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Germany Rejects Microsoft FAT Patent
Askmum writes in with news that a German patent court has ruled Microsoft's patent on FAT invalid in that country, finding that it is "not based on inventive activity." Just one of 6,000-odd patents Microsoft has amassed since a 1991 memo from Bill Gates turned around the company's attitude to patents.
Are they ruling on the oldest patents first? Its going to take a long time to reject all 6,000.
Libertarian Leaning Political Discussion Forum.
I don't fault MSFT for patenting everything they can. Apple does it, Google does it, everyone does it. Eolas does it.
The system is broken. Don't hate the player, hate the game.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
this patent is only valid in the US and Samoa. Germany has no right to allow any Fat patents.
Are you intolerant of intolerant people?
What about the thin MS patents?
Inquiring mind demand to know!
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
Germans have always preferred skinny patents
Switzerland is the real land of chocolate, not Germany.
-- Rastignac was here.
Doesn't McDonalds already own this patent in Germany?
No.
Greetings from Switzerland.
"FAT" - who cares? Even Microsoft essentially dumped that format almost a decade ago.
You have to invent something to patent it! Say it ain't so! An awful lot of companies are going to go into panic over this! Why, it could threaten the entire patent holding industry!!
I was under the impression that software patents were _not_ allowed on the whole of Europe.
When his defense asked, "Which computer has Jon Johansen trespassed upon?" the answer was: "His own."
If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today's ideas were invented, and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today. I feel certain that some large company will patent some obvious thing related to interface, object orientation, algorithm, application extension or other crucial technique. If we assume this company has no need of any of our patents then they have a 17-year right to take as much of our profits as they want. The solution to this is patent exchanges with large companies and patenting as much as we can.
Now that large company is MS and is trying to patent the obvious.
We've got other things to hate them for.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
That would be Switzerland (or perhaps Belgium, though they are known more for the pralines they make out of chocolate than their chocolate). Germany is the land of beer.
Patents cannot prevent, limit or contrain the production and distribution of products made using patented technologies and methods provided that said product is distributed without financial or material recompensation either directly or for supporting good and services.
1) The market is improved by keeping patents from harming free distribution of goods and services that in general better the lives of others. [i.e. patents cannot become tools of anti-generocity and anti-benevolacne]
2) The patent holders cannot be abused by other people who want to make money off of their work without providing compensation [if such is desired].
34486853790
Connection too slow for X forwarding? Try "ssh -CX user@host"
I thought it was only slightly chubby...
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
Germany is the land of beer.
And beer festivals. Yum...
... and wrong again ! Belgium really is the land of beer.
Well, Germany may be famous for beer, but the history of beer dates back to ancient Egypt. We aren't even world champions in drinking beer any more. The Czech Republic has a higher per capita consumption than Germany.
FTA "[Prevents company from] lay claim to basic computing procedures that in the final analysis are trivial."
And, FAT is a trivial format, (as are Apple DOS 16, ProDOS, CODOS, and other ancient formats) but FAT has the caveat it is commonly used today in devices such as digital cameras (So pfffft on the person who said its not used.)
I completely agree with the german PO that a patent has to be on something innovative and inventive. Every time I see a patent for a double-linked list or radix sort I get the shivers.
/\/\icro/\/\uncher
... that this is a don't care for MS. FAT is ubiquitous - thumbdrives use it, digital cameras use it, mp3 players use it. In fact it's hard to find a piece of solid state media that doesn't come pre-formatted with FAT. Because of that, I guess I was always under the impression FAT was in the public domain; it really surprised me to see there was a patent at all. Does anyone out there know if MS collects royalties or license fees from this patent?
The more you regulate a company, the worse its products become.
Considering that they don't use NTFS in SD, MMC, CF, xD, etc. cards (Or ext2/ext3, etc...)
and they use FAT32 for those for interoperability with everything, MS claiming they have
a patent on that file format and everybody owes them royalties...
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
needs the money!
People not liking MS. Nothing to do with Apple or patents but you don't like the dislike of MS.
MS are trying like billy-o to get SW patents in other countries. Does that sound like someone who's not part of the problem?
No.
MS are hated because they are a binch of arrogant lying manipulative and ignorant bastards. Most of the *people* aren't that, mind, but the corporation and the people *as a group* are.
Apple are *sometimes* forgiven but not always. MS are forgiven (as per your post) but not always.
You guys know how Microsoft folk like to toss about that Linux violates Microsoft's patents...
You guys know how "we" like to shout out "put up or shut up"...
Opportunity is right in front of our noses - right now!
Whether we think the patent is valid or not is irrelevent - it's been held as valid by the USPTO. The existance of a patent is considered prima facie evidence of validity in a court of law. It takes LOTS of money and time to get a patent declared invalid in court. LOTS of money - a million dollars would not be unusual for legal costs in a patent fight. Unless YOU have the money to put up for the fight, the battle is already lost here.
Microsoft has a valid patent on FAT (or more specifically FAT32). Linux implements FAT and FAT32. Unless someone has a signed document from Microsoft stating that Linux has a royalty-free license to use the patented technology, we are violating the patent - period.
Time to get coding - people talk about "coding around" a patent issue should one be found. Well, one has been laid directly at our feet. Time to get coding...
Ron Gage - Westland, MI
FAT itself was documented in 1983 (or earlier?) in Byte magazine. It can not be and is not patented today as I understand it. My understanding is that MS patented the long filename feature that came along later. Lets not confuse basic FAT functionality with long file names. It's also more interesting to call it a long filename patent, as it sounds even dumber than a FAT patent.
Isn't this the patent on the hack that allows Windows 95 file systems to be used in MSDOS? It's a hack for back compatibility for a system that's completely obselete. And I'm not sure where its used. All cameras I've used use MSDOS 8.3 filenames. Mayeba few portable devices use FAT on flash, and maybe flash relies on this method or something ut I'd have thought this would have been thought of before. Why didn't the standards organisations come up with a better, free filesystem for USB filesystem devices or for flash or something? FAT is cheap and nasty and, as I mentioned earlier, long filename support is a hack.
Asking my elders here :
Isn't FAT a rip-off from CP/M ?
Wouldn't it be considered prior art if presented in court ?
Just in case anyone was interested, here is a full list of Microsoft's Issued Patents [Current as of a week or two ago]. :)
Its hosted at a free patent searching tool, so don't blame me if their servers melt.
Microsoft's Patents
--Ne auderis delere orbem rigidum meum, non erravi pernicose!
Its not FAT, its Big Boned.
-Now I may be an idiot, but there is one thing I am not sir, and that, sir, is an idiot.
at first there where smale germans soon the became fat germans.
:)
It's more a matter of evolution and ingnorence that tey'r still fat.
I can asure this was before MS claims on FAT
We might partition those in two groups MS -Fat and german Fat
Altouhg MS recognized later more races and therefore counted til Fat16, widely used in america too.
But what if one of these rases would mix up with a german?
Gues what Fat32 was born in 1998.
Well it couldnt endup with 32 so then someone had to break this logic and said wtf..! no he didnt he said ntfs!
But we sofar failed to understand, what is mentioned by it, in regards to those poor Fat Germans.
Probaply wtf would have made them angry so they agreed on the term ntfs
Well that's historical correct.
I know you're out there. I can feel you now. I know that you're afraid. You're afraid of us. You're afraid of change.
So now I can legally format my harddrive?
If Microsoft was mass, stupidity would be gravity.
Actually, these days there are a couple of vending machines for iPod purchases available at airports http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/security/?p=41/. Therefore today I wouldn't think of software sold via a vending machine to be absurd, but several years ago? Yes.
"People are stupid. Persons are smart" -- Agent K, MiB.
hmm you forget the historics.
Fat was allready there in the Dos age, it was simply used again in windows 95
Fat32 (long filename support) arived in win98, a kind of hack the FAT concept.
Fat16 the plain old Fat has some good and simpel concepts too.
Mainly it didnt require much overhead, as systems with long filenames have.
So because of its simplicity it has been used for a (short) while in some memory device sticks too.
But these day they are often formated to NTFS, i use NTFS on my usb sticks.
Not sure what is running my cam but it's memcard in my PDA seam to understand long file names, might be fat32.
But still there are simpel devices who can only read something as simple as a fat partition table, or cannt write long filenames. Like the devices you seam to have.
Fat is mostly simple.
I know you're out there. I can feel you now. I know that you're afraid. You're afraid of us. You're afraid of change.
Don't forget FAT12.
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
I am glad that the German (and European) patent system is a little more reasonable than in America. Here, instead of rejecting it, there would be some lobbyist and a senator or two trying to push a bill to make it law, or something crazy like that.
:/
This is not to say Microsoft doesn't deserve the patent on things that they SHOULD have patents on, but let's face it -- the patent system for computer technological advances leaves a lot to be desired.
Maybe someone should patent a logical way of dealing with this
I am open source, and Linux baby!
According to Wikipedia,a patent filer gets 20 years before the patent expires, typically. Clearly there are many companies/organizations that are currently running software that has been in production use for more than 20 years. Couldn't a company using software that has lost patent protection take that software, make a few changes and call it their own new product and then cancel any licensing/maintenance contracts with the vendor?
"Lack of technical competence coupled with the arrogance of power, as usual, leads to no good end."
Ireland has more drunks per capita than people.
-Will P.
It wasn't just Gates.
...and then continued with what to do if you thought you had a patentable idea.
I was working at a Fortune 500 minicomputer company in 1991, and the corporate law office sent around a memo that was posted on every department's bulletin board. It read something like this:
"Many progammers believe that software cannot be patented. The message of this memo is simple. They are wrong:" and then, in 144-point type that could be read from across the room:
"IT CAN BE."
Similar things were probably happening in any large company where software was being developed and the lawyers were awake.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
'till the FAT lady sings
It's entirely possible that if Google or Apple was in the position Microsoft is in, I'd hate them just as much as I do MS. In fact, it's highly probable. But they're not, so it's a bit of an academic point. I wasn't a big fan of IBM back in the early 90s, when they were the dominant player, and every once in a while I find it odd when I read some pro-OSS, pro-IBM article, because there's a part of me that still thinks that ought to be a contradiction.
... just bigger. There's no vision there. Compare him to John D. Rockefeller, or any number of early-20th-century philanthropic industrialists, and the guy's just a total zero.
But to be honest, what really gets to me about Microsoft isn't their overly aggressive business practices, it's the fact that they're boring. They have more money, more resources, than God, and yet they seem to constantly fail to innovate. That's what's really painful. Maybe being on the top isn't conducive to innovation, and if Apple or anybody else were up there, they'd be just as stagnant and dependent on buying and copying ideas from elsewhere, but I think part of it is just a function of Microsoft's culture and its leadership. I mean, you could say virtually the same thing about Bill Gates personally -- the man has enough money to practically reshape the world, but he seems mostly content to sit in his gigantic house and run his pet charity, which on the whole isn't particularly creative or innovative. It's just like every other charity
So that's what really gets me about Microsoft. It's not that they're evil; I could forgive them for that -- I respect evil. But they're mediocre and evil, and there's no excuse for that.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Ireland has more than four million people. You say "drunks per capita" is more than "people", so that would come out to more than four million drunks per person, or 16 trillion drunks total.
Even the Irish can't drink as much as sixteen trillion drunks...
Corporations don't behave as they are supposed to within the system. They behave in the worst possible way the system allows them, then try to bend it, then try to change it. In addition to rules, humans have ethics, and you can't just take them out of the discussion. Say tomorrow murder is made legal in your country. Would you suddenly accept someone killing your beloved ones? Don't think so.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
They did.
I believe that, while the patent is valid in principle, since MS failed to actively defend the patent initially they cannot start enforcing it now. This is because every time MS let a product enter the market that was "MS compatible" they leveraged the availabililty of those products to increase MS OS appeal. Now that they dominate the market, they cannot be allowed to change the rules to their further benefit.
The US government have made it clear that we have no inalienable rights; any we do not defend vigorously will be taken.
They tried to, but the schnitzel producers' guild claimed prior art.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
It dates back to even before ancient Egypt to the mountains of western Iran
"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote."
Never been there so had never eaten one, here is the wiki entry for anyone else who wants to see what a doner kebab is
m any
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%C3%B6ner_kebab#Ger
Actually the origional filesystem was FAT12, which is mostly used for floppies. FAT16 was used in MS-DOS as the filesystem for hard disks. VFAT is the long file name support that was put into Windows 95, it actually is a hack that stores the filename as a table entry with an invalid combination of attributes, so older versions of DOS will skip over the entry when they read it. FAT32 was a new filesystem that came out with Windows 95 OSR2 which allowed it to be used on hard disks over 2GB.
The clash of honour calls, to stand when others fall.
Microsoft though it was ahead with this IDEa, and had it served on a platter, yet it was a hard drive to get FAT off thin ISA. Specializing in radio advertising, our LLC, could have promoted this via AM/FM. You get the idea.
Have you read my journal today?
CP/M had a flat file system with no directories. There was also not a free list on disk as it was dynamically calculated every time you pressed control-c. They did have "user" numbers but these were filters only and not hierarchical. In fact the first version of Dos, called 86dos by seattle computer products didn't support subdirectories and this feature was added later by MS, probably at IBM's request.
Late in the 1980's Digital resarch folded their DosPLUS fat support into Concurrent DOS, and then we had md, cd, rd...
Wow, that sure sounds like a lot. Oh, except that IBM has that beaten into a cocked hat.
I know that the general opinion here is that MS is evil, and (software) patents are evil, but IBM is still by far the largest patentee in this field, and some of us still remember when Big Blue was as evil and hated as MS is now.
Point being don't single MS out for criticism, as they're all doing it, even our "friends".
It's official. Most of you are morons.
Yeah, you're right ... the last time I was in Germany, it seemed like you couldn't go ten feet without tripping over a Döner stand/shop. Actually, I've always been surprised that it's not more popular here in the 'States. I mean, it's got some vegetables in it, you could pass it off as "healthy" (*snort*...but there's a sucker born every minute, right?).
Man, I could go for a Döner right now, actually. I'd probably just lose interest somewhere over the Atlantic, though.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
The File Allocation Table was actually invented by Gary Kildall and Digital Research as part of CP/M. The original MS DOS was developed from a reverse engineered copy of CP/M called QDOS which was written by Tim Paterson of Seattle Computer Products. Paul Allen bought the rights to this, it then became MS DOS. CP/M had the 8.3 filename restriction that came from FAT.