Slashdot Mirror
PUBPAT Challenges Microsoft's FAT Patent
An anonymous reader writes "The Public Patent Foundation filed a formal request with the United States Patent and Trademark Office today to revoke Microsoft Corporation's patent on the FAT File System, touted by Microsoft as being 'the ubiquitous format used for interchange of media between computers, and, since the advent of inexpensive, removable flash memory, also between digital devices.' In its filing, PUBPAT submitted previously unseen prior art showing the patent, which issued in November 1996 and is not otherwise due to expire until 2013, was obvious and, as such, should have never been granted."
... somebody did this. FAT's been around and is now somewhat of a standard. Maybe some of MS's other patents can be challenged as well.
If you're a lawyer-type interested in technology, send them an email.
They have several interesting projects on patent re-examination, commentary on the patent process, etc.
until now, but I love what I see as the idea behind the work they are doing: Fighting unwarranted, unfounded and/or improperly sworn/filed patents
Go get 'em!
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uR iGn0ranc3, Their Power
How about a law that says a typical individual trained in the relevant art cannot reinvent the patented material in less than an hour? Just because you thought of it first does not make it original.
-- http://thegirlorthecar.com funny dating game for guys
On one hand, no patents means that inventing something immediately gets stolen, evil corporation profits millions of dollars, joe inventor gets squat.
However, too many patents means that when joe inventor makes something, evil corporation sues him for violating patent 284958390*pi^12, "Use of energy to propell machine," and steals his work anyway, making millions of dollars while give the original invetor squat.
Is it possible to make patent approvals open-source? Which is to say, volunteers (preferably, whole teams thereof) would do the work done now by individual patent clerks (Patent reviewers? Whatever they're called), with all decisions publicly reviewable and modifiable.
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
This only weakens the concept of intellectual property. Why invent if you're just going to have to fight legal battles for the length of your patent?
Um - because if it really is a novel invention worthy of patent protection then all the later judges are going to throw it out of court immediately based on the previous decision, and if you're a scum sucking pond scum who's standing on the shoulders of the giants before you and setting up a toll gate to stop those who really are innovating then you bloody well deserve what you get.
The concept of intellectual property was never designed to protect the sort of arsewipe who patents every piece of common knowledge they can slip under the noses of the patent office and makes a business out of milking their "valuable IP portfolio". If you're in the business of buying other people's ideas for the purpose of extorting money from people building the future on top of them, then I say good riddance to you - our current technology is built on the ideas of our predecessors, and who are we to stop our successors from learning from us?
While the patent stands it impacts on any device/product that implements FAT. Examples: Operating systems that implement FAT; CDs with such software; PCs loaded with such software; cameras, MP3 players etc with Compact Flash/SmartMedia etc cards; media (floppy disks, Compact Flash, SmartMedia cards,...) pre-formatted with FAT.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Microsoft's 'FAT' patents do not patent FAT... specifically, they patent the VFAT extensions to FAT. And, as was previously mentioned on slashdot, there's much prior art to using long file names on FAT as well.
So don't call them 'FAT' patents, because they aren't. Call them VFAT patents. Or call them by their names, which also makes it obvious.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Didn't 4DOS support long filenames on top of FAT long before VFAT (Windows 95) did?
I'm pretty sure I remember using 4DOS around the DOS 3.3 to DOS 5.0 days.
My other first post is car post.
I just gave them the $72.38 I had sitting in my PayPal account. Stupid software patents have cost me a lot more than that in time reading Slashdot articles alone. Give till it hurts.
The "Online" link on this page will take you straight to PayPal.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
As you may have read in a prior Slashdot article, no ordinary fine is going to stop Microsoft from changing its anticompetitive ways. But suppose the next time Microsoft was fined, the fine was this: "All your patents are hereby revoked, and you will never be granted another! Furthermore, the next time your actions are brought before this Court and found to be illegal, all your copyrights will be revoked!"
I bet THAT would get Microsoft's attention!
Probably bogus patents up the wazoo on that too.
(Patents aren't going to mean much anyway once anyone can do desktop manufacturing for next to nothing.)
--
Power to the Peaceful
1. Patent random, generic idea
You CANNOT patent an idea. You can only patent the IMPLEMENTATION of an idea. You're only looking at the title of the patent, which will be something generic like "A method for doing X". That's only to make them easy to search, the thing that matters is the text of the patent. In this case, MS doesn't have a patent on the idea of a filesystem, they have a patent on one specific filesystem, FAT. That's all.
Patent discussions on Slashdot at meaningless, because 99% of the Slashbots think that the title of a patent is the entirety of the patent.
Shouldn't they not be issued a patent on this if they allowed people to use their filesystem method? It seems like it's in such common use by many devices now...
Some other posts have indicated that the patent only covers the storage of long filenames associated with the FAT filenames for use by Windows...if this is true, isn't that an obvious invention (i.e. database relating short names to long names)? You can't patent a relational database based on purpose, can you? If so, I will be submitting my patent for databases that store telephone numbers in relation to adressee names within a matter of days, and get rich of the phone companies alone...
I wonder if HFS could be considered prior art...each file as I understand it, is given a unique ID with which is can be referenced by, regardless of path. This (as I am to understand) is how Mac apps can still save to any file if it is moved while opened. Could the ID number be considered a short name? Then again, FAT came before HFS, but HFS came before long Windows filenames...
IAONAL, anyone with definitive answers is more than welcome to correct me.
CAn'T CompreHend SARcaSm?
Remember that Linux included another method to achieve the same thing (and more): UMSDOS.
It was introduced in early 1994, a year and a half before the introduction of Windows 95.
As much as I hate to admit it the methods they use to store long file names in directory entries in a backward-compatible way are novel (for the time) and non obvious - hence patentable.
IANAL, but the patent would seem to apply to the VFAT driver in Linux. A driver that only reads long filenames but does not generate them should probably be be ok as one patent claims the method of writing and the other patent claims media formatted according to this method.
Microsoft are currently targeting makers of devices such as digital cameras and PDAs that use FAT on removable flash devices. At least cameras should be able escape the patent as the standard DCIM format only requires 8.3 filenames.
Stop worrying about the risks of nuclear power and start worrying about the risks of not using nuclear power.
Yeah, as other posters noted, I was laughing too and saying "what's next, five blades?"
The cartridges are so expensive that I feel like I am using a cadillac to scrape hairs off my face. And that's for the three bladed kind.
What I find interesting is that Wal-Mart has a generic cartridge that fits the sensor razor.
So since they have dozens of patents on the sensor (presumably to stop cartridge knock offs), how are the generics able to be made?
Myself, I'm an Atra man. The dollar store had a ten pack of generic cartridges for a dollar. I filled a large drawer with them.
They don't have the lubra strip on them, but I'm quite happy with the price.
It also seems that the three blade variety do not stay as sharp as long, and clog easier. Which is natural if your profit model is based on people tossing cartridges.
They sent me a free four blade razor in the mail. I think I will save it for special occasions.
Maybe I can get a hot date through slashdot personals.
Me against 10,000 other nerds. I don't know.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
In general (IIRC), a patent application must be filed with the patent office no more than one year after the invention was first released to the public. As someone in an earlier message noted, Microsoft released a beta version of Win95 with long filename support sometime in 1994, approximately 2 years before the patent application was filed. If these dates are indeed true, then the patent is invalid.
Of course, I can't speak for all groups at Microsoft, but the group I was in was very aware of this "one year grace period" for patents. We always noted exactly when a "patentable idea" was first mentioned to the public, even if it was just a Powerpoint slide at a trade show. The day the first non-Microsoftee hears about an idea is the day the patent clock starts running.
Again, I'm sure different groups within Microsoft handle this differently, but if the Win95 group didn't file the patent application within the one year grace period, then they fucked up in a big way.
Of course, in a refreshing turn of events, Microsoft's fuck up could turn out to be a blessing for the rest of the industry...
Microsoft's patent application was originally filed in 1993. So, the question is whether their claims (see below) were novel and nonobvious as of that date.
Claim:
1. In a computer system having a processor running an operating system and a memory means storing the operating system, a method comprising the computer-implemented steps of:
(a) storing in the memory means a first directory entry for a file wherein the first directory entry holds a short filename for the file, said short filename including at most a maximum number of characters that is permissible by the operating system;
(b) storing in the memory means a second directory entry for a the file wherein the second directory entry holds a long filename for the file and wherein the second directory entry includes an attributes field which may be set to make the second directory entry invisible to the operating system and the step of storing the second directory entry further comprises the step of setting the attributes field so that the second directory entry is invisible to the operating system, said long filename including more than the maximum number of characters that is permissible by the operating system; and
(c) accessing the first directory entry with the operating system.
Maybe the way to address some of these issues would be to have an officiall public review period for patents, with convenient access through a web site.
Imagine something like Slashdot, where each patent application gets posted. Anybody (competitor, script kiddie, whatever) is able to post responses, point to prior art, etc. The patent examiner then can take those discussions into account when making a decision. The discussions would have no legal significance other than being a resource for the patent examiner working on that particular patent (well, they might also constitute published prior art for future patent applications and changes to the patent). If the discussions aren't useful, we are no worse off than now. If they are useful, then the patent examiner can more easily weed out bad patents.
This wouldn't even have to be financed by the PTO. Anybody could set it up outside the PTO and put the published patent applications in there. The only thing that would need to change is that the patent examiners would have to get motivated to look at it before making their decision.
Not just that, what the People need is their Own Corporation.
...
I see no reason why a corporation can't be founded to protect -all- individual details and information.
"Life Product, Inc. - we keep your details safe."
If I owned -stock- in the company that I knew had its soul purpose to protect not just my copyrighted material, but also my general 'life product' as art, then I'd be much happier having mega-corp know my weekly shopping list and able to tune its production/output accordingly
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
That's called communism. We don't do that here, yet. There is no such entity as 'society', other than a collection of individuals. What you're proposing is that a certain group of individuals has the right to appropriate the efforts of another, typically smaller, group of individuals. This is also known as slavery.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
i thought a patent was so that it would protect an idea until you had a working product based on that idea, not create a working product and then patent it in afterwards (working product as in ready for market, not as in prototype).
so im starting to wonder if patent laws should be rewritten to cover this fact, and at the same time remove any ability to patent software solutions as that is like patenting a painting technique or music style (oh how the riaa would love that idea)...
comment first, facts later. http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
As lots of people have noted, the patent is on the long filename extensions in VFAT, not on the basic FAT file system.
So why don't cameras, flash drives, etc, just come with FAT file systems installed? Cameras never need to produce long filenames. Flash drives don't need to produce files at all.
If the user's OS chooses to put some long filenames on the device, that's not being done by the device, it's being done by the OS.
The only devices that should need to worry about this patent are things like MP3 players that display the filenames themselves.