Appeal 2007-1114
Application 10/314,687
With respect to independent claim 26, Appellants contend that Yoo
does not teach every element of the claimed invention and requests an
affidavit from the Examiner (Br. 17). Again, we find no need for an
affidavit for what is taught or fairly suggested by Yoo. Appellants argue
that the method need not be implemented by a computer and that Yoo does
not teach a computer for all the claimed elements (Br. 17). We find that the
Examiner has set forth a sufficient rational why it would have been obvious
to one skilled in the art at the time of the invention to have used stored
computer instructions for the recited functions. (Answer 6 and 18-21). We
find the Examiner’s rejection sufficient to establish a prima facie case of
obviousness. Appellants contend that the Examiner has not shown that Yoo
teaches “enabling an optical switch to switch a second portion of the optical
signal away from the switching node upon determining from the header that
the optical signal is not destined for the switching node.” The Examiner
relies upon figures 6 and 7 and column 10 of Yoo to teach that the larger
part of the optical signal is delayed and ready to be forwarded to the switch
fabric now set up according to the header information. We agree with the
Examiner that Yoo teaches this limitation. Therefore, we do not find that
Appellants have shown error in the Examiner’s initial showing of
obviousness, and we will sustain the rejection of independent claim 26.
With respect to dependent claims 27-28, Appellants appear to contend
that since the Examiner has relied upon a single reference under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103 the rejection is deficient since all of the express elements are not
shown in Yoo (Br. 18-19). We cannot agree with Appellants and do not find
this argument persuasive of an error in the prima facie case of obviousness
of dependent claims 27-28. With respect to generating the bypass control
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