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Microsoft Patents Keyboard Browser Navigation

Posted by timothy on from the pan-kisses-you-kiss-the-pan dept.

Scooby Snacks writes "It looks like Microsoft and the United States Patent and Trademark Office have done it again. It would appear that Microsoft, in their extensive R&D labs, have developed a way to control a web browser through the use of a keyboard. What's next, a method for displaying a plurality of running programs, each in its own defined rectangular viewing area?"

13 of 32 comments (clear)

  1. This is a duplicate article :-( by sycotic · · Score: 5, Informative

    link here

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    -- If I were a fish, I'd be wet
  2. Redundant news by ubrkl · · Score: 3, Informative

    What's the point of posting this as news...? There's so much prior art (Lynx) that this patent will be thrown away as soon as someone challenges it.

    The story should be called: USPTO stuffs up again.

    NTSH, MA

    1. Re:Redundant news by __aafkqj3628 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      that this patent will be thrown away as soon as someone challenges it.

      If only someone REALLY rich would join our side.

  3. An outdated dupe... by Reorax · · Score: 3, Informative

    Not only was this story posted a few days ago, but the patent was filed seven years ago. I may hate Microsoft as much as the next guy, but seven years? C'mon people....

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    This sig is only here so people stop skipping the last lines of my posts.
    1. Re:An outdated dupe... by jerde · · Score: 3, Interesting

      The web was originally TEXT ONLY. How many roll & scroll applications used a mouse at all in 1997?

      I share your righteous indignation at the stupid patent, but your facts are a bit off...

      Read Tim Berners-Lee's FAQ about the web. The first web browser was designed on a NeXT system, and was graphical. Yes, a line-mode browser was written shortly thereafter, but a windowed point-and-click version came first. Graphics weren't inline, but they were definitely part of the initial idea. But the app itself was indeed GUI based.

      And how many applications used a mouse in 1997!? Dude, all the apps I've been using have been with a mouse since Jan 24, 1984, where've you been? :)

      But seriously, the patent is patently ridiculous, excuse the pun. The "invention" is a method for using the tab key to select a link on a web page. I feel as though millions of geeks all cried out "DUH!" and were silenced...

      - Peter

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      INsigNIFICANT
  4. Have the /. editorial staff been outsourced? by scupper · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I am going to be karma flogged for this, but it seems in the last 6 months that the editorial staff of slashdot may have been quietly outsourced. Aren't the number of dupes reaching an unprecidented high in slashdot history?

  5. really... by JVert · · Score: 2, Funny

    So... they are scared of lynx now?

  6. Re:Have the /. editorial staff been outsourced? by Jahf · · Score: 2, Funny

    No, not really.

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    It is more productive to voice thoughtful opinions (reply) than to judge (moderate) others.
  7. Re:Is there a group of Dupe Trolls? by DaoudaW · · Score: 3, Informative

    Good grief guys! RTFP

    The patent was applied for March 6, 1997, but it wasn't approved/published until August 30, 2004. Sorry, no coincidences involved, it's just a week old story which is about on par for Slashdot.

    Whoops, I pressed tab to preview my comment. Dang I hate to pay those M$ royalties!

  8. Rectangular? by __aafkqj3628 · · Score: 2, Funny

    In Windows XP, the top two corners are ROUNDED.... oh shit! There goes my patent idea.

  9. Re:Have the /. editorial staff been outsourced? by Kris_J · · Score: 3, Interesting
    No, not really.

    ("This exact comment has already been posted. Try to be more original..." - Wow, that's a new one.)

  10. Prior Art! by stinkydog · · Score: 2, Interesting

    As the 1980s came to a close, a high tech web browsing tool called LYNX stormed the scene. It was the the browser of choice on my text only VAX account at Wright State University. The arrow keys moved up and down through the links and the spacebar represented the 'click'. I hope microsoft sue on this one, so that they can be laughed out of court. You can still download and use Lynx at http://lynx.isc.org/.

    SD

    --
    âoeWho knew something as harmless as willful ignorance could end up having real consequences?â
  11. At what point .... by gstoddart · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Will a behaviour which has been available in various applications for two decades be exempt from patenting?

    The use of keys to control a GUI is far from novel, and just because it's the damned web I fail to see anything new or original about this.

    Waay back when Microsoft applications didn't run in windows or anything, and there was no network to connect to, that whole "alt+f" to bring up the file menu was well established in things like DOS' edit program and has been applied to everything since.

    Aeons before that, vt100 terminals and the like could use the tab key to move among fields for data input. Hell, the Motif style guidelines would have included stuff which describes how to do keyboard shortcuts, and it predated Microsoft's patent application by a whole lot of years.

    I've said this before, but why the hell is a method of interacting with a piece of software via the keyboard a novel or patentable exercise, or does it count as innovation???

    If you've had keyboard navigation in applications for over a decade (almost two!), just because you add keyboard navigation to a new application doesn't mean shit.

    Meh.

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    Lost at C:>. Found at C.