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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?
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,"
...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.
I don't think they'll actually be reviewing the patents for five years, they just have so many to review that it will take them five years to get to each one. Once a patent gets to the front of the queue, they'll still just pull out the "Approved" stamp and pass it on.
The EFF Patent Busting Project: http://eff.org/Patent/20040419_eff_pr_patent.php
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."
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
...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.
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,.
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.
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.
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...
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..."
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."
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.
When I press it for more than 1 second, the radio tunes me
But only when you're in Soviet Russia, right?
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.
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
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-