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Microsoft Patents Timed Button Presses
ScooterB writes "According to TechDirt, Microsoft has patented having the action of a button determined by how long the button was pressed. From the patent listing, it seems to be targeted towards PDA's and other handhelds." Whether patents like this are the chicken or the egg, this relates to an MSNBC article submitted by prostoalex which says "United States Patent and Trademark Office is overwhelmed with incoming requests," and that "Unless the budgeting increases, the review process for a patent could double to 5 years."
Oh, wait...
has played a handheld and/or console game.
Ever.
Whatever, ignore, continue. Who are they going to call on it?
Fuck Beta. Fuck Dice
Patents for:
;)
Shirt Pressed By Iron
Iron Pressed By Muscleman
Muscleman Pressed By Time
Time Pressed By Space
Space Pressed By Gravity
Find out about the Lexus Rx400h Hybrid!
On the Tungsten series, pushing the navigator button quickly does an app-defined action. Holding it for a second or two switches to the launcher. How is this not prior art?
1. Do such an inept job at screening patents that it quietly expands their scope.
2. Watch as a whole industry is created out of filing for these new patents.
3. Watch incoming volume of new patent requests increase astronomically.
4. Whine to Congress about insufficient resources.
5. Swill at public trough.
6. Hire more workers.
7. Get big raise because you now manage many more workers.
8. Profit!!
Wow, that's actually a cool idea. Does anyone have any prior art they could show me? I'm not sure I've seen it before.
-Patrick
"They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we."
Like when on a Mac, if you hold the one mouse buttom for a longer amount of time, you get a menu? Or when I press and hold a button on my radio to set the memory?
Like a severly beaten slave showing the evils of slavery, and extreme example like this shows the evils of patents. It's an illogical system and will not last. If it gets backed up--well that can only be a good thing.
-I am an elective eunuch.
Damn, another stupid patent. Yes I looked at the application and saw that the scope was narrow, but come on, just in front of me right now I have:
Sharp Zaurus: The "Cancel" button sends an ESC char to the OS, but if you press and hold it, it turns the unit off. Also if you press the button while it's off, nothing happens, but if you press and hold, it turns on again. I believe the various application buttons can also be programmed with different apps for press vs. press-and-hold.
VIA Mini-ITX motherboard: I have it set in the BIOS to sleep when the power button is pushed. But if you hold the power button for several seconds, the power light flashes and it powers down.
CRT iMac: power button does sleep, unless you hold it down, then it blinks and powers off.
APC SmartUPS: holding down the power-off button turns the unit off, but if you press-and-hold down for several more seconds, it turns off the battery charger too (you can hear the relay click off inside).
And of course SOFTWARE buttons have been doing this for years (click vs. double-click vs. click and hold). My KDE konsole application has a button that you click for a new session or click and hold for a menu.
The patent office needs to get a clue. PLEASE!!
every single watch i have ever owned has done this! you have to hold the set button for a number of seconds before it lets you set it...this by far predates microsoft's empire!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Even on desktop systems, this is old. Plenty of games have used this technique for a long time. Golf, for instance, in which your swing is determined by how long you hold your click.
REDMOND, WA--In what CEO Bill Gates called "an unfortunate but necessary step to protect our intellectual property from theft and exploitation by competitors," the Microsoft Corporation patented the numbers one and zero Monday.
With the patent, Microsoft's rivals are prohibited from manufacturing or selling products containing zeroes and ones--the mathematical building blocks of all computer languages and programs--unless a royalty fee of 10 cents per digit used is paid to the software giant.
"Microsoft has been using the binary system of ones and zeroes ever since its inception in 1975," Gates told reporters. "For years, in the interest of the overall health of the computer industry, we permitted the free and unfettered use of our proprietary numeric systems. However, changing marketplace conditions and the increasingly predatory practices of certain competitors now leave us with no choice but to seek compensation for the use of our numerals."
A number of major Silicon Valley players, including Apple Computer, Netscape and Sun Microsystems, said they will challenge the Microsoft patent as monopolistic and anti-competitive, claiming that the 10-cent-per-digit licensing fee would bankrupt them instantly.
"While, technically, Java is a complex system of algorithms used to create a platform-independent programming environment, it is, at its core, just a string of trillions of ones and zeroes," said Sun Microsystems CEO Scott McNealy, whose company created the Java programming environment used in many Internet applications. "The licensing fees we'd have to pay Microsoft every day would be approximately 327,000 times the total net worth of this company."
"If this patent holds up in federal court, Apple will have no choice but to convert to analog," said Apple interim CEO Steve Jobs, "and I have serious doubts whether this company would be able to remain competitive selling pedal-operated computers running software off vinyl LPs."
As a result of the Microsoft patent, many other companies have begun radically revising their product lines: Database manufacturer Oracle has embarked on a crash program to develop "an abacus for the next millennium." Novell, whose communications and networking systems are also subject to Microsoft licensing fees, is working with top animal trainers on a chimpanzee-based message-transmission system. Hewlett-Packard is developing a revolutionary new steam-powered printer.
Despite the swarm of protest, Gates is standing his ground, maintaining that ones and zeroes are the undisputed property of Microsoft.
Above: Gates explains the new patent to Apple Computer's board of directors.
"We will vigorously enforce our patents of these numbers, as they are legally ours," Gates said. "Among Microsoft's vast historical archives are Sanskrit cuneiform tablets from 1800 B.C. clearly showing ones and a symbol known as 'sunya,' or nothing. We also own: papyrus scrolls written by Pythagoras himself in which he explains the idea of singular notation, or 'one'; early tracts by Mohammed ibn Musa al Kwarizimi explaining the concept of al-sifr, or 'the cipher'; original mathematical manuscripts by Heisenberg, Einstein and Planck; and a signed first-edition copy of Jean-Paul Sartre's Being And Nothingness. Should the need arise, Microsoft will have no difficulty proving to the Justice Department or anyone else that we own the rights to these numbers."
Added Gates: "My salary also has lots of zeroes. I'm the richest man in the world."
According to experts, the full ramifications of Microsoft's patenting of one and zero have yet to be realized.
"Because all integers and natural numbers derive from one and zero, Microsoft may, by extension, lay claim to ownership of all mathematics and logic systems, including Euclidean geometry, pulleys and levers, gravity, and the basic Newtonian principles of motion, as well as the concepts of existence and nonexistence,"
Does anyone else besides me think that this could be a GOOD IDEA on their part? Maybe if they actually took their time to process the patents and run exhaustive prior art checks most of these silly patents they're awarding would be preemptively tossed in the trash.
Gabriel Ricard
...hope they don't discover that infringing gas pedal it has!
Does anyone else see the need for a distributed prior art review. The idea is fairly simple, when a patent is applied for, it is placed into a queue where anyone who wants to sign up for the job can spend a small amount of time looking for any prior art. If any is found, the user is allowed to upload the data as well as some simple references that can be attached to the patent that would be flagged for review. This should at the very least provide some time savings for the patent officers, and allow all of us (myself included) to quit bitching and help out.
I'll sleep when I'm dead, right now I drink coffee and rub my eyes
... my digital wristwatch of EIGHTEEN YEARS AGO was doing something like this... you needed to hold down one of the buttons for 2 seconds to get it into 'set' mode.
It's like your ignition key. If you keep it turned for about a second, it starts the car. If you keep it turned for 10 minutes, it burns out the starter.
And there's also auto-repeat.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
This is not prior art. It is clearly a new innovation. Microsoft is poruing billions of dollars into R&D. They invent new stuff all the time, it is very natural for them to patent these new techniques.
We can not have a society where everything is for free. We are not in communism.
What's up with prostoalex? I noticed his name like twice today, so I looked...
211 total articles submitted and accepted?
At this rate, by next year, he'll have more accepted articles than Hemos posted!
And michael said I had no life for simply having over 800 comments.....
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Maybe if they didn't grant so many patents for obvious and existing things, there wouldn't be so many people jumping on the bandwagon!
The EFF Patent Busting Project: http://eff.org/Patent/20040419_eff_pr_patent.php
On an iPod, while browsing songs, clicking the center button selects a song and starts playing it. Holding the center button instead adds it to your "On The Go" playlist.
I filed several patents - the last of which was filed in the spring of 2001. 3 years later NONE of them have issued (including one that is passing 4 years now). I don't see a doubling to 5 years, just an increase to 5 years.
I have mod points and I am not afraid to use them
"every single watch i have ever owned has done this! you have to hold the set button for a number of seconds before it lets you set it...this by far predates microsoft's empire! "
Perhaps, but thanks to the way patents work, using it on a PocketPC or mouse driven PC is different 'enough'. Not saying I support it, just saying I've talked to patent lawyers before about those little kinds of deviations.
"Derp de derp."
Elevators were operated by people who held down a button or a switch. The length of holding determined which floor you went to. This type of tech is ancient.
"I'm just here to regulate funkiness."
Read The F&#@ing Patent Application
please go and read the actual patent app. before posting ignorant comments. You might find that your digital watch, cell phone, mouse, pda or whatever has nothing to do with what they are trying to patent.
I dislike MS business practices as much as the next guy, but please be informed....
That's the point.
Oh cruel fate, to be thusly boned! Ask not for whom the bone bones; it bones for thee. -Bender
If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land,
it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. -James Madison
Don't blame Microsoft, blame the patent system.
... But there are plenty of smaller companies out there that make money by hitting up the big guys on these silly patents.
...
Microsoft, being the nice fat company they are, is a ripe target for patent lawsuits. If I was them I would also patent all the idiotical things I could get away with, because if I don't someone else will. Use the system or it will bite you in the ass.
I highly doubt Microsoft would ever try to enforce this patent on anyone
So anyway the patent system is broke, we know this, what are we going to do about should be the question
Closer to PDAs are mobile phones. Look for the tapereel/voice mail icon on button '1'. Hold it, and you're calling your voicemail. Not hold it, and... well... you pressed '1' :)
Hyperom.com
...this is another bad patent. At least some people paused to notice that it's not THAT rediculous (compared to, say, patenting reverse auctions on the internet, or Amazon's one-click checkout patent, etc.), just another classic case of why just because it's being done on a computer or on the internet does NOT make it new and non-obvious.
However, I wonder what else a company like MS, or IBM, or Intel can do in a situation like this -- namely, one where they're doing things that haven't been done before that, while NOT patentable in "our" sense of the term, are nevertheless things that DO get patents from the USPTO.
I mean, if you want to do something, and *someone* will patent it because our broken system lets them, shouldn't you try to patent it first? That's what most corporate patents seem to be these day -- defensive patents.
It's the nobody's out there that are really abusing the system -- SCO, Eolas, etc. I'm not really saying they're forcing Microsoft's hand (or IBM's, or Intel's, or AMD's, or NVidia's, etc.) -- but I *am* saying that I think these large research-driven companies are exercising good business sense by trying to defend themselves against the more flagrant abusers of the patent system.
Sooner or Later (I'm guessing Later), even the cost of doing business with defensive patents and cross-licensing will reach that point that the big guys will push for Patent/Trademark reform, and these sorts of problems will finally go away. But, IMHO that day is years away, and the targets for patent abuse have to defend themselves in the meantime.
I just wish one of the big patent powerhouses like MS or IBM would step up and drive a challenge against the existing patent status quo -- either via a Constitutionality argument, or lobbying Congress to get REAL patent reforms going, *something*. It's a gamble right now, sure, but business is all about risk and reward, and the payoffs for being able to get out of the patent litigation minefields that any technology company finds itself in these days would be worth it.
Xentax
You shouldn't verb words.
What about the whole apple macintosh computer system? A computer with one mouse button. There were so many things that were done by holding the mouse down instead of clicking. And double clicking? That's older then Windows.
I wonder how many of the junk patents that have been approved lately were done by the same people. It would be nice to have a better feedback system for Patent Examiners then expensive lawsuits.
Mod this one -1 obvious.
This is not prior art, because a watch is not a computer. Well, except a Casio DataBank, but that's not a general purpose computer. Except the Matsucom onHand, which is a 16-bit PDA, but it's not a PocketPC PDA. See, Microsoft's invention is new and innovative.
Not that this wasn't entirely predictable.
here's how:
We need to set up some kind of open source org for generating and funding silly patent applications. With some sympathetic venture capital, we may be able to clog the patent system for the next 50 years!
Not that im gonna do it. Just think it would be neet if someone tried. Of course, the org would have to have protections from not actually inforcing the patents.
The goal here isn't to make good patents. Just to clog the system, so we need not think to hard about them.
just an idea,.
Would a digital watch count? I'm pretty sure my first one would do different things from how long the button was pushed. Granted, it was only generally how it knew you wanted to set the time and switched modes, but it was a pretty limited computer.
R: That voice. Where have I heard that voice before? B: In about 365 other episodes. But I don't know who it is either.
press ctrl-click or *gasp* plug in a regular 2 button mouse.
Jisho - A Japanese English German Russian French Dictionary for the rest of us.
An example of prior art:
bash$ xset r rate 250 40
Hmm: Let's see - hold down a key for a brief while:
X
Or hold it down for a long while:
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.
With a Palm OS device, if you just hit the Address Book button, it takes you to that app. If you hold the button down longer, it tries to beam a record that's been designated as a "business card", if such a record exists.
I don't know how long they've been doing this, exactly, though I doubt it was after M$ started producing PDAs, much less filed for this patent.
Seems they're trying to patent the concept of double-clicks as well... they bloody stole that from Apple!
All I want is a kind word, a warm bed and unlimited power.
If you take the time to actually read what's claimed in this patent (on /.? yeah right...) this isn't as broad a patent as a lot of readers seem to think it is.
Basically, they've patented the following (all being done on a "limited resource computing device"):
Not ingenious, and of doubtful usefulness in my opinion, but certainly not as bad as patenting the very general "having the action of a button determined by how long the button was pressed" where that action could be anything.
Would Morse code count?
unfortuneatly, that doesn't have anything to do with parts c&d in claim one. Most of the other claims are very similiar.
(c) opening an application if the application button is released prior to the expiration of a threshold time limit; and
(d) opening the application and automatically causing the application to display the last known state of the application if the application button is pressed, without being released, for a period equal to or in excess of the threshold time limit.
A lot of people here are saying the same thing, but the claims require more than just holding a button for a set length of time to preform some mysterious action. Each independant has it preform a different function.
Bring back the old version of slashdot.
I want to know how exactly you simulate a right-click on a Mac when the system has no concept of a right-click.
Trolling, right? Right-click application support for contextual menus has been around since Mac OS 9.
Or by "system" do you mean the last time you used a Mac?
We are missing the point a bit here. Of course, you are all totally correct, this isnt anywhere near a new thing, but we are missing the whole patent issue. I know you all understand this as well as cookies, but ill say it anyway. Patents protect an IDEA. They dont protect the end result. Hell, imagine if Hoover could patent clean carpets, no one else is allowed to invent a sucky upy thing, since it's patented!
This is exactly the problem with a load of software patents. They dont patent HOW something is done, that patent WHAT is done. It's like trying to patent staying dry and warm, and therefore preventing anyone else building houses! I do believe there are some valid software patents, but that should NOT stop someone else getting to the same result by doing it differently. Just because some guy invented RSA security, does not stop some other guy inventing a totally differnt way to use the same algorithm.
Microsoft can patent the source they used to time this button, if it uses some cool new timing algorithm that works without needing the internal clock, but no way should they be allowed to patent the actual result, a timed button.
And honestly, i dont blame microsoft, i blame the fucking stupid patent clerks and judges who let things like this through. Microsoft are just using the system, we all would given half a chance. You patent people should wake the fuck up and engage brain!
However, you will owe me money, since i own Thought(TM). oh, and i also own "Correct Answer(TM)" and "Common Sense(TM)", all registered trademarks and patents, thank you...
what about the text-entry method of most mobile phones? i doubt this is about the PDA market half so much as mobile telephony.
ed
Um, hi. Welcome to 1996. I am your guide, Al Gore.
The system knows what a right click is. In Mac OS X, the native mouse drivers know what it is. It also knows all of the other mouse buttons, and communicates them. The default mouse is one button. Plug in a USB two or whatever button mouse in, badda bing, it works.
I wish people would shut up when they don't know better.
- oZ
// i am here.
(I read the patent)
even if this is meant to apply to virtual buttons, prior art exists in many places: a friend of mine
used to work for Symbol Technology, the bar code scanner folks. he told me about how you determine
if a button is pressed at all; there's an effect he described as "button bounce" where as the button is
depressed, the electrical contact is intermittent for a while until it becomes constant - i.e. don't do anything
until the button has been "on" for 1200milliseconds. he's had to write customized timing code for a variety of
vendors' buttons, since they are all have a bit different 'action'; and since there's generally only one button(trigger)
on a hand-held scanner, they'd have done the same as described in the patent. the extensions
they've applied for seem completely "obvious" to anyone who's had to use/work/design a product with
"limited resources", i.e. buttons.
anyway, deciding what what to do depending on how long a button(real or virtual) has been done for
many, many years:
elevators, digital watches/clocks, PDAs, Apple Newtons and many others previously mentioned.
maybe the patent office should 'open source' the research of prior art(like groklaw?) since they seem to be
incapable of handling any more than a couple of applications per day.
c
"...that's as white as it gets; all the bits are on..."
5 years? That's ridiculous.
I mean, how long does it take to blindly rubber stamp any piece of paper that shows up on your desk? One examiner could do thousands in a single day.
For instance:
Sounds like it's a fairly widespread thing. Seems to me like applying it to a new field is a "logical next step", which isn't patentable.
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
It was called 'anti-bounce' circuits, in early days of digital logic and key(pads/boards). A timing loop is run to determine the length of the key-press. It was assigned to every new EE grad out there, way back when. Way prior art !
In 1973 I worked for HP's Medical Electronics Division on the 78221 Arrythmia Monitor. It had a hardware box (about 16"x 4" x 12") with 9 buttons on it, a minicomputer and a bit-mapped graphics display (256 x 256 pixels).
8 of the buttons selected individual patients (it handled up to 8 CCU patients). Pushing and holding the button for several seconds would switch between a graphical display of EKG abnormalities and displaying a summary of ALL 8 patients (showing HR, recent abnormalities, etc.).
In fact, we didn't even have hardware debouncing on the button; we used the minicomputer to sample the signal line and detect when it stayed stable for several milliseconds and treated that as a transition....
This would appear to be VERY similar to the claims in the patent.....
I'd call that "prior art" and "limited power computing device."
Some day people will hopefully understand that even though it may be pretty hard to read computer programs, they're just something written in a certain language. Microsoft won't sell you a button at all - it sells you a library with instructions especially sorted out by them to instruct your computer to do something. They differ from a book (ok an eBook) in absolutely nothing except for the language they were written in.
Think of it. Theoretically it is possible to write a compiler that compiles the text of a patent to software that implements it. That shouldn't even have to be so very theoretical if version 0.1 only has to be able to compile one certain patent text. Now all of the sudden the patent itself has become a patented piece of software! If we don't stop patenting software now and one day someone comes up with a fucking smart compiler that can do such things, we'll all be uttering patented programs all day.
The lack of a compiler from natural language to software (and vice versa) doesn't make software any less language. Software patents exist thanks to the utter stupidness of people that cannot see the difference between "an apparatus" and "some text I don't understand and I don't have a translator(compiler) for".
0x or or snor perron?!
I used to play computer golf games, and as I remember, how hard you swung the club depended on how long you held the mouse button.
For every post, there is an equal and opposite re-post.
If you click on a dock icon in OS X, the default is that that application will become the current app and its windows moved to the fore. This is unless it's an object that's been dragged to the dock (like a folder or document) or the trashcan in which case it'll open.
If you hold down the mouse button instead of simply clicking, after... (tries it) two seconds a context menu for the object refered to by the icon will appear. For folders, this is actually a pop-up menu containing the folder's contents, which is cool as you can drag your Applications folder there and use it as a quick launch. For apps a variety of context items will appear, such as Show In Finder, Hide, Quit, etc.
The only reason this might not count as prior art is that some people are saying (I haven't read the patent yet) that the patent only applies to handheld devices. OS X doesn't yet run on any handheld devices.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
If you take the time to read the patent claims, you would see that the patent coverage is nowhere near as broad as the post makes it sound. I really wish the editors would stop posting patent stories to the front page, because they are almost always misleading, if not clearly wrong. At the very least, I think /.ers need a lesson in patent law. As a patent lawyer myself, I'd be willing to answer a few questions to hopefully put an end to the patent ignorance I see here day after day.
isn't something that is "obvious" not patentable?
seems to me i can name a lot of items with buttons that do different things depending on how you press it. and one of the posts above this appeared to have a good list of them.
to me this just seems and obvious application of something that has been used in many different devices with buttons, i guess i just don't see why it is patentable, but then again i don't see why the patent office lets quite a few of the patents through...
To add to this -- contrary to popular belief, this patent has nothing to do with operations performed by a stylus or mouse. It is carefully restricted to focus on HARDWARE-based buttons of a PDA. Anybody who has a Pocket PC should know what I'm talking about. A similar frame of reference for the rest of you: Most everybody has seen (or owns) one of those "Internet" keyboards that has separate buttons for Email, Search, Browse and Play. These are similar to the application buttons on a Pocket PC. What Microsoft has patented is a method to detect how long these buttons are held down and respond in different ways, depending on the length of the button press. They've carefully limited the scope of their patent to only these "application buttons."
Now, you MIGHT be able to claim prior art with a calculator watch (aka "limited-resource computing device") that did different things depending on how long the buttons on the side were pressed. But I doubt it.
GreyPoopon
--
Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?
The issue of this patent may be finished, but the larger issue of why the patent office is not receiving enough funding is extremely important.
Those who want corruption in the U.S. federal and state governments have found a new way of accomplishing it. They arrange that there is not enough money to do the work. This is happening throughout the United States. Here is a quote from an article written by the president of the Oregon State Bar Association:
"The crippling loss of nearly one-third of their staff have left our [Oregon State] courts unable to hear criminal cases such as car theft, shoplifting, prostitution, fraud and identity theft. Criminals, meanwhile, have figured this out and in some cases are operating virtually unchecked by a broken public safety system." [From "In Our Opinion", by Charles Williamson. Published in the Oregonian newspaper on 2003-06-24. Available from OregonLive.com for a charge for archive access.]
The U.S. is a rich country. It is not that there is not enough money. This is widespread corruption. This is deliberate degradation of government by those who want to use governmental power to make money.
The corruption in the U.S. government is becoming severe. For example, read the book, House of Bush, House of Saud: The Secret Relationship Between the World's Two Most Powerful Dynasties. (I make no money from book purchases.) If you haven't been reading books and magazine articles about this is the last 20 years, you will learn that a close Bush family friend knows Osama bin Laden, and that George W. Bush served in the national guard with someone who has done a large amount of business with one of Osama bin Laden's brothers, and with the Bush family.
This week the U.S. Supreme Court is hearing a case about U.S. vice-president Dick Cheney's secret activities involving large oil businesses. One of the Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court, Antonin Scalia, is a long-time friend of Cheney and is judging this case, even though there are strong rules against conflict of interest.
Remember that it was Republicans on the U.S. Supreme Court that decided that George W. Bush would be president of the U.S., not the voters. For more about that, see the book Supreme Injustice: How the High Court Hijacked Election 2000 by Alan M. Dershowitz
Here are some tips for those who plan to take an interest in U.S. government corruption:
1) Most people don't read books. Only 2% read non-fiction about subjects other than their work. So, although there is plenty of information available about U.S. government corruption, most people don't know that.
Television, magazine, and newspaper news reporters rely on being granted access to politicians, and therefore cannot say anything very negative without risking losing their jobs.
Only books have comprehensive information. A book author has the luxury of spending two years gathering facts.
Of course, not all books are written by authors who care primarily about the facts. Bob Woodward, for example, is known for being especially positive toward those who grant him access. That creates a kind of blackmail in which people grant him access to avoid having negative things written about them.
Those who corrupt government for money don't care about what book authors say because only 2% of the population reads books.
2) When someone is reputed to be an "oilman", that does not mean he has an interest in geology. That means that he is interested in profit.
It's wrong to say that the U.S. government goes to war over oil. The amount of oil is the same. It is who gets the oil profit that motivates U.S. government violence.
"Even better prior art: On my Zaurus (linux handheld) if I tap the stylus on an icon it launches the associated program. If I hold the stylus on that icon it will bring me to a properties screen about the shortcut for that application (change icon, change the name of the shortcut, rotate the screen when the application is launched)."
That's good enough for me. For the record, my intent wasn't to defend Microsoft so much as to clarify what prior art would have to be to shoot this cas down. Based on some of the other responses I recieved, I think the impression was that I was saying Microsoft's in the clear. Not really the case, but I didn't express myself clearly enough.
Thank you for being civil.
"Derp de derp."
When I press it for more than 1 second, the radio tunes me
But only when you're in Soviet Russia, right?
Perhaps, but thanks to the way patents work, using it on a PocketPC or mouse driven PC is different 'enough'.
I understand this "just add 'on the Internet' to a previous patent and it's a new one" argument, but I think there is more to it in this wristwatch example.
Microsoft, specifically, and many others have been pushing the convergence of many consumer devices by pushing (or proposing to push) their OSes into them. Wristwatches were specifically mentioned as a potential platform for Windows CE at its introduction, and Linux is already there. They have been telling us, for years, to think of these as just alternate instances of the same thing, and that this is where the industry would be headed.
At the very least, I think this greatly dilutes any recent argument that it's a novel concept to apply any specific wristwatch concepts to any other computing platforms (or vice-versa). More than that, I think it totally invalidates such an argument.
And in this particular case, it's one of the very companies that has been strongly pushing the convergence for a long time that is now trying to patent one of the things they have been "converging".
The final, unquestionable proof that the USPTO is truly fucked up beyond all recognition. I mean, what do those PTO idiots think it means when their computer repeats keys when the key is held down? I have a laptop from 1982 that does this! Consider God-only-knows what other stupid patents they grant, and this is a true SNAFU: Situation normal, all fucked up.
:)
If you're going to grant every single idiotic patent that comes your way, you might as well just replace it with a motion-activated tape player that says "Patent Granted!"
On a more serious note, I want to know how on earth they could possibly review a patent for *five years* and not see glaringly obvious prior art from at least 20 years ago. They can't all be this stupid, can they? *whispers in my ear* I'm going to go cry now...
Y'Know, I think I'll apply for a patent on "A means to generate an electromotive force by motion of a conducting material through a magnetic field" and for "A means to drive said conductor through magnetic field by union of carbon and oxygen atoms." Not only is it glaringly obvious, but the level of scientific knowledge required to understand it is far beyond anything these morons are capable of. Then you'll all have to pay me for the alternator in your car
Many watches DO do something different when you hold a button down - they enter a "set" mode (to input the starting position of a countdown timer, or to set the time). I suppose Casio's Databank watches do too.
Yeah, most people didn't even look at the specific print.
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No big surprise.
Regardless, I think I've almost found prior art (this is really close & quite debate-worthy).
1. Look at Mac OS X's "Dock".
A single click on an application-icon or document-icon starts up the app or document as normal.
A control-click, right-click, or long-click causes a menu to drop down from the icon.
If the icon is an active application, the menu usually has some stuff like "hide", "show in Finder", "Quit", and anything else the programmer would have added.
If the active application's icon is an icon that only appears while the app is active (you can have inactive app-icons kept there too) there is one more option, "Keep in Dock"
Though I don't see a perfect claim-match, it's pretty damn close.
Apple might even be able to debate that the "Keep in dock" option is similar/same to "restore it to it's last known state." because by default, the Dock doesn't retain the icon of an app when it quits. You have to have told to keep in dock (not a default).
Wether or not Apple has prior art depends on the interpretation of "restore it to it's last known state".
2. MacOS's "spring loaded folders" also match the timer threshold part, but not the rest of the claim.
3. Though unimplemented, Apple does already hold a patent on an OS interface feature called "piles". Piles could hold folders, applications, documents, etc. As you click & hold, the stacked icons would levitate up so you could see the icons without them overlapping, and you'd release on the file/folder/app you wanted.
No, none of these are a perfect match, but still noteworthy since they are quite similar to the claim.
I think that they should replace the review process with a challenge process. Instead of having patent officers review patent applications, wait until the patent is in question. Then the patent officers can take the time to fully investigate the patent claim. Further, since it is triggered by a challenge, there are now two knowledgeable sides (the one who applied and the challenger) which have the technical knowledge and interest to properly consider the patent claim.
I would also suggest that these challenges be on a loser pays basis. Thus, the patent examiner will be under no quota that forces them to reject/accept applications with only a cursory review. Further, if one side realizes that they are in the wrong, they have an incentive to admit it and not run up the bill more (or at all; they could admit it before the challenge review).
In this system, a patent application would just be filed. No review would be done until the challenge. Note that this also allows for your distributed review. If you wish to comment on a patent application, you should be able to do so. That information would then be available in the case of a challenge.
The beauty of this is that it moves the patent examination to a time when someone has the resources to fully examine the issue. Also, it makes it cheaper to apply for a patent (encouraging an increase in the information sharing aspect) and increases the rigorousness of the patent examination.
Note: this would still require a clarification of the patent rules. The problem that I see with the current patent is the idea that someone could patent "holding the button down to get a different effect than a quick click." Patent a particular physical implementation? Sure. Patent the concept (even limited to a specific platform)? That does not promote information sharing, so it should not be part of the patent process.
How about an organization and website dedicated to creating prior art. In other words, we simply document any idea that any of us thinks about. These ideas are then timestamped, so that if someone tries to patent any of the concepts after they were submitted to the website, we immediately have a source and documentation for prior art.
Is this legally feasible? Does prior art begin the day before a company files for a patent? Or is there a grace period that could cause a problem with people patenting things too soon after entries are made?
If it does work, then all we have to do is fill the public database with ideas. Then, any patents covering those ideas filed for after the data of any entries can be easily invalidated, and perhaps with patent reform, even prevented.
What do you think, /.?
My old Macintosh moniter is so small I have to save the files, then enlarge them in a text editor. But it can be difficult to mouse over and hold down the mouse button for several seconds to get to the "save link as" menu.
It makes me so frustrated that I want to force a hard shutdown by holding the power button down for three seconds.
The ______ Agenda
You can disable that, you know...
In XP (and 2K?): Control Panel -> Accessibility Options -> Keyboard tab -> Settings (for sticky keys...and any others that bother you) -> Uncheck "Use Shortcut".
I sing the doggie electric!
I write a message on my 'phone.
I press a number, I get a letter
I hold the number down, I get a number! - amazin!
Are you seriously telling me that no member of the USPTO has ever used a mobile!
If this get passed, follow the money.
Patent indeed! it's total b0110cks if you ask me!
Microsoft's USP 6,727,830 is for using the length of time an application button is pressed, in various broadly-specified ways. It was issued April 27, 2004, and filed July 12, 2002, as a continuation of an earlier application filed Jan 5, 1999. So the timeframe for unconditional prior art status of printed publications and uses in USA appears to be the timeframe ending on Jan 4 1998.
My HP41 programmable calculator, in use since 1981, was and is a "limited-resource computing device" with (physical) buttons associated with applications (functions). For every button and application there was a period during which the application's name would be displayed for a predetermined period if the button is pressed and held down, and activated if the button was released during that period, but if the button was held down longer, the display would go to 'null' and the application would not be activated on release. (It was a valuable HP41 feature to enable the user to check and get a reminder of what a button would do, without committing to the operation.)
It seems to be only on the last point -- what happens after delayed release -- that the Microsoft patent claims appear to differ
in detail from the HP41.
But the actions specified vaguely in the MS claims do not appear to be matters of principle, let alone invention, they are just choices about which alternative action should happen after delayed release.
I hope this patent would be found invalid at least for obviousness if challenged. But like so many others, MS may calculate on benefiting from the doubt in the meantime, and from the effort and expense of mounting a challenge.
-wb-