SGI Sues ATI for Patent Infringement

Ynsats writes "The Register is reporting that SGI is filing suit against ATI for patent infringement. The suit alleges that ATI violated patent number 6,650,327, "Display system having floating point rasterization and floating point framebuffering", which was filed in 1998 and granted in 2003, in its Radeon graphics cards. This is coming fast on the heels of AMD's announcement of the intention to buy ATI for $4.2B and it doesn't seem to be swaying AMD's intentions. AMD hopes to finish the takeover by the end of this year. SGI has also issued an ominous statement stating that they have plenty of intellectual property left and there will be more litigation to come."

Comments

Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Ryu2]

If you can't beat them, sue them...

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[jcr]

The difference here is that SGI really did invent a lot of things, and their patents are probably valid.

-jcr

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[xENoLocO]

When it's something original, sure, patent it.

Patenting it because you were just the first one to get there? Lame.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference here is that SGI really did invent a lot of things, and their patents are probably valid.

"Display system having floating point rasterization and floating point framebuffering"

Probably valid? Floating point? Old invention. Raster? Old invention. Framebuffer? Old invention. Basically, it's a patent for "doing the same as every other display in the world, except with more digits".

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Anonymous Coward]

Like he said, if you can't beat them, sue them. ("Valid" patents or not, they are still resorting to litigation-as-business-model like any dying company in the US does.)

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[tomstdenis]

ATI deserves to be sued. Their Linux support is horrible. :-)

And AMD still owes me a grand from my Linux World expenses... cheap bastards the lot of them!

Tom

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Mike Savior]

Sometimes, they're one in the same. It's just a matter of coincidence. (Just saying)

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[AndrewRUK]

And what, exactly, is creating something original, if not being "the first one to get there"?

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[jcr]

Nope. Making a display system work with floating point is a pretty massive undertaking technically, and I'm sure it resulted in quite a few patentable inventions along the way.

-jcr

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the parent was trying to restate, in layman's terms, the patent stipulation that an idea is patentable only if it is non-obvious to someone skilled in the trade. If the idea is very simple, but that company was just the first one to think, "Hey, we can patent this", then it is pretty lame. At least, that's how I read it after a few mental contortions. :-)

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[mabinogi]

A patent is not on the concept itself, it's on the actual "invention" - the method and / or mechanism.

Anyone can come up with ideas, but unless you can demonstrate how they work, you don't get a patent.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[russotto]

A patent is not on the concept itself, it's on the actual "invention" - the method and / or mechanism.

You're thinking of the old patent system. In the new patent system, you patent the goal and then sue anyone who reaches it. This patent is definitely an example of that.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[swthomas55]

Alexander Graham Bell was 4 hours ahead of a rival inventor filing the patent on his telephone. Being first is all, in this race. (From Wikipedia: Bell then secured his own patent in 1876, just hours before Elisha Gray visited the patent office for his own work on the telephone.)

The Wikipedia article also tells the story of Antonio Meucci, who apparently invented the telephone several years earlier but was too poor to take out a patent. Seems things really weren't all that different 130 years ago.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Niddix]

The difference is this.

Alexander Graham Bell didn't sit there and watch Elisha Gray build a sucessful business selling his 'rogue' telephones. Then wait till he was tired of being a broke inventor then sue him.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Anal Cock]

If only someone had patented the idea of being a patent troll, and sued all the other patent trolls for infinging. Yeah, not possible, but it would have been nice.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Anonymous Coward]

Total BS. Have you read the patents floating around today? Most of them ARE vague concepts. Our patent system is totally ludicrous and needs to be scrapped ASAP.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[IAmTheDave]

In the new patent system, you patent the goal and then sue anyone who reaches it.

Which makes it much easier to completely fail as a business, and have a fall-back business already in place. While we're successful, let's patent some shit. Then when we fall out of success, we can start suing people.

Thank goodness that WE didn't get sued when we were successful, however.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[swthomas55]

So you're saying that since SGI didn't sue ATI years ago, they should just roll over and let their patent rights evaporate? If my neighbor has been letting his dog dump on my front lawn for years, does that mean that I lose my right to ask him to pick it up or take the dog elsewhere? I don't think so.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[SuperSpaceCracker]

Isn't this more like when Rambus sued Micron than it is like the SCO lawsuit?

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Changer2002]

Not having read the patent, I can't comment on this particular one, but one thing /.'ers love to do is point out how obvious patents are based on their titles. Being a lawyer and working with patents all day let me just state that the title of a patent often doesn't spell out what the inventive step is. It's just a general topic and area, and in a crowded area sometimes the titles are pretty generic. Usually you have to really get into the patent to find out what the innovation is (if it's there). So before you declare a patent obvious take a look at it, not just it's title.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[daeg]

By not enforcing the patents earlier, yes, SGI should forfeit their right to pursue violators in the legal system. You can't just sit back and wait for a company to turn profitable and be on the verge of a $4.2B takeover before suing them.

"Hey! They have money now! GET THEM!"

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[theStorminMormon]

Isn't that part of the reason we have a statue of limitations? It does seem to change the moral dimensions if you are happy to watch someone profit off of your idea, then sue them once they are a nice plump target. How to you distinguish between a patent troll that's happy to watch other people do all the work and take all the risks of going to market and a company that, for whatever reason, is incapable of suing in a timely manner?

The rewards of using an idea aren't just from the IP, they're also from the marketing, from the manufacturing, and from the risk-taking. Since the patent-holder invested none of that, why should they profit from it? If the patent stealing prevented the company from doing that (e.g. if a poor inventor can't keep up with a rich manufacturing firm) that's one thing, but if a company simply sits on a patent while another company works with it - why should we reward the lack of investment?

-stormin

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Deagol]

So you're saying that since SGI didn't sue ATI years ago, they should just roll over and let their patent rights evaporate?

No, he's saying that SGI is being a chump of a sore loser in the marketplace. Rather than trying to actually *do* something with that big fat IP portfolio, they're taking the evil route. They're a dying company with a bunch of IP that they can't produce and provide for a competitive price. They should just cash out and liquidate the IP and other assets they own. Having supported/administered SGI products (from Indigo workstations to 64-node Origin 2000's), I know their products were once kick-ass, but SGI's products are so overpriced (they even make Sun and IBM big iron look pretty cheap -- and at least IBM has decent support beyond the 1st tier) as to be silly. This lawsuit is, like others have pointed out, the same route to the Dark Side as SCO has taken. Will SGI's stock become a penny stock before too long?

If my neighbor has been letting his dog dump on my front lawn for years, does that mean that I lose my right to ask him to pick it up or take the dog elsewhere? I don't think so.

I mostly agree with you. But... if you've ignored the problem when you were on good terms with said neighbor, you're an ass if you decide to make an issue of it *after* you've had a falling out with your neighbor.

In some states, I believe that squatters on private property can acquire the title if they can prove they've been living on the property unchallenged for ten years. (Note: I had a couple of real estate agents tell me this, though I've been unable to back that up by digging through the Utah state legal code.) I think other forms of IP should have somethings similiar to this (like trademarks). If you choose not to pursue (in good faith) copyright and patent violations for so long, then you should forfeit your right to your exclusive rights. That would stop stupid submarine patent lawsuits, like the GIF compression, where the IP holder conveniently decides to pursue only after *years* have passed and they notice that their idea is actually making *someone* (not them, obviously) some money. Of course, this would increase legal costs for the IP holders, and some may say that this will put small businesses at a disadvantage. However, I think the history of trademarks shows that this is not the general case.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[jank1887]

so... the patent was only granted in 2003. It's now 2006. I would tend to give them the benefit of the doubt that 3 years is about the right amount of time to investigate (reverse engineer, if need be) whether a rival's technology is infringing, attempt to secure a licensing agreement, and then, after that, file infringement suits. On a 17 year patent, 3 years is young. It's not like they filed on some vague idea 14 years ago that wasn't even implementable then, and now that something looks close enough to what they cooked up back then they start suing. THAT would be troll-ish.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[I Like Pudding]

> And what, exactly, is creating something original, if not being "the first one to get there"?

something original = copyright
something original + non-obvious* = patent

* not applicable in the US (fucking goddamn it)

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[UnStatusTheQuo]

Well that's one way to rid themselves of the ugly bankruptcy numbers... good luck with that.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[HiThere]

Didn't SGI just get out of bankruptcy? I'd guess that this is how. On the strength of various lawsuits that they could file, they got a new round of financing. There's probably some way to check this, but I don't know what that would be, so this is just a guess.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Zordak]

If my neighbor has been letting his dog dump on my front lawn for years, does that mean that I lose my right to ask him to pick it up or take the dog elsewhere? I don't think so.

Well, actually, if you let his dog dump on your lawn long enough, it's possible that your neighbor has established an easement for his dog dumping on your lawn by virtue of adverse possession. At that point, your neighbor would have an established property interest in your lawn that gives him the right to let his dog poop on it. If you have a right, you're always better off asserting it sooner rather than later.

But your point is otherwise valid. In this case, they appear to be well within the statute of limitations for patent infringement, so the suit is proper.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[The Real Nem]

I think the main point is why does essentially taking something that is an integer and converting it to an IEEE float or an obvious implementation of a 16 bit float constitute a non-obvious invention?

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[modecx]

Being a lawyer and working with patents all day let me just state that the title of a patent often doesn't spell out what the inventive step is. It's just a general topic and area, and in a crowded area sometimes the titles are pretty generic

Point taken, the patent titles often don't accurately describe something, if indeed they actually try to describe anything at all. We should probably thank you lawyers for that.

A floating point rasterization and frame buffer in a computer system graphics program. The rasterization, fog, lighting, texturing, blending, and antialiasing processes operate on floating point values. In one embodiment, a 16-bit floating point format consisting of one sign bit, ten mantissa bits, and five exponent bits (s10e5), is used to optimize the range and precision afforded by the 16 available bits of information. In other embodiments, the floating point format can be defined in the manner preferred in order to achieve a desired range and precision of the data stored in the frame buffer. The final floating point values corresponding to pixel attributes are stored in a frame buffer and eventually read and drawn for display. The graphics program can operate directly on the data in the frame buffer without losing any of the desired range and precision of the data.

I'm not a professional engineer of 3D stuffs, or even more than a novice programmer, but it seems fairly obvious that floating point rasterization of fog, lighting, texturing, blending and antialiasing is no less than the obvious way to do it... Defining the size of your floating point operators to optimize the precision you need dosen't sound particularly non-obvious, either. I like SGI, but it really sounds like this is a bogus patent.

The one part that might echo of some innovative thing is the last scentance: The graphics program can operate directly on the data in the frame buffer without losing any of the desired range and precision of the data. But I'd wager that people in the demo scene have been doing that for a long time.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[mrchaotica]

floating-point coordinates --> scaling and rounding --> integer coordinates

What am I missing, that makes it so hard?

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[GigsVT]

I had a couple of real estate agents tell me this, though I've been unable to back that up by digging through the Utah state legal code

It's probably all common law and not codified in most places. Right of easement is what you are probably referring to. It's real.

If it is codified it's probably done on a local level in the building ordinances, not a state level.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[udippel]

Not even in the old system. There is an International Class for Patents on Perpetuum Mobile.
Which surely would have never worked in front of the officer ... .

The whole patent system has gone down the drain. Worldwide and not only the USPTO. WIPO is a bunch of industrial puppets these days, and the - then - great EPO has become a patent printing mill as well.

And, yes, I have spent more than 6 years of my life as patent examiner, in case you thought I was just a troll.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Jaysyn]

I can't find the post but somewhere in the comments of the story about SGI reorganizing this very thing was predicted. Going from a hardware company to a litigation company that is.

Jaysyn

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Anonymous Coward]

They're one and the same.

As in "They're the same. They are one."

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[dgatwood]

Indeed, MPEG and other graphics standards have done floating point for many, many years---since 1989, even. Hardware implementations have been around almost as long. The line between a hardware decoder for a video format and a video framebuffer is essentially nil. Indeed, ATI was doing MPEG decoding in their graphics chips prior to when this patent was filed.

I'm not saying that SGI doesn't have any valid patents, but at least the floating point framebuffer portion of this one should be tossed out. It is effectively nothing more than storing the same data at a different address. The floating point rasterization claims seem more novel, though.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Ryan Monster]

No, that's part of the reason we have a statuTe of limitations. But in this case it would probably more like acquiescence or laches if more time than just 3 years had lapsed.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Jahz]

> And what, exactly, is creating something original, if not being "the first one to get there"?

something original = copyright
something original + non-obvious* = patent

Way off-base. The problem is that so many Americans do not really understand what a Patent or Copyright is. Right from the horses mouth (USPTO):

" There are three types of patents:
1) Utility patents may be granted to anyone who invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, article of manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof;
2) Design patents may be granted to anyone who invents a new, original, and ornamental design for an article of manufacture;
3) Plant patents may be granted to anyone who invents or discovers and asexually reproduces any distinct and new variety of plant. "

The key here is that patents are for things that are invented. The invention may be an entirely new idea or a significant improvement on some other idea. By idea, I mean: "process, machine, article of manufacture, or composition of matter." So even though 64-bit cards are the natural evolution of 32-bit graphics cards, SGI was the first company to "think of" this improvement to the cards.

On the other hand a copyright only applies to authored materials, namely "literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works, both published and unpublished." You may copyright the manual describing how to manufacture a 64-bit graphics card, but you would have to patent the procedures in that manual.

Back to the OP. So you see, your definition of a patent as being a "non-obvious copyright" is way off base.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Some_Llama]

"Well, actually, if you let his dog dump on your lawn long enough, it's possible that your neighbor has established an easement for his dog dumping on your lawn by virtue of adverse possession."

What about a neighboor's cat? I have a number of neighboors who have no qualms with letting their cats be "outdoor" cats, which means they come and poop on my lawn, since they usually do this at night I don't know about it till I get a whiff of cat poop in the morning when I open my windows...

Would it be wrong to shoot the cats with a paintball gun if I see them pooping on my lawn years later when i finally catch one of them?

*desks himself in camo, loads paintballs and waits...*

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Ana10g]

Okay, mods, mod this parent funny... That is friggin hilarious! A "shit easement" on my neighbors lawn. I gotta get me one of those. Do you think it applies to humans, too? What about the neighborhood kid that keeps leaving burning bags of dog crap on my doorstep... is that adverse possession too, or fecal arson? I certainly don't want the kid to claim a burning poop easement on my doorstep.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Xanius]

What I'm wondering is why aren't they suing Nvidia?

Or for that matter any company that makes graphics chips that are capable of this?
Macs didn't use ATI/Nvidia for graphics in the past but they probably had GPUs that could do this as well.

The lawsuit has to be focused based on the fact that AMD is buying them for so much.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Taagehornet]

Robert E. Peary was the first man to reach the North Pole, Roald Amundsen the first to reach the South Pole.

Both were without doubt great achievements, but none of them can be considered creations of something original.

I guess/hope most people would find the idea of Peary patenting the very process of reaching a pole rather silly - I however fail to see how that would be any different from many of the patents we see today...

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Anonymous Coward]

And patents encouraged this innovation exactly how? One man was given a government sanctioned monopoly when several people came up with the invention. This led to less competition and more expense for the consumer.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Mike Savior]

Thanks, I really do appreciate when people clear things up like that for me.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[eXtro]

nVidia, as well as other vendors, licenses the technology from sgi.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Anonymous Coward]

their stock is so cheap maybe they're hoping for a takeover FROM ATI

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Anonymous Coward]

By not enforcing the patents earlier, yes, SGI should forfeit their right to pursue violators in the legal system. You can't just sit back and wait for a company to turn profitable and be on the verge of a $4.2B takeover before suing them.

Sadly, yes - you can.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[ari_j]

Given your signature, I will take you seriously. I have mod points right now but sadly there isn't an option for "+1 Gracious." :)

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[ari_j]

SGI still has viable products. This is actual protection of its intellectual property in the one area that it has always (rightly) prided itself in leading. SCO is different because it is litigating something it didn't invent and has no continuing interest in protecting. SGI might be dying, but it is not yet at the point that its business model gives priority to litigation.

Where would you draw the line? When is it okay to litigate to protect your intellectual property without being accused of having a business model of litigation?

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Osiris Ani]

guess/hope most people would find the idea of Peary patenting the very process of reaching a pole rather silly

...and it would indeed be rather silly, had he not invented any new and novel means to achieve that particular end. Your failure to see the difference between the circumstances presented in your exceptionally obtuse analogy (there existed prior art for numerous forms of self-sustained human ambulatory movement, as well as other basic and elaborate forms of geographic transport) and reality is a reflection not of a general failure in the system, but of your lack of understanding of that system.

The first team to reach either pole by means of a teleportation device that they invented has a very good chance of acquiring a valid patent on the process.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[flaming-opus]

That's pretty much how patents work. It costs millions of dollars to sue someone for a patent claim. You have to know that winning the case will net you tens of millions, or it's not worth the legal fees.

The real difference, is that sgi is now out of the graphics card industry, so they don't have to worry about ati coming back and counter-suing them for using some technology Ati has a pattent for.

This would be the normal and expected course for technology patents.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[flaming-opus]

You know, as much as we feel good bashing the patent troll, the patent process is really built to protect the little guy from the market Gorillas. Lets say I come up with a really clever design for a widget that is really clever and useful. Because I don't have a supply chain, or much manufacturing capacity, it costs me a thousand bucks a unit to manufacture. Then General Amalgamated Industries sees I'm selling them as fast as I can make them, copies the design, and can build them for a hundred bucks, undercutting me and putting me out of business. The idea of a patent, is that the little guy, if he comes up with something that really is a unique invention, has a short period of years to sell the product, without competing with unlicensed knock-offs. It's really a very progressive idea.

The real challenge with patent law in the IT industry is that the patent laws were written when the pace of invention, and of the market were slower. 15 years without competition is a very, very long time in the computer world. Much moreso than competing designs of steam engine.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[mikael]

In some states, I believe that squatters on private property can acquire the title if they can prove they've been living on the property unchallenged for ten years.

It's certainly true in England - a guy managed to gain ownership of a house simply by squatting there for 16 years. Didn't make a nuisance of himself, was polite to everyone and the council didn't find out for 16 years.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Bill Grates]

fascinating story I had not heard this before .

But Wikipedia's account is more complicated

ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elisha_Gray
> Contrary to popular myth, Gray's caveat was taken to the US Patent Office a few hours before Bell's application.[1] But the filing fee for Gray's caveat was entered on the cash blotter hours after Bell's filing fee which led to the myth that Bell had arrived at the Patent Office earlier. Bell was in Boston on February 14 and did not know this was happening until he arrived in Washington on February 26

In fact the caveat would have secured Gray's rights ahead of Bell's except ...

ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elisha_Gray
> When Gray was notified through his lawyer of this interference, Gray's lawyer advised Gray to abandon his caveat because he said Bell had invented it first and had it notarized earlier than Gray. When Gray agreed to abandon his caveat, the examiner granted the patent to Bell.

So in fact it was not not being first in the race but bad legal advice that made the difference between the men in history. Maybe the race for the best lawyer in town is the better analogy.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Anonymous Coward]

Why being first doing something obvious should give me any right to prevent everyone else doing that ?

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[rising_hope]

It's a good thing Meucci was too poor! Imagine everyone trying to pronounce Ma Meucci. Doesn't exactly roll off the tongue. ;-)

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[rising_hope]

True. Reading headlines and presuming the content of the article is just as good as reading the whole thing is often the case with news readers in general. A headline and title is just that - something on a general related note to get your attention. Even laws end up this way. S.3930: Military Commissions Act of 2006 (the so-called "detainee bill") sounds pretty harmless on the surface, and the summary sounds harmless too... but then you get into the bill and find the details and how utterly scary it really is. Digging deeper into things isn't something most people have time or willingness to commit, unfortunately, in this day and age of infoglut. Unfortunately, when we don't take/make the time, scary things happen when we don't. When's the last time the average joe actually *read* one of those licensing agreements to a piece of software they just purchased anyway? Doubtful they even ever have. In fact, most people, when learning how to operate a computer, are pretty much instructed "oh, just click accept," rather than understanding that accepting the terms is not always in your best interest. Thus the advent of spyware/malware. We're not all lawyers, but we all need to be just as cautious as if we were in a litigious society.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Libertarian001]

"3 years is about the right amount of time to investigate (reverse engineer, if need be) whether a rival's technology is infringing"

Wait, isn't reverse engineering a DMCA violation? No, I'm not being a snarky bastard.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[rubycodez]

and if SGI's failure was really in fact largely due to patents being violated?

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Taagehornet]

your exceptionally obtuse analogy

What analogy? - I questioned the assertion that >>what, exactly, is creating something original, if not being "the first one to get there"<<

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[jank1887]

hmmmm... would DMCA even apply here? don't think so. This reverse engineering wouldn't seem to be directed at a copyright protection measure. But I haven't read the DMCA, so not sure.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[I Like Pudding]

My description was accurate, but not as precise as yours. I didn't feel the need to bludgeon the reader with detail when all I wanted to get across was how much I hated the unenforced non-obvious clause in patent law.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[jambarama]

There is an old saying - "the deeper the pockets, the more buzzing flies."

With AMD behind ATI, ATI is worth a lot more. And yes, I just made that saying up.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[mabhatter654]

The patent was orginally filed in 1998, but granted in 2003? that was about he time SGI started laying off the people that would create Nvidia and 3Dfx... I believe ATi has been around much longer. But That means they missed 5 years of graphics cards.. 5 years!!!! That's the ENTIRE time 3DFX was actually selling cards plus some. That's much to long to be considered seriously in an industry where stuff was obsolete in 6 months for much of that same time period. This reaks of a "submarine" that was tweaked at the last minute to hijack everybody else that outdid them by leaps and bounds.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[bit01]

The key here is that patents are for things that are invented. The invention may be an entirely new idea or a significant improvement on some other idea. By idea, I mean: "process, machine, article of manufacture, or composition of matter."

The key here is that you've actually defined one fuzzy term with a bunch of fuzzy other terms and ended up with nothing. The patent lobby use that fuzziness/ambiguity as an empire building tool.

So even though 64-bit cards are the natural evolution of 32-bit graphics cards, SGI was the first company to "think of" this improvement to the cards.

64 bit is a blindly obvious extension of 32 bit, particularly when you realize that 32 was also an extension of 16, 16 of 8 and 8 of 4, and therefore totally fails any reasonable obviousness test.

---

The patent mafia: When all they've got is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[enharmonix]

I didn't feel the need to bludgeon the reader with detail...

I'm pretty sure that bludgeoning the reader with detail is mandatory per the /. TOS :)

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Jahz]

64 bit is a blindly obvious extension of 32 bit, particularly when you realize that 32 was also an extension of 16, 16 of 8 and 8 of 4, and therefore totally fails any reasonable obviousness test.

Okay sure it is. 128-bit will be next. Then 256-bit. What's the point? Everything is built on something else. I never said patents were good, or even not "broken," I was just defining them. It is important for people to understand what they are talking about. The OP had confused patents and copyrights... two very different things.

Re:Reminds me of another three letter 'S' company

[Jahz]

something original = copyright
something original + non-obvious* = patent

You have to remember who you are dealing with here. Most people really don't know the difference between these things and would probably take your definition as fact. However, it is completely wrong... Perhaps you knew that, perhaps you didnt or maybe you could care less. Either way I feel as though I have educated some people and got some good karma.

welcome back SGI

[hlimethe3rd]

So SGI has been reborn as a patent troll? Welcome to the party.

Re:welcome back SGI

[c_forq]

I submitted this yesterday after seeing it on OSNews, but my question was: is this becoming the new business strategy for technology companies that failed in their traditional business? Just on the heels of rejoining the NASDAQ and after a period of bankruptcy instead of a restructure or new plan they announce litigation. Is SGI going to use any capital gained to rejoin the table as a technological competitor, or are they following the steps of SCO?

Re:welcome back SGI

[displague]

Patent Troll? Were they honestly hording patents or were they innovating?

It seems fair that SGI, who was very big in the game not that long ago and can no longer compete, should be able to collect dues for their patented ideas. I know nothing about the patent on hand, and whether or not it was obvious at the time, but I'm giving SGI the benefit of the doubt because of their cool blue Indigo systems.

My only question to SGI is why didn't you start defending the patent earlier? "Because we thought we were financially stable" won't make for a good answer.

I hear they make a good portion of their current income from real-estate leases to Google.

Re:welcome back SGI

[timeOday]

It seems fair that SGI, who was very big in the game not that long ago and can no longer compete, should be able to collect dues for their patented ideas.

If only you had said "legal" instead of "fair."

SGI did have their heyday. They had many good innovations, and at the time they also made a lot of money on those innovations for their employees and investors. That's all teriffic.

But now that it's over, what good will be had by forcing us to pay an "SGI Tax" on anything to do with graphics for the next N years?

Re:welcome back SGI

[drgonzo59]

I thought there was supposed to be a law that would curb such practices i.e.: 1. Get a patent for something 2. Hide into a hole 3. Wait years for some other company to implement something related 4. Sue 5. ? (obligatory South Park refernce) 6. Profit! Not sure if the law passed but there was some talk about it. The law was supposed to deter 2 and 3. SGI's claim for the patent is probably valid (unlike SCO's claims) but if they are so offended and can claim so much loss they should have sued right way when they found out about ATI's announcement. The fact that they waited means that they are becoming the new SCO -- a patent monkey. It seems that all S?? companies eventually end up sucking!

Re:welcome back SGI

[mikael]

The patent is mentioned in the OpenGL extension specifications color_buffer_float.txt

SGI owns US Patent #6,650,327, issued November 18, 2003. SGI
        believes this patent contains necessary IP for graphics systems
        implementing floating point (FP) rasterization and FP framebuffer
        capabilities.

SGI's patent was filed June 16, 1998, and granted November 18, 2003

ATI did similar work at the same time ATI_pixel_format_float

The development history of ATI's document ranges from 9th June 2002 to 4th December 2002

Basically, ATI gets caught between SGI filing for a patent, and SGI having the patent granted. Although, given that SGI have been announcing the status of this patent for the past three years, it does seem odd that they are only sueing now. Maybe they are scared of the ATI/AMD merger, or see that ATI has more money now.

Re:welcome back SGI

[mike2R]

is this becoming the new business strategy for technology companies that failed in their traditional business?

I think it's inevtable. When a public company goes bankrupt, it has to be wound up or reconstituted in such a way as to give maximum value to its creditors and shareholders. If it's sitting on software patent assets that are potentially worth money then those assets must be realised.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Das Modell]

Unfortunately, SGI is violating my patent number 1,337 which is the concept of "being an annoying fucktard who wants to halt progress by patenting everything and then suing everyone."

Seriously, fuck patents. Whatever they were originally intended for seems meaningless at this point.

Re:welcome back SGI

[cgenman]

A once great company behaving like a patent troll is still a patent troll.

A patent is intended to be a device to protect non-obvious research and innovation from being stolen so that you can reap the rewards in your product line. In this case, the research was not stolen, as ATI thought of it too. And SGI no longer has a product line to protect.

They're suing ATI because they have no way left to make money. Period. They're not protecting their own product line or income stream, as they have neither. They're not even protecting their own research, as ATI developed this independently. They're just in their death throes, and are suing.

Remember, patent mutually assured destruction doesn't work if one company no longer has a product line to destroy. Dying companies have a habit of taking others with them.

Re:welcome back SGI

[ehrichweiss]

SGI actually manufactures things(or at least they DID up till recently) so "patent troll" doesn't quite fit. Just because one company sues another over IP rights doesn't mean one of them is a patent troll.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Waffle Iron]

My only question to SGI is why didn't you start defending the patent earlier?

Most likely because they used to actually make stuff. Since most of the companies that they could sue probably have plenty of patents of their own that SGI was infringing on, such an action would have risked shutting down SGI's production lines.

Now that they've gone bankrupt, they probably figure that they don't stand to gain much by trying to produce things, so they can go forward as a pure patent troll. This won't infringe on others' patents, so there's no longer any deterrent to SGI filing patent lawsuits as they please.

Re:welcome back SGI

[ehrichweiss]

"But now that it's over, what good will be had by forcing us to pay an "SGI Tax" on anything to do with graphics for the next N years?"

The same good it does us to pay the "Ford Tax" or "Chevy Tax" on items *they* patented and others are using. We do that ALL THE TIME. You make it sound like sour grapes. They failed so they should give up their intellectual property?!?!?

Re:welcome back SGI

[AdamKG]

The same good it does us to pay the "Ford Tax" or "Chevy Tax" on items *they* patented and others are using. We do that ALL THE TIME. You make it sound like sour grapes. They failed so they should give up their intellectual property?!?!?

No, not specifically them. Anyone who has an innovation from which they gained by being first to market shouldn't get a patent to hold back competitors- from where those competitors would have reached anyway- for 20 years. Being first to market is all the incentive that's needed for companies in the area of computer graphics to innovate. Therefore patents, which have the express and exclusive purpose of promoting progress, do not need to be granted at all in that area (or in business methods, software, etc. In other areas, like medicine, being first to market isn't enough.).

People are missing the forest for the trees. You do not have to have patents on every last thing in order to get progress, and just resign yourself to put up and shut up with all the harmful trolling, all in the name of progress. It's well within Congress's power to mandate that the USPTO only grant patents in fields where they are necessary for progress. We just need a better Congress to decide this.

Re:welcome back SGI

[fistfullast33l]

Good catch on that. Not many people will pay attention. I bet it took them 3 years to file the lawsuit because law moves slower than technology, and they had to take time to build a claim. I'd like to give SGI the benefit of the doubt here and say they're not a patent troll. You don't just file a lawsuit and hope for the best. As a business you need to make sure that your decision can be backed up (otherwise you become SCOX). Of course, I bet the bankruptcy had a lot to do both with the decision to file and the delay in filing. Plus, we don't know if SGI approached ATI before this and offered a deal over litigation.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Creepy]

I find it hard to believe SGI and ATI weren't aware of this a long time ago and I doubt they can win a court case on it unless they are referring to work done before it became an ARB extension of OpenGL.

SGI (Jon Leech to be specific) was part of the ARB group that near-unanimously approved the ARB extensions WGL_ARB_pixel_format_float, ARB_texture_float, ARB_half_float_pixel, and ARB_color_clamp_control into OpenGL in 2004. The real problem is that SGI LICENSES OpenGL, something hardware and software manufacturers pay a licensing fee to use (Mesa is an OpenGL work-alike, NOT OpenGL). I believe the licensing fee is supposed to cover any patents involved, but I could be wrong.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Zordak]

Your .sig is completely wrong. You may WANT juries in America to judge the LAW, but they don't. They judge the facts. Questions of law are always decided by judges, because they know the law and (presumably) the juries don't. But your comment was spot on.

Re:welcome back SGI

[RobBebop]

Patents protect the efforts required to advance the state of the art, not only non-obvious research. If something truly is non-obvious after other companies do it, the better way to protect it is through trade secrets. In this sense... there is a striking LACK OF a patent for the ingenuity. If I recall correctly from undergrad courses in this and related subjects... one main research that Coke is so strong a company is that their recipe for the soft-drink is secret. If they were to patent it, after X years the patent would expire and "generic" Coke could be made to taste like "authentic" Coke by using the patented recipe. As the case is now... they can get close - but not close enough to replace the lumbering giant.

Re:welcome back SGI

[OakLEE]

I am an IP Lawyer and patents are not about just protecting stolen research, though it does. They are about protecting you investment in a device that is non-obvious and innovative (you got that part right). What this means is that even if ATI did invent this all by themselves, if SGI invented it before ATI, they are entitled to sue.

You are confusing patent law with trade secret law, which does protect from missapropriation and stealing, but requires that you keep your innovation secret, which you cannot do if you file a patent. The two laws are for the most part mutually exclusive.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Anonymous Coward]

That's exactly what my first thought was when we heard they were out of chapter 11. I mean, they basically have no product left that anyone wants to buy, they've laid off tons of people and all. What are they possibly going to do? Oh, look at all that IP patent portfolio we're sitting on... I bet lots of the trivial stuff they've patented is also used by anybody and everybody in the graphics industry (not just ATI/nvidia/intel for video cards, but companies making rendering engines and stuff like that too.

SGI is the new SCO. I for one, would like to welcome our new patent troll, litigating bastards^H^H^H^H^H^H overlords.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Anonymous Coward]

Your statements regarding patents are absolutely incorrect:

http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/doc/general/i ndex.html#patent

"The right conferred by the patent grant is, in the language of the statute and of the grant itself, "the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling" the invention in the United States or "importing" the invention into the United States. What is granted is not the right to make, use, offer for sale, sell or import, but the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, selling or importing the invention. Once a patent is issued, the patentee must enforce the patent without aid of the USPTO."

A patent is intended to be a device to protect non-obvious research and innovation from being stolen so that you can reap the rewards in your product line.

    A patent is intended to exclude others from making, selling, or importing the invention to the US.

In this case, the research was not stolen, as ATI thought of it too.

    Sure nothing was actually "stolen", but how is it that ATI "thought of it too"? Did ATI hear about the research that SGI was doing? Did ATI hire some staff from SGI? In this case, it really doesn't matter. The fact is that SGI filed for the patent and it was granted. This means that SGI has the right to prevent others from making, selling, or importing this technology.

They're not even protecting their own research, as ATI developed this independently

    Isn't this is technically what the patent is supposed to protect? As an indepent inventor with meager resources, if I filed for and was granted a patent, this would give me the right exclude others from creating the invention. Meaning ATI can do all the research they want, but cannot make or sell any product using the invention or technology. This protect me and my invention from being developed independently by ATI, as ATI has the resources to develop a product offering in 1/3 of the time.

still a patent troll

    Yes they are and at this point they need to be. They have nothing left right now. Optimistcally speaking though, perhaps a source of incoming revenue will spark the company to start doing some real research again. They did some interesting things in the past and maybe they can do so again in the future... but of course, this is VERY unlikely.

Re:welcome back SGI

[halfelven]

My only question to SGI is why didn't you start defending the patent earlier? "Because we thought we were financially stable" won't make for a good answer.

It is hard to fathom the ineptitude of the former upper management at SGI. "Bizzarely stupid" is probably a fair assesment. For a very long time, SGI was a company of brilliant, innovative geeks and utterly moronic upper management.
Rick Beluzzo was the one who decided to stop pursuing the lawsuit against NVidia, a few years back. So, yes, they did start to defend themselves earlier, but for some bizarre reason they stopped doing it. BTW, Beluzzo was instrumental in "delivering" SGI into numerous financial problems.

At least now they have people who know business, in the upper seats.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Anonymous Coward]

^^ This person is an idiot & has no idea what they are talking about. ^^

Re:welcome back SGI

[Eccles]

Juries can do whatever they please. Unless there is evidence of jury tampering, a jury can come back with a not guilty or guilty verdict regardless of the facts of the case. In the case of a not guilty verdict, that's the final word. You just need 12 jurors to agree. (Heck, they can ignore both the law and the facts, as in the OJ Simpson verdict.) A judge can explain matters of law to the jury, but the jury can ignore the explanation.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Eccles]

They are about protecting you investment in a device that is non-obvious and innovative (you got that part right). What this means is that even if ATI did invent this all by themselves, if SGI invented it before ATI, they are entitled to sue.

However, if both developed this independently and at about the same time, that's a pretty clear sign that it is not "non-obvious," and is in fact a natural extension of what came before.

Given a problem, if similar problems have been solved by the same solution, then that solution should *not* be patentable.

Re:welcome back SGI

[cgenman]

I didn't mean protecting legally defined stolen research. I was using the term a bit loosely to refer to reverse-engineering a competitor's product to do the same thing... using their research without conducting your own, if you will.

"Hey, why are Nike's shoes so soft? Wow, they're full of air. Their air pocket takes the shape of successive tubes of 1 cm diameter running the length of the shoe plus a 3mm thick membrane around the edge. Let's do that." Now, granted, Nike probably has / had a design patent on that as well, but you get the point.

SGI is most definitely legally entitled to sue. What they are not entitled to is a patent on blood, sweat, and tears rather than originality. If multiple companies come to the same solution to a problem at the same time, the solution is probably obvious to someone skilled in the arts.

The system is a bit broken at the moment. The patent office is underfunded for their mandate, which means they let things through assuming the court will sort things out. The courts assume that the patent office did a thorough job, making it difficult to challenge bogus patents. Anyone who works in IT has come across these, and quite a few of us have these. Unfortunately, you're legally bound to your shareholders to take all of these seriously, no matter how frivilous or stupid they are (the patents, not the shareholders).

Hence, we have patent warfare. And patent death throes. And we waste lots of resources defending and countersuing instead of getting on about the business of making IT better.

Re:welcome back SGI

[ari_j]

I always thought the Crimson was the coolest. Here is a picture of a few SGI systems for your amusement.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Tim C]

I bet it took them 3 years to file the lawsuit because law moves slower than technology, and they had to take time to build a claim.

Exactly. My guess is that it simply took them that long to discover a possible infringement, research it, confirm it, then gather evidence and build a case.

If every company launched into a lawsuit the moment they thought their IP was being infringed upon, there would be a hell of a lot of spurious suits and we slashdotters would be up in arms. (Well, that's our natural state, but I digress...)

Re:welcome back SGI

[rising_hope]

I think they're just begging for someone to buy them out. A while back, before they were delisted, I thought it'd make sense for Apple to buy them, as they held similar markets with different target customers. These days, though, it's a joke to even consider it. SGI needs cash. It needs new products. It needs innovation and direction it once had. Unfortunately, not firmly committing to any particular product line or direction ultimately killed it. A shame for essentially the pioneer of many modern computing technologies... At least Digital had the sense to get purchased by Compaq (which is now HP.) How the mighty have fallen...

Re:welcome back SGI

[Zordak]

Yes, juries can decide whatever they want, regardless of the law. But the judge will not allow some things to go to the jury. The judge may decide certain issues as a matter of law, and those issues may eviscerate one party's case so much that there is no need for a jury trial. If there is a jury trial, the court can adjust the jury's award of damages either because they are capped by statute, or because he considers them "excessive." Judges can even issue Judgments Notwithstanding the Verdict, meaning that the judge deems that there was insufficient evidence for the jury to find as it did. All of these are "legal" issues that the judge decides. The jury decides facts like "who's lying; who's telling the truth." We never ask them to interpret the law---just how the facts fit the law they are given.

Re:welcome back SGI

[OakLEE]

I didn't mean protecting legally defined stolen research. I was using the term a bit loosely to refer to reverse-engineering a competitor's product to do the same thing... using their research without conducting your own, if you will.

Exactly my definition. Patent law protects against reverse-engineering. If I have a patent on A, and you reproduce what is basically equivalent A you are liable for infringement, even if you reverse engineered it or came up with it all by yourself. (Note: what can be "equivalent" is really complex and depends on the type of patent. I will not get into that here.) Reverse-engineering is only protected under trade secret law, which involves innovations that have not been patentited. Thus, if I had a trade secret A, and you independently reverse-engineer and come up with A, I have no right to sue you for trade secret misappropriation.

SGI is most definitely legally entitled to sue. What they are not entitled to is a patent on blood, sweat, and tears rather than originality. If multiple companies come to the same solution to a problem at the same time, the solution is probably obvious to someone skilled in the arts.

Yes, all of what you said is true, but SGI filed for the patent in 1998. Meanwhile, IIRC another post said ATI's work came about circa 2002. In a fast developing industry like one would be hard pressed to call 4 years simultaneous. As far as not bieng novel, which is what your person skilled in the art defense goes to, we would need more facts, but the fact that in four years, only one other company out of an entire industry (SGI, ATI, Nvidia, Intel, S3 to name a few) came up with this independently is strong evidence that their innovation was probably not obvious.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Zordak]

One last point: Yes, in a criminal case, if the jury says "Not guilty," that's it. End of the road, regardless of the law and/or facts. Usually when judges mess with jury findings, it's bad for the plaintiff/prosecution.

Re:welcome back SGI

[OakLEE]

Like I said to the other reply, from what I'm reading in the other posts, ATI's technology came to fruition circa 2002, while SGI filed for its patent in 1998. Four years is not "simultaneous," especially in the computer industry. Just look at the CPU's from four years ago. Could you honestly have predicted in 2002 then that multi-core CPU's would be commonplace on laptops or even desktops? In 2002, I was the only person in my entire college dorm (~700 people) that had a dual-processor system. I bet I could go through it today and find at least 50% of the people have an multi-core system.

Even if they did both invent simultaneously, would the fact that two out of how many graphics chips companies (S3, Rendition, 3dfx, Nvidia, Intel, ATI, SGI, PowerVR, 3DLabs, Matrox at a minimum) came up with this technology really indicate that it was an obvious natural extension? ATI probably has a prior art defense if they indeed did invent this at the same time as SGI, but I would sincerely doubt that they could claim non-obviousnes. It's not like SGI designed a 4 vertex shader card and ATI came along and made an 8 shader model.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Ilgaz]

SGI, the company which brought us OpenGL technology may have some patents and intellectual property. It doesn't have to be "troll". Remember 3dfx was crying that Nvidia is using their inventions and nobody were taking them serious. Nvidia later purchased 3dfx for their inventions/intellectual property. So, there was really something going on.

SGI isn't a newly founded company to sue people around and it doesn't deserve to be called "patent troll" automatically without reading anything.

As OS X user I am glad they created OpenGL technology and kept up supporting it until they went broke. I have no clue what would happen if OpenGL wasn't around and MS is alone with their Direct3d technology.

I just did a spotlight search (os x local search engine) on my system for "Silicon Graphics" , dozens of readme, license, acknowledgements popped up, including OS X'es own.

If they really invented something and that was stolen from them, they should sue.

Re:welcome back SGI

[bit01]

I wish lawyers like you would realize that just because something hasn't been done before doesn't mean it's not obvious.

Most technology is developed when "it's time has come", the necessary precursors have been developed and the next step in development is obvious. Both floating-point-as-an-extension-of-integer and multi-processing, both also developed incrementally, are blindingly obvious in themselves, and to their applicability, and were developed many decades ago.

Some companies move into a particular area sooner, others later, depending on their business objectives and evaluation of the technology and market. It has absolutely nothing to do with innovation and patents do not protect business models.

I also get highly irritated by lawyers, who are not in the business of creating things like me and hence are amateurs, claiming to know more about creation than I do.

---

The patent mafia: When all they've got is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Anonymous Coward]

You claim "ATI thought of it too". Look at the names on the patent... they all work at either ATI or Nvidia today. I'm betting the SGI filing has everything to do with their securing a new line of credit and coming out of bankruptcy (the creditor's lawyers probably wrote it into the agreement). Showing that their patent portfolio has teeth would be a good way to attract suitors for a takeover as well.

Re:welcome back SGI

[Eccles]

Could you honestly have predicted in 2002 then that multi-core CPU's would be commonplace on laptops or even desktops?

Neither Intel nor AMD have a patent on the dual core concept, thank goodness.

In 1991, I was part of a research project at UNC -- Pixel-Planes -- that stored floating point texture coordinates on a per-pixel basis in a frame buffer. (I believe Greg Turk http://www-static.cc.gatech.edu/~turk/ did the actual implementation.)

Re:welcome back SGI

[OakLEE]

I wish lawyers like you would realize that just because something hasn't been done before doesn't mean it's not obvious.

I never made that statement. I said, the fact that it was only done twice in a competetive industry with many companies is evidence that it might not be as obvious as you think.

Most technology is developed when "it's time has come", the necessary precursors have been developed and the next step in development is obvious. Both floating-point-as-an-extension-of-integer and multi-processing, both also developed incrementally, are blindingly obvious in themselves, and to their applicability, and were developed many decades ago.

I should note that what is obvious and what is not obvious is a question of fact and depends on far more information about the state of the industry than I have knowledge of. I regret not mentioning that caveat here, like i did in some of the other posts in this thread. An while I agree and will concede the extension of moving from integer to floating point and from single to multi-processor might be logical progressions of the idea. The implementation of those concepts as compared to the implementation of previous art might be radically different. Again, it depends on the facts and what SGI's patent covers. (I will admit to not having read it, or reading a description of ATI's allegedly infringing design.)

I also get highly irritated by lawyers, who are not in the business of creating things like me and hence are amateurs, claiming to know more about creation than I do.

I worked at Nothrop Grumman's aerospace division for 2 years before going to law school. Do not imply that I have never been or do not know about the business of creating things. (Some of my work helps guide their new UCAVs). Attack the argument, not the person.

Re:welcome back SGI

[OakLEE]

Well there you go, possible prior art. Get in touch with ATI.

You suck SGI.

[dpaluszek]

Sorry SGI, you are done. Your products are done, all of your competition can bring better products to the table. This isn't 1998 where you brought these trendy cases and we all "ooed" over them.

Bye bye.

Re:You suck SGI.

[halfelven]

all of your competition can bring better products to the table

HP Superdome is plainly less capable, no matter how you compare it to SGI Altix.
IBM is faster only in cluster mode, and that's just because they can build larger clusters. Plus, it's much harder to develop for the IBM which is very proprietary. SGI Altix is the fastest single-image system and it is, after all, a "plain Linux" machine that just happens to have a sh*tload of CPUs.

Re:You suck SGI.

[kramulous]

I for one don't mind the Altix machines. For a shared memory system (yes, I have neither the time nor patience for distributed systems) price and support is way ahead of its competitors.

Was playing with a Prism for a while and it gave me a pretty much constant boner.

I for one am glad that SGI has emerged from chapter 11. I think you need to better understand their full product line before you jump on the band-wagon, blend into the crowd and slay 'em.

Huh?

[giorgiofr]

They have pantented graphic adapters, basically?!

Re:Huh?

[jcr]

No, RTFA. They patented floating-point frame buffers, which didn't exist before SGI invented them.

-jcr

Re:Huh?

[ThosLives]

The problem is that this patent fails the obviousness test about 100%. The patent itself, if you follow the link, says that "People have used floating point before, just in emulation because hardware cost too much. Now that hardware is cheap, we just do floating point rasterization from the framebuffer instead of through emulation."

I don't understand how the USPTO granted a patent that says "This method has been known for some time, but now we just have the capability to do it."

I'm all for granting legitimate patents (they do actually exist) but this one does not pass the sanity check.

Re:Huh?

[mwvdlee]

No, they patented the use of floating point math in graphics hardware.

Ofcourse, OpenGL (and probably a lot of others) was using floating point math in graphics way before the patent was filed, but that obviously has nothing to do with this.

Re:Huh?

[LizardKing]

SGI created OpenGL.

Re:Huh?

[lexarius]

I seem to recall OpenGL being originally developed by SGI. I don't think prior art counts when the company in question developed the prior art.

Re:Huh?

[MORB]

So they have been the first to implement an obvious idea (storing numeric values using floats instead of integers to get the kind of advantages one usually get by using floating point numbers instead of integers? OMG THAT'S BRILLIANT RUSH TO TEH PATENT OFFICE NOW!!1!).
Why should they be entitled them to reap benefit from other people managing to build a successful product using the same, painfully obvious idea?

I just hate the patent system for this.

Re:Huh?

[marcello_dl]

IANAGCD but it still seems the obvious thing you shouldn't be able to patent. You got something encoded with integers, then you think: "Hey, now the cost of doing FP arithmetics is negligible, why not add resolution in the most transparent way by going to FP?". Happened to audio file and picture formats, maybe hundreds of times in the history of computing.

Re:Huh?

[lisaparratt]

Perhaps because, when they did it, the cost of doing FP arithmetic was phenomenal? Because at the time, the idea was madness, not obvious?

Re:Huh?

[wrf3]

Their patent is a little more specific than this. A company called Chromatics had floating point hardware in their CX 1536 graphics engine back in the 80's (so named for it's 1536 x 1152 resolution) and used floating-point to represent the initial coordinates. What they didn't do, but SGI does, is store computed pixel attributes in the framebuffer in floating point.

Re:Huh?

[jcr]

The problem is that this patent fails the obviousness test about 100%.

If it's so obvious, why didn't you do it first?

Implementing floating-point framebuffers is non-trivial problem, and SGIs solutions to doing so are why they deserved the patent.

-jcr

Re:Huh?

[Jekler]

I don't even think so-called legitimate patents exist. I've yet to see a patent that isn't anymore than an extension of an idea using a previous technology and applying it to a more contemporary one.

The idea of changing a software to hardware method isn't anymore impressive than a caveman changing a written communique into a verbal one. "He wrote 'ugh' but I was first to say 'ugh' so I patent it!"

Re:Huh?

[jcr]

I've yet to see a patent that isn't anymore than an extension of an idea using a previous technology and applying it to a more contemporary one.

Try looking up the patent on Xerography, then. People come up with novel solutions all the time, and many of them apply for and get patents on them.

-jcr

Re:Huh?

[joebooty]

"No, RTFA. They patented floating-point frame buffers, which didn't exist before SGI invented them."

This statement is completely incorrect. Floating point point frame buffers have existed forever. Back in the day it was all done in software ofcourse. Essentially every pretty rendered image from the 90's or earlier that was not ray traced used them. The problem is that the initial 3d accelerators used integer based frame and zbuffers because they were cheaper and easier. SGI did not invent anything. They patented a hardware version of existing software methodology.

They are in fact patent trolls if they think this patent is valid.

Re:Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

If it's so obvious, why didn't you do it first?

Ok, so maybe SGI did it first. Then let's give them a nice gold-plated medal or something. Regardless of how much time and money you spent training for the competition, winning a race shouldn't give you the right to charge an arbitrary fee to anyone else who wants to run that course in the future (or prevent others from doing it at all).

Re:Huh?

[Jason69]

I don't understand how the USPTO granted a patent that says "This method has been known for some time, but now we just have the capability to do it."

Try this out.
The method to harvest wheat had been known for a long time but was handled in software (human + sickle). The mechanical wheat thrasher was invented and patented using the same method and concept but now in hardware.

Re:Huh?

[ThosLives]

The difference I see is that the complete idea for using a floating point framebuffer existed - just nobody could afford it. I would equally have a problem if someone tried to patent the idea for a mechanical wheat thrasher. Now, patenting a specific mechanical mechanism, or a specific method of implementing a floating-point frame buffer, is fine.

That's ultimate difference in my book: implementations should be patentable, but ideas should not. (Similarly: Information (such as a chemical formula or genetic sequence) should not be patentable, but methods to get it should - and not the idea of coming up with a way to measure the information, but the actual method itself.) Granted, that may actually take some effort to separate those two things, but that's the crux of my disagreement with the patent system.

Re:Huh?

[ThosLives]

See my comment below for more details, but I wouldn't care if they patented the specific implementation. It appears that they patented something far more general than that (the idea of floating point framebuffers - not "this one way to make a floating point framebuffer").

Incidentally, part of "obvious" in my book is "It's so obvious, why bother trying to patent it?"

Re:Huh?

[Halo1]

If it's so obvious, why didn't you do it first?

That's a non-argument. In fact, in Europe novelty and non-obviousness are even two completely distinct patentability requirements. This argument also misses the point that the fact that nobody already published something about doing that (since this is the actual criterium for novelty/non-obviousness) does not mean it was not obvious.

In fact, it may have been so obvious that nobody actually saw the point of publishing something about it (like what's the case with many software patents), which paradoxically makes it quite hard to invalidate the patent based on absence of novelty/non-obviousness.

Re:Huh?

[DragonWriter]

They have pantented graphic adapters, basically?!

No, the summary description doesn't define the scope of the patent, it describes what the thing patented is. They patented an implementation of a hardware graphic adapter, and are claiming ATI infringed by using that particular implementation, or at least elements of it that are substantial enough to infringe on what is protected by the patent.

Re:Huh?

[mavenguy]

I don't understand how the USPTO granted a patent that says "This method has been known for some time, but now we just have the capability to do it.

I can't see what the correspondence during the patent prosecution was, nor what prior art was actually discussed, since the application from which this patent issued was too old have an online public Image File Wrapper, but under current patent law (but under Supreme Court review) to show Obviousness one needs to show positive evidence that "suggests" each aspect of the patent claims. Simple hand waving won't cut it; i. e. saying "It's generally obvious that doing anything in sw can also be done in hw (and of course vice versa).

So, can anyone find a good prior reference that explicitly mentions the desirability of using a floating point based frame buffer in a graphics environment? I know nothing, specifically about this art, but this would be needed to establish a good case. This would have a good shot at invalidating claim 22, the broadest claim to this feature.

Also I noticed that a number of claims, notably the first few independent claims seem to define mention floating point only in the context of individual sub-units of the rasterizing hardware, which, to my perhaps naive mind, do not require that the frame buffer actually store floating point color data, and at least one of the prior art patents cited (Intel's 5,995,122) uses fp in parts of the rasterizing hw. I know I would have used such a reference against to make a rejection, if, for no other reason, to get the applicant on record as saying these claims implicitly requires fp color data in the frame buffer.

Re:Huh?

[lovelace]

I know for a fact that Nvidia supports "full 128-bit (4 component) floating point precision throughout the entire pipeline". Why isn't nvidia getting slapped with a lawsuit as well?

nVidia, last I knew, had a fairly broad cross-licensing agreement with SGI, mainly as a result of settling the suit between them about 6 years ago.

Why doesn't SGI have a patent on integer-based textures/framebuffers? Probably because its rediculous to patent the use of a specific numerical type. Its like saying SGI invented floating point numbers. Rediculous.

Because they didn't invent "integer-based textures/framebufers". They did, however, come up with the first working implementation of a floating point framebuffer and patented it.

Re:Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, sorry, lots of raytracers did not use floating point framebuffers. Much of the pipeline might have been in floating point, but when it came to store the data, they did so in fixed point (0-255) RGB (it's also questionable as to whether a targa file is a framebuffer). The patent's actually reasonably specific - down to pixel formats. Admittedly, it does claim as broadly as possible, but that is pretty standard.

If ATI is infringing on some of the later claims, eg., they're using a pixel format of s10e5, then there's a problem. I think that might be why they're only suing now. If you bother to look, you'll notice that ATI started off using s16e7 floating point in their graphics cores. nVidia started with support for s10e5 and s23e8 (both explicitly in the claims), so we might assume that nVidia licensed from SGI at this point (In fact: http://www.sgi.com/company_info/newsroom/press_rel eases/2006/october/ati.html 'SGI has licensed this technology to ATI's major competitors...' basically says that nVidia have). ATI have now added support for pixel formats which infringe on SGI's patent, which is clearly documented in the ARB note. SGI don't (the Prism is now legacy) sell any products with ATI hardware in. SGI sue.

If this is true then:

1) It explains why nVidia aren't getting sued.
2) It explainy why ATI weren't being sued, but now they are.
3) The infringement claimed is about a specific implementation rather than the general concept.

Oh, and yes, they're still shipping new products - there being an announcement for some the day after they announced suing ATI.

Re:Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

If it's so obvious, why didn't you do it first?

Gee, maybe because he didn't have resources to build integrated circuits? Don't think that may have something to do with it? Of course then there is that this patent stuff is frankly, madness and lots of folks consider not participating in it a good thing. And finally there some boring business aspects...

Implementing floating-point framebuffers is non-trivial problem

False. Some implementations of floating point framebuffers are non-trivial. You could say, share exponents in a block of pixels etc.

In a world with a) 32-bit floating point software framebuffers and b) 8/16-bit fixed point hardware framebuffers do you claim that the idea of (drumroll..) a 16-bit floating-point hardware framebuffer is something genuinely novel and innovative and as such something worth giving a single company a monopoly for? Keep in mind that developers generally are aware that using custom number formats is cheaper in hardware than in software.

If not, name three details in this patent that ARE not trivial.

(I also urge the person who modded you insightful to reply to this post explaining his/her rationale)

Re:Huh?

[mikael]

The research paper InfiniteReality: a real-time graphics system provides some clues as to why.

It's more than just saying:

float framebuffer[1024][1280][4];

The engineers had to resolve the problems of increased video memory bandwidth requirements (512 bits or 64 bytes per pixel) at a 1280x1024 resolution at a consistent 60Hz, and use parallel processing techniques to eliminate major bottlenecks (4 geometry processors built from custom ASIC's, 80 image engines, and texture mapping hardware to support virtual 2048x2048 textures using clipmaps).

Re:Huh?

[mypalmike]

In fact, it may have been so obvious that nobody actually saw the point of publishing something about it

I vaguely recall a talk at a conference several years back where an NVidia guy was talking about the need for floating point framebuffers in hardware. IIRC, he was specifically referring to their use in improving the accuracy of Z-buffers, and it sounded like they were in development at NVidia. I think it was the GDC road tour conference back around 1998. There must be some published material on the subject from around that time.

Re:Huh?

[Tim C]

That's not a good analogy. You're not trying to charge for use of the course, you're trying to charge for use of the techniques you used to reach the end. Others are free to hop, skip and jump where you sprinted, or carry the egg in their hand where you used a spoon.

Re:Huh?

[forkazoo]

So, can anyone find a good prior reference that explicitly mentions the desirability of using a floating point based frame buffer in a graphics environment? I know nothing, specifically about this art, but this would be needed to establish a good case. This would have a good shot at invalidating claim 22, the broadest claim to this feature.

I would check into the original REYES hardware, which ultimately became Pixar's RenderMan. RenderMan has always assumed colors were meant to be floats, and the original implimentation was supposed to be in hardware...

I don't know for sure that it would have used an actual FP frame buffer, but it would probably be a good start for pointing out that FP for the frame buffer is bloody obvious. I still need to read through the patent to see if there is anything specific and novel that might be more impressive.

Re:Huh?

[Raenex]

Implementing floating-point framebuffers is non-trivial problem, and SGIs solutions to doing so are why they deserved the patent.

They don't deserve anything except the opportunity of having a first-mover advantage. Patents are granted "To promote the progress of science and useful arts". Consider all the advances that were made in software before software became patentable. It's been clearly shown that patents are not needed, and all they do is gum up the works. Do you think the progress of "useful arts" in computer graphics would have been better off if all the early research that took place was under a patent umbrella?

And while a video card may be hardware, it's really just a realization of a software algorithm.

Re:Huh?

[dwater]

I'm curious what the actual hardware was....anyone actually know?

Out of the frying pan and into...litigation?

[multiOSfreak]

Looks like the folks at SGI really did have a plan for restructuring. It's a shame that is' predicated on litigation rather than innovation. Although with the way companies are greedily gobbling up "intellectual property" (hah!), I don't feel too much pity for ATI.

I wonder if the cost of going forward with this suit will hamper SGI's ability to produce and market new products?

My guess is that they will, ultimately, lose this case, and that they will end up, in 18 months or so, filing Chapter 22.

Re:Out of the frying pan and into...litigation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Chapter 22 = Twice as bad as Chapter 11?

Re:Out of the frying pan and into...litigation?

[organgtool]

Although with the way companies are greedily gobbling up "intellectual property" (hah!), I don't feel too much pity for ATI.

Many companies gobble up intellectual property for the sole purpose of using it as a defense against companies that would rather litigate than innovate. Intellectual property is in many ways like nuclear weapons - few people want to use them but everyone wants to have them to deter attacks from other countries. If ATI had been using their IP to attack other companies, I would agree with you and say that SGI is giving ATI what they deserve, but that is not the case. This is just SGI coming back from the grave to be a bunch of zombie grabasses.

Re:Out of the frying pan and into...litigation?

[halfelven]

Well, other companies sue all the time. What's new in this situation is that SGI has been pretty much a "saint" - it didn't sue anyone at all for a long time. Now that they joined the club, it's headlines all of a sudden.

Chill out, this whole thing is not really newsworthy.

Re:Out of the frying pan and into...litigation?

[VGPowerlord]

Either that or filing 2 Chapter 11s. :D

And so it begins...

[gfxguy]

The SCO-iffying of sgi. I used to love SGI. I still love their old hardware, from Indys to Reality Engines, from the 4D85 I started on (before they gave fancy names) to the Onyx Infinite Reality that we ran virtual sets on in real time long before PCs could even think about doing this stuff, and the sgi's ran a lot of our live TV well into the PC era, doing a better job than PCs could years after the sgis were released.

But now it's over and sgi has become an office with a few lawyers, and this is what the call emerging from bankrupcy.

Re:And so it begins...

[Pharmboy]

I am starting to think there is something about companies with 3 letter names that makes them want to sue, like SCO, DEC, NCR, AT&T and now SGI.

Thank goodness we have IBM and AMD to stand up to them.....

Re:And so it begins...

[MMC Monster]

Good hardware from a company that has gone bad.

Not only did I love the hardware, but also the names. an "Indigo machine" is a great name for a machine, and the machine really looked great, too. Years ahead of the big shops offering good looking machines (Except Apple, of course).

Re:And so it begins...

[operagost]

DEC hasn't existed for eight years. What are they suing for?

Re:And so it begins...

[Anonymous Coward]

Nah, Apple's machines looked like shit^W PCs before they came out with the "new world" macs, which was in '99 iirc.
SGI seemed to care about appearances long before that...

Re:And so it begins...

[Pharmboy]

If you did a little googling, you would see that DEC sued Intel over patent infringement and for abuse a monopoly, along with a few others.

Here is another link you might find useful.

Re:And so it begins...

[HiThere]

Sorry. This is unpleasant. That doesn't suffice to make it like SCO. So far there's no evidence that SGI didn't own the claimed patents. So far there's no evidence that SGI is going to refuse to say what it's suing about. Etc.

SCO is so much worse than any ordinary company that it's difficult to comprehend just how foul they are, and how foul the legal system is to allow them to use it so. SOMEBODY's got to be being paid off. It can't normally be THAT bad.

The SCO case is so bad that they have yet to clearly state what they are suing about. Currently it appears to be something about the AT&T contract with IBM. AT&T and IBM both deny that the contract means what SCO says it means, and under contract law that should mean that the case is immediately dismissed with prejudice (caution: IANAL). And yet it goes forward, spending IBM's and Novell's money. (O, Yes. SCO is paying it's lawyers with stolen money. Stolen from Novell.)

Do not compare SGI with SCO. SGI may well have a legitimate grievance.

Same failing business model as SCO

[Anonymous Coward]

This thread is closed now. Next story.

Sounds like SGI has been talking to SCO

[haplo21112]

Can't do business by developing, Building, and selling products/services? Thats OK, we have this great business plan, it can't fail! Business by litigation.

Re:Sounds like SGI has been talking to SCO

[marcello_dl]

Then maybe SCO will sue them for stealing their business model.

Not the first time

[tjkslashdot]

Anyone else remember they gave NVidia the same treatment back in the heady day's of '98? This is nothing new for SGI. "Rattle the cage, and try to stave off the end with another lawsuit." How did that last one work for SGI? Not so well....

Re:Not the first time

[Ilgaz]

I remember 3dfx cried for multitexture technology and when they got broke, NVidia bought them for INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY purposes.

3dfx, Nvidia has roots at SGI, they were founded by ex SGI people. Before shouting "SCO", everyone should think about it.

SCO Mk II?

[pixelised]

"SGI has also issued an ominous statement stating that they have plenty of intellectual property left and there will be more litigation to come."

How many times can a Phoenix rise from the ashes? I remember another dying "S" company claiming MILLIONS lines of infringing code in some other OS... Look at their case now - a pile of ashes.

Re:SCO Mk II?

[nuzak]

I don't think SCO's case can be considered typical -- for one, when pressured to present specific claims, they don't seem to even have any at all! It's really quite unusual to sue someone without even presenting your OWN account of what you think is evidence, especially your biggest rival, one of the biggest companies in the world, and second only to tobacco companies for playing legal hardball. Deliberate suicide is something people do, watching SCO slit its wrists over and over again is something fairly unprecedented. That it's all a stock manipulation scheme is something Novell, and apparently now IBM are specifically alleging ... but that's a pretty atypical approach, even for patent trolls.

Paradigm Shift

[necrodeep]

We all knew it was coming, but it looks like SGI finally made the shift from Computer Maker - to Patent Company. Their business model failed - the only thing they now have to save themselves is the possibility that they may make money from Patents/Copyrights. Unfortunately, it's probably mostly stuff that can be seen in prior art. And litigation is likely to deplete their already depleted coffers (just look at the SCO case). Coming straight out of bankruptcy and going straight to litigation. I call this a bad sign for SGI stock holders.

Re:Paradigm Shift

[LWATCDR]

Except SGI could actually have legit patents.
SGI should have thought of spinning off it's graphics IP a long time ago. Take a look at ARM. They make nothing but IP and money.

Re:Paradigm Shift

[rahvin112]

They did, to nVidia, about 3 years ago.

War

[b1ufox]

Let the War begin :)

Cry for help?

[MiniMike]

I hope this isn't SGI's last gasp. They have made amazing products for years (and a few not so amazing- I have an SGI NT box, but I'm not bitter).
Maybe they're trying to get AMD to buy them too, as it might be cheaper than fighting years of patent litigation. Also, just think of the hardware
that an SGI-ATI combination could produce!

Similar in so many ways.

[Anonymous Coward]

SGI has 3 letters, SCO has 3 letters. Both start with S. Coincidence? I think not!

SGI = SCO!

The thing is

[jlebrech]

SGI probably went thru all the proper channels to innovate, and were crushed by other more wealthy opponents, they did invent OpenGL and fantastic 3d hardware. But prending time and money on patents may just keep them afloat. but hopefully they wont just troll but start innovating again from the ashes.

serves ATI right

[cmorgan47]

not because of any of this, mind you....just cause of the lack of decent PPC ATI drivers.

Re:serves ATI right

[Rik Sweeney]

not because of any of this, mind you....just cause of the lack of decent PPC ATI drivers.

not because of any of this, mind you.... just cause of the lack of decent drivers.

There, fixed it for you.

Seriously though, somedays I really wonder what possessed me to buy a laptop with an ATI card in it. I really can't remember why I decided that ATI would have better Linux drivers over nVidia. Does anyone know how well the open source drivers compare to ATI's ones?

Re:serves ATI right

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah... they're more stable, but slower.

Re:serves ATI right

[cmorgan47]

for PPC linux, the open ones are about all you get. and they're crap.

the real culprit: clueless legislators

[theStorminMormon]

When I read about stuff like this, it makes me annoyed. Not because any sense of fairness or ethics (companies don't have morals), but because of the wasted resources. Litigation is money spent without any production at the end. You pay a bunch of bloodsuckers to fight another bunch of bloodsuckers and either you take money from the other guy or the other guy takes money from you, but the only people guaranteed to get paid are the bloodsuckers.

Imagine if the money spent on spurious litigation went into actual R&D, capital investment for fabrication centers, engineer salaries, hell even advertising. Anything but litigation!

But as long as there's an avenue to make money this way, you can't really expect companies like SGI to behave any differently. You're providing a way for companies that are no long profitable (either because they have no product, e.g. SGI, or because they have an antiquate business model e.g. **AA) to leech off of the market instead of exiting it. Of course they're going to try to survive and not just go quietly into that good night. So, while I'm annoyed at this behavior, you have to realize that it's intellectual property laws that are the problem. We need fewer and simpler IP laws. Of course, trying to get lawmakers to pass fewer laws is like asking a competitive eater to "take it slow", and that's not even mentioning that the bloodsuckers aren't going to be happy to see yet another cash cow disappear anytime soon.

How long will it take for public outrage to really grow until real reform is made?

-stormin

Re:the real culprit: clueless legislators

[demon_2k]

Wow, there still is some smart people here.
Well said!

Re:the real culprit: clueless legislators

[Anonymous Coward]

When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are the legislators.

-- P.J. O'Rourke

Oh boy....

[borgheron]

Sounds like SGI has been taking a page out of SCO's book. Next thing you know they'll be spreading false claims about how parts of IRIX were illegally contributed to Linux or some crap like another three letter "S" company did.

Later, GJC

Re:Oh boy....

[Anonymous Coward]

They have much in common.
They offered fast hardware with a robust OS.
Now you can have an equally robust OS ranging from 0$ to less than 500$ (whether you choose Linux/*BSD or MacOS/X or Win); most of them have hardware accelerated OpenGL, etc etc. Linux, MacOS/X and BSDs are even unix-like and posix compliant (most of them at 0$). Intel and AMD offer multicore processors at a wonderfully low price (at least if you compare them to the system SGI was selling..); don't even mention graphic hardware from nVidia and ATI.

When you are put in this situation (which is common between previous *nix vendors) you either 1) embrace a new business method (IBM/Sun/Novell) or 2) sue who trampled your market (SGI/SCO).

SGI Caught Wind of AMD's new Fusion?

[AikonMGB]

Perhaps SGI caught wind of AMD/ATI's new "Fusion" CPU/GPU combination?

Aikon-

Re:SGI Caught Wind of AMD's new Fusion?

[Yvan256]

Isn't Fusion a razor anyway? You know, the one that combines hot and cold in the ad but does nothing special in real life?

Re:SGI Caught Wind of AMD's new Fusion?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, this is very likely - the patent contains claim for CPU and graphics on the same substrate that does.

Just proves the old adage....

[Darth_brooks]

"Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue."

UNREAL

[axonis]

Cool Jurassic CG wars in full HD !

makes me want to play with my SGI 540's Cobalt chip set in full glory !

Law of business astrophysics

[Anonymous Coward]

After the business star inflates to its maximum and explodes as supernova, the remnants form patents troll company which sucks in the material of other business stars in lower stages of their life cycle.

Wait for a while...

[Lonedar]

We shouldn't jump to conclusions so quickly, as it is possible that SGI is simply trying to gain a foothold in the market.

I would definitely welcome another competitor in the video card market.

Re:Wait for a while...

[Wyzard]

You do realize that SGI is the company that invented OpenGL, right? This isn't some newcomer to the graphics market — they've been around longer than ATI and nVidia.

Floating point in graphics hardware is obvious

[Anonymous Coward]

No, they patented the use of floating point math in graphics hardware.

Which they should not have been able to do.

Floating point is not novel. Graphics hardware is not novel. Putting floating point into hardware is not novel. So neither is putting floating point hardware onto a graphics card.

Just because something hasn't been done before doesn't mean it's not obvious and patent-worthy. It's extremely obvious that anything that runs on a computer can be run in hardware.

Re:Floating point in graphics hardware is obvious

[stiggle]

Passing enough electricity through a wire so it glows to provide light is obvious - AFTER someone else thought of it. Its so obvious someone else did and Edison bought the patent off them.

Re:Floating point in graphics hardware is obvious

[russotto]

Edison's patent on the incandescent light bulb was ruled invalid.

Re:Floating point in graphics hardware is obvious

[AKAImBatman]

Edison's patent on the incandescent light bulb was ruled invalid.

You are highly confused. The incandescent light bulb was one of the few patents of Edison's that was not overturned. In fact, Edison strengthed his case by buying off previous patents for similar work, making sure that there was an unbroken chain of Intellectual Property. So when Sawyer and Man attempted to challenge Edison's patent, they had to do so on addendums they added to their own patent application. The Supreme Court found that Sawyer and Man's claims were too broad, and that their addendum was an afterthought rather than core to their invention. Thus Edison's patent was upheld as valid.

A sad day...

[FellowConspirator]

SGI is late to the table to become a patent troll. If there's any lesson to be learned in the past 5 years in the tech world it's that a business plan built around litigation is no plan at all (unless you are a law firm, then you're basically printing your own money).

It's a shame too, SGI was a great company with some very good products too.

However, I would point out that it's not unexpected. One of the reasons that vendors of video cards don't provide hardware programming specs or open source drivers for their products has been for fear of litigation. It's been a prevalent rumor for years that many vendors feel that their products potentially run afoul of a bunch of patents and that's why they are so cagey with letting people understand how to program for their products and to get the best performance out of them. If SGI wins in this suit, expect a horrible blood-letting in the graphics adapter business and prices for premium technology to go up across the board.

Re:A sad day...

[RAMMS EIN]

``It's a shame too, SGI was a great company with some very good products too.''

Yes, and they gave to the Free software movement, too. XFS, OpenGL, and the STL, IIRC.

Lawsuit mushroom clouds rise over remains of USA's

[NZheretic]

To any company involved in bringing to market saleable goods or services, the Patent Lawsuit strategy is like starting a Nuclear War. Only those who consider they have no future in the market will risk the inevitable mutually assured destruction from the counter lawsuits.

That is another reason why Lawsuit mushroom clouds rise over the remains of USA's Tech industries

The USA will fall behind because ever more intellectual property will be locked up behind a multitude of corporations and individuals effectively ruled by lawyers who are more interested in earning legal fees rather than bothering to actually manufacture anything.

Other Governments and Europe's bureaucracies will not hesitate to forcibly acquire the necessary intellectual property needed get things done for large projects

Other countries and even Europe's parliament will also not hesitate to adopt more liberal intellectual property structures if you demonstrate that doing so will better benefit their economies as a whole, instead of just a few major corporations.

The USA administration and even more myopic major corporations will continue to let more and more manufacturing, service industry and development to be off-shored resulting in importing permanent poverty into the USA.

You want to see the future of the USA? Visit the remnants of Detroit motor city works, Ye Mighty, and despair

Re:You suck, SGI. but we still love ya

[arth1]

What worries me is if this New Business model will have an impact on Open Source. For the past few years, SGI has been one of the major contributors to Open Source in general and Linux in particular, including thread handling, non-uniform memory access (NUMA), access control lists, file stream support, and lots of other things. Will this dry up? And, more importantly, will the SGI remainder turn SCO on us and sue for something they've already given away? I sure hope not!

SGI had some of the best engineers, best ideas and for a while the best products in the world. They deserve a comeback, but it hurts to see them doing it through litigation and not new innovation.

Regards,
--
*Art

So the analogy is...

[mjhacker]

SGI : ATI :: SCO : Linux?

SGI's income went to research

[nadanumber]

SGI always poured the lions share of its income into research, and to the best of my knowledge they, even now, continue to do so.

SGI is the company that today has the very fastest Linux computer - the Altix shared memory multiprocessing family - available at any price, really a technological marvel because it runs a single OS kernel and has memory architecture which is truly phenomenal - it scales better than any other multiprocessing/clustering solution.

So any defense of their patents, however 'unpopular' with the video gaming set, should be welcomed because it could help a company that we really owe a lot to in many ways get back into the game. Honestly.

They would not be a 'patent troll'. Don't forget, SGI open sources a LOT of its technology. Much more than most other hardware vendors. Much more.

I used to work at NASA and our division was largely an SGI shop, and yes, they were expensive, but at the time, there was nothing else out there that was comparable in ANY way. You won't ever find me saying anything bad about SGI except maybe that it would be great if they were cheaper.

Why? Because they are the best.

Re:SGI's income went to research

[Anonymous Coward]

> SGI is the company that today has the very fastest Linux computer - the Altix shared memory multiprocessing family

What about the IBM Blue Gene? It runs Linux, and currently Blue Gene/L has the largest Altix installation beat, as evidenced in the current Top 500 List

Re:SGI's income went to research

[Copid]

The difference is that the Altix is a shared memory machine and Blue Gene/L is a cluster with distributed memory. You can always make bigger and bigger clusters (although it is quite a technical trick to make them as large as BG/L), but shared memory machines like the Altix are are a different ball of wax. The difference is that an Altix 4000 can be called *a* computer more readily because it actually runs *one* instance of the OS across 512 processors.

Re:SGI's income went to research

[Crackez]

Yeah, cause Sun's UFS was really worth something to linux... Besides the internals of UFS has been well know for a long long time in the form of it's BSD bretheren. Not to say it hasn't advanced though, but it's no where compared to XFS. Then again ZFS, which is now also open source, may top it.

I do have to give them extra credit for the C++ STL though. That is a handy peice of library there. That and Boost...

Re:SGI's income went to research

[kramulous]

Awesome! Well said. I agree whole heartedly.

Re:SGI's income went to research

[kramulous]

Update regarding how truely cool SGI is. This is FYI to show how SGI FPGA's are able to provide services for Altix users. SGI has been working very closely with Mitrionics

Lifted from email received 5 minutes ago:

We have recently announced our Mitrion-C Open Bio Project, which will include key bioinformatics applications such as BLAST, Smith-Waterman and Hidden Markov Models - all open source (forget the black box solutions!) and free to use and tweak to fit your projects. The first application being released at sourceforge.net, the world's largest open source community, is BLASTN for the Mitrion(tm) Virtual Processor and SGI(r) RASC(tm) RC100 Blade.

If you plan to visit SC06, we would like to give you a live presentation, because this application is an impressing and real world example of how different and superior the Mitrionics' software approach to FPGA Supercomputing is compared to the hardware design approach.

And if you are not into bioinformatics, maybe we could entice you to visit us by letting you know that if you respond to this email, we will give you your own Mitrion SDK (Software Development Kit) Personal Edition, so that you can experience the Mitrion advantage yourself.

*JUST RELEASED: BLASTN FOR THE MITRION VIRTUAL PROCESSOR AND SGI^(r) RASC(tm) RC100 BLADE* BLAST is used worldwide for similarity searches for genes and proteins and is the main tool for data mining in large databases in molecular biology.

The FPGA-accelerated Mitrion BLASTN program is based on the BLAST source code from the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI). NCBI BLAST users will recognize the user interface, file formats and output options. So if you like the BLAST you have used up to now - you will love Mitrion BLAST.

You can access the Mitrion BLAST source code and start your own development project, at www.sourceforge.net. http://www.sourceforge.net/> BLAST for the Mitrion Virtual Processor and SGI^(r) RASC(tm) RC100 Blade will be presented at the SGI booth (#905).

*ABOUT MITRION AND MVP*. The revolutionary Mitrion(tm) Virtual Processor (MVP) and software-centric Mitrion-C programming language makes FPGA (Field Programmable Gate Arrays) Supercomputing accessible to a broader market of scientists, researchers and software developers than the traditional hardware approach to FPGA computing.

Since the MVP was launched it has been tested and selected by many of the world's leading supercomputing sites, such as National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA), Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Naval Research Laboratory (NRL). For all our customers Mitrion unleashes the massive performance benefits of hardware application acceleration with FPGAs.

*WELCOME TO BOOTH NUMBER #2045 * If you are going to SC06 in Tampa, Florida November 11 - 17, you don't want to miss seeing the incredible software that unleashes the power and promise of FPGA Supercomputing, and get your hands on a free Mitrion SDK Personal Edition. Make sure you reply to this email, and we'll be sure to reserve a copy for you. Come see us at SC06, booth # 2045, in lovely Tampa, Florida!

We're suiting you because...

[Anonymous Coward]

your daddy is rich!

I was kinda hoping...

[Bin_jammin]

that SGI would be able to come up with a working business model and pull themselves out of debt and stay around a while, if it means they're going to sit on their IP and sue the bejesus out of everyone, I wish they'd just go away. You hear me SGI? Innovate or die means innovate now, not 20 years ago.

Classic case of innovator's dilemma?

[defile]

SGI is the market leader in high performance graphics.

Someone makes cool 3d video game with a VGA.

SGI laughs, continues selling workstations for $10k.

Someone releases a commodity 3d graphics card.

SGI laughs, continues selling workstations for $10k.

Someone releases a fast commodity 3d graphics card.

SGI laughs, but to placate the market, throws half-hearted PC graphics effort over the wall (Fahrenheit, x86 workstations, etc.) Effort is severely overpriced due to SGI's existing value network/cost structures. No one buys it.

SGI thinks little of it, decides to let the commodity vendors have their razor thin margins, they're doing them a favor by leaving all of the fat deals to them, right?

Commodity 3d graphics vendor offers lucrative deal to SGI top talent.

SGI top talent, looking for new and exciting and more money jump ship.

SGI, instead of getting the message, continues to focus on moving up-market and ignoring commodity markets.

Commodity graphics grows into a dozens of billions of dollar market.

SGI participates in none of it. Dies instead.

Clap. Clap. Clap.

Re:Classic case of innovator's dilemma?

[SirKron]

Delete:

• SGI participates in none of it. Dies instead.

Insert:

• AMD gobbles up SGI too as the company is cheaper than the future cost of attorney fees to defend against the patent claims.
• Intel, NVIDIA shit themselves as their graphics cards also infringe the patents.
• Lawsuit proceeds pays for SGI acquisition and more.

Re:Classic case of innovator's dilemma?

[Doctor Memory]

SGI top talent, looking for new and exciting and more money jump ship.

SGI top talent, seeing future products cancelled and current projects crippled by cost-cutting measures, see the writing on the wall and jump ship.

Fixed that for ya...

Re:Classic case of innovator's dilemma?

[jfisherwa]

Exactly. It's very possible that SGI's delay in filing this suit is due to them shopping around to be bought-out, with this patent as either their ammo or their blackmail. (i.e., approach Intel with a deal to sell to them just after AMD buys ATI.)

But the problem here is that they likely already approached AMD and/or ATI and hinted that a buy-out/merger would make this problem go away for them. AMD/ATI would only bite if they thought the patent was irrefutably valid.

Re:Classic case of innovator's dilemma?

[xenocide2]

Maybe the delay in filing was caused by their bankruptcy claims? No point in pursuing a claim if you may be forced to sell that right to someone else. But filing now as opposed to later sounds like an attempt by SGI management to be purchased by AMD, rather than inherit an ugly patent dispute and injunctions against distributing technology.

Re:Classic case of innovator's dilemma?

[defile]

Why didn't SGI file this lawsuit years ago, then?

This is a hail mary, they have nothing to lose now.

The solution is easy

[aadvancedGIR]

If AMD can buy ATI for $4.2B, can't they simply add a few bucks to buy SGI too?

Re:The solution is easy

[Dachannien]

If AMD can buy ATI for $4.2B, can't they simply add a few bucks to buy SGI too?

Why else would SGI be doing this? Eventually, either they'll sue the right deep pockets and get bought out, or another company will take a look at their growing list of pending lawsuits and decide they want in on that action. At least, that's the plan.

Re:The solution is easy

[dfl]

Could be. But they might be trying to avoid a buyout, too.

SGI can raise capital only because it has an IP portfolio, which in theory is as good as any other asset. Except that when the people using your IP won't take a license, you have to sue them or admit that you really don't have the assets you've been borrowing against. So the "action" SGI is looking for might just be continued access to capital.

Cornered Corporate Animals Sue

[StandardCell]

SGI hasn't exactly been doing so well lately. One of the guest speakers in business school told me straight out: have good legal representation because, when the chips are down, that's all you may have left. All this lawsuit is is a manifestation of that principle and the "cornered animal" principle.

The next SCO?

[reed]

Looks like SGI is the next SCO :)

Except that SGI actually did develop its own technology, so maybe it has a bit more ground to stand on here than SCO...

This is why they dont want to open the drivers...

[jonwil]

I am sure that if NVIDIA and ATI were to open their drivers or specs, it would make it much easier for companies with patents to go after them.

AMD's takeover of ATI is now DONE...

[Svartalf]

As of today, they've announced that they've completed the merger. Now begins the integration of the companies in question...

Re:AMD's takeover of ATI is now DONE...

[rootEToTheIPi]

Some seem to think it's been official for three months now:

http://tech.netscape.com/story/2006/07/25/amd-and- ati-merger-complete/

Re:AMD's takeover of ATI is now DONE...

[Svartalf]

It might have been "official" there- but go to their websites... ATI's has radically changed to be AMD logoed, etc.

From innovator to litigator

[Anonymous Coward]

SGI go from being the cool company we all admired to another despised litigator. Despite the management decisions, SGI were still pretty cool this time last year. If I'd been in charge 10 years ago, there wouldn't be a 3d animator without an SGI on his desk. All that's left now is for the sicko money-men to rape the carcass!

Re:This is why they dont want to open the drivers.

[Svartalf]

Actually, no... All the technical data does is tell you how to drive the chips. It doesn't reveal all too much of how the silicon actually does what's being asked of it. If they've got any mojo that can't be revealed in that manner, they've got piece-parts of tech where they shouldn't be. Intel opened up everything except how to drive the Macrovision pieces of the chip (per their agreements with Macrovision and DVD CCA/MPAA...)- if it were Patent concerns, I assure you, it'd not been open sourced.

Catagory?

[Barny]

Aww Taco, you had a chance to use the old SGI icon again and missed it ;(

Poor thing rarely sees the light of day anymore.

If you can't beat them...

[Devir]

... the honest hard working way.

Take em to court and sue for millions to keep your company alive.

Zombie process.

[Lethyos]

I am sure now we do not want SGI to make a come-back. People here have mentioned that they have made interesting products in the past, but now that they are unable to compete, they will become a purely litigious company. They could not and cannot keep up, so they are effectively determined to hold everyone else back. This is yet another example of a failed patent system defeating what is demonstrably productive market economics. SGI, when it was king of graphics, failed to deliver the substantial improvements in technology at better prices demanded by the market, so the market turned elsewhere. That is precisely what should happen and it does not matter who came up with those developments in the first place.

WTF? TLA FTW!

[adavies42]

Tags: amd, ati, sgi.

SGI and Bankruptcy

[Anonymous Coward]

Guess we know how they're going to get out of bankruptcy. If you can't inovate, sue!

All Hail the New Unisys

[SloWave]

Enough said.

SGI

[usrusr]

So SGI is making cloudy suggestions that there might be more IP to blackmail over.

Someone seems to be really desperate to get bought by one of the remaining big players (most likely they are hoping for intel). So the whole company is really only worth the legal matches to light the other guy's factory.

It's not the legislators who are clueless

[Anonymous Coward]

Legislators are by and large (drum roll please) LAYWERS! Even if they aren't lawyers, there are plenty of trial lawyer association PACs that will buddy up with them. Why in the hell are they going to legislate away a solid business model that their buddies will enjoy?

So you're wrong, just plain wrong. Legislators are not clueless, they know exactly what they are doing. It's the people who only vote Republican / Democrat (because those are the only two choices) who are clueless. Both parties are bought off by big business, doesn't matter who you vote for in those parties.

Re:It's not the legislators who are clueless

[theStorminMormon]

Do you have any facts to back up this claim? I know that some legislators are lawyers, but in the past whenever I've contacted my own representatives (which I've done many times) I've been struck by how utterly clueless their staff seemed to be. (And, by the way, Senator Allen R-VA is a lawyer who, judging by his staff and subsequent form letter, has no idea what net neutrality even means.) Furthermore, law is a specialized profession. You don't just have to be a lawyer to really understand this, you have to be a lawyer with at least a rudimentary understanding of technology who also specializes in IP law (as opposed to tax law, criminal law, family law, constitutional law, etc.) How many legislators fit that bill? I think you're drastically over-simplifying this case. I find that annoying because every time some wide-eyed fanatic claims "all the legistlators are lawyers and teh lawyers are all out to get us!" he or she takes away from serious analysis of a serious problem. No one is going to take you seriously if you sling around unfounded assumptions, and that gets in the way of people like me who actually want to change things instead of just be melodramatic about them.

In any case, I visited this site: Congress Merge to do a search of how many members of congress were lawyers. I first did a search for "lawyer" in the profession field. I got 6 hits (3R, 3D, if you're curious). Then I did a search for "attorney" and got 193 hits. Assuming no overlap, we've got 199 lawyers in congress (102D to 90R, if you're curious, and I'm assuming 1I). Congress has 635 members (435 in the House, 200 in the Senate).

So out of 635 members, 199 were lawyers or attorneys at any point in the career. That's 31%. Hardly enough to say, in my opinion, that "Legislators are by and large lawyers". 31% of those are lawyers, how many do you think are IP lawyers? Sorry to rain on your simplistic world, but it's more complex than just "teh lawyers are everywhere!"

-stormin

Zombie companies

[aero6dof]

SGI is back from the dead and is now trying to feast on living companies. If that doesn't fit the halloween season I don't know what does.

Re:Zombie companies

[Anonymous Coward]

% ps aux
root 2564 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? S 1982 0:00 [sgi]
root 2564 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? S 1979 0:00 [sco]
root 2564 1.0 1.0 0 0 ? S 1911 0:00 ibm
root 2564 1.0 1.0 0 0 ? S 1911 0:00 amd
root 2564 1.0 1.0 0 0 ? S 1911 0:00 ati

Re:Let me be the first...

[gr8whitesavage]

to welcome our new rasterization and floating point framebuffering overlords!

You guys are really falling out of practice here.

Re:This is why they dont want to open the drivers.

[@madeus]

The Intel chips are much less sophisticated than offerings from ATI or Nvidia (to the extent that Intel graphics chips are seen as something of a pariah by gamers ;-), so there is probably a lot less risk in that they are not doing nearly as much either in the chip or in the drivers. In the case of ATI and Nvidia I think a sufficent amount of code remains in the software due to the constantly-evolving and highly competative nature of consumer graphics card market (where it's common to see driver updates that allow existing cards to support the latest effects). If they crammed as much into hardware as was possible, that would reduce the flexibility of the platform quite a bit.

I forget which but either ATI and Nvidia (possibly both) have said the reason why they haven't open sourced their drivers is because they contain valuable intellectual property that could be to the advantage of a competitor (i.e. each other - I assume), and I'm inclined to belive them to a large extent. If that's the case, I think it's certainly conceivable that if it's possible to determine a bit more about how the system operates, that it would make it easier for those looking for both trivial and non-trivial patent violations to make a case, and that might be part of the reason why neither party has been inclined to released open source drivers despite both being sufficently aware of demand that they've provided binary drivers for Linux on x86.

'buy me too'

[bWareiWare.co.uk]

Actually this is probably just their odd way of saying 'buy me too' to AMD.

Given that their licences to SGI's IP, is one of ATI's excuses for no OSS support, this may not be a bad idea. If AMD buys all of SGI's old IP and release good OSS drivers it is going to take a big swing at nVidia and regain some ground ageist Intel's open chipsets.

Begun this Patent War is

[jmorris42]

I think we can now see the first salvo of the Patent Wars we have all feared were coming. It seems every dying company decides that they need to 'monitize their patent portfolio.' as soon as the customers disappear. And SGI will be horrible in their death throes. Thankfully most of Xerox was bought instead of us all having to suffer through their death spasms because they had even more patents to abuse when they were dying, although by now many of the most dangerous ones are probably expired.

But this is still unfocused thrashing. Wait until they, like SCO, sucumb to the temptations of the monopolist in Redmond to focus their attack.

The patent system doesn't need reform, it needs to be scraped and rethought. I'd say cap em at 1000 per year. With a number that low only real inventions would make it through and the number in any particular industry would be small enough anyone in that industry could be expected to be aware of them.

Re:Begun this Patent War is

[Jaysyn]

You were doing great until you mentioned Microsoft. I hate them as much as the next guy, but since ATI doesn't make mice, I don't think they have much to worry about from that angle.

Jaysyn

Re:Begun this Patent War is

[Anonymous Coward]

What, no one remembers when the patent wars STARTED, in the 80's, with people suing over things like the concept of a 'GUI'?
Ugh, kids these days ... ;-)

Re:Begun this Patent War is

[Anonymous Coward]

A cap won't work. They will simply file the extra patents using a shell company.

Re:Begun this Patent War is

[jmorris42]

> A cap won't work. They will simply file the extra patents using a shell company.

You misunderstand. I didn't mean a 1000 limit per entity. I meant 1000 per year, total. As in patent numbers could be reworked as (SOMEPREFIX)YYYYNNN. Really, when you think of 'invention' you think of real inventions, the stuff that is clever enough to warrant a government monopoly, most people do not envision the crap that gets issued nowadays. I'm saying restrict em to the big ones that nobody would dispute. The light bulb, vulcanized rubber, major new drugs, etc. There isn't 1000 per year of those, so my solution would still allow hundreds of bogus patents to be issued, but would reduce the problem to managable proportions.

If one wanted to REALLY cut em down require them to issue from Congress as individually passed bills with a stipulation that they always be by roll call vote. Would probably require an Amendment, but it would put some accountability into the system, slow the process to a crawl and generally gum up the works. Downside is that it would hopelessly politicize the process.

So leave the patent office and their examiners in the loop, just force a cap on em. And here is another idea I just had. Change the submission fee schedule to prevent the flood of dodgy apps. Require a $100,000 (cash or bond) to submit an application. If the idea really is patent worthy return the money minus some small administrative fee, otherwise keep the whole wad as a disincentive to wasting the examiners time.

Re:Begun this Patent War is

[Savage650]

... The patent system doesn't need reform, it needs to be scraped and rethought. I'd say cap em at 1000 per year. With a number that low only real inventions would make it through and the number in any particular industry would be small enough anyone in that industry could be expected to be aware of them.

A cap won't work. They will simply file the extra patents using a shell company.

I dont think he meant 1000 per year per applicant but 1000 per year total.
Thus, people (and companies) could apply for as many patents as they wanted,
but the applications would be kept stack orderd by "importance" (or "usefulness").

At the end of the year, only the "Top 1000" applications would actually be granted.

That in itself wouldn't protect the system from being flooded with patents.
Thus it becomes critically important what happens to the remaining applications
(the bottom of the stack). I'd say they should

• be kept in public record
• be inelegible for resubmission or (trivial) extension

that is, they should enter the public domain at once.

Huh?

[WilyCoder]

"Display system having floating point rasterization and floating point framebuffering", which was filed in 1998 and granted in 2003, in its Radeon graphics cards.

This is insane. Look at this snippet from the OpenGL extension ARB_texture_float:

SGI owns US Patent #6,650,327, issued November 18, 2003. SGI believes this patent contains necessary IP for graphics systems implementing floating point (FP) rasterization and FP framebuffer capabilities. SGI will not grant the ARB royalty-free use of this IP for use in OpenGL, but will discuss licensing on RAND terms, on an individual basis with companies wishing to use this IP in the context of conformant OpenGL implementations. SGI does not plan to make any special exemption for open source implementations. Contact Doug Crisman at SGI Legal for the complete IP disclosure.

Did the ARB cough up money to SGI to be able to use floating point textures? What about DirectX's use of floating point textures?

I know for a fact that Nvidia supports "full 128-bit (4 component) floating point precision throughout the entire pipeline". Why isn't nvidia getting slapped with a lawsuit as well?

Also, a lot of graphics techniques were invented almost 30 years ago (such as bump mapping). Surely there has to be SOME prior art out there..... no one needed floating point textures/framebuffers until SGI invented/patented it?

Why doesn't SGI have a patent on integer-based textures/framebuffers? Probably because its rediculous to patent the use of a specific numerical type. Its like saying SGI invented floating point numbers. Rediculous.

How can we get around this stupid patent? Someone needs to invent a double-precision version of the floating point texture, and tell SGI to get lost.

Re:This is why they dont want to open the drivers.

[DeadCatX2]

Yeah, but if SGI patented using floating-point numbers in the framebuffer, and you have something like
 
// loads the frame buffer with floating point data
int loadFrameBuffer(float* data);

in a header file lying around somewhere, then it doesn't matter what your underlying implementation is. You're violating the patent.

Re:This is why they dont want to open the drivers.

[DeadCatX2]

I forget which but either ATI and Nvidia (possibly both) have said the reason why they haven't open sourced their drivers is because they contain valuable intellectual property that could be to the advantage of a competitor (i.e. each other - I assume)

Should ATI and nVidia figure out each other's tricks, wouldn't everyone benefit from the technology developed? (or at least the Linux crowd...) On top of this, the manufacturers would be forced to continue innovating to maintain their presence in the market.

Well its 2006 and SGI are still here.

[Viol8]

So your point is?

Re:Well its 2006 and SGI are still here.

[tjkslashdot]

Between 1998 and now, SGI has had to rent space out to Google to stay afloat, has been delisted, gone through at least three separate downsizings (including several executive changes), and has filed for bankruptcy. The point is, SGI has tried the "sue to keep afloat" pattern before, and it didn't work then. I doubt very much it'll work now. SGI produces fast Linux boxes, for sure, but it competes in a very hard market.

Re:Well its 2006 and SGI are still here.

[Anonymous Coward]

["Rattle the cage, and try to stave off the end with another lawsuit." How did that last one work for SGI? Not so well....]

So your point is?

  Brainless lawyer-bashing, apparently. SGI's 1998 case against NVidia looked like it would have been successful, but then SGI got a case of "let's not be the bad guys to the libertarians on Slashdot" and pulled back. Some people believe this was the turning point for SGI, as it emboldened other companies to use SGI's inventions without paying for them. SGI subsequently started it's long downhill slide into bankruptcy.
  If they're going to come back out, they'll have to start enforcing their patents. To put it bluntly, you can't run a "let's invent stuff" company purely on the goodwill of lawyer-hating slashdot retards. You run it by inventing things, patenting them, and charging people to use those inventions. If they don't pay, you have to sue, period.

  Oh, and as someone pointed out, this patent's name may look obvious, but the details are fairly specific and patent-worthy. SGI was not some clearing house for overly broad patents with no substance behind them, but rather a major inventor of serious tech.

  (Geez, slashdot is all "Slow down, cowboy! It's been 1 hour 17 minutes since you last posted!" Yeah, I'm such an attention whore I'm going to post twice today!)

Re:Well its 2006 and SGI are still here.

[xenocide2]

SGI is only alive because corporate euthanasia is socially unacceptable in the USA.

IP

[Draelen]

In my view, its not 'Property' if you unknowingly infringe on patents that companies have "invested a lot of research and development into"

Its far more like 'research things that are as likely as possible to be thought of eventually by someone else then sue them into the ground for "damages" and royalties'

Which in effect means, as the vast majority of us know, the patent system is ripe for abuse and has been abused since its creation. [/rant]

Easy Solution

[MrCopilot]

AMD buys SGi and ATi

renames new comany Stigmadia

Re:Easy Solution

[Anonymous Coward]

or MAD GITS.

Re:Easy Solution

[MrCopilot]

or MAD GITS. Rule: Gotta use all the letters. I had a page full of em yesterday.

SGI is still alive and has lot's of IP...

[capsteve]

but i dont think they will turn into a patent troll

much of their business is coming from government, defense and education. SGI is still selling MIPS based systems until the end of 2006, and will continue to manufacture MIPS/IRIX systems for several more years(most likely goverment amd defense contract obligations). most of the IRIX enginners have already been shifted to migrating the core technology from IRIX to linux. i don't believe SGI is turning into a SCO-like litigation machine, even if some PR monkey makes a wide sweeping statement about the vast amount of IP SGI is holding.

and while i'm on the topic of SGI and SCO, wasn't SGI initially accused by SCO of having violated licensing agreements in the whole SCO V. World debacle?

SGI has admitted defeat in the CPU market by porting EVERYTHING from IRIX to linux. it's a very risky process, and they've made a pretty good go of it. apple is the only other company whose actually managed a platform change THREE times and survived(four if you include OS change), perhaps SGI is hoping for similar results. if any company in the tech arena has a strong following, SGI certainly does.

Ridiculous Patent

[logicnazi]

Go read the background of this patent. The patent itself admits that there was plenty of graphics prior art that used floating point values to do the calculations. All they are claiming a patent on is implementing this system in hardware! And they include a line in their patent about how it has now become possible/desierable to implement the floating point stuff in hardware.

To be fair it seems their 'advancement' is that they kept the data in floating point format in the framebuffer rather than converting it to fixed point. Now their implementation of this approach probably contained some genuine advancement but just the notion of doing everything in floating point is pretty fucking obvious.

What I don't understand about this is that surely SGI has some much more substantial patents in their pockets. Is the problem that they gave them away with OpenGL/don't want to scare people away from opengl?

My personal guess is that SGI isn't serious about pursuing this particular patent infringement. Rather they are using a very broad and simple patent to go on a fishing expedition about ATI's hardware. During discovery on this patent SGI will be able to get details about how ATI's hardware/software works that they would otherwise not be able to get. I suspect SGI thinks ATI is infringing on a more substantial patent somewhere and is going to use the discovery during this case to find out.

Re:Ridiculous Patent

[Anonymous Coward]

SGI was co-developing Linux drivers with ATI back when they were working on Prism systems. I am quite sure they know all the potential patent infringements. Now all those work will go to AMD when ATI merge. I can imagine why SGI would want to sue ATI. AFAIK there wasn't any working relationship with AMD.

SGI not being very "RAND" with their "standards"

[Theovon]

OpenGL has become a standard in graphics. You cannot reasonably do OpenGL without floating point operations in your rasterizer (Trust me, I've tried to find a way around it). OpenGL is an "open standard" that was pushed by SGI. So SGI wants others to use OpenGL. But, given the patents, they DON'T want others to use OpenGL, at least not without everyone paying them lots of money.

It just me, or does it seem to be that SGI are pulling a Rambus on us here?

Also, given the OpenGL spec, everyone doing 3D graphics (ATI, nVidia, Matrox, 3DLabs, S3, etc., etc., etc.) is violating this patent. No?

why this is wrong

[Traa]

Years after SGI's failure to commercialize their invention they try to coin in using their patent portfolio. The main reason why I think this is wrong is that SGI isn't competing in this space (anymore) and thus is not loosing any money.

Personally, I'm not convinced that SGI invented the floating point display buffer. But they did patent it before anyone else did. Even if they did invent (as in "first to be there") this technology, they never managed to make a commercial product out of it. They tried and failed due to their own incompetence, slipping schedules and eventually dropping that product all together. This was years ago.

Now they twist patent law to make a dishonest living. Yet another example of why the US Patent system is flawed.

that's one way to emerge from bankruptcy...

[tomcres]

File for chapter 11..
re-organize...
sue the pants off of everyone...
...
PROFIT!!

Suspicious Logo

[chandlerc1024]

Not sure if anyone has noted this before, but in retrieving any entries from the PTO online database...

Every page has the SUN logo on it! Innocent accident you say? I think not!!!

Perhaps until the PTO can check for a single corporation's logo branding every single patent's online posting, we shouldn't hold them to such high standards for checking the actual patents they are issuing.

Re:Suspicious Logo

[Phoenix00017]

Oh yeah, nice going...

Anonymous Sun Employee: "Damn you chandlerc1024! Now I'm going to lose my over/under pool on how long it'd take them to notice!"

Re:Suspicious Logo

[Anonymous Coward]

And curiously, http://www.sun.com/favicon.ico just says "Sun" instead of their logo.

Question the motives of a post-bankruptcy SGI

[kckman]

I just have the Dylan Thomas line ringing around in my head upon hearing this. "Rage rage against the dying of the light" Would a patent infringement suit have been adversely impacted had it occurred prior to or during bankruptcy proceedings?

Probably inevitable

[JakiChan]

ATI and nVidia are chock full of ex-SGI employees. For example, a good chunk of my friends from the MIPS division are at ATI. There's also the story of how they got rid of the desktop graphics division. The story goes that the entire team was pulled into the cafe. As they walked in their badges were taken. They were then told that some would be going to nVidia and some would be going home. So there is probably a whole bunch of SGI guys at nVidia as well. I wouldn't be surprised if some SGI-patented ideas leaked in....

Stick a fork in 'em...

[Jaysyn]

SGI is done as a technology company they won't be contributing anything to FOSS anymore. At least it's not like they can take the things they did give us back.

Jaysyn

Re:This is why they dont want to open the drivers.

[Svartalf]

Heh... They both sit on the ARB board, come up with new OpenGL extensions together. They can figure out the other's tricks easily enough. It's not REALLY that they're not being nice. It's because of some bad advice from IP attorneys that think EVERYTHING should be kept secret, lest they lose the right of patentability, copyright, etc. Believe me when I tell you this; it's a story that keeps playing itself out at each and every place I've been contracting at for the last 3-4 years now.

Re:This is why they dont want to open the drivers.

[Svartalf]

They don't have to have source code, all they need do is provide the register level info- what each register in the PCI/PCIE space does and what you're supposed to set them with. That's all anyone had when they did the RagePRO, Rage128, i810, or G400 chipsets in the days of the Utah-GLX or the early days of the DRI project. I know, I was there DOING it. Doesn't matter much, though... Saying Intel's part is less complex isn't quite the case, and me bitching about how silly it all is to not release register info doesn't change the situation any. If AMD sees fit, they'll make ATI open up the info a little more. If they don't, well, just hope that their OpenGL driver group catches up with NVidia soon... :-D

Re:This is why they dont want to open the drivers.

[T-Ranger]

Yes, but at a faster rate. Currently the requirement for R&D budgets is driven by hard core gamers demanding faster frame rates, and new games coming out demanding faster hardware. The system has reached an equilibrium and everyone is happy. CxOs don't mind spending money, what they have a problem with is change. If ATI and nVidia together open sourced their drivers (and while they wouldn't be on the stage sucking each others cocks while they did it, if one did so within a month the other would almost have to) that would mean the CxOs would have to deal with change. Initially, to ship the drivers: more tech writers, more (real) technical support; in response to this from the other guy: more people in research figuring out what the other guy is doing; and with the research in hand: more hardware developers now producing new systems more frequently; with shorter product life cycles: screw up your whole production/marketing systems.

This new-video-card-world-order may be obtainable and viable. But would it, at the end of the day, mean more profits? There is only so much money around looking for video cards, shipping newer things faster wont necessarily suck any more money from that stone. So, from a business perspective; its a good ride now; changing the system opens up a lot of work, risk, with questionable outcome.

Corporate apologists eat balls.

[Generic Player]

Quit making up nonsense excuses to forgive corporations who shit on their customers. The specs required to write video drivers do not tell anyone anything that makes it easier to sue for patent infringment. The list of features on the nvidia and ati websites gives as much info for patent trolls as programming docs would. It just tells you what functionality is supported, and how to tell the card to do it.

Alas, not that startling for SGI/Mips

[davecb]

I loved the chips and the techies, but the legalists at SGI/Mips were startingly evil.

An unnamed former employer found their contract contained a clause that said the purchaser indemnified the vendor in the event of a patent suit brought in Canadian court...
--dave

Yeah!

[Anonymous Coward]

"SGI has also issued an ominous statement stating that they have plenty of intellectual property left and there will be more litigation to come.""

Yeah, it's the new SCO.

It might work

[Danathar]

suing for patents may not work if you have no other products that sell, but SGI DOES sell products (not many graphics related ones) in the supercomputing realm.

Everybody likes to to try and point out you can't make a biz out of licensing patents, go look up how much money IBM made off of licensing their rather large patent portfolio.

Re:Let me be the first...

[Anonymous Coward]

thanks man! my left eye had started twitching.

How to read a patent

[ari_j]

The abstract, which you quoted, is not the patent. Read each of the "claims" in the patent for what is actually claimed as being covered by the patent.

That said, I don't know what the state of the art was in 1998, but how obvious was a floating-point frame buffer back then? To me, that seems to be the real question here, at least in terms of obviousness of the patent. When did ATI start using similar technology? How far behind does ATI have to be before the idea is no longer obvious?

Re:How to read a patent

[bit01]

That said, I don't know what the state of the art was in 1998, but how obvious was a floating-point frame buffer back then?

Floating point was developed in the 14th century. Floating point for computers was developed in 1936. It's applicability to any computer problem where you have sufficiently powerful hardware and a need for flexible scaling is blindingly obvious. Please, no more bullshit about it not being obvious more than 60 years later.

---

The patent mafia: When all they've got is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Re:How to read a patent

[ari_j]

How does hardware floating point for what borders on a realtime application in 1997 become obvious if nobody else was doing it? There's no need to throw flamebait out there - but if you must, then at least make sure that your point is linked to the discussion in a rational way. How can you say that something is obvious when only the world's leader in graphics hardware manages to think of doing it? If SGI wasn't the only company doing it, that's different, but that's the question I posed. If truly nobody else came up with it, then you have a pretty steep hill to climb on convincing anyone that the idea was really so obvious as to be unpatentable.

Re:How to read a patent

[bit01]

How does hardware floating point for what borders on a realtime application in 1997 become obvious if nobody else was doing it?

I repeat: It's applicability to any computer problem where you have sufficiently powerful hardware and a need for flexible scaling is blindingly obvious. All companies were and are doing it. Whether it's realtime or not is irrelevant. Whether it's with a framebuffer or not is irrelevant. See my other comment and comment also.

There's no need to throw flamebait out there - but if you must, then at least make sure that your point is linked to the discussion in a rational way.

I used the word bullshit because I'm heartily sick of lawyers implicitly claiming that being first to implement is synonymous with being innovative. Many inventions are obvious but are not implemented due to inadequate precursors. In the case of floating point framebuffer hardware it was because floating point hardware could not keep up with video speeds. When the hardware improved sufficiently it was only a question of time, pricing and business direction before some company decided to implement it.

How can you say that something is obvious when only the world's leader in graphics hardware manages to think of doing it?

There is a world of difference between "thinking of doing it" and "doing it". Don't confuse the two. Patents are not there to protect a business decision.

If SGI wasn't the only company doing it, that's different, but that's the question I posed.

Every company in the industry was using floating point to solve all sorts of problems. It was only a question of time and pricing before it got implemented by many companies.

If truly nobody else came up with it,

That's my point. Many other people thought of it. Shit, I was working with early frame buffer hardware myself with scaling problems and I thought it would be great if the hardware could handle floating point. They were merely the first company to implement it.

then you have a pretty steep hill to climb on convincing anyone that the idea was really so obvious as to be unpatentable.

No hill to climb except for the artificial one created by the patent mafia. The non-obviousness scam that the patent mafia are currently pulling doesn't somehow make patents okay.

---

The patent mafia: When all they've got is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

Re:How to read a patent

[ari_j]

Like I said, I am no expert in the framebuffer hardware field. However, you talk about the hardware being unable to handle it at the time. Hardware is not something that one grabs out of the aether and it is not something that evolves on its own. Someone has to invent, develop, and implement the hardware. Was SGI doing something non-obvious with the hardware that made the claimed technology here possible? Why was SGI able to do it when nobody else did? (Note that the business decision not to invent something or not to develop it is likely financially motivated, and any relevance it has to obviousness of the innovation is probably limited to a suggestion that the invention is not obvious if only one person is capable of figuring out how to invent it without taking a long-term financial loss; I'm not willing to make that suggestion here.)

On a side note, the lawyers that you detest are able to articulate their arguments without using the word "shit." Why aren't you?

It seems this hasn't deterred AMD at all...

[TranscendentalAnarch]

http://www.forbes.com/technology/feeds/ap/2006/10/ 25/ap3119965.html/

welcome

[sgt scrub]

I personally welcome our AMD/ATI/SGI (AAS?) overlords.

The Bell Rings and SGI comes out...

[netglen]

The Bell Rings and SGI comes out of Bankruptcy swinging legal meat hooks. I guess the lean mean SGI machine is looking at all avenues to grow and claim any money that they can swing at.

And you thought the "S" stood for Silicon

[muzza]

It's SCO I tell you, the "S" stands for SCO.

In other litagous moves ScoGI have announced an intention to file suit against Intel over ownership of said patent. And every-one who designs, manufactures, sells or even looks at any kind of device for interaction between a computer and a human eye must pay us roayalties! Honest!

Re:SGI not being very "RAND" with their "standards

[mabhatter654]

it does look like that. in 1998 it was only barely possible to implement that on Irix machines.. by 2003 when the patent was actually approved Nvidia and Ati were doing "floating point" but definately not the same type that SGI was doing.. their's was drastically different... much like comparing a chevy 350 to a mazda rx7... they're way different, I'd guess SGI ammended it's claims to include the "cheap" stuff they missed out on and fired all the engineers for.

Microsoft is the EVIL in this story

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft demands floating point support of graphics card to be DirectX 9.0 certified. In Vista this demand will be an OS requirement. No one can manufacture a DX9 or Vista compatible graphic card without violating SGIs patent. As usual M$ is behind all this evil doing -> lawsuits makes it harder for IHVs to open source their drivers.

Told ya so

[sadangel]

Well, I did

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=176905&cid=146 85077

Re:This is why they dont want to open the drivers.

[@madeus]

Good post! That's what I was thinking, but I couldn't think of a concise way to put it :-)