Appeal 2006-0342
Application 09/944,893
concludes that Pogue’s intelligent devices meet the definition of an active
network as defined in the Specification (9: 16-21) (Answer 7-8).
In the Reply Brief, Appellants point out the Examiner states that
Pogue does not disclose encrypting data or an active network (i.e., with
respect to new grounds of rejection, Pogue in view of Tennenhouse,
discussed infra) (see Answer 6, ¶ 2, first line, emphasis added). Appellants
restate their argument that the Examiner has impermissibly relied upon
hindsight in formulating the rejection (Reply Br. 2-4).
At the outset, we do not agree with the Examiner’s statement (made in
applying the new grounds of rejection) that Pogue does not disclose an
active network (see Answer 6, ¶ 2). We note the Examiner’s statement
directly contravenes the earlier position the Examiner took in rejecting
representative claim 1 as being unpatentable over Pogue in view of Daniels
(see Answer 3). We find the Examiner was correct in the first instance. In
particular, we agree with the Examiner’s first position that Pogue’s
disclosure of “intelligent nodes” meets the language of the claim that recites
an “active network” (claim 1). We note Pogue discloses the capabilities of
“intelligent nodes” as follows:
Intelligent nodes generally have some level of microprocessing
power that can be made available for controlling some aspect of
the node's interaction with the network data bus, while a dumb
node would generally have either no processing power or no
available processing power. Preferably, the interface circuit can
be configured to recognize whether its associated node is
intelligent or dumb, transfer some portion of the data bus
control functions to the node if the node is intelligent, and
maintain substantially all of the data bus controls within the
interface unit (or some other portion of the network data bus) if
the node is determined to be dumb.
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