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Microsoft Seeks Patent On Virtual Desktop Pager
ihabawad writes "Microsoft has a patent on file for this really cool new technology called 'virtual desktops' where you see a 'pager' on the screen. Read all about it by searching under "Published Applications" for patent #20030189597 at the US Patent and Trademark Office. You know, I had a dream that I was using such a thing once; what was it called? -- yes, FvwmPager! Weird, eh?"
It's crap, but it does provide the same functionality
$ strings FTP.EXE | grep Copyright
@(#) Copyright (c) 1983 The Regents of the University of California.
to the Patent Office! Because you just know they don't read slashdot.... if they did, they wouldn't approve half the patents they approve.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Someone at the patent office needs to wake up and smell the coffee. We are going to have a situation like the landrush on domain names as a few bottom feeders run off and patent every idea in the book, and if the past is any indication, the patent office will grant patents on whoever is the first to show up, regardless of prior developments or use.
"Would you, could you, with a goat?" Dr Seuss
Microsoft reminds me of that kid who always has to be "reminded" of the rules whenever he plays a game with the other kids...
"No Billy, that's not your toy. That's FVWM's toy. Say you're sorry!"
I guess people just really don't care today about another foolish USPTO flub... in MSs' favor no less. huh. news they call it.
Please, do not read this sig
Bill's got a real knack for stealing other people's ideas, claiming them for his own and making money from them... Xwindows anyone?
Results of Search in 1790-2003 db for:
PN/20030189597: 0 patents.
Wasn't there also something like "wintop" in some NT3.51 resource kit, in addition to Fvwm pager (and possbily some others)?
methinks that prior art is going to be a concern for msft.
twm, the window manager from whence all others came - has a pager concept, too.
... hi bingo
Those of you who don't want to search for the document, this is the direct URL:
1 =P TO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PG01&p=1&u=/netahtml/PTO/srchnu m.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1='20030189597'.PGNR.&OS=DN/2 0030189597&RS=DN/20030189597
http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect
It took ages to find it... *sigh*
-huha
... patents idea with lots of prior art.
News at 11.
...the patent can't be granted because there's another piece of software that used that same pager-thingy before the patent was filed?
this is ridiculous. I've seen about 10 - 20 different implementations of virtual desktop pagers. many in unix enviornments and many on the windows ones as well. ranging from gpled to freeware to shareware. is microsoft stupid or what? i hope they crash burn in hell and see hundreds more viruses for their software.
-Jonathan c.
I'm willing to admit that I'm old enough to remember (and use) vtwm, or Virtual Tom's Window Manager. A version of the venerable twm that added virtual desktops.
This was circa 1990, even before fvwm. I think xrooms was earlier still.
"The cost of freedom is eternal vigilance." -Thomas Jefferson
I use a program called CodeTek Virtual Desktop for Mac OSX, and the abstract in that application sounds an awful lot like it.
I'm sure there are differences, but is this patent, if it is awarded, going to allow Microsoft to send C&D letters to every company and organization that has been providing virtual desktop software for years, regardless of platform?
How could such a thing happen?
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
Write a well thought-out email or better snail mail to the US Patent Office that explains the prior art and why this patent should not be granted. The more people do this, the better!
dont read the patent. if you later write a pager like program which infriges the patent you are in for a tough ride as you infriged it willfuly.
Even in a patent systems as f***** up as USPTO this ought to be laughed out. But who knows, money talks laoder than facts over there
I remember seeing them on the Apple II and on DOS text displays.
Geez, can't you post the link instead of us having to copy+paste? http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=P TO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PG01&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2F srchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=%2220030189597%22.PGN R.&OS=DN/20030189597&RS=DN/20030189597
You know, I had a dream that I was using such a thing once; what was it called? -- yes, FvwmPager! Weird, eh?
Can a dream constitute prior art?
-kgj
-kgj
Ah, but you don't understand. MS's patent uses xml! That's makes it sufficiently different from all previous desktop pagers. :)
Push the button Max!!!!
This is available in XP as a power toy.
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/downloads/
Works fine I guess... never really got used to it myself.
This surprises you why?
Bill is a firm believer in the fact that you don't get ahead in business by doing the "right thing."
It's a sad statement.
I do not fear computers. I fear the lack of them. Isaac Asimov (1920 - 1992)
They have *applied* for this patent, so they don't actually have it yet. The poster needs to read a bit more before frothing at the mouth.
This means that the USPTO could still be contacted and instances of prior art be submitted.
It is interesting that they don't cite any references in their application. But if you do a quick search for "virtual desktop" you'll get a dozen results with dozens more references. This patent application should be thrown out pretty quickly. This patent was filed in 2002, while a quick search shows references in the 1987 to 1995 time frame.
Thank you for your application fees. Don't call us, we'll call you.
I have had good success with Deskwin.It can be found here. http://www.yipton.net
Doesn't make it that much better, but at least make sure you're ranting about the right thing.
...but has Microsoft actually, finally, produced an operating system that is capable of such breakthrough technology?
If so, good for them. The rare occasions when I have to get work done on a Microsoft operating system will be slightly less painful.
I know the PTO people have good hearts. They just need a few more domain experts.
A method for a user to preview multiple virtual desktops in a graphical user interface is described. The method comprises receiving an indication from a user to preview the multiple virtual desktops and displaying multiple panes on the display. Each pane contains a scaled virtual desktop having dimensions that are proportionally less than the dimensions of a corresponding full-size virtual desktop. Each scaled virtual desktop displays with one or more scaled application windows as shadows if the corresponding full-size virtual desktop has one or more corresponding application windows that are active.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
I actually registered a copy of enable Virtual Desktop, one of the best vdm's and pagers out there for any operating system as far as i'm concerned.
Wtf, is there a way for us to comment on the patent by sending all this prior art somewhere?
-T
Old truckers never die, they just get a new peterbilt
(Gets out Soapbox) So why don't we give the USPTO and Congress a good old fashioned snail mail slashdotting and try to convince them that while software copyrights on source code is fine, that software patents are patently stupid.
C'mon - who's with me? Anyone want to step up and coordinate this effort?
Let's write letters and Slashdot the USPTO! And the US Senate! And The House! Here's the USPTO Mailing address -
U.S. Patent and Trademark Office
USPTO Contact Center (UCC)
Crystal Plaza 3, Room 2C02
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, VA 22313-1450
http://www.senate.gov for finding your state's senator. http://www.house.gov for finding your district's representative.
Open source really needs some dedicated lawyers.
Open source should be patenting every new idea that comes up in open source projects, licence them for companies like M$ to provide fundings for further open source development.
It isn't a patent yet. Search for applications rather than patents.
Is this the same thing that KDE, Gnome and other window managers use for Unix-like OS's? If so, it sounds like just another evil move by M$ to kill open source OS's. When did Windows ever use virtual desktops in the past?
Sorry, but what does it mean to "lose the plot"? Is it like losing track of the story? Not being a wise@$$, just wondering what you mean exactly.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
How do you report prioor Art to the US Patent office? Or draw trhere attention to it? If there was a case for doing so this would be it!
Web Sig: Eddy Currents
I used a program in Windows to do this years ago although I forget its name [may have been part of Windows Blinds or that popular shell replacement *I have mental blocks tonight apparently so this is anonymous heh*].
I thought OpenLook had a Virtual window manager before fvwm... but I am to lazy to look it up.
Ah, and this is what we call the "martyr complex." Fascinating specimen, isn't it?
From the document:
The figure is a sketch that clearly shows a KDE desktop. So they seem to think they have somehow improved the idea of virtual desktops. Of course, I was not able to see anything in the application that looked very new to me.
I'm sure the patent will be granted, MS will sue someone, then the FSF or some other body will get involved and 5 years from now some judge wil rule against MS and it will be the end.
Right? Nothing to worry about. At least that's what the Microsoft drones here always say when Microsoft patents some obvious technology. Who do they need protection from? Oh that's right. The people who actually invented this like 10 years ago.
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
I was looking through the patent application pdf at (http://www.dagsavisen.no/innenriks/apor/2003/06/7 39300.shtml)
On page2. Isnt that a gnome and KDE screendump? You can clearly see the foot and the KDE logo in the right bottom corner.
How is it possible to file a patent on someone elses technology, and use a picture of their product to describe it?
Just the way it should be in a Communist society.
From the USPTO abstract:
A method for a user to preview multiple virtual desktops in a graphical user interface is described. The method comprises receiving an indication from a user to preview the multiple virtual desktops and displaying multiple panes on the display. Each pane contains a scaled virtual desktop having dimensions that are proportionally less than the dimensions of a corresponding full-size virtual desktop. Each scaled virtual desktop displays with one or more scaled application windows as shadows if the corresponding full-size virtual desktop has one or more corresponding application windows that are active.
This really sounds similar to Apple's Expose with its ability to display multiple windows. And it is Expose if you are running a bunch of emulators on a Mac and each "window" is an emulated desktop.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
Another poorly-chosen article title. To most people, this is a "pager". And here is a link to the actual patent application, rather than a generic link to the patent office.
Slashdot quality declines as the number of hot grits posts decreases. - Provolt's Law, Apr-09-2005
fvwm was doing this in 1993!
Web Sig: Eddy Currents
The way it's described in the patent, the 'preview' of all of the desktops is hidden until the user specifically triggers it, whereas all the other virtual desktops I'm familiar with have an omnipresent preview on your current desktop.
Of course, this is exactly the kind of trivial difference that disqualifies it from being 'new and non-obvious', so it still deserves to get laughed out of the Patent Office...
Patents should not apply to Software.
Time to create a new lobby to fight for change of laws.
Unfortunately, since I had to use windows for many years before finally getting into Linux, I was used to NOT having this functionality - I just keep my windows organised on one desktop through use of *gasp* minimize, maximize, tile, cascade, etc.
I'm so used to this, that one of the first things I do when I install/configure Linux is to disable the pager in whatever window manager I'm using since I won't be using it anyway!
If software businesses end up patenting everything, then you can still use the idea in a GNU (free) software, right?
The patents are only prohibitive if you charge for your software, is that correct?
In that case, wouldn't pretty much all software become GPL? Since no one but the BIG software vendors could possibly pay all the patents included in their software, they would end up having to charge an arm and a leg for the software they produce, and since no one would buy it at that price, the GNU project would quickly become THE software industry.
I'm probably all wrong, can someone explain?
I don't know the meaning of the word 'don't' - J
It appears that MS also describes a full-screen multi-desktop preview. Was anyone able to view the images associated with the application?
It's the on with Enlightenment 0.16 where you can see, if you want, the entire desktop with the actuel application !
Ceci n'est pas une Signature !
It would be interesting to see if this actually has effect; you would expect thats how the US Patent office *should* be operating.
Patent Application submitted
Prior art vendors notice application
Prior art shown to patent office
Patent Application declined due to prior art
Seems reasonable?
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
Heck, if enough people inform them of the substantial amount of prior art relating to this patent, and the sheer length of time it has been in use (at LEAST 12 years), perhaps they may take notice.
... you should too.
Software using this has got to go back around 10 years or so... what have we got:
Sun Microsystems OpenLook Virtual Window Manager (olvwm)... in use prior to 1992
FVWM... in use prior to 1994 (cant find exact date)
any more that date back a reasonable time?
I've already sent a message to 'usptoinfo@uspto.gov' with the subject Patent '#20030189597 Virtual desktop manager'
That's not the biggest issue. This has global repercussions since the US, although it has "lost the plot" is also the most influential country in the world at present and although we are wont to deny it, most western coutries follow the US's lead. It follows that the US has an obligation to us all.
So I say to you, yes, by all means be the world's police force. Yes, try to enforce peace with your heavy handed approach. OK, get involved with anything going on in the world as if you are some sort of predestined saviour, but for fuck's sake get some perspective or nobody will ever take you seriously enough to like you.
Resistance is futile. Reactance buggers it up.
Ian
since Darl thinks pagers are a derivate of unixware
- I choked on the red pill and now I'm stuck in limbo
Since the USPTO is merely a tool of corporate pigopolists you can't expect it to acknowledge prior art in free software.
However, you could hit them with the fact that CDE implemented virtual screens.
Perhaps you are forgetting the current patent licensing they started enforcing with the makers of compact flash and other digital media for the DOS filesytem?
I wrote it sometime during the fall of 2001; I don't remember exactly when, but it was last updated Jan 23 2002.
Of course, X pagers had been around long before this one... can the public submit prior art to the USPTO and get MS's patent denied?
That was not the right link :)
:)
e nt_number=20030189597&Submit.x=14&Submit.y=7&Submi t=Get+the+PDF
Copy/Paste in Gnome 2.4 is broken
This is the patent in PDF: http://www.pat2pdf.com/cgi-bin/patent_pdf.cgi?pat
But they do use a Gnome and KDE screendump to illustrate the patent on page 2.
Here is the link to the Patent Protest Document.
By innovate I mean they would have had to have actually produced something original at some point in the last couple of decades. Well, at least until the Patent Office took Microsoft's definition of innovation on board that is.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
Prior to fvwm, I used this in olvwm - Open Look Virtual Window Manager. Open Look was what Sun used before they had whatever lobotomy led them to believe CDE was something anyone wanted, and olvwm was a 'virtual' version that you could get separately. I seem to recall using it back in '93-'95 or so, but it might have been a year or two later than that...
"They haven't. They don't do business that way."
It may be true that they haven't and perhaps are not currently doing business this way. But when asked why they wouldn't return the US$15Bn in cash they had to their shareholders in the form of larger dividends, the answer was that they needed it for their legal department.
So, perhaps their business strategy is going to be adapted in the future. You would concede that this is possible-- no?
And send it to the US Patent and Trademark Office. stating the fact that there are prior art out there and this patent 20030189597 should not be issued.
Get Movie Posters
Isn't that just MSN Messenger with a skin? I think Yahoo better counter sue.
You say things that offend me and I can deal with it. Can you?
That seems really lame and an abuse of the patent office to me. Microsoft should get shot down over this; this is a clear case of them trying to get a patent on something which has been around for quite a while (i.e. prior art).
I may also have the wrong impression about this patent, but it appears uspto.gov is slashdotted atm... (!)
I wonder if I still have time to patent breathing so everyone on the planet will have to adhere to my cease & desist demands and stop breathing or pay me royalties! Bwahahahaha.
Actually, I think I will only charge Bill Gates for the breathing one and give the rest of the world a freebie.
Rican
Want a free iPod?
For a patent application, the applicant attempts to include everything under the sun under their claims. Of course, it's unclear how throughly the patent office will go through their claims, but it's not a given that what MS has claimed is what they're going to get. They may end up with nothing, or with claims so specific that they're nigh useless.
GET YOUR WEAPONS READY! --DR.LIGHT
Kind of like Enlightenment has one? Or am I mistaken/confused there?
Be careful, they will say you have a Moral Superiority complex.
realkiwi
The abstract is a general summary and can be misleading. Take a close look at the claims section. A patent only covers what is in the claims, not the abstract. The claims could be broad or narrow. I'll try to find a link to patent basics for folks. Then if you wish to invalidate a patent, or application, you'll be more effective. (PS I have about a dozen patents on mechanisms and read patents on a daily basis. Can't say they are my favorite bedtime reading).
- buy companies that have the patent, or
- armtwist them into cross-patent license agreements.
Both are much quicker than actually fighting a patent lawsuit.- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
I was browsing around Microsofts site awhile ago, and came accross this application.
It does have some nice features, though I don't think it is nearly as robust as the OSS version.
One of the biggest problems that I have using it is if I have any office application open and switch desktops, I lose all of my buttons/toolbars in the apps.
The other annoying thing is that you can't cycle through the desktops, it lets you cycle through applications on all desktops, but not the actual desktops. Strange and annoying, yet I still use it from time to time.
Anyone else actually use this product? I think it was grouped into the WindowsXP powertoys section.
Later,
Just another Farmer
Just your average Farmer
Using pat2pdf, I got a PDF of the whole document including the images. If anyone has a place to host this, I'll email it to them.
Some of the illustrations show a gnome display right down to the foot. What Microsoft seems to be trying to claim is...
1) When you preview, then entire screen is filed with tiled preview images large enough so you can really see what is in each window.
2) The mini-images on the toolbar have the same background properties as the full-scale window.
Not the most innovative patent in the world, but not a slimy attempt to patent the work of others either.
Just my 2 cents.
Geoff "Mandrake" Harrison
Some Random UI Hacker
Since you should actually be reading the independent claims: The embodiments of the invention in which an exclusive property or privilege is claimed are defined as follows: 1. Method for presenting multiple virtual desktops in a single graphical user interface formed on a display of a computer system, the display having a first periphery and a second periphery, the method comprising: receiving an indication from a user to preview the multiple virtual desktops; and displaying multiple panes occupying at least the first periphery of the display, each pane containing a scaled virtual desktop having dimensions that are proportionally less than the dimensions of a corresponding full-size virtual desktop, each scaled virtual desktop being displayed with one or more scaled application windows if the corresponding full-size virtual desktop has one or more corresponding application windows that are active. 7. Computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions of performing a method for presenting multiple virtual desktops in a single graphical user interface formed on a display of a computer system, the display having a first periphery and a second periphery, the method comprising: receiving an indication from a user to preview the multiple virtual desktops; and displaying multiple panes occupying at least the first periphery of the display, each pane containing a scaled virtual desktop having dimensions that are proportionally less than the dimensions of a corresponding full-size virtual desktop, each scaled virtual desktop being displayed with one or more scaled application windows if the corresponding full-size virtual desktop has one or more corresponding application windows that are active. 8. Method for sharing applications across multiple virtual desktops in a graphical user interface being presented on a display of a computer system, the method comprising: receiving an indication from a user to share an application window; and displaying a button representing the application window in a first virtual desktop in which the application window is opened, the button being displayed in other virtual desktops besides the first virtual desktop in which the application window is opened and being selectable from any virtual desktop to switch from another running application window to the application window. ETC....
They should be fined for such arrogance. What's the deficit at now?
Last one in jail is a fascist.
I care not for your silly "first post." It contains no calories and therefore is of no interest to me.
This "frosty piss" you malnourished nerds speak of, however, intrigues me. What is its nutritional value, and more importantly, does it contain cholesterol?
FATMOUSE MUST FEED.
-
FATMOUSE MUST FEED.
this is a patent application, not an actual patent. All patents filed after the near end of 2000 are pubished 18 months after they were filed. This is a good thing, as examiners can now search this database of prior art, which is substantially larger than the current USPTO patent database.
As this is only an application, it does not have patent protection.
Bring back the old version of slashdot.
The Borland C compiler for Windows 3.1 shipped with a pager in the early 1990's. It was called "amish desktop" if memory serves. That was over 10 years ago. Talk about prior art!
In 1993 when I set up my first Linux box, I remember running a clone of Sun's OLVM (Open Look Virtual Window Manager) which provided this functionality.
At this point in time, Windows 3.11 was the extent of the offering from Microsoft.
I can guarantee that at least Sun had this before Microsoft had barely figured out how to make multiple windows on screen.
I wouldn't be at all surprised to discover that like damned near everything else about GUIs, someone at PARC did this ages before that.
Lets email the contacts listed on the patent:
Bret Paul Anderson
Kelly Elizabeth Rollin
Daniel J. Shapiro
Can someone find those addresses?
And lets ask them how they can sleep at night attempting to patent something like this?
Surely there are other ideas in the open source world that are worth patenting, just to avoid such issues in the future.
This is a patent application. The story poster says that in his own comment.
OSS is mentioned in the specification, perhaps you should be less paranoid.
Bring back the old version of slashdot.
on my BOB virtual desktop.
-------- In Soviet Russia, "Soviet Russia" sigs hate Slashdot.
> version patenting it, because 99% of potential users of something like
> this would be locked out.
That's the beauty of it!
I am not embarrased to admit that I used uwm, circa 1989, with the default gray weave background (theme!). It is still the cleanest desktop ever designed and arguably the best. When I started using twm I was amazed at how ornate it was.
Reading this Micro$oft patent application makes me see red.
an ill wind that blows no good
Don't recall the exact name, but ran on MS DOS 4.x, or PC Dos, or DR DOS. Might have been called VirtuaDesk386... Was a long long time ago, and worked, at the time... (Maybe DeskPro386? Man there are sure a lot of cobwebs up here....)
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
MS filed for the virtual bluescreen
desktop patent
Ballmer patents life itself... Sorry, guess we're screwed then.
Best death? What, die from a naked lady avalanche?
Microsoft suits patent the crack pipe.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
I hope you're kidding. Not only is the USPTO generally incompetent, they're generally overworked to the point that they have something like half an hour to research a given application. They most certainly will NOT be spending 18 months researching this.
The number of ridiculous patents being granted is stunning, and given the crack MS legal team, I have no doubt this one will too.
If I had means of collecting bets from /. readers, I'd propose a bet.
I wonder how this fits in with Microsoft's "Freedom to Innovate." I also noticed that on that site, it describes the Freedom to Innovate Network (FIN) as a "grassroots" network. I don't think the word grassroots is often used with propaganda efforts started by multi-billion dollar companies.
Freedom to Innovate
Please excuse my English. I am American.
It should also be pointed out that many companies use patents as a measure of their innovative productivity. If you get a bunch of patents for stuff, even if you never enforce them, you can tell your investors that you create a gazillion patents and they will be happy. Also, when it comes to comparing open source productivity versus proprietary it will be used. "Proprietary companies make X patents per year while the entire open source community make X/1000."
When some tech company applies for a software patent, the USPTO should post the application to a specially created website, along with all relevant details. They should then post a reward -- $50 or whatever -- to each person who submits a unique instance of valid prior art, maybe up to 3 instances to keep it cheap. Then if after a certain number of days, like 30 or 60 or whatever, the patent review processor takes the information that has been submitted about the patent and uses that to *help* determine if the patent should even be awarded.
I think this could help avoid 99% of blatant patent abuse problems.
"To make a mistake is only human; to persist in a mistake is idiotic." Cicero
How do you tell the USPTO?
There is some e-mail direction, you must send a snail-mail, have to go in person, to present some prior art and fight this patent?
I believe that they are actually trying to patent the preview button, as found in the XP virtual desktop powertoy. I thought it was quite a good idea when I saw it, quite like the apple expose function, although it is dog slow and flawed in its implementation. It's certainly a different take on the virtual desktop manager solution than the ubiquitous preview panes that many people have already pointed out have been found on Linux window managers for years now.
This approach (make a buck now, have somone else handle consequences) is rather common in the government; Even presidents have shown no qualms about turning dubious bills into bad law. Who cares if a law is later repealed as unconstitutional? THEY give a shit!
Those who are talking about the old x-windows multiple desktop switch tools are correct: and Microsoft is well aware of them. They are claiming a particular version where there is a tray icon (without preview) that summons a dialog which shows all the desktops in scaled format for selection. I use the alt-tab powertoy that I'm pretty sure this is based on: as I alt-tab I see a reduced picture of the app I'm selecting to (except my X-Window client, which it can't read).
Personally, I don't see this as a patentable advance, but they are claiming that showing a full rendition of the desktop in reduced form is different from showing shaded areas where the windows are.
Sig under construction since 1998.
Did you send a letter to the law firm listed on the application?
...is being able to easily tell which windows are which. If you look at the related work section, it ends up saying that the similarity of the window representations in the pager is confusing, and that is what must be fixed. So they have added something to make it easier to identify each window.
Kinda like how a number of pagers show window names or grab a scaled view of the window contents continuously. And have been doing so for years. So yeah, I would call it invalid in a heartbeat.
-Lars
The abstract doesn't say that they are trying to patent a virtual desktop switcher. They are trying to patent a way of displaying all virtual desktops to the user, as scaled down versions.
For example, if you are running 4 virtual desktops, and you indicate you want to see all your desktops, your screen would be seperated into 4 sections, each displaying a smaller version of each desktop complete with the apps that are running on them.
This is NOT the same thing as the Gnome/KDE applets that let you click to change desktops...
no joke
I work as an examiner.
The claims presented in this application will likely be signifigantly different if it becomes allowed.
Examiners usually have 10-40 hours based on paygrade to fully examine a case. Keep in mind experts don't need as much time to search, and unless you have a proper legal background to understand the metes and bounds, you may not realize how narrow or broad the claims actually are.
I can not comment on office policy, or validity of the claims for this, or any other patent application.
Bring back the old version of slashdot.
So you have an uptime longer than a year on a Win2K box? I assume that means you haven't patched in the past year. ie. 2003 "The Year of the Worm"... Please patch that box and take it off of your network now. You are either an idiot or a liar.
Un-news
Okay, I didn't want to read through the naked patent office article, so I looked for a news story synopsis. Went to news.google.com, looked for "patent microsoft pager" .. and all it gave me was a link .. back to Slashdot. We're doomed.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
here.
If anyone is dedicated to going through with this thing,
we should be able to stop this patent from being granted.
You're just cranky because you haven't had your afternoon nap.
The default is CMD-OPT (1-9) to switch between the desktops. You can move running application windows around to each desktop and flip (or swirl or fade-in, etc) around. It is very much flavored after the same offerings that have been on Linux for many years now.
My only complaint w/ it is that I can't bring a running application and it's windows into the current desktop (directly). All the desktops are common as well -- it would be nice to actually have each desktop unique w/ its own file structure. Perhaps that is what Microsoft has a patent on?
I have been using JSPager which does exactly what this patent says. I have used it on my Windows boxes since way before 2002. Dare I say, 'Patently Ridiculous'
Think: time zones. HTH.
Wouldn't it have been nice if the submitter, who obviously had to find the patent for themselves, had provided a handy link in the story submission? Or maybe he just wanted us to have to go through the trouble of finding it like he did?
This page has pdf's of patent office forms, including one about prior art. The USPTO website also seems to suggest that prior art is something that has been patented in this example.
If people really care about this and aren't just into recreational bitching, then write the patent office a letter with the appropriate details so that the clerks at least have the opportunity of being made aware of this stuff.
I hope you're not pretending to be evil while secretly being good. That would be dishonest.
May I remind you it's a patent application and not a granted patent : it means it is not yet evaluated (in technical term : examined) by the USPTO (whatever you're thinking of the USPTO quality).
The abstract is only informational. If you want to know the scope of the invention M$ wants to protect, please read the claims.
They're not actually trying to patent virtual desktops, they're trying to patent a pager with a preview of each desktop. You know, kind of like Gnome has (and probably KDE as well; can't remember).
No, they're not - they're actually showing the Gnome pager as prior art (Figure 1c). You have to go up to Figure 5 to see what they're actually claiming: a method to preview your virtual desktops on the entire display. So you'd click a button on your pager to get, say, all your 2x2 desktops displayed simultaneously at half size. The undeniable advantage is that at half-size you'll see a lot more detail than at pager (say, 1/16) size.
If anyone knows of prior art specifically relating to this kind of preview, please *do* contact the patent office. This isn't going to be so easy to defeat as some here are spouting off without bothering to look at the blasted thing. Give the MS-lawyers some credit - they may be evil, but stupid they're not.
Be faithful to your obsessions. Identify them and be faithful to them, let them guide you like a sleepwalker. JG Ballard
a thousand /. pussies are posting about how there's nothing you can do, and oh well, the patent office suxbad, now ms r control all r VWM's.
the guy posted a valid link to what everyone is bitching about.
Fetch me a baby, scrawny human servitor.
-
FATMOUSE MUST FEED.
Simply a rare moment of lucidity in the screwed-up life of a technofreak ;o)
;o)
Seriously, I'm not getting at the Merkins. I have friends over there. It just so happens that when those friends and I start chatting, we always end up at the same question: Where the hell is all this going to lead us? It doesn't matter whether the question is patents, Iraq, global politics or religion. The other one that crops up from time to time is how, if so many people feel the same way, do our respective governments manage to screw things up to the point where other countries *and our own people* start laughing at them? After all, these people are supposed to have their finger on the pulse of public opinion. Aren't they?
OK, I'm back to the usual delusional state
Resistance is futile. Reactance buggers it up.
Why do they bother doing this?
Proving prior-art for this is easier than trivial - as we all know how long pagers have been about....so why are MS giving money to the Patent Office for worthless patents ????????
- or is this just some MS guys playing and making their bosses think they are doing a real job?
I think there is a key difference between the KDE, Gnome implementations, Bigdesk for windows etc. and this patent.
Reading the patent document, the key point is that the users hits a key and all the desktops are scaled within the window using animation. So if I have a 3 x 3 virtual desktop and hit the desktop view button, my screen is shrunk to (say) the top left 9th of the screen and 8 other mini desktops become visible. If I select another desktop it zooms towards me filling the screen. They make a number of references to background images and I guess animating 9 different background images for the demo above would look very cool.
I haven't seen this implemented before. The nearest is Mac OS X.3 which allows all application windows to be minimised and switched between, I use it a lot and it is excellent, particularly if you have a number of quicktime movies or similar playing. As I recall, Apple patented this and I think this is Microsoft's answer
prior art?
photosMy Photostream
Isn't it time to create a team+website to seek prior art on each software patent ?
This could be done in a wiki or something of a kind...
IAMAL == I Am Married to A Lawyer? While on the one hand we are happy for you being married and all, on the other hand .. Damn! Did you have to marry a lawyer? Geeks are sometimes desperate but to go fishing with the sharks? ;-)
Dream as if you'll live forever.
Live as if you'll die tomorrow.
~Anonymous~
Can you sue someone for getting a patent they know is invalid simply so that they can sue you?
I mean, if tit ever came down to Microsoft suing RedHat over a desktop pager, I have almost no doubt RedHat could prove, at least to the standards of a civil trial, that Microsoft had KNOWN, absolutely, that their idea was not original.
Then, they had intentionally gotten a patent they knew was invalid. I don't think getting an invalid patent is illegal (possibly defrauding the patent office?) but shouldn't it be illegal to do something like that for the purpose of a lawsuit?
How about people submit the prior art references to the USPTO? There is an explanation of the procedure at the USPTO site (PDF)here
Appendix A of this document has some Usenet postings from over a decade ago discussing who came up with the concept of Virtual Desktops.
It looks like the first virtual window manager for X was developed sometime between 1988 and 1990
i really wonder how many (percentage) patents ms have cooked in her own kitchen all by herself?
Is it possible that MS has implemented virtual desktops functionnality in his labs and not released it since before any above mentionned "prior art" appeared ?
http://www.enablesoftware.com/s .com
http://www.triplu
I currently use the enablesoftware one. It's pretty good.
IANAL but because there are so many other software products that have this, can't it be concidered prior art?
Sounds like the open windows manager half the people here at work use, the rest of us have CDE. The owm guys have a little pager with proportionally scaled replresentations of the other virtual desktops and application windows represented as proportionally sized grey boxes. I'm not sure how old owm is, but I've worked here for over 5 years so it goes back to at least january 1999...
I don't see anything new in the abstract shown in parent post, where is the new thing MS is doing?
It's called "Desktop Pager." It's been around for a while, and it does EXACTLY what microsoft is saying (does a mini-view of each virtual desktop, and you can resize them to whatever size you want). I think the main diff is it doesn't actually display the contents of the windows from each desktop; it displays an icon instead of the contents (so it is not incredibly slow). It's meant to be view at a small view, not a very large one. Works pretty well IMO. I don't use it that much because I can remember what is on each desktop pretty well (I split up desktops by what I'm doing).
The only claim to this patent *application* that appears to me to have any merit at all is the one for the full screen display of the pager. I don't recall ever having seen one of those (but that doesn't mean they didn't exist).
And even that claim is questionable. It appears to me that the FvwmPager might have been able to do that in 1997 with the proper configuration. Some people believe that fvwm2 config files are turing-complete :-)
Question:
Response:
I haven't seen this implemented before.
The first X Windows desktop I remember seeing something like this with was Enlightenment, back in ~1998, whose pager had miniature screenshots of all your other desktops. I'm sure Microsoft is updating the screenshots more frequently and zooming to them more smoothly, but since even Enlightenment's improved version of the pager is too obvious an idea to deserve a patent, in a sane world "Enlightenment + more eye candy" wouldn't stand a chance.
My favorite pager is actually less, but I often use more just out of habit. I don't really see why MS would need to write a pager at all, given that there's not so much command line stuff anymore with Windows.
Full marks to Microsoft for blatent patent abuse.
/. been filled with a ton of wannabe patent attorneys?
And you're 100% wrong. This isn't abuse. They're simply filing a patent. Anybody with enough money can file for a patent. They're not going to be able to use it though. It's unenforceable. Just because they have a patent, doesn't mean that they can use it. Now if they started paying high power attorneys to try to enforce the patent, that's one thing, but just applying means nothing.
Since when has
Their name is right on the patent application. Who knows, we might appeal to their sense of fairness, by showing pager screenshots.
Too bad, they dont have an email address.
Name and Address:
CHRISTENSEN, O'CONNOR, JOHNSON, KINDNESS, PLLC
1420 FIFTH AVENUE
SUITE 2800
SEATTLE
WA
98101-2347
US
... is the earliest implementation of this that I can remember. This was circa 1993, IIRC, i.e. in the days of Windows 3.x. I was running it on a Sun 3/260 running SunOS 4.1.1. It was a cool upgrade from Sun's standard OLWM... I am not sure I can shout PRIOR ART loudly enough on this one...
When companies like Eolas stop trying to sue Microsoft over an obvious technology such as plugins.
You can hardly blame Microsoft for covering its back after these debacles.
david shapiro is listed as one of the patent applicants.
his blog is here
and his email address is danielsh@microsoft.com.
lets stop the speculating and just ask him.
Follow the link on the us patent office, click "images", go page #1, hopla! you will found on the desktop sketch the linux-desktop "gnome" sign on the (presumably) Start button! ;)
I often see the posts on /. generally stating that there ought to be a procedure for the public to raise issues of prior art before the USPTO grants a patent. Well, guess what? there is such a procedure. And it is very very simple.
/. why not do something to help the USPTO do a better job?
... set ... go!
37 C.F.R. 1.291 gives members of the public the right to protest a pending application by simply advising the patent office of any reason why a patent should not issue, including prior art. The essential aspects of this are that you must (a)correctly identify the application; (b)provide a concise explanation of the reason for the protest; and (c)provide a copy of the prior art your protest relies on.
So, rather that the usual pablovian reflex of ranting about this stuff on
Ready
You have to go up to Figure 5 to see what they're actually claiming: a method to preview your virtual desktops on the entire display.
Yeah, actually reading (or just skimming) the application shows that the "invention" is a preview button that preferably lives on the taskbar. You click the button, you get a full-screen preview of all the desktops. Clearly a useful idea, that may not have any specific prior art.
But it still kinda cheeses me. Basically, you take the Enlightenment pager, which already includes dynamic previews, and add a button that scales it up to full screen and back on demand. Useful, but does it require full patent protection?
I mean, I'm all for innovation in interfaces, but does every tiny policy change mean a new patent? What if instead of a button, I prefered the preview panes to pop up when I hover the mouse over the pager? Or maybe have it automatically pop up when I start a new window, so I can set my WM to have me manually place windows, and I can then easily put the new window on any desktop that has room. Dropping the window on a certain section of the preview pane creates a new virtual desktop for that window. Do I get to patent that idea? I spent a whole twenty seconds thinking of it; don't I deserve however many years of protection for my innovation?
It's these kinds of simple-yet-possibly-useful WM policy decisions that make me want to switch to Sawfish, which is scriptable in something like Lisp. But the thought that every ten lines of code I write could be someone's patentable "invention" just annoys me.
The enemies of Democracy are
I recall Desk Overview long ago in IRIX. There was even an IP dispute over some aspects of this widget with another company (who's name I have forgotten). See here for a note a decade old about how cool this thing was. It had (has) several features that the linux pager lacks. Hopefully, IMD4Linux will give them back to me!
Subject: Patents
Patent application #20030189597 - Virtual Desktop Manager
I have been using a facility identical to this both on my Unix/Linux systems and on Windows systems for a (large) number of years.
On Unix/Linux under the X-windows system the facility is best typified by the pager facility of the fvwm Window manager. It has equivallents on all graphical user desktops since the mid 80's
On Windows, a pager called sDesk (Semik's desktop), based on the above mentioned fvwm has been on my desktop since 1999 (it was copyright 1998 by Jan Tomasek)
More information and a picture of my desktop may be seen at: http://richard.pacdat.net/home-office.htm
I trust this will put a stop to the possibility that anyone may patent this facility - it has ample prior art.
richard
Been there, done that, paid for the T-shirt
and didn't get it
So what? If the idea got into "public domain" before the patent claim was made, sorry. It's in public domain, no matter who did it first.
Keep your inventions strictly in secret before you bring your papers to the patent office. Just like my post on 8052 forum about an idea I had got the response: "If you ever planned to patent and build it, sorry, by posting it to this forum you just released your idea to public domain. It's not patentable anymore."
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
A. Microsoft costs the patent office time on this, and that's our money.
B. They cost us, as a community, time.
C. They're gambling on getting it through under radar, and if that happens it'll cost lots of folks money to fight it.
So there's a monetary component to this.
Meanwhile, Microsoft KNOWS they don't have actual title to this, and are submitting it in effort to take title to this idea FRAUDULENTLY, as they KNOW they don't have title.
That sounds to me like slander of title, and is ACTIONABLE, correct?
And while it's hard to figure out who needs to do the actual suing, damages to the community could be set as a fraction of legal fees expected as an average of Microsoft's expenditures on patent actions.
And it would put the fear of God into some of these slanderers of title we've been talking about for the past year(s).
Nice job. It was really innovative the way you invented Open Look.
Oh wait. That was Sun? And they did that about 15 years ago?
Think about it. MS can grab all these bogus patents knowing there is plenty of prior art. (In this case, this has been a feature of Unix desktops before Linux or MS Windows). Now we all know that MS will get these patents. So, small time Linux distributions will not have the money to fight this in court. Would Red Hat or even SuSE/Novell want to fight something like this? Patent away the features of Linux or make it very hard for Linux to add new features. I guess MS feels they cannot just beat Linux on technical merits, so why not beat them on Legal merits?
/. users should just start picking random features and applying for a patent? Could be an easy way to make some cash?
Did Mac OS have a feature like this? If so, for how long? Apple is the only company I see spending the money to fight MS on these silly patents.
It doesn't take much to get a patent now adays`. The Patent office doesn't verify crap. I guess they figure to let the companies fight it out in court.
Maybe a bunch of
American business and the American government is going down the drain fast.
If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land,
it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. -James Madison
Virtual desktops are nothing new in the Unix world and most window managers or desktop environments have this feature. There is a lot of prior art, so we can safely ignore this patent.
... because, you know, if it was taco he probably submitted it 2 or 3 times.
too obvious?
(Then again, I didn't RTFA)
Programming can be fun again. Film at 11.
As do many video games. You can't play an adventure game any more without some kind of cell phone or pager or whatever to communicate with offstage characters. At this rate, some bozo's going to try to patent breathing and it'll sail right through at the Patent Office. Hmmm... "Stop right there, Sonny. No breathing without a consent form from Barney's House of Discount Respiration."
"Is this Winkhorst a nova criminal?" "No just a technical sergeant wanted for interrogation."
Damn, now I must stop using the SCREEN command as it provides me with a virtual desktop ;-)
Lots of people have commented generally about the fact there is massive prior art on virtual desktops controlled with a pager. I'm wondering what the earliest example people know about is. I remember using one on probably Windows/286, and something like OS/2 2.0. And I think I saw it on some old Sun workstations around the same time, or maybe earlier.
But I would not be too surprised if the implementation went back even farther--say to a utility for the first Macs, or on one of those Xerox/Alto prototypes. What's the first thing you know of? And even better, do you have a screenshot of such an early version?
Buy Text Processing in Python
My observation is "better safe than sorry" - grant the patent.
In one story on the Patent office, I recall they collect less fees if the patent is denied.
True or not, the patent office seeks input more from Congress and from lobbyists and almost never considers their actual mission: granting limited monopolies on an implimentation of an idea, so as to encourage publishing specifications (no secrets are taken to the grave).
The office is bloated and serves only itself and their friends in Congress. It's been a long time since the days where a patent on the Cotton Gin was rejected. Today, you can patent cotton and even the seeds.
In some circles it is more important that government agencies are self-financing and lean towards privatization... EVEN if that happens to foster mistakes and even corruption in the patent office... that is PERFECT... such mistakes are not Congress's fault or the patent office for being too loose with patents... OBVIOUSLY the division needs to be completely privatized and spun off right?
As a private entity, the Patent Office could choose more meaningful names.. like Thought Police.
Yeah, you know, I could have swore that Micro$oft was the LAST operating system to gain this feature.... wierd to think they are claiming to be the only inventor and user of said technology.
I mean, does ANYONE still have faith in the Patent Office? Does it still provide ANY functionality other than letting big companies sue everyone? Do they WORK for MicroSCO?
http://www.google.com/profiles/malachid
Am I the only one that remembers winpopup.exe... the network pager that was released in Windows For Workgroups 3.11? This is prior art to all the nVidia and fvwmpager stuff you guys are talking about.
Sometimes its hard to read these forums because people feel like they know they are right, but they only really do a Google search for "web pager" and check the first page for results.
...that there's TONS of prior art available that does exactly what they're describing here.
Starfish Dashboard...
Several different pieces of shareware at the time Dashboard95 came out...
FVWM...
GNOME...
KDE...
Simply put, they shouldn't have filed this one.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
... and sues everyone for usage fees. "With our new Digital Air Management (DAM) system, we'll catch all of those freeloading scofflaws in no time!" said a Microsoft spokesman.
Yeah then I'm gonna patent buttons, scrollbars, windows, ppull down menus, etc.
I've seen win2k boxes with insanely long uptimes. An engineer at a company I used to work for had 3 win2k boxes that controlled the plant machinery and I know they had uptimes of at least 8 months, probably more. However, these machines had no physical connection to the outside world, thus no need to patch or anything. To access those boxes you needed to be in the control room.
Windows can be stable, Linux can be insecure, insightful posts can be offtopic.
All that said, I have to say that the original AC post was retarded.
you're all figments of my deranged imagination
The HP Apollo workstation's I used at university back in the early 90's had virtual desktops...yawn.....
+++ BASELINE REALITY FAILURE+++ +++ PLEASE REBOOT UNIVERSE +++
This application doesn't look like their trying to patent the concept of virtual desktop pagers, but a specific implementation of one. This patent app would fall under the broad cateogory of being an incremental improvement of an existing invention.
... which means Microsoft is now using patents directly as a means of preventing improvement in their competitors products.
Worse, it looks to be broad enough to cover most (perhaps all) possible improvements on the desktop pager
In other words, patents are now being used strategically to do exactly what they purport to not do: to stifle and forbid innovation.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Tell me guys, what happens if someone releases code that is patented under GNU?
Is it illegal to do so? Or is it something like the SCO thing... the end user is liable to pay the patent holder?
Dont make a better sig, you insensitive clod!
I don't know when FVWM came out, but I've been doing virtual desktops first on Solaris and then on Linux using CTWM since at least 1992.
Unfortunately, having read now into the details of this case, it seems to be exactly the sort of thing that the patent system was designed to encourage, and is not an artifact of the digital age or any lack in the patent application/review process.
Their listing of prior art shows an understanding of the field, and they are merely patenting a specific innovation of the proportional preview screen that zooms to/from the individual desktops. I have seen a lot of pagers in my day, dating back over 10 years, but never one that worked in that manner. And that is the key thing of the patent system, to allow for and encourage incremental improvements to existing inventions.
That said, the patent enforcement system may need some examining if any attempt is made to apply this patent in cases of any pager that does not implement the specific improvement listed.
I was trying to visit the USPTO but was hit ith the ugliest colors that made my eyes spin around and jump out of my head. Luckily I was able to hit the back button using some keyboard shortcuts before my eyes rolled too far away...
:P
Who are the USPTO webdesigners, a bunch of monkeys? Sheesh, even my cat has got better sense of colors than USPTO's so called webdesigners!
Seeing as how I got treated yesterday I guess I don't have any more friends "over there" =:-D.
/. is the only place I have seen where some yank will moderate a bland on topic remark as flamebait or troll. Guess they don't teach dialectic in schools there.
And I ain't even from "over here".
Where do I belong?
But
realkiwi
I've used fvwm, enlightenment, Windows, OS X and to a lesser extent OS 9, the Amiga and GEOS and I don't recall ever seeing the preview they describe in 0008 under Summary of the invention. Can anyone point me to prior art on that one?
Darthtuttle
Thought Architect
We'd better be careful with these frequent Patent articles... next thing you know slashdot will be declared a terrorist organization for taking part in the "electronic terrorism" of attacking an official government website.
I will not give in to the terrorists. I will not become fearful.
OS X has had this since its inception as far as I recall, and www.winexpose.com has a add on clone.
sheesh...
Here is the link to the Patent Protest Document.
You cannot protest a patent once the application has been published (look it up). What you are looking for is a Citation of Prior Art. Prior art citations can be sent to the USPTO by anybody, at any time during the validity of the patent. They simply enter the patent file, where they'll be looked at in case of a reexamination request.
Be faithful to your obsessions. Identify them and be faithful to them, let them guide you like a sleepwalker. JG Ballard
What exactly does Microsoft think they are doing? If the patent office doesn't notice the prior art out there I will be less than impressed. Also, IBM has a similar patent but with a different kind of panner. Unfortunately tvtwm "infringes" on both, though it also predates both.
If you look at the NT 4 resource kit from Microsoft itself, you will notice a little app called TopDesk (copyrights held by MS and Sanford Staab) and originally created for Windows NT 3.1 (I thought NT started at 3.5 but I have not kept up with my Ancient History).
It seems like it does all that is described by this new patent. Funny it took them 15 years to get around to filling for the patent.
Yep. I remember stock FVWM came with a 4 display pager. One time I changed it to 3x3 and 4x4 (9 and 16 virtual displays). They become a bit useless after about 3x3 though. It was neat to see how much stuff I could get running on my '486/66 in 1995. It got even crazier when I made each virtual desktop larger than the display size (mice hitting the edge srolled the display). Suddenly you have a *lot* of desktop real estate. Is microsoft not concerned about prior art or is the patent office rubber stamping everything these days?
I filed a patent for a desktop operating system that can facilitate the process of marshalling computer resources across the internet to conduct distributed attacks on corporate websites. It got denied due to the existence of prior art created in Redmond, WA.
There are (were) swm, vuewm, vtwm, tvtwm, mvwm, and more. Some of those date to X11R4, maybe earlier. So we are talking 1989 or maybe earlier.
I really don't understand the "ingenuity" of these patents. These types of patents are all about applying well-known concepts in different contexts, then calling them "inventions." This isn't about inventing anymore, it's about control and money.
Are there any "prior art" websites out there where people could submit ideas?
"Wow, people are actually arguing against patents. They probably don't have a good reason."
Patent Application
The link above points to a patent submission by Bret Anderson (aka MrJukes) on behalf of Microsoft for a Virtual Desktop Manager. Here's a relevent blurb from the patent application itself...
"...each pane containing a scaled virtual desktop having dimensions that are proportionally less than the dimensions of a corresponding full-size virtual desktop, each scaled virtual desktop being displayed with one or more scaled application windows if the corresponding full-size virtual desktop has one or more corresponding application windows that are active."
The patent application was file on April 5, 2002. MrJukes and I have both been writing and writing applications for replacement shells for many years. In 1997/1998, i wrote a shell called Dimension. One of its components that eventually was released by itself (in 1998) was DVWM. It was downloadable from my website between 1998-2002. Below is a link to lokai.net's download page from 2001 (the best i could get via archive.org). Bret Anderson had clear knowledge that this patent application contains prior art. I was definately not the first person to do something like this either.
VWM's and VDM's have been around for a very long time. Enlightement's Pager/VWM/VDM did this at the time as well, however at that point in time, while giving mini-views of the windows on a given desktop, it did not provide a 1-to-1 mini-view like DVWM did to my knowledge (please correct me if i'm wrong).
I believe this to be a pretty low point. A former shell developer lands a job at Microsoft and patents ideas obtained from the shell community and/or elsewhere in free software. I don't know if idea theft is illegal since i didn't patent it myself, but i'm just disgusted that this has happened.
Here's the archive.org view of lokai.net's downloads. You can download the version of DVWM that was hosted at the time which does all the things i describe.
Archive.org view of Lokai.net in 2002
Here is a screenshot of DVWM from 2001.
DVWM Gif
Here is the source to DVWM from 2001.
DVWM Source
Here is DVWM 1.02 in case archive.org fails to work for you.
DVWM Zip
Here is the skinnables.org orphanware page showing DVWM.
Skinnables Orphanware
I'm currently exploring my options to see what if anything i can do about this. I find it to be just flat out wrong. It should be noted that not all things that are wrong are necessarily illegal, but i'll see what i can do.
Don't flame the guy for reading /.
Originally there was twm which as "Tom's Window Manager". When it became the official "default" they reworked it and retro-named it "Tab Window Manager". But Tom had already written some newer virtual window managers, one of which was vtwm "Virtual Tom's Window Manager". He later merged the X.org improvements, rewrote (?) manor portions and renamed it as tvtwm "Tom's Virtual Tab Window Manager". There were several variants which added things like animated buttons or pie menus which used different names like ctvtwm, cvtwm, piewm, etc.
How about writing to the law firm that sent in the application? They are professionals pledged to inform the office of relevant disclosures, right?
USPTO only search *their* db for prior art. Heck, some guy could be sitting in front of a linux desktop that was set up with fvwm pager on it years ago and he would not be expected to notice it as prior art.
Protests by a member of the public against pending applications will be referred to the examiner having charge of the subject matter involved. A protest specifically identifying the application to which the protest is directed will be entered in the application file if: (1) The protest is submitted prior to the publication of the application or the mailing of a notice of allowance under rule 1.311, whichever occurs first; and (2) The protest is either served upon the applicant in accordance with rule 1.248, or filed with the Office in duplicate in the event service is not possible. For more detailed information on protesting a patent, you may visit our Web site at http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/mpep.htm for the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure (MPEP) Chapter 1900.
LiteStep has a module that does Virtual Paging. Does that count?
http://www.litestep.net
I have been using it for about 6+ months now.
Scott Carr
http://saveie6.com/
Is microsoft going to go after Gnome for their 'Workspace Switcher'? Or whatever KDE calls theirs? Software patents suck.
TallGreen CMS hosting
Yes, the "full size preview" is sort of new. However it is an OBVIOUS extension if you assumme a backing store and hardware that can resize the images quickly to the screen. The previous implementations DID NOT HAVE SUCH HARDWARE and thus could not do this.
The Enlightenment preview can be resized to the full screen and it certainly tries WITHIN THE LIMITATIONS OF X to do everything this patent claims.
This is like patenting opaque-drag of windows and claiming it is new because all previous versions of X and Windows dragged only the outline. The reason they dragged the outline was not because nobody thought about moving the window, it is in fact because THE HARDWARE COULD NOT DO IT!!!! In fact "dragging the outline" (or in this case "tiny preview") are the actual innovations, inventions designed to get around hardware limits, when if the hardware was unlimited in speed and power the more obvious solutions (like what they are trying to patent) would have been done.
This has to be refused. Otherwise anybody could patent any obvious idea in software by patenting a method of "doing it the obvious way that we can now do because the hardware is powerful enough". The real inventors of the innovation (virtual desktops in this case) are screwed, forced to continue with the poorer implementation that they did due to hardware limitations.
This is absolutely evil and a new type of patent nonsense that must be stopped now!
So, let me get this straight... They want to patent something they don't use (I don't recall seeing a virtual desktop pager in WinXP's default shell), that's been used for maybe a decade or two before in competing products, that can be emulated with some pain via programs like LiteStep (some Windows programs just plain and simply were not meant to exist in a virtual destop environment), and that they never seemed to want anything to do with?
I'm just sayin', is all. Just trying to make sure I've got most of the facts straight.
Demanding constant attention will only lead to attention.
_They_ (Microsoft) are not doing that. The patent system of the US is doing that.
Christ.
the patent is a lot more specific than just desktop pagers. that's the point of the matter
I've been reading it and have yet to find a significant difference between what it describes and any of a number of virtual pagers I've used over the last 15y. or know have existed over the last twenty. I think if you can tabulate the specific alterations microsoft has that are so innovative and compelling as to warrant a patent, please show us. From what I can read I fail to see anything deserving of note and it is nothing more than a generic description of what we have been accustomed to using for YEARS.
They also have failed to provided anything on that page by way of prior-art investigations.
mefus
In Open Society, GPL Software frees YOU!
Once again, most people don't RTFA and 90% of the discussion believes MS is patenting the idea of virtual desktops, which certainly isn't the case. Now that there's a few threads where people read the patent application and see that the "innovation" is full screen preview of the virtual desktops people say it's useful but "obvious". So if it's both useful and obvious, name one window manager that has this exact feature? None? On the other hand, this is similar to televisions that can preview channels with still frames and you choose which one you want to switch to, but they are different applications.
Is there no way for the public to submit prior art? Or do you just wait until you end up in court, and demonstrate the prior art then?
You cant make anything foolproof, they'll only invent better fools.
Cool, thanks for the lesson! In that case, I agree.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Not if the invention has entered public knowledge, surely?
In NZ, you used to be able to (and still can?) patent something by 'importation' - import something nobody in NZ has ever seen or heard of before, and can patent it. With the advent of modern communications and the Internet, I imagine winning a patent on this basis now is practically impossible.
_They_ (Microsoft) are not doing that. The patent system of the US is doing that.
... presumably ... unintended effect of granting monopoly entitlements; again, the Wright Brothers' story is an excellent example of the US Government's recognition of this fact).
... this is almost certainly a predatory patent filed by Microsoft for the purpose of banning innovation by the free software community.
Both are doing it. The patent system stifles innovation by its very design (a
However, this patent (and similiar ones filed in the past) appear to be a strategic effort by Microsoft specifically to limit the ability of others to innovate in the design of their products. Microsoft does not use a pager on its desktop, whereas X Window managers such as fvwm and KDE have done so for years. There is no rational way to stretch this patent and spin it as an effort by Microsoft to protect its own "innovations" against predatory patents filed by others
Christ.
As an athiest, I doubt he will be of any help to you, grotesque and overhyped movies notwithstanding.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
I think the current logic is that people will take the US seriously when they have a US missile aimed at their face. So it doesn't matter if they like us or not. That's just the line, I don't claim to agree with it. Besides, the US has been the world's policeman for a while now. How do you like it so far?
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Hey Bill I just saw that you're looking to patent Virtual Desktops. I went ahead and checked our documents here and it turns out SCO holds rights tho that functionality that we got from the zergs back in the 70's. Our lawyers are on their way clear this all up. Oh, and thanks for the money for that whole linux thing.
Your Buddy,
-Darl
The maker of the one desktop that doesn't have a pager is now patenting the desktop pager.
WTF!!!
Here's an interesting read on prior art & trademarks.
Acts of Gord
/*drunk.. fix later*/
ctwm and tvtwm were one of the oldest window managers with virtual desktops, derived from one of the oldest X window managers twm (uwm was older).
Here is an interesting family tree of twm descendants, showing the first virtual desktop window managers appearing in 1990/1991.
To be perfectly honest, I just have to accept what is, like it or not, although my last words would probably be "Fire and live with the guilt, arsehole". Or did that go out the window with decency, too? If it wasn't the US it would just be another country with a large ego and resources to burn and to hell with the rest of the world. It just so happens that the US has the firepower. Lovely law to live under, don't you think? I think Dubbya may have had cowboy fantasies when he was younger... I'm just thankful that the president is still, to some measure, answerable to his people. Most Americans I know are sensible folk.
Now we are getting into the realms of flamebait, and this really isn't my view of the American *people* at all, not that my opinion makes any difference or carries any weight. We're also way off topic, so I'll just shut my face ;o)
Resistance is futile. Reactance buggers it up.
See the *twm family tree.
Metamod parent redundant unfair! The reply above his was posted one minute earlier. There's no way this guy could have seen it before he posted his comment.
I am writing the USPTO -
If it is for a specific addition then say so they are trying to patent the whole thing - what a bunch of crap.
They are trying to make so we can't create anything without being sued.
fsck off Microsoft
Central Point Tools for Windows anyone? I still have the 3.5" floppies at home for Win 3.1. That included a vwm of sorts, although I didn't know at the time that's what it was.
Not to mention there are a handful of vwms for the various replacement shells for Windows. Obviously they wouldn't duplicate exactly what MS is attempting to patent.
...if a windows user knows what a pager is :)
and he didn't knew what i'm talking about.
congratulation to the user (mcp) you made it ;)
Exactly.
This should not have been filed.
And who knows this? Only the Geeks.
A Patent Officer is probably someone who hates computers or becomes infuriated at the show of a blue screen - like most poeple who do their jobs - and furthermore doesn't want to know - and subsequently lack information when dealing with applications. This isn't kindy garden. People Sue for MILLIONS over patents.
The Patent office NEEDS TECHNICAL PEOPLE TO EVALUATE TECHNICAL PATENTS [Knowledgeable ones at that]. How the XML one for word processing got passed is beyond me as others were already using the XML standard not created by M$ to do the same thing - so who thought of it first? Thats the real issue with patents is that you think only one person can come up with the idea - well thats just wrong. I am reminded of a time (years ago now) when I wrote an amiga program from the ground up did everything myself - then I released it to the internet thru a news group - couple of days later I get a message back saying that I had ripped this guys idea off and just changed the manual. Rather shocking as that was by no means the case - though two people world wide had managed to come up with the same application concept, and even the same name for it. AMAZING EH! Believe it - It did happen.
This VD patent tells me two things:
1 - Microsoft are abusing patents.
2 - Microsoft just love ripping everyone elses ideas and claiming them as their own.
Both of these have been semi-hearsay till this patent.
Now its patently obvious.
Did you guys see this article? The pager is the least of our worries...
sev
but have you considered the following argument: shut up.
It costs money to submit a patent regardless whether it gets accepted or rejected. They don't get any extra money if it's accepted. So the argument of them not refusing patents because it doesn't make them money is not valid.
Ummm... Anybody else out there remember a little outfit called Quaterdeck? They made this nice little utility called Desqview. Ran under Win3.1 and DOS. Allowed multiple virtual desktops. Doesn't exist anymore, but it can still be found out there on the web.
-- "Never underestimate the power of human stupidity." - R.A.H.
> Reading the patent document, the key point is that the users hits a key and all the desktops
> are scaled within the window using animation. So if I have a 3 x 3 virtual desktop and hit the
> desktop view button, my screen is shrunk to (say) the top left 9th of the screen and 8 other
> mini desktops become visible. If I select another desktop it zooms towards me filling the
> screen. They make a number of references to background images and I guess animating 9
> different background images for the demo above would look very cool.
>I haven't seen this implemented before. The nearest is Mac OS X.3 which allows all
> application windows to be minimised and switched between, I use it a lot and it is excellent,
> particularly if you have a number of quicktime movies or similar playing. As I recall, Apple
> patented this and I think this is Microsoft's answer
This sounds a lot like 3ddesktop, a rather flashy paging program for X11 (well, at least Linux)computers. It's an OpenGL application. When you click a particular button or hotkey, the screen that you're looking at scales down so that you can select another virtual desktop. The desktops can be viewed in several ways (for example, if you have four virtual desktops, you can have them displayed as the faces on a rotating cube). It's not exactly the same thing as you describe, but it's somewhat similar, and I find it interesting.
--
-JC
coder
http://www.jc-news.com/parse.cgi?coding/main
About three years ago, the Australian government did a review of its intellectual property policy. Anyway, one of the proposals was tightening up the "inventiveness test" for patents, as follows:
That should neatly deal with the stupid patents of the type you describe.The entire document is well worth a read, actually. In a lot of ways it's going in the right direction, making patents harder to get, and recommending that Australia not extend its copyright term. Pity that its recommendations will get chucked out the window as part of our "Free Trade Agreement" (which isn't really very free at all) with the US.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
In 1998, I saw a demo of Weblogic Tengah J2EE server application that used a virutal pager.
SGI's IRIX (5.2 I think) had this back in 1993.
I also implemented a version of it in 1995 in an X11 debug tool.
I heard from someone who works for a company that files for many patents that the company intentionally files for patents that they know they're not going to pursue. They do this to protect themselves from other companies filing for that patent because a previous patent application constitutes prior art. /. reader have experience with this patent filing for the sake of disabling competitors from getting that patent?
Maybe that's what M$ is doing? Maybe they knew that there is not a snowballs chance in hell that they're gonna get this one but decided to file for it anyway just in case? Does any
Even so, I am absolutely baffled why on earth they are using the Gnome taskbar... I mean, it's not even a screenshot!!! Someone actually went through a considerable amount of trouble sketching up that foot!?!??!
You don't think enough... therefore you better not be!
Cheers!
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Gnome started development long before microsoft did (lead up projects Enlightment and others formed the base). Gnome used XML first for all its config files.
Kind hard to go up hill
As a matter of fact, the default setting for multihead in XFree86 is to have multiple independent desktops.
Prior art goes back significantly further than any of the X based windows mangers. A number of the development enviroments at PARC had virtual displays which were significantly more powerful than what Microsoft is citing in the late 70s and early 80s.
The UI which most closely matches Microsoft claims was one called "Rooms" which appeared in a number of Xerox development environments (like Interlisp-D) in the early 1980s. The first paper I remember was in 1986 (CHI i think). Rooms permits multiple virtual screens, a "preview function" to see all your rooms, and a nice navigation to get between the "rooms". Elements of the Rooms UI was eventually turned into a UI which ran under Windows 3.1.
The first UI that I recall seeing which was related to this was the "Project" construct in Smalltalk. You can see a more advanced version of this in Squeak.
The ultimate form of this where the Views. You could have multiple viewers on one physical display at the same time, swap your screen between multiple viewers, have multiple heads displaying the save view, or move the view between machines (aka RemoteViewers) which was really useful when you went home and wanted to pick up your work from where you left it.
Interesting... M$ gives me a great idea of patenting something that has a lot of prior art.
Maybe I should patent chopstick?
[Patent Description]
A pair of similar stick, use by one hand and for dinning purpose.
SWM was released in 1989 and it was virtual, so it was 1989 at the very latest.
Both enlightenment and rvtwm have these shrunken screenshots and they are both older than OS X. Microsoft is screwed; there's tons of prior art even including the screenshots as a requirement.
I definitely remember using such a thing in X windows 15 years ago or so.
I've always said: "The Art is in the Audacity."
This applies both to modern art, and
to Microsoft.
- The audacity of patenting a 15 year old idea.
- The audacity of hijacking the name ".net" which
as far as I remember is one of the more common
generic top-level internet domain names and is clearly in the public domain.
- The audacity of releasing the software they
do with basic usability flaws all over it, and
not fixing the flaws in 10 years of product
upgrades.
High art indeed. Bravissimo.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
Hows about Prior Art bounties? (sounds so obvious it's probably in another comment round here somewhere)
:-)
Examiner takes a patent, if he rejects it, fair enough.
If he approves it, but shouldn't have because of prior art, you can dish the dirt, pop the patent and collect a percentage of the patent application fee from the Patent Office.
You'd probably need to pay a small fee tho to stab at the patent to prevent feedback loops of bottomfeeders.
Oh, and pay the examiner a bonus if they find the prior art first, coz they just saved the Patent Office money.
Catch? It would take an act of God to get anyone to implement it, and Greed is God.
After all, snatching the brainchildren of America and selling them as prostitutes to Big Business keeps a large number somewhere, large, or somesuch equally noble goal.
Hey, USPTO, if I patent every possible combination of DNA, can I have your firstborn?
Note: This represents a FULL Screen, not some cute little VWM sitting in the lower right of your desktop.
Desktop Manager screenshot
When you click on the leftmost button on the Desktop Manager, your current Windown zooms-out to occupy it's appropriate spot, and the Manager zooms-out to show all of the defined workspaces/desktops.
This is not like fvwm, Starfish/HP Dashboard or any other kind of workspace manager.
Get a clue and get educated about a topic before you shoot your collective mouths off.
--ScottKin
I don't give a rat's behind about "karma" here or anywhere else. Don't like what I have to say here? Deal with it!
psxndc
The emacs religion: to be saved, control excess.
Oh, witness the old guard defending the old ways and coming up with excuses to defend them.
When will he learn that the world doesn't stop for him and his, it mearly sidesteps those that would stand in it's way....
(chorus)
Sometimes a man can't see the thing,
Right about his face.
The truth is omnipresent,
but a bias can't displace.
It's hard to simply face the facts,
and see what lies ahead..
But the world will do what worlds will do,
And change til you are dead...
(chorus)
-chorus-
And they fought tooth and nail!
To defend their biases ways,
But the big bad world ignored them,
And went merrily on it's way...
And the sun seemed to mock them,
as it rose and set each day..
For the future is upon us,
and the slow will fade away....
You need to just give it up man. Good Lord the posts you dedicate to bashing anything non-microsoft. I'd have to be paid to act so lost, or generally just very lost. People are getting smarter. Free software keeps getting better and better, and will continue to do so. Linux isn't afraid of you. It isn't going anywhere. So sorry. Thank you for playing!
"Cease and desist: the honestly conducted business of the future." ...US.
The rest of the world doesn't have to be as brain damaged, and OSS outside of the US doesn't have to worry about big, bad MS and their attack dogs (just look at the SCO case outside the US).
Look up the word:aggregation.
I know it's a Slashdot tradition to do a "woe is me" and "The glass is empty and the air is leaking out" type post but people can, and have fought bad patents. Bill Gates for all his money in the world isn't the richest, or most powerful person on the planet. But he has done a good job convincing others that he is, and that's part of his strategy of winning. Keep telling yourself that only the rich, handsome, or ruthless can win and history will prove you wrong, over and over.
Enlightenment rules!! Rasterman though of everything before everyone else. OK not everything, but this is exactly what was in DR 16. And he was on the very beginning of the whole skinning craze.
"So, rather that the usual pablovian reflex of ranting about this stuff on /. why not do something to help the USPTO do a better job?"
Raise taxes to hire more and better examiners.
Pah! Windows...
Before Apple introduced System 7 that had switching built-in, there was an application called "Switcher" that allowed the user to run up to 4 simultaneous screens. This was for the Macintosh Plus/SE/IIGS/etc, that typically had between 512K and 2megs of RAM, I'd say about 1985 though I'mnot at all certain about this.
Best resource page I could find quickly.
The US will patent ANYTHING. Duhh.
"Good news, everyone!"
Maybe you should write an article here on slashdot, explaining what you do, how, and why? You'd certainly get more readers than just posting comments.
LAME argument,
Its just cosmetical different. Sorry M$, you loose.
Except that Billy is a 300 pound behemoth and will beat the crap out of any kid that complains.
... and complaining adults too.
hany
Has any one patented the Computer or a car ? if not perhaps I should before M$ get's that idea..
...
Let's talk about the wheel, ractangle, box... !!!
This is as crazy as witch hunts use to be
SWM was a virtual window manager and it was released in late 1989.
The claims they make don't go towards that- my guess is that they're hoping nobody will catch them on it, including the examiners. Since a filing's a comparative drop in the bucket for them and there's no penalties past the filing fees for it, it's very likely they're running something up the flagpole to see if someone will salute it. As it stands, the FAT filesystem filings were filled with a BUNCH of obvious stuff and stuff that could quite possibly be covered by prior art. I'd have not approved what got approval on those Patents if I'd been the examiner- I know what it is supposed to take and the patents in question and their latest application really don't have what it takes.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
probably removed that feature
Maybe when M$ saw that IBM had created a 3840x2160 flatscreen that needed 4 DVI connectors to display 4 high definition images, they realized they could show 4 hi-def desktops on one monitor?
Before that who would have attempted to show and use 4 views/desktops on a 800x600 or even 1280x1024 monitor?
From my point of view, the only reason many of these concepts haven't been attempted before now is simply because displays didn't have enough resolution and memory was limited.
(If M$ succeeds, then maybe someone else will have to patent a 2-screen concept, an 8-screen concept, a 12-screen concept, a 16-screen concept, a 24-screen concept, etc...)
[MrJukes> we're not patenting the pager idea
[MrJukes> or virtual desktops
[MrJukes> or whatever you want to call it
[MrJukes> the patent was for the full-screen preview mode
[MrJukes> I had never seen a full-screen preview
[MrJukes> that divided the screen up into four sections
[MrJukes> and did animation into and out of preview mode
[MrJukes> that's what the patent was for
his xp vwm module (use the preivew button to see what is really being patented):
grab the vwm powertoy for xp
There is no such thing as a "defensive patent"
Patents are themselves neither offensive nor defensive. But they can be used defensively.
Suppose company A gets a patent on writing to hard disks. Company B gets a patent on accepting keyboard input. Company B sues company A: "you accept keyboard input! Pay up!" Company A can then defensively say "Oh yeah? Well you write to hard disks. Leave us alone and we'll call it even."
If company A never did anything else with that patent, I'd be willing to call it a "defensive patent".
Of course, all it would take is a change of management for the patent to be turned into a profit center, and used offensively. Or imagine this: suppose upstart company C comes along and starts taking business away from companies A and B. As an upstart company, it has no patents yet, so it has nothing to cross-license with companies A and B for their patents. If basic software concepts are locked up in patents, then the only way to successfully introduce a new software product would be to get a large company (that already has lots of patents) to shield you. This sucks.
Note that IBM has a huge patent portfolio, and they went through it and found four patents with which to hammer the SCO Group. I'm eager to see the SCO Group lose their IBM lawsuit... but I'm nervous about what IBM could do if they ever, as a company, go nuts and start trying to abuse their patents.
steveha
lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely
Fame at last.
Kids today are tyrants. They contradict their parent, gobble their food, and tyrannize their teachers. - Socrates 400 BC
Those bitches really think they invented the virtual desktop...hehe..:P It wouldn't suprise if they try to patent the command line...
I remember using this in X many years ago. I first noticed it running X under an old Slackware distro, brings back memories.