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Apple Patent Claim Threatens To Block Or Delay W3C
Posted by
timothy
on Tue Apr 07, 2009 12:20 PM
from the broad-patents-big-problems dept.
from the broad-patents-big-problems dept.
Kelson writes "The W3C Widget specification is running into a problem: Apple claims a patent on automatic updates and is unwilling to license it royalty-free in the event that it impacts the spec. The W3C is investigating to determine whether the spec includes anything covered by the patent, and decide what to do."
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Oh, Apple (Score:5, Funny)
I hope this is a legitimate claim, or I'll have to start hating you, too.
Re:Oh, Apple (Score:5, Insightful)
it's a software patent.
start hating.
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Re:Oh, Apple (Score:5, Insightful)
I can't stand these kinds of patents, especially when they block progress and innovation.
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without interruption of its primary function... (Score:5, Insightful)
... and in a manner that is completely transparent to the user of the computer.
In my book that means: no need for a restart. Completely different from what i.E. FireFox / Thunderbird and the like do - needing to ask the user to stop with his / her work in order to perform the update.
Not trivial.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Not trivial to implement. Is the concept itself worth a patent?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Patents don't cover concepts. They only cover implementations. So the question is moot.
Re:without interruption of its primary function... (Score:5, Informative)
Patents don't cover concepts. They only cover implementations. So the question is moot.
Close. Patents aren't supposed to cover concepts. Rampant abuse of the patent system has been a problem in this area for some time now.
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Re:without interruption of its primary function... (Score:5, Informative)
No, copyright covers expressions. Patent covers inventions. Nothing covers concepts.
A large part of the problem here is that in software, the line between concept and implementation is blurred. But let's make an analogy to mechanics:
If you have a sandwich making machine patented, somebody can't just make a sandwich machine out of a different material without your permission. But they can still make a sandwich machine, so long as it doesn't stomp on the specific claims of the patent. The concept "sandwich machine" isn't protected, only doing a sandwich machine via a certain method.
You're right that you don't have to implement an idea to patent it. But your patent still only covers such an implementation, even if it's never done.
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Re:without interruption of its primary function... (Score:4, Insightful)
What you write in software is the expression of one idea in a certain language.
You don't "invent" software, software has been invented many eons ago when living beings got brains.
What software patents cover is the concept. If they covered a specific implementation, they would provide a worse legal environment than the copyright, in the point of view of the authors, for it would last many, many years less.
And as anyone who wrote software can tell you, ideas are a dime a dozen, the devil is in the details. It's the expression that counts in software, and not the concept.
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Re:without interruption of its primary function... (Score:5, Informative)
And in a manner that Apple doesn't use. Software updates on OS X always ask the user. And depending on what it's updating, you may have to restart a program or reboot. The patent (from 1995) is pretty clear that it has to be completely transparent to the user which implies not only no reboot, but no notification. Anybody tries that on my machine gets the software booted off right quickly.
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Re:Unimplementable (Score:5, Informative)
# cat
apt-get update && apt-get upgrade
completely transparent. No verifications or reboot requests. new version is put in place. I keep working with old version until I'm done and the new version takes over whenever I naturally quit and restart.
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Re:And do it fast enough for the user not to notic (Score:3, Funny)
Re:without interruption of its primary function... (Score:5, Interesting)
Yeah, I'm a grumpy old man...what of it...
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Software patents are rubbish (Score:4, Insightful)
I know. I have not seen a valid software patent. This one is almost impossible to implement. Apart from Web-2 applications. And this is probably why it popped up.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Wait, what? Reading the patent excerpt suggests that this is no different than doing <script src="http://some.external.site/latest.js"</script>. Or just visiting ANY web app, for that matter - except when dealing with Flash Player, I'm automatically using the latest version of the site without any need to update things at my end.
It would be one thing if any Apple software actually DID this sort of automatic, transparent updating - including their own Dashboard Widgets. If anyone can point me to an
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Wait, what? Reading the patent excerpt suggests that this is no different than doing <script src="http://some.external.site/latest.js"</script>. Or just visiting ANY web app, for that matter - except when dealing with Flash Player, I'm automatically using the latest version of the site without any need to update things at my end.
Did you read the claims? Cause that's all that matters. The abstract and spec do not define the invention (with a couple minor exceptions). (Disclaimer: I haven't read the patent)
I call shenanigans! (Score:5, Insightful)
this patent is total BS!
the patent description makes it sound like we're talking about a system for automatically updating any program while its running without any interruption (which would be quite a feat if accomplished, but still not worthy of a process patent because its an obvious goal).
However the operation the patent actually describes is as follows:
1) I click on an icon to launch an application,
2) a process starts that checks to see if I have the latest version of the application
2a) if I have the latest, it launches the application
2b) if I don't have the latest, it replaces my copy with the latest and the launches the application
this stuff about "transparently running" and "no need for restart" is a red herring. of course there's no need for restart, the program isn't running yet!
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Re:I call shenanigans! (Score:4, Interesting)
What's funny is that the steps that you've outlined seem to describe exactly how Microsoft's ClickOnce [wikipedia.org] works when it comes to updates. So if Apple threatens to sue, it would seem that there is at least one large player interested in opposing them on this.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Oh, Apple (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Oh, Apple (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Oh, Apple (Score:4, Funny)
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and in a manner that is completely transparent (Score:5, Informative)
FTFP:
A software program running on a computer automatically replaces itself with a newer version in a completely automated fashion, without interruption of its primary function, and in a manner that is completely transparent to the user of the computer.
As long as the user is notified or must explicitly grant permission, the update process is not transparent to the user.
Apple claims a patent on a stealth method.
Re:and in a manner that is completely transparent (Score:4, Funny)
"Apple claims a patent on a stealth method."
Microsoft already own the portfolio on this nonsense!
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Re:and in a manner that is completely transparent (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:and in a manner that is completely transparent (Score:5, Funny)
I think whoever wrote the first computer worm should sue apple
How apt that a worm would ruin an apple. :)
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
My work machine does this, much to my anguish.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, it does notify you by placing a "rebooting in x seconds" warning on the screen. Its also clearly interrupting the program in question. Even the basic updates that don't require a reboot sometimes reset the desktop, close windows, or at the very least, notify the user. Not a single MS update is completely transparent to the user.
Re:and in a manner that is completely transparent (Score:4, Funny)
I though Reboots were part of Windows Primary Function.
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I posted to the wrong story. (Score:5, Insightful)
From the article [nytimes.com] "It probably helped that in those days we avoided patents and other restrictions; without any financial incentive to control the protocols, it was much easier to reach agreement." Exactly why patents don't work in their current form.
Now it seems more appropriate for this story.
Prior art, obvious (Score:5, Informative)
*sigh* Patent 5155847 [uspto.gov], referenced in Apple's patent, covers everything Apple's does. The only differences are obvious minor adaptions based on the different communications channels in use, things any network programmer does automatically every day.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
*sigh* Patent 5155847 [uspto.gov], referenced in Apple's patent, covers everything Apple's does. The only differences are obvious minor adaptions based on the different communications channels in use, things any network programmer does automatically every day.
You fail patent law 101.
The reasons those references are there are to point out that yes, the filer knew about those inventions and yes, the filer believes that the new invention is sufficiently different to be patentable, and yes, Mr. Trammel, examiner of record, and Mr. Corcoran, assistant examiner, please do look over these other patents, because we are damned sure that our invention is sufficiently different from them that it is patentable, and we are not afraid to tell you about them.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Updating a running program without interruption is everything but trivial.
It can be pretty easy. I helped write a database app where every time the menu form was invoked, it would check the back-end database to see what the "current" version of the front-end should be. If it wasn't the same, it would launch the new version and quietly kill itself.
The user only experiences a slight delay that can not be differentiated from network congestion or heavy database load.
The key here is that the app does the work
Use of this patent against web browsers? (Score:3, Interesting)
If you read this claim, it seems that any webpage loaded through a caching web-browser *could* fall under it.
1. A method for automatically updating software programs on a computer, comprising the steps, of:
storing an updated version of a program at a designated location in a remote memory that is accessible to the computer;
Being that most browsers will check a cache to see if it already has your content, the act of overwriting the cache before loading the asset for your page seems to run afoul of this auto-update process.
Re:Use of this patent against web browsers? (Score:4, Insightful)
Except that web pages are not programs.
The line's blurring. Ever use Google Documents?
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Bunch of hypocrites (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Bunch of hypocrites (Score:5, Funny)
No kidding: http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http://www.apple.com/about/w3c/ [w3.org]
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Re:Bunch of hypocrites (Score:5, Informative)
Geez, did you even read that page?
To accomplish this, a W3C member would be required to disclose and license to any practitioner all essential patents of a W3C standard. To exclude a patent from this royalty-free license, a W3C member could, on a case-by-case basis, notify a particular working group that it has patent rights that it believes are essential to that working group's recommendation, and that it is unwilling to license on a royalty-free basis.
Which is exactly what they're doing. You can accuse them of being patent-trolls, and using vaguely-worded, over-generalized patents, but you can't say they're being hypocritical. They're behaving exactly as they promised they would.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Yes, exactly. Apple had this patent already. The W3C royalty free licence includes the NEW, currenlty unpatented technologies being rolled into the standard. Any company that has an existing patent that W3C tries to leverge a technology protected by has the right to notify the W3C and let them know they're infringing, and then decide wether or not to licence that technology to the group.
Apple may very well want this technology to be a part of W3C, but if they don't want it to also become available royalt
Consider the patent... (Score:5, Informative)
The broadest claim the patent makes (bullet points mine):
1. A method for automatically updating software programs on a computer, comprising the steps, of:
Could one not simply have the client software send a request to the server software saying "send me the stored version, if it is modified since version 12.34"
Hence it would not be the current version carrying out the action of determining whether a the newest version of the program is more recent than the current version of the program; rather it would be being performed at the server.
Indeed, HTTP already includes an "If-Modified-Since" header the client can send to the server, though the HTTP header uses a date rather than a version number.
Will W3C strike back? (Score:5, Funny)
I assume Apple doesn't get to sit in? (Score:5, Interesting)
According to the Patent Advisory Group [w3.org] they've formed to deal with this hurdle, the PAG membership includes "Advisory Committee Representatives of each Member participating in the Web Applications Working Group".
Of course, the Web Applications Working Group [w3.org] includes: "Apple, Inc. (4 representatives)".
Isn't it kind of a conflict of interest for Apple to be sitting on the committee that has the purview to:
?
A bit early to get all excited (Score:5, Informative)
That email doesn't say in any way that Apple is doing anything inappropriate or is threatening anyone or refusing to give anyone a license. What is happening is a very simple process that W3C is prepared for: Apple was kind enough to inform them that there is a patent, so they will now look at the patent, which will or will not turn out to be relevant, and if it is relevant, something will be sorted out.
Now that fine article (or whatever the f in RTFA stands for) calls Apple "patent-lawsuit happy". So who exactly is Apple suing right now? Maybe the manufacturer of a new phone that is vastly outselling the iPhone, except that it doesn't do that quite yet, because it is not for sale right now, so not a single Palm Pre has been sold, and Apple hasn't sued them, because as long as Palm doesn't sell its phone there is nothing to sue them for?
Apple says: "OK, we're evil" (Score:4, Funny)
After bricking unlocked iPhones, kicking applications off the iPhone store that might even slightly compete with iTunes in the far future, and filing a wave of patents on basic well-known computer science, Apple Inc. today filed a 10-Q with the Securities Exchange Commission declaring that it was openly adopting Evil(tm) [today.com] as a corporate policy.
"Fuck it," said Steve Jobs to an audience of soul-mortgaged thralls, "we're evil. But our stuff is sooo good. You'll keep taking our abuse. You love it, you worm. Because our stuff is great. It's shiny and it works. It's not like you'll go back to a Windows Mobile phone. Ha! Ha!Ã
Steve Ballmer of Microsoft was incensed at the news. "Our evil is better than anyone's evil! No-one sweats the details of evil like Microsoft! Where's your antitrust trial, you polo-necked bozo? We've worked hard on our evil! Our Zune's as evil as an iPod any day! I won't let my kids use a lesser evil! We're going to do an ad about that! I'll be in it! With Jerry Seinfeld! Beat that! Asshole."
Sergey Brin of Google said, "Of course, we're still not evil. You can trust us on this. Every bit of data about you, your life and the house you live in is strictly a secret between you and our marketing department. But, hypothetically, if we were evil, it's not like you're going to use Windows Live Search. Ha! Ha! I'm sorry, that's my 'spreading good cheer' laugh. Really."
Re:I'm confused (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:I'm confused (Score:5, Funny)
But a stylish, tasteful inferiority complex. You don't see Steve Jobs with sweaty underarms, do you?
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Re:I'm confused (Score:5, Insightful)
That's why he always wears black: there's not enough contrast to see it;-) Apple certainly has a far better marketing department, and they've gone to great lengths to not only play up their image, but to tie their products to that image; but once you're beyond that they are every bit as deceptive and secretive as Microsoft. They've essentially convinced an entire class of consumers to think that they are "different" from everyone else when they really just aren't. The inferiority comes from reacting vehemently over any thing that is said along those lines, which is why, like my initial post, this will be modded down to -1 TROLL in no time.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If it were all about money, Apple products would suck. Exhibit A: Microsoft Windows--makes a lot of money AND they don't care about users. Exhibit B: Mac OSX--makes a lot of money but has to care about users, otherwise they render themselves obsolete.
You don't have to outrun the wolf, just the slowest member of your party.
Re:See! (Score:5, Insightful)
Apple "cares" about its users the same way a gold-digging wife "cares" about her husband, or a manufactured pop music group "cares" about its fans.
Apple cares about keeping its users blinded with shiny distractions, sure. It does not care about providing quality products or services, or about the long-term well-being of its customers.
Apple has been a bunch of lawsuit trolls since the infamous "look and feel" lawsuits of the late 1980s. There are every bit as evil as Microsoft, just smaller and wrapper in a prettier box.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Shiny and Quality are not mutually exclusive.