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| Authored by: lnuss on Monday, April 22 2013 @ 09:13 PM EDT |
Ordinary skill was originally written in the days when skills such as carpentry
and blacksmithing were among the common "arts." So I'd think that it
meant something most people in the relevant profession could do, meaning you
don't have to have a specially gifted programmer, since that's not
"ordinary."
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Larry N.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: dio gratia on Monday, April 22 2013 @ 10:06 PM EDT |
184 F.2d 592 INTERNATIONAL STANDARD ELECTRIC CORPORATION v. MARZALL,
Commissioner of Patents. Nos. 10209-10211. United States Court of Appeals
District of Columbia Circuit. Argued March 16, 1950. Decided July 12,
1950.
The question may be stated in another way: how much or
how little skill in automatic telephony must be possessed by the statutory man
whose ability or inability to construct Hatton's devices from his disclosures
determine whether patents will or will not be issued? The appellant says that
because of the complexity of these inventions the statutory person must be and
is an expert in the art. The appellee says the devices are unpatentable if the
average worker cannot fathom them.
The truth is that "any person skilled in
the art" is a relative expression. The degree of skill requisite in such person
varies directly with the complexity of the invention; the more technical and
complicated the device being described, the greater the degree of skill
requisite to understanding the disclosure and constructing the machine
therefrom.
This was convincingly stated and clearly held in A. B. Dick
Company v. Barnett, D. C.S.D.N.Y., 1922, 287 F. 573, 577-578, an infringement
suit, where it was said:
"* * * The phrase is always relative. Some patents
are addressed to mechanical problems of a minor order. It may well be that the
man skilled in the art in such instances may be even a journeyman. But this
stencil art really concerns itself with large production, running into thousands
and hundreds of thousands of sheets, and in such an art, where chemical
ingredients or units are employed, it would be quite deterrent of inventive
enterprise if it were held that the chemist was too high in the scale, and that
if one below that equipment were to fail, then the patent which the chemist
found operative must be held to be inoperative, because the court has reached
down far enough to find that one not a chemist is the `man skilled in the
art.'"
You could note the appeals court in International v.
Marzall placed the burden of proof on the patentee to determine whether or not
disclosure was sufficient for one of ordinary skill in the art.
The
dissenting opinion makes for interesting reading. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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| Authored by: MadTom1999 on Tuesday, April 23 2013 @ 02:22 AM EDT |
I'd call someone Skilled in programming when they know over 50% of the basics.
So yes, 20-30 years experience.
I've been doing it 40 years and have yet to see a patent that, if coherent, is
not obvious.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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