellants’ arguments appear to approach the
combinability issue from combining structures where the issue is really the combinability of the
respective teachings. Both references relate to host computer systems in a computer network and
their respective management of so-called peripheral devices or elements. In view of the
foregoing, we are not persuaded by appellants’ brute force argument at the middle of page 14 of
the Brief that the examiner has failed to demonstrate any motivation or incentive in the prior art
to combine and modify the respective references. Even at page 5 of the Answer, the examiner
correlates the static assignment and dynamic assignment of respective physical elements in
Bakke to the correlated teachings in Shah, which relate directly to some features claimed.
Lastly, appellants’ discussion with respect to virtual elements and service levels at
pages 2 and 3 of the Reply Brief are unpersuasive of patentability.
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