Appeal 2007-0241
Application 09/931,296
As Appellants’ own remarks (Reply Br. 3:14-18) recognize, however,
the engineering models of Bentley are comprised of a plurality of
components, each of which includes a program for interpreting and
modifying the component data values. (Bentley, col. 2, ll. 20-29, col. 4, ll.
52-65, and col. 17, ll. 16-41). While Appellants’ arguments (Br. 7-8)
attempt to distinguish the programs stored by Bentley from those claimed, it
is our view that those arguments are not commensurate with the scope of the
claims. We find no language in the appealed claims which requires that the
claimed stored programs be externally accessible to execute particular tasks
as asserted by Appellants. Conversely, we would add, there is nothing in the
language of the appealed claims which precludes the stored programs from
being interpretive programs which operate internally to modify the database
components, such as those characterized as such by Appellants in Bentley.
It is our opinion that Appellants’ arguments improperly attempt to narrow
the scope of the claim by implicitly adding disclosed limitations which have
no basis in the claim. See In re Morris, 127 F.3d 1048, 1054-55, 44
USPQ2d 1023, 1027-28 (Fed. Cir. 1997).
We further find to be without merit Appellants’ related contention
(Br. 8; Reply Br. 2) that any programs that might be stored in the database of
Bentley are not “legacy programs” as described in Appellants’ disclosure.
We find it noteworthy that Appellants’ arguments in the Briefs have pointed
to no precise definition of the terminology “legacy programs” in their
disclosure. Our review of Appellants’ specification reveals that the wording
“legacy programs” is discussed in the context of programs “that have been
developed throughout history” (Specification 1:8 and 5:9) and of a software
facility “that contains a chronology of the development of software over
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